BER 



bishopric for a canonry or headship at 

 Oxford ; but it was not permitted him. 

 Here he lived highly respected, and col- 

 lected and printed the same year all his 

 smaller pieces in 8vo But this happiness 

 did not long 1 continue, beingsuddenly cut 

 off by a palsy of the heart, January 14, 

 1753, in the 69th year of his age, while 

 listening to a sermon that his lady was 

 reading to him. The excellence of 

 Berkeley's moral character is conspicu- 

 ous in his writings : he was an amiable 

 as well as a very great man ; and in ma- 

 ny respects worthy the character given 

 him by Pope : 



" To Berkeley eveiy virtue under hea- 

 ven." 



BF.RMFLCH, in mineralogy, called the 

 agaric mineral, is yellowish white, and is 

 composed of slightly cohering very fine 

 particles : it is dull, opaque, has a meagre 

 feel, soils the fingers when handled, and 

 so light as nearly to float in water. It 

 effervesces, and is dissolved in acids, and 

 appears to be a carbonate of lime. It is 

 found in fissures of secondary limestone 

 rocks in Switzerland, and at Sunderland 

 in Durham. 



BERNACLE. See ANAS. 



BERNARD, (Dr. EDWARD) a learned 

 astronomer, critic, and linguist, was born 

 at Perry St. Paul, near Towcester, the 2d 

 of May, 1638, and educated at Merchant- 

 Taylor's school, and at St. John's college, 

 Oxford. Having laid in a good fund of 

 classical learning at school, in the Greek 

 and Latin languages, he applied himself 

 very diligently, at the university, to the 

 study of history, the eastern languages, 

 and mathematics, under the celebrated 

 Dr. Wallis. In 1668 he went to Leyden, 

 to consult some Oriental manuscripts left 

 to that university by Joseph Scaligerand 

 Levin Warner, and especially the 5th, 

 6th, and 7th books of Apollonius's Co- 

 nies, the Greek text of which is lost, and 

 this Arabic version having been brought 

 from the east by the celebrated Golius, a 

 transcript of which was thence taken by 

 Bernard, and brought with him to Oxford, 

 with intent to publish it there with a La- 

 tin translation ; but he was obliged to 

 drop that design for want of encourage- 

 ment. This, however, was afterwards 

 carried into effect by Dr. Tlalley, in 1710, 

 with the addition of the 8th book, which 

 he supplied by his own ingenuity and in- 

 dustry. 



At his return to Oxford, Bernard exa- 

 mined and collated the most valuable ma- 

 nuscripts in the Bodleian library. In 

 1669, the celebrated Christopher Wren, 



BER 



Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford, 

 having been appointed Surveyor- General 

 of his Majesty's works, and being much 

 detained at London by this employment, 

 obtained leave to name a deputy at Ox- 

 ford, and pitched upon Mr. Bernard, which 

 engaged the latter in a more particular 

 application to the study of astronomy. 

 But in 1673 he was appointed to the pro- 

 fessorship amself, which Wren was oblig- 

 ed to resign, as, by the statutes of the 

 founder, Sir Henry Saviile, the professors 

 are not allowed to hold any other office, 

 either ecclesiastical or civil. 



About this time a scheme was set on 

 foot at Oxford, of collecting and pub- 

 lishing the ancient mathematicians. Mr. 

 Bernard, who had first formed the pro- 

 ject, collected all the old books published 

 on that subject since the invention of 

 printing, and all the manuscripts he could, 

 discover in the Bodleian and Savilian 

 libraries, which he arranged in order of 

 time, and according to the matter they 

 contained ; of this he drew up a synopsis 

 or view ; and, as a specimen, he publish- 

 ed a few sheets of Euclid, containing the 

 Greek text, and a Latin version, with 

 Proclus's commentary in Greek and La- 

 tin, and learned scholia and corollaries. 

 The synopsis itself was published by Dr. 

 Smith, at the end of his life of our author, 

 under the title of " Veterum Mathemati- 

 corum Grscorum, Latinorum, et Arubum, 

 Synopsis." And at the end of it there is 

 a catalogue of some Greek writers, whose 

 works are supposed to be lost in their 

 own language, but are preserved in the 

 Syriac or Arabic translations of them. 



Toward the latter end of his life he 

 was much afflicted with the stone ; yet, 

 notwithstanding this, and other infirmi- 

 ties, he undertook a voyage to Holland, 

 to attend the sale of Golius's manuscripts, 

 as he had once before done at the sale of 

 Heinsius's library. On his return to Eng- 

 land, he fell into a languishing consump- 

 tion, which put an end to his life the 12th 

 of January, 1696, in the 58th year of his 

 age. He was the author of many valu- 

 able works. 



BERNOULLI (JAMES,) a celebrated 

 mathematician, born at Basil, the 27th of 

 December, 1654. Having taken his de- 

 grees in that university, he applied him- 

 self to divinity, at the entreaties of his fa- 

 ther, but against his own inclination, 

 which led him to astronomy and mathe- 

 matics. He gave very early proofs of his 

 genius for these sciences, and soon be- 

 came a geometrician, without a precep- 

 tor, and almost without books ; for if one 



