BUR 
two fennons under the title of, For God and the King; 
together with an apology jaftitying his appeal. February i, 
a Ytjeant at arms, with other officers, broke open his doors, 
lei zed his papers, and took him into cudody. Next day 
lie was committed to the Fleet prifon ; from which place 
lie dated one epiftle to his majefty, another to the judges, 
-and a third to the true-hearted nobility. March ri, he 
was proceeded againft in the ftar-chamber, for writing and 
publifhing feditious, fchifmatical, and libellous, books, 
againft the hierarchy of the?church, and to the fcandal of 
the government. To this information he (and Baftwick 
and Prynne who were indicted with him) prepared an- 
fwers. In the end of May 1637, a perfon came to the 
F'leet, to examine Burton upon his anfwer ; but, hearing 
that the greateft part of it had been expunged, he refufed 
to be examined, unlefs his anfwer might be admitted as it 
was put in, or he permitted to put in a new anfwer. June 
2, it was ordered by the court, that, if lie would not an¬ 
fwer to inte, rogatories framed upon his anfw er, lie fhould 
be proceeded againft pro confejjo. Accordingly, June 14, 
Burton, and the two others, being brought to the bar, the 
information was read ; and no legal anfwer having been put 
in in time, nor filed on record, the court began for this con¬ 
tempt to proceed to fentence. The defendants cried out 
for juflicc, that their anfwers might be read, and that they 
might not be condemned unheard, Neverthelefs, becaufe 
their anfwers were not filed on record, the court proceeded 
to pals lentence: which was, that Burton, Prynne, and Bad- 
wicke, pay a fine of 3000I. each, and that Burton in par¬ 
ticular be deprived of his ecclefiadica! benefice, degraded 
from his miniderial funftioh and degrees in the univerfity, 
be fet on the pillory, have both his ears cut off there, con¬ 
fined to perpetual clofe imprifonment in Lancader-cadle, 
debarred the accefs of his wife or any other except his 
keeper, and denied the life of pen, ink, and paper : all 
which, except the fine, were executed accordingly. Af¬ 
ter twelve weeks imprifonment in the common gaol at 
Lancaffer, where great crowds pitying his misfortunes re- 
forted to him, fome of his papers being difperfed in Lon¬ 
don, he was removed, by an order of council, to Cornet- 
caltle, in the ifle of Guernfey, October 1637, where he 
was Quit up almod three years; till in November 1640, 
the houfe of commons, upon his wife’s petition, complain¬ 
ing of the feverity of his fentence, ordered that he fhould 
be forthwith lent for to the parliament in fafe cuftody. 
Burton, on his arrival at London, prefented a petition to 
the houfe of commons, fetting forth his fufferings. In 
confequence of which, the houfe refolved that the fen¬ 
tence againft him was illegal, and ought to be reverfed ; 
that he be freed from the fine of 5000I. and from impri¬ 
fonment, and redored to his degrees in the univerfity, or¬ 
ders in the minidry, and to his eccleliadical benefice in 
Friday-fireet, London ; alfo have recompence for his im¬ 
prifonment, and for the lofs of his ears, which they fixed 
at 6000I. but, by reafon of the enfuing confutions in the 
kingdom, he never received that fum. He was, however, 
redoi'ed to his living of St. Matthew’s, after which he 
declared himfelf an independent, and complied with all 
the alterations that enfued. He died January 1648. Be- 
fides the tracts mentioned above, he wrote federal others. 
BUR'TON (William), author of the Hiltory of I.eicel- 
terfhire, and elded Ion of Ralph Burton, Efq. of Lindley 
in Leicederfhire, was born Augud 24, 1373, educated at 
the fchool of Sutton-Coldfield in Warwicklhire, admitted 
of Brazen-nofe college Oxford 1391, and of the Inner 
Temple May 20, 1593, B. A. June 22, 1594, and after¬ 
wards a barriderand reporter in the court of common pleas. 
But “his natural genius leading him to the bodies of he¬ 
raldry, genealogies, and antiquities, he became excellent 
in thofe obfeure and intricate matters.” His weak con- 
ffitution not permitting him to follow hisbufinefs, lie re¬ 
tired into the country; and his great work, the Defcrip- 
tion of Leicederfhire, was publifhed in folio, in 1622. He 
tells his patron, George Villers, marquis of Buckingham, 
Shat “ he has undertaken to remove an ecliple from the 
Vol. III. No. 146. 
