RUSH WORTH RUSSELL. 



37 



speedily as possible- out of the reach of their cries. 

 His incessant labours of body and mind, by night 

 and day, nearly cost him his life; but by timely and 

 proper treatment, he was rescued from the grave. 

 This was the most eventful year of his life, and in 

 it he laid the foundation of a reputation inferior to 

 few in the annals of medicine. Doctor Rush did 

 not confine his attention exclusively to the practice 

 of his profession, but took an active and zealous 

 part in political affairs. He was an ardent friend 

 of liberty, and was one of the signers of the De- 

 claration of Independence. In 1777, he was ap- 

 pointed physician-general of the military hospital 

 in the middle department ; some time after which, 

 he published his observations on hospitals, army 

 diseases, and the effects of the revolution on the 

 army and people. In 1787, he was a member of 

 the convention of Pennsylvania for the adoption of 

 the federal constitution, which received his warmest 

 approbation. During the last fourteen years of his 

 life, he was treasurer of the United States' mint. 

 Doctor Rush took a deep interest also in the many 

 private associations for the advancement of human 

 happiness with which Pennsylvania abounds. He 

 was an honorary member of many of the literary 

 institutions, both of his own country and of Europe. 

 He died April 19, 1813, in the sixty-eighth year of 

 his age. Notwithstanding his great labours as a 

 lecturer and practitioner, he was a voluminous wri- 

 ter, having, during forty-nine years, from the nine- 

 teenth year of his age to within a short period of 

 his death, been constant in the employment of the 

 pen. His printed works consist of seven volumes, 

 six of which treat of medical subjects, and the other 

 is a collection of essays literary, moral and philo- 

 sophical. He also wrote various political essays, 

 which were published in the papers of the time. 



RUSHWORTH, JOHN, an industrious collector 

 of historical matter, born in 1607, was, for some 

 time, a student at Oxford, which he quitted for 

 Lincoln's-inn, where he remained until he was 

 culled to the bar. He was, however, more attached 

 to politics than to law, and made it his business to 

 attend parliament, the star-chamber, and other 

 courts, when important business was transacting, 

 in order to take notes of what he saw and heard. 

 In 1640, he was assistant clerk of the house of 

 commons ; and when Sir Thomas Fairfax became 

 general of the parliamentary forces, he was ap- 

 pointed his secretary. He was a member of parlia- 

 ment in 1658, and, in 1660, he was re-elected for 

 Berwick in the healing parliament. In 1667, he 

 was made secretary to Sir Orlando Bridges, keeper 

 of the great seal, but, after the decease of that 

 lawyer, was arrested for debt, and committed to the 

 king's bench prison, where he died in 1690. His 

 Historical Collection of private Passages in State, 

 weighty Matters in Law, and remarkable Proceed- 

 ings in Parliament, was published at different times, 

 in folio, until it amounted to eight volumes, includ- 

 ing the trial of the earl of Strafford, published in 

 1680. The first seven volumes of these were re- 

 printed uniformly in 1721. 



RUSSELL, LORD WILLIAM, third son of the 

 first duke of Bedford, and a distinguished supporter 

 of liberty, was born about 1641. He was educated 

 in the principles of constitutional freedom espoused 

 by his father, and yielded to the vortex of dissipa- 

 tion introduced by the restoration, until his mar- 

 riage with Rachel, second daughter and co-heiress 

 ol the earl of Southampton (then widow of lord 

 Vaughan), which wholly reclaimed him. He re- 



presented the county of Bedford in Your parliaments, 

 and, being highly esteemed for patriotism and inde- 

 pendence, was regarded as one of the heads of the 

 whig party. When Charles II., exasperated at the 

 court of France for withdrawing his pension, ap- 

 peared desirous of joining the continental confeder- 

 acy against Louis XIV., a French war being gene- 

 rally popular in England, the parliament voted a 

 large supply of men and money. The whigs, aware 

 of the king's character, dreading to give him an 

 army, which might as probably be employed against 

 liberty at home as against France, opposed the mea- 

 sure. This movement being acceptable to the 

 French king, an intrigue commenced between the 

 leading whigs and Barillon, the French ambassador, 

 the consequence of which was the receipt, on the 

 part of some of them, of pecuniary assistance, in 

 order to thwart the intended war. From that 

 minister's private despatches, Sir John Dalrymple, 

 in his Memoirs of Great Britain, has published a 

 list of those persons ; but lords Russell and Holland 

 are specified as refusing to receive money on this 

 account. (See Sidney, Algernon.} In 1679, when 

 Charles II. found it necessary to ingratiate himself 

 with the whigs, lord Russell was appointed one of 

 the members of the privy council. He soon, how- 

 ever, found that his party was not in the king's 

 confidence, and the recall of the duke of York, 

 without their concurrence, induced him to resign. 

 Although his temper was mild and moderate, his 

 fear of a Catholic succession induced him to take 

 decisive steps in the promotion of the exclusion of 

 the duke of York. In June, 1680, he went publicly 

 to Westminster-hall, and, at the court of king's 

 bench, presented the duke as a recusant ; and, on 

 the November following, carried up the exclusion 

 bill to the house of lords, at the head of two hun- 

 dred members of parliament. The king dissolved 

 the parliament, and resolved thenceforward to 

 govern without one ; and arbitrary principles were 

 openly avowed by the partisans of the court. 

 Alarmed at the state of things, many of the whig 

 leaders favoured strong expedients, in the way of 

 counteraction, and a plan of insurrection was formed 

 for a simultaneous rising in England and Scotland. 

 Among these leaders, including the dukes of Mon- 

 mouth and Argyle, the lords Russell, Essex and 

 Howard, Algernon Sidney and Hampden, different 

 views prevailed ; but lord Russell looked only to 

 the exclusion of the duke of York. While these 

 plans were ripening, a subaltern plot was laid by 

 some inferior conspirators, for assassinating the 

 king on his return from Newmarket, at a farm cul- 

 led the Ryehouse, which gave a name to the con- 

 spiracy. Although this plan was not connected with 

 the scheme of the insurrection, the detection of the 

 one led to that of the other, and lord Russell was, 

 in consequence, committed to the Tower. After 

 some of the Ryehouse conspirators had been exe- 

 cuted, advantage was taken of the national feeling, 

 to bring him to trial, in July, 1683 ; and pains being 

 taken to pack a jury of partisans, he was, after 

 very little deliberation, brought in guilty of high 

 treason. " It was proved," says Hume, " that the 

 insurrection had been deliberated on by the prison- 

 er; the surprisal of the guards deliberated, but not 

 fully resolved upon ; and that an assassination of 

 the king had not been once mentioned or imagined 

 by him.'' The law was, on this occasion, stretched 

 to the prisoner's destruction, and his condemnation 

 wa-i deemed illegal by judge Atkins and many other 

 authorities, not to dwell on the act which on this 



