RIIOWX. 



723 



attracted by the splendour of his talents, and after 

 having employed him as a tutor to his sons, appointed 

 him to read over in the evening to the students that 

 lecture which he had delivered in the morning. 



In the year 1765, he married and opened a board- 

 ing house for the accommodation of medical students ; 

 but being unluckily of a very social disposition, and 

 .possessed of talents calculated " to keep the table in 

 a roar," he became intemperate in his habits and ad- 

 dicted to wine. After a period of four years he was re- 

 duced to a bankrupt. A professor's chair now fell va- 

 cant, for which he became a candidate, but, being un- 

 successful, he attributed his want of success to the 

 jealousy of Dr Cullen, and a rupture ensued between 

 them. Having taken the degree of doctor in medi- 

 cine at St Andrews, he commenced practice in Edin- 

 burgh, and produced his celebrated work, entitled the 

 Elements of Medicine. He then commenced lec- 

 turer on the practice of physic, and made use of this 

 work as his text book. 



The boldness, novelty, and simplicity of* his new 

 theory, attracted for a time a numerous class, but his 

 habits of intemperance increasing, he became remiss 

 and irregular in his attendance, and his pupils fell off. 

 With an increasing young family, and heavy pecuniary 

 embarrassments, he found it impossible to remain at 

 Edinburgh, and took refuge in London, with the in- 

 tention of teaching physic there. He arrived in the 

 metropolis in 1786, but his embarrassments increased, 

 and he was arrested and thrown into the king's bench 

 prison ; from which he was liberated by the exertions 

 of some friends. Soon afterwards he was found dead 

 in his bed one morning, after having been intoxicated 

 as usual the preceding evening, and taken, as was 

 customary with him, a large dose of laudanum. He 

 left a widow and numerous family ; for whose benefit, 

 in 1796, Dr Beddoes very humanely published a new 

 edition of his works in three 8vo volumes, with a life 

 of the ill-fated author prefixed. 



The system of physic which he taught had, for a 

 time, great vogue upon the continent, but is now very 

 generally and deservedly fallen into disrepute. 



BROWX, John ; a late eminent and learned minis- 

 ter at Haddington, was born in Perthshire in 1722. 

 By his own intense application to study, he became 

 acquainted with the French, Italian, German, Arabic, 

 Persian, Syriac, and Ethiopic languages, as well as the 

 Greek and Hebrew. Notwithstanding this great ac- 

 quisition of knowledge, it is said he was never under 

 the tuition of a master, except about a month. In 

 summer, he rose between four and five in the morn- 

 ing ; in winter at six ; and prosecuted his studies till 

 eight in the evening. The hours which thousands 

 waste in sleep he occupied in prayer, reading, or 

 writing. In general he preached three sermons every 

 Sabbath day. He was accounted very liberal as to 

 his property, and was of opinion that every man ought 

 at least to give the tenth of his income to charitable 

 purposes. The following is a list of his publications : 

 1. The S*>lf interpreting Bible, 2 vols. 4to. 2. 

 Dictionary of the Bible, 2 vols. 8vo. 3. Explication 

 of the Assembly's Catechism. 4. The Christian 

 Journal. 5. Explication of Scripture Metaphors. 6. 

 System of Divinity. 7. Evangelical View of the Types. 

 8. History of the Secession. 9. Letters on the Govern- 

 ment of the Christian Church. 10. Two Short Cate- 

 chisms. 11. The Christian Student. 12. Practical Piety 

 Exemplified. 13. The Young Christian. 14. Letters 

 on Toleration. 15. General History of the Church. 

 16. Particular History of the Churches of England, 

 Scotland, and Ireland. 17. Harmony of Scripture 

 Prophecies. 18. Select Remains. 



Mr Brown died on the 19th of June, 1787. Of 

 All his works, his Dictionary of the Bible, and 

 Self- Interpreting Bible, seem to be most generally 



admired, as they have gone through several edi- 

 tions. 



BROWN, Robert, the founder of a religious sect, first 

 called .Brownists, and afterwards Independents, was 

 born of an ancient family in Rutlandshire, and studied 

 at Cambridge, where, in 1580, he began openly to 

 attack the government and liturgy of the church of 

 England as anti -Christian. He first ascended the 

 pulpit at Norwich in 1581, where he succeeded in 

 converting a number of Dutch, who had a congrega- 

 tion there, to his opinions, for which he was brought 

 before the ecclesiastical commissioners, to whom he 

 behaved so rudely, that he was sent to prison, but 

 soon obtained a release. He then went to Middle- 

 burg, in Zealand, with his followers, and wrote a 

 book called A Treatise of Reformation without tarry- 

 ing for any Man. In 1585, he returned to England, 

 and, as he still laboured to gain converts, he was ex- 

 communicated by the bishop of Peterborough. This 

 censure, joined, perhaps, with the evaporation of his 

 zeal, induced him to submit; and, in 1590, he was 

 presented to a living in Northamptonshire, of which 

 he received the emoluments without discharging the 

 duties. In other respects, too, his morals were licen- 

 tious, so that he retained little of the austerity of the 

 founder of a sect. After leading a turbulent life, 

 this extraordinary character died in 1630, in North- 

 ampton jail, where he had been sent for assaulting a 

 constable and insulting a magistrate. The sect of 

 Brownists was far from expiring with their founder, 

 but spread so as to become a great object of alarm ; 

 and a bill was brought into parliament which inflicted 

 on them very severe pains and penalties. In process 

 of time, however, the name of Brownists was merged 

 in that of Congregationalists or Independents (q. v.), 

 under the latter of which titles they formed a power- 

 ful party iu the commonwealth, and were very obnox- 

 ious to the Presbyterians, whose successors, it is re- 

 markable, have, for the most part, gradually adopted 

 Brownist principles in relation to church government. 



BROWN, doctor Thomas ; a very eminent metaphy- 

 sician, was the son of the Rev. Samuel Brown, minis- 

 ter of the parish of Kirkmabreck, in the stewartry 

 of Kirkcudbright, and was born there in 1778. 

 He was educated at the high-school, and subse- 

 quently at the university of Edinburgh, where he 

 obtained the professorship of moral philosophy. Ho 

 distinguished himself, at a very early age, by an acute 

 review of the medical and physiological theories of 

 doctor Darwin, in a work entitled Observations on 

 Darwin's Zoonomia, 8vo. This work introduced him 

 to the academy of physics, of which Mackenzie, 

 Jeffrey, and Brougham were members. It was this 

 society which gave rise to the Edinburgh Review, to 

 which the first contributors sent their papers gratui- 

 tously. B. wrote the review of the philosophy of 

 Kant, in the second number, but, being displeased 

 with some liberties taken with one ot his papers 

 intended for the fourth number, his connexion with it 

 was terminated. He also published some poems, 

 which displayed considerable talent. His principal 

 poetical work is the Paradise of Coquettes, London, 

 1814. But he chiefly deserves notice on account of 

 his metaphysical speculations ; and his last work, on 

 the Philosophy of the Human Mind, affords ample 

 proof of his merit as a profound and original thkiker. 

 The system which he developed is characterized by 

 great simplicity. He reduces the intellectual facul- 

 ties to three great classes perception, simple sug- 

 gestion, and relative suggestion ; suggestion, which 

 last term is nearly synonymous with association : and 

 thus he stripped the science of mind of that burden of 

 instincts which distinguished the school of Reid and 

 Stewart. His classification of the affections, passions, 

 and duties, is equally perspicuous ; and his theory of 