T O N. 5 41 
fun without art or abrononiieal dimciifion, to give light 
to the county of Leicefter, whole beauty has long been 
(hadowed and obfeured.” He drew up the corollary of 
Leland’s life, prefixed to the Colleftanea, with his favou¬ 
rite device, the fun recovering from an ecliple, and motto 
Rilucera, dated Faledi 1612, from Falde, a plcafant vil¬ 
lage near Tutbury, Staffordlhire, and a great patrimony 
belonging to his family, and then to him. 't he county 
hidory was dated from the fame village, October 30, 1622. 
He alio caufed part of Leland’s Itinerary to be tranferibed 
in 1631, arid gave both the tranfeript and the feven origi¬ 
nal volumes to the Bodleian library in 1632 ; as alfo Tal¬ 
bot’s notes^. To him his countryman Thomas Purefoy, 
Efq. of Barwell, bequeathed Leland’s Colleftanea after 
his death 1612. Wood charges him with putting many 
needlefs additions and illudrations into thefe Colleftanea, 
from which charge Hearne defends him. He died at Falde, 
after differing much in the civil war, April 6, 1645, and 
was buried in the parifh-church thereto belonging, called 
Hanbury. He left feveral notes, collections of arms and 
monuments, genealogies, and other matters of antiquity, 
which he had gathered from divers churches and gentle¬ 
men’s houfes. 
BUR'TON (Robert), known to the learned by the name 
of Democritus junior, was brother of the preceding, and 
born at Lindley, February 8, 1576. He was educated at 
the fame fchool with his brother, and in 1393 lent to the 
fame college. In 1599, he was eleCted dudent of Chrid- 
church. In 1616 he had the vicarage of St. Thomas, in 
the wed fuburb of Oxford, conferred on him by the dean 
and canons of Chrid-church ; and this, with t lie rectory 
of Segrave in Leicederfhire, given him fome years after by 
George lord Berkeley, he held to the day of his death, 
which happened in January 1639. He was a man of ge¬ 
neral learning; a great philologer, an exaCt mathemati¬ 
cian, and (what makes the peculiarity of his character) a 
very curious calculator of nativities. He was extremely 
dudious, and of a melancholy turn, yit an agreeable com¬ 
panion, and very humorous. The Anatomy of Melan¬ 
choly, by Democritus junior, as he calls himfelf, (hews, 
that thefe feemingly different qualities were mixed toge¬ 
ther in his compofition. This book was printed, fird in 
quarto, afterwards many times in folio, to the great profit 
of the bookfeller, who, as Mr. Wood tells us, got an ef- 
tate by it. “ Burton upon Melancholy,” fays archbifhop 
Herring (Letters, 1777,12010.) “ is an author, the plea- 
faiited, the mod learned, and the mod full of derling fenfe. 
The wits of queen Anne’s reign, and the beginning of 
George I. were, he adds, not a little beholden to him.” 
Some circumdances attending his death occafioned drange 
fufpicions. He died in his chambers.at Cluid-church, at 
the time, which it feems he had fome years before predict¬ 
ed from the calculation of his own nativity; and this ex- 
aft nefs made it whifpered about, that for the glory of af- 
trology, and rather than his calculation fhould fail, he be¬ 
came indeed a felo de J'e. This, however, was certainly 
not notorious; for he was buried with due folemnity in 
the cathedral of Chrid-church, and had a fair monument 
erefted to Ills memory, with his bud in rud, gown, Hair, 
and beard : on the right hand of which is the calculation 
of his own nativity. He left a very choice collection of 
books, part of which he bequeathed to the Bodleian, and 
100L to buy five pounds worth of books yearly for Chrid- 
church library, 
BUR'TON (Ezekias), fellow of Magdaleu-college 
Cambridge, and an eminent tutor there. In 1667 he was 
made chaplain to the lord-keeper Bridgeman, and the fame 
year for his lingular merit was prefented to the prebend of 
Norwich. He was very drenuous for a comprehendon. 
with the Diffenters, and a toleration of others ; and back¬ 
ed the treaty propofed in 1668, by the lord keeper, with 
ail his might. Died of a malignant fever in 1681. His dif- 
courfes were publifhed in two volumes by Dr. Tillotfon : 
thefe give us, fays Mr. Grainger, an high idea of t lie piety, 
and no mean one of the abilities, of the author. 
6 Y BUR'TON 
