530 



BIDPAI BIGGLESWADE, 



quence of which he was committed to jail by (lie par- 

 liamentary committee then sitting- at (iloucester, hut 

 was liberate^ mi security being given for liis appcar- 

 nnce when called tor. About six inonllis afterwards, 

 lie was examined before a committee of (lie parlia- 

 ment, to whom lie readily acknowledged his opinion 

 ;.L;.iin-[ the divinity of the Holy (ilm-i. Hi- Twelve 

 Arguments \\i re now ordered to be burned by the 

 common hangman. He however persisted in his 

 opinion, and, in IM-J. published two tracts, contain- 

 ing his Confession of Faith concerning the Holy 

 Trinity, and The Testimonies of Irena-tis, .Justin 

 Martyr, and s, \rral other early writers on (lie same 

 Mibjert. These publications induced the assembly of 

 divines to solicit parliament to decree the punishment 

 of death against those who should impugn the esta- 

 blished opinions respecting the Trinity and other 

 doctrinal points, as well as to enact severe penal- 

 ties for minor deviations. The parliament indulged 

 these ministers in their intolerant request, which 

 i rawed lately exposed Biddle, who would neither 

 consent nor recant, to the loss of life ; but dif- 

 ference of opinion in the parliament itself, and the 

 penalties to which this sweeping measure rendered 

 many in the army liable, prevented its execution. 

 He was. some time after, again remanded to prison, 

 by the teal of president Bradshaw, and remained 

 for some years in confinement, subjected to the great- 

 est privations. A general act of oblivion, in 1651, 

 res.ored him to liWrty, when he immediately dis- 

 seminated his opinions both by preaching and by the 

 publication of his Twofold Scripture Catechism. A 

 complaint l>eing made to Cromwell's parliament 

 against the book, he was confined in the gate-house 

 for six months. Cromwell banished him to St Mary's 

 castle, Scilly, where he assigned him an annual sub- 

 sistence of a hundred crowns. Here he remained 

 three years, until the protector liberated him in 1C58. 

 He then became pastor of an independent congrega- 

 tion, and continued to support his opinions, until fear 

 of the Presbyterian parliament of Richard Cromwell 

 induced him to retire into the country. On the dis- 

 solution of that parliament, he preached as before, 

 until the restoration, which obliged him to confine his 

 exertions to private preaching. He was, however, 

 in June, 1662, apprehended at one of the private as- 

 semblies, and, upon process of law, fined 100, and 

 ordered to lie in prison until it was paid. He fell a 

 martyr to this sentence, by catching one of the dis- 

 tempers so common at that time in jails, and died in 

 September of this year, in the forty-seventh year of 

 his age, a martyr to religious intolerance. The pri- 

 vate character of this courageous sectarian, like that 

 of most of those who suffer from principle, was moral, 

 benevolent, and exemplary ; and his learning and 

 logical acuteness rendered htm very fit to gain pro 

 selytes. He did not agree in all points with Socinus, 

 but was apparently unsolicitous to establish a perfect 

 agreement. Toulmin styles him the father of the 

 modern Unitarians. 



BIDPAI. See Pilpay. 



BIELEFELD ; a town in the province of Westphalia, 

 near Prussian Minden ; Ion. 8 27' E. ; lat. 51 53' 

 N. ; population, 6000. The best German linens are 

 manufactured here, and exported in large quantities 

 to South America. 



BIEVRE, marquis de, marshal, born 1747, served in 

 the corps of the French musketeers, was a life-guard 

 of the king of France, and acquired much reputation 

 by his puns and repartees. After publishing several 

 entertaining works, he composed (1783) Le Seduc- 

 tevr, a comedy in verse, for the theatre, which has 

 maintained its place on the stage, although it is bad 

 loth in plan and execution. When he was intro- 

 duced to Louis XV., the king wished to hear a 



calemlotirg (pun) of his. Doinn-mni itn sujrt, sire 

 (Give me a subject, sire), said B. Faitca-en ten aur 

 mtti (Make one on myself). Sire, le roi n' eat pas mi 

 avjet (Sire, the king is not a subject), was the 

 answer. In 1789, he went to Spa for the benefit ot 

 his health, and died there. Mrs a mix, he said, dying, 

 je m'en vats de ce pas (de Spa), lie has written se\c- 

 ral works ; among others, an Almanac d?s ( 'tt/rin- 

 bourgs. There is also a collection of his jests c.illed 

 Bievriana. 



BIGAMY, in the canon law, means being twice mar- 

 ried ; in the common acceptation of the won I. 

 term of municipal law, it means the being married to 

 two wives or husbands at the same timu. Though 

 the laws relating to plurality of wives or husban is 

 might, with more strict propriety, be treated of under 

 the head of polygamy, they are more usually brought 

 under that of bigamy ; and, incompliance with this 

 usage, they will be introduced in this place. The. 

 laws of every civilized society make some provision 

 respecting this subject. By the statute of 4 Edward 

 I. stat. 3, c. 5, the marrying of a second husband or 

 wife, the first being alive, was made felony ; and by 

 that of 2 James 1. c. 11, this crime was made punish- 

 able by death. But the same statute provided that, 

 where either party was absent beyond seas for seven 

 years, whether known or not known to the other 

 party to be alive, or was absent, though not beyond 

 seas, for the same period, and not known by the 

 other party to be alive, the other party was at liberty 

 to marry again. The determination of bigamy in- 

 volves the consideration of what constitutes a valid 

 marriage. If a person be married within the age of 

 consent, which, in England, in the case of the hus- 

 band, is fourteen, and in that of the wife twelve 

 years, or was otherwise incapable of making such a 

 contract ; or in case the marriage was not celebrated 

 with the forms and ceremonies required by law ; in 

 these cases a second marriage does not subject the 

 party to the penalty of bigamy. The statute of 

 James I. has been adopted in most of the United 

 States as to the description of the crime ; but the 

 American laws generally differ from it as to the 

 penalty, having assigned, heretofore, instead of 

 death, as provided by the English statute, the pun- 

 ishment of whipping, setting on the gallows, &c., 

 which latter is the punishment in France ; but most, 

 if not all of the United States, have now dispensed 

 with these corporeal inflictions, some of them pre- 

 scribing imprisonment and hard labour for a number 

 of years, according to the discretion of the court ; 

 others leaving it to the verdict of the jury to fix the 

 period of imprisonment. 



BIG. See Barley. 



BIGGAR ; a market town and parish in Lanarkshire. 

 The town is small, but the main street, although not 

 regular, is otherwise broad and spacious. The only 

 building claiming notice is the church, which was 

 collegiate, and founded by Malcolm lord Fleming, in 

 1545, who liberally endowed it for a provost, eight 

 prebends, four singing boys, and six poor men. It is 

 in form of a cross, with a tower in the middle, but 

 the steeple was never finished. The employment of 

 the people chiefly consists in weaving and in the con- 

 veyance of lead from the lead hills. The parish, 

 which extends in length about six miles by about 

 three and a half in breadth, is partly hilly and partly 

 level, and a considerable portion of it remains in na- 

 tural pasturage. Here are the vestiges of three 

 Roman camps and a large tumulus ; and the remains 

 of Biggar castle are situated in a lx>g about a quarter 

 of a mile south of the town. Population of the parish 

 in 1831, 1915. 



BIGGLESWADE ; a market-town and parish in Bed- 

 fordshire, situate forty-five miles N. N. W. from 



