JOHN 0V QAUNT. 



JOHNSON, SAMUEL. 



council of Constance, John, DOW again Balthaasx COM, escaped from 

 Germany, and mad* hi* submission to the new pope, who treated him 

 kindly and gar* him the Ant rank among the cardinal*. He died 

 eon after. 



JOHN OK GAUNT. [EDWARD IIL; HMBI IV.] 



JOHN HVUCANUa [HYBCAKUS.] 



JOHN, or JOAM. KINGS OF PORTUGAL. [PoBTCOii, in 

 GSOC.KAI-IHCAI. Div. or Ko. Ore.] 



JOHN, KINGS OF SPAIN. \Jv*x.] 



JOHN, KING OF SWEDEN. [CUARLBS XIV.] 



JOHN. SAINT, THE APOSTLE AND EVANGELIST. Among 

 the persons who at the commencement of hi* ministry joined them- 

 selves to our Sariour were two brothers, named James and John, the 

 eons of Zebedee. They were both admitted by him into the number 

 of his Twelve Apostles, and John was throughout distinguished by 

 him with peculiar marks of regard. He speaks of himself, in the 

 account which he left of the ministry of Jesus, as the disciple whom 

 Jesus loved ; and whenever a very few only of the apostles were to be 

 employed by Jesus, or to accompany him, John was always one of Uiu 

 number, James and Peter being usually the others. 



At the Last Supper we find him leaning on the bosom of Jesus. He 

 attended Jesus in the garden and in the hall of the high-priest He 

 accompanied him to Calvary, and when Jesus was hanging on the cross 

 John drew near, and while the miraculous darkneu struck fear into 

 the hearts of those who were employed in the work of death, he 

 entered into conversation with Jesus, who commended to him the care 

 of his mother Mary. This dying request of our Lord the apostle seems 

 to have regarded as a sacred injunction, for he took her from that time 

 to his own house. 



After the resurrection of Jesus he was again distinguished by his 

 notice ; and when Jesus had ascended to heaven, and the interests of 

 the Gospel were committed especially to those who had been chosen 

 by him out of the world, John became one of the leading persons in 

 the Church ; acting in concert with the other apostles, and especially 

 Peter and James, till the history in the ' Acts of the Apostles ' ceases 

 to notice what was done by the other apostles, and is confined to the 

 travels and labours of Saint Paul. 



Saint John's labours in the Church were chiefly among the inhabit- 

 ants of Syria and Asia Minor, and no doubt he had a large share in 

 planting Christianity in those provinces, where for a time it flourished 

 greatly ; but Christian antiquity does not present to us many parti- 

 culars of the labours of the apostles, and we learn from it respecting 

 John little more on which dependence may be safely placed than that 

 he resided at Ephesus in the latter part of his life, and died in extreme 

 old age. 



Two pleasing stories are related of him by early Christian writers 

 deserving of regard : one that, when too feeble to do more, he was 

 wont to be carried into the assemblies of Christians at Ephesus, saying, 

 as he went along, " My little children, love one another." The other 

 respects his conduct to a young mau who had joined a party of bauditti. 

 But when we read in those writers that he was thrown into a cauldron 

 of boiling oil, and camo out unhurt, distrust arise*, ami we question 

 the sufficiency of the evidence. There is however little reason to 

 doubt that h was at one period of liis life banished to the island of 

 Patmos, and that there he wrote the book called the ' Apocalypse,' or 

 ' Revelation.' 



There are also preserved three epistles of his : but the most valuable 

 of his writings which have descended to our time is the 'Gospel 

 according to Saint John.' This Gospel is unlike the other three in 

 several respects, and is supposed by those who have considered it to 

 have been written with some especial purpose, either as a kind of sup- 

 plement to the other evangelisU, which was the opinion of Eusebiut, 

 or with a view to the refutation of certain erroneous notions respecting 

 our Saviour which had begun to prevail before the long life of Saint 

 John was brought to a close : but with whatever design it was com- 

 posed it must ever be regarded as amongst the most valuable testimonies 

 to the life, character, and doctrine of Jesus. 



JOHN, SAINT, THE BAPTIST, son of Zaclmriah, a Jewish priet, 

 and Elisabeth his wife, who was a near relative of Mary, the mother 

 of Jesus Christ, was born to them in their old age. The sacred office 

 was aiaigned to him of being the precursor or herald of the Messiah. 

 Tho history of the public ministry of Jesus begins with the acts of 

 John the Baptist, whom we find withdrawing himself from the ordinary 

 aflaira of life and retiring to the desert country watered by the Jordan, 

 where he preached in a fearless manner against the vices of the age, 

 urged an immediate repentance, enforcing his exhortations by the 

 announcement that the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand, and requiring 

 of those who professed to receive him as their instructor that they 

 should submit to the rite of baptism. 



Amongst Uxe who came to him and were baptised by him was 

 Jrsus Christ, who at Us baptism was announced, both by the Baptist 

 himself and by a voice from heaven, to be the Son of God, the Messiah. 

 From this time we bear little more of John till we find him in prison. 

