THE 
EDINBURGH 
PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL. 
Art. I. — Biographical Notice of M. Le Chevalier Delambre, 
Perpetual Secretary for the Mathematical Sciences in the 
Institute of France, Member of the Board of Longitude, 
Professor of Astronomy in the College of France, Officer of 
the Legion of Honour, and one of the Honorary Members of 
the Royal Society of Edinburgh, &c. &c. *. 
M * Delambre, one of the most learned and active astrono- 
mers of the last century, was born at Amiens on the 19th Sep- 
tember 1749. At the Gymnasium of that town, he acquired 
his knowledge of the Latin and Greek languages, and had the 
honour of being a pupil of the celebrated French poet the Abbe 
Delille. When Delambre was pursuing his studies at his na- 
tive place, the expulsion of the Jesuits from France left vacant 
several of the professorships in the College, and these vacancies 
were filled by Professors sent from Paris. Among these was 
the Abbe Delille, a Repeater of Syntax in the College of Beau- 
vais, who had already attempted to translate the Georgies 
of Virgil. The citizens of Amiens, who were attached to the 
interests of the Jesuits, refused to admit the new Professors in- 
to their society, and Delille was thus left to associate only with 
his pupils. Under these circumstances, he soon distinguished 
Delambre, and a friendship thus commenced between the mas- 
* This notice has been drawn up from an Eloge of Delambrd written in Dutch 
by our learned correspondent Professor Moll of Utrecht, who was one of his pu- 
pils, and from M. Dupin’s Notice Necrologique sur M, Delambre , published in the 
Revue Encyclopedique , December 1822. 
VOL. IX. NO. 18. OCT. 1823. 
O 