 He had ventured publicly to reprove Herod the king for an act of great 

 immorality. Herod had married Herodias, who was the wife of Philip, 

 tetrarch of Idunuta, his own brother. The Baptist's reproof was 

 resented more violently by Herodiaa than by Herod. The history is 

 related by the evangelist* with all particulars. Salome, the daughter 



of Berodias, had so pleased Herod with her dancing at a public enter- 

 tainment given by him, that he in an oriental affluence of professed 

 obligation said publicly, that he would give her whatever she would 

 ask, even to the half of his kingdom. The little girl, for she was then 

 extremely young, instructed by her wicked mother, asked the head of 

 John the Baptist. Persons were immediately sent to the prison in 

 which John was confined, who beheaded him, and delivered the head 

 to the young princess, who carried it in a dish to her mother. 



JOHN OF SALISBURY finds a place, and very deservedly, in every 

 catalogue of learned Englishmen. His era was the reign of King 

 Henry II., the Salisbury from which he took his name was therefore 

 the old town of that name (Old Sarum), and not the present episcopal 

 city, which was not founded till the reign of Henry IIL John had 

 studied at Oxford, but he visited also the universities of France and 

 Italy. According to Leland, he was intimately acquainted with the 

 Latin and Greek writers ; be had some knowledge of Hebrew ; he was 

 skilled in the mathematics and every branch of natural philosophy, as 

 he was also in theology and morals ; he was an eloquent orator and an 

 eminent poet Leland further says of him that he was possessed of 

 the most amiable disposition, ever cheerful, innocent, and good. 



John was much connected with Thomas a Backet, archbishop of 

 Canterbury. Peter of Blois, in the twenty-second of his ' Epistles,' 

 which are collected and printed, calls John the eye and hand of the 

 archbishop. John became himself the Bishop of Chartres in 1104. 

 He died in 1182. 



John's principal historical writings were ' Lives of Two Archbishops 

 of Canterbury, Auselm and Thomas ii BeckeV But the work by which 

 he is best known to scholars, for the curious matter which it contains 

 can scarcely be said to have found its way into the vernacular literature 

 of his own or any other country, is entitled ' Polycruticou, de Nugis 

 Curialibus et Vestigiis Philosophorum,' in which he describes the 

 manners of the great, speaking not unfreqnently in the style of sharp 

 satire. There is an edition of it at Paris (1513), and another at London 

 (1695). A large catalogue of his writings may be seen in 1'itz and other 

 writers of that class. See also Tanner, ' Bib. Brit 1 lib.' 



JulINSON, SAMUEL, the son of Michael Johnson, a bookseller at 

 Lichfiel,], and Sarah, his wife, was born at Liohiield on the 18th of 

 September 1709. As a child he was afflicted with the king's evil, which 

 disfigured his face and impaired his eyesight, and he was taken to 

 Queen Anne to be touched. His education was commenced at Lieu- 

 field, whence he was removed to a school at Stourbridge; and in 1728, 

 two years after he had left Stourbridge, ho was placed at Pembroke 

 College, Oxford. Young Johnson had early shown a vigorous under- 

 standing and an eagerness for knowledge : though he had poverty to 

 contend with and a natural indolence, and was als j subject to consti- 

 tutional infirmity, and periodical attacks of morbid melancholy, he 

 acquired a large fund of information at the university. Necessity 

 compelled him to abandon the hope of taking a degree ; his debts, 

 though small, were increasing ; remittances from Lichfield could no 

 longer be supplied ; and he quitted college and returned to his father's 

 house. Iii the December following (1731) his father died in such 

 pecuniary distress, that Johnson was soon afterwards glad to become 

 usher of a school at Market Bosworth in Leicestershire, to which it 

 appears from his diary that ho went on foot: " Julii 1C," he writes, 

 " Bosvortiam pedes petit" But finding the drudgery of this employ- 

 ment intolerable, he sought other means of obtaining his bread, and 

 procured temporary employment in translating for a bookseller in 

 Birmingham. During his residence in this town he became intimate 

 with the family of a mercer named Porter, whose widow he subse- 

 quently married (1736). Mrs. Porter was more than twenty years older 

 than himself, but he was fondly attached to her, and she added to other 

 powers of increasing his happiness the possession of 8002. With this 

 capital he established a school, but his advertisements produced few 

 scholar?, the scheme failed, aud he left Staffordshire with his pupil 

 Garrick to seek his fortune in the metropolis. 



His prospects at this time must have been very gloomy : he had 

 nothing but literature to trust to for subsistence, and those were times 

 when the condition of literary men was most miserable aud degraded. 

 In the reigns of William, of Anne, and George L, successful writers 

 were rewarded by private munificence and public situations ; but such 

 patronage wag now at an end, and the year in which Johnson left his 

 home formed port of an interval which elapsed before a new source of 

 remuneration arose before the number of readers became large. Of 

 readers there were still but few ; the prices therefore that bookseller* 

 could afford to pay to authors were necessarily small ; and an author, 

 whatever were his talents or his industry, had great difficulty in 

 keeping a shilling in his purse. The poverty and neglected condition 

 of his friend aud brother author, Savage, were the causes of Johnson's 

 writing his ' London,' an imitation of the third satire of Juvenal, for 

 which Mr. Dodsley gave him ten guineas, and by which he obtained a 

 certain degree of reputation. We ore told that when 1'opo read it he 

 said, " The author, whoever be is, will not be long concealed." No 

 great advantage however immediately accrued to him. Again he 

 sought to be a schoolmaster, again his scheme miscarried, and ho 

 returned to his drudgery in the service of Cave the bookseller, who 

 was his only patron. His pen was continually at work, and his 

 pamphlets, prefaces, epitaphs, essays, and biographical memoirs, were 

 continually published by Cave, either by themselves or in hii periodical 



