FIE 
and died a lieutenant-general. Henry was his eidefl fon, 
by his firft wife, a daughter of fir Henry Gould, one of 
the judges of the king’s-bench. He was fent early to 
Eton fchool, where he laid in a reputable flock of cla(Tical 
learning. Thence he went to Leyden, at which univer- 
fity he ihidied the civil law with great application ; but 
the flraitened circumftances of his father, who had a nu¬ 
merous family,.laid him under the neceffity of returning 
to England, after an abfence of only two years. He now 
commenced w riter for the flage, and his firft piece, a co¬ 
medy, entitled Love in feveral Mafks, was brought out 
in his tweoty-firft year. From that period his fertile pen 
produced annually a crop of pieces, all of the comic kind, 
of which it is unneceftkry to name the titles, fince fcarcely 
any of them have obtained a permanent Ration upon the 
Rage. Some of his works are no more than free tranfla- 
tions from the French, of which L’Avare of Molfere, 
prefented under the title of the Mifer, was the mod fuc- 
cefsful. In fonte of his pieces he touched upon political 
topics ; and he was one of the writers who by this means 
contributed to the aCt for limiting the number of theatres, 
and fubmitting dramatic performances to the examination 
of the lord chamberlain. 
When Fielding was about twenty-feven years of age, 
he married a young lady of Salifbury ; after which he en¬ 
tered at the Temple, and ftudied the law with great a (li¬ 
ef u i t y. It was, however, neceffiiry for him to devote 
fome portion of his time to immediate profit; and, there¬ 
fore, befides continuing to write for the ftage, he em¬ 
ployed his pen on a variety of occafional fubjefts. He 
wrote in a periodical paper entitled The Champion ; and 
eompofed An EfTay cn Converfation ; An Eftay on the 
Knowledge and Characters of Men ; and A Journey from 
this World to the next; in all which he difplayed a fund 
of good fenfe and acquaintance with mankind. He made 
attempts in poetry, but they were too deficient in cor- 
reCtnefs to acquire him any reputation in that walk. His 
Hiftory of Jonathan Wild may be regarded as the com¬ 
mencement of that kind of humorous and fttiric delinea¬ 
tion of character in fictitious adventures, which he after¬ 
wards praCtifed with fo much diftinCtion. In 1742, he 
publiftied his Hiftory and Adventures of Jofeph Andrews. 
In this performance, the grave Cervantic ftyle cf humour 
is imitated ; and the principal character, parfon Adams, 
by his fingularities, is rendered, as it were, the Quixote 
of the piece. His fuccefs, however, as a novel-writer, 
vva-s not very likely to produce fuccefs at the bar; and 
Iris application to profeftional purfuits was too defultory 
to raife him to eminence. He received little emolument 
from his legal practice, and his other fupplies were inade¬ 
quate to the demands of a mode of life never regulated 
by economy. Being warmly attached to the caufe of li¬ 
berty and proteftantifm, he endeavoured to ferve it, dur¬ 
ing the rebellion of 1745, by a periodical paper entitLed 
The true Patriot, which was followed by the Jacobite 
Journal. It is probable that a farther motive might be, 
the hope of making a merit with the government; and 
lie feerns to have obtained it in his appointment to the 
office of a Middlefex juftice. It is greatly to his credit 
that he employed his talents to render that office truly 
refpeCtable, by attending to the prevention of crimes, 
and the improvement of the police. He publiftied, in 
1749, a Charge to the Grand Jury, containing an accu¬ 
rate account of ihe inftitution and particular duties of 
grand Juries. His Enquiry into the Caufes of the In- 
•creafe of Robbers, &c. dedicated to lord chancellor Hard- 
vvicke, was efteemed a very judicious and ufeful perform¬ 
ance ; and his Propofal for the Maintenance of the Poor, 
evinced much diligent refearch into ! hat difficult fubjeCt. 
It was in the intervals of thefe ferious occupations that 
lie found leifure to write his principal work in the de¬ 
partment of invention, the novel of Tom Jones, which 
could not fail to be well received, and gained him in¬ 
finite reputation in this fpecies of compofition. His 
third novel, entitled Amelia, appeared in 1751. It is 
F I E 359 
inferior to Tom Jones in point of variety and invention, 
though even in tliofe refpeCts it may vie with many ad¬ 
mired compofitions of the kind. But its true character 
is that of a feries of domeftic paintings, drawn, it is fup- 
pofed, in part from his own family hiftory. It has more 
of the pathetic and lefs of the humorous than his other 
pieces. After this period, his conftitution, undermined 
by repeated attacks of tlie gout, rapidly gave way. His 
mind, however, retained its activity ; and lie engaged in 
a new periodical paper, entitled the Covent-garden Jour¬ 
nal, of which two numbers a-week were publiftied for a 
twelvemonth, to the general entertainment of its readers. 
Its farther progrefs was flopped by the author’s ill health, 
who was now fallen into a dropfy ; and he was advifed 
to tfy the climate of Portugal. The laft effort of his pen 
was to write an account of his voyage, marked with the 
peculiar character of his genius. About two months 
after his arrival at Lifbon he funk under bis malady, Oc¬ 
tober 8, 1754, in the forty-eighth year of his age. Mr. 
Fielding’s novels are chiefly diflinguiftied for their hu¬ 
mour; a .humour w hich, if not of the moll refined and 
delicate kind, is original, and peculiar to himfelf. The 
characters which he draws are lively and natural, and 
marked with the fbokes of a bold pencil. The general 
fcope of his ftdries is favourable to humanity and good- 
nefs of heart; and in Tom Jones, his greateft work, the 
artful conduCt of the fable, and the fibferviency of all 
the incidents, to the winding up of the whale, deferve 
much praife. Thofe, however, who queftion the moral 
tendency of this production, cannot but give him credit 
for the conftant reverence he paid to revealed religion ; 
in the defence of which, lie had projected an elaborate 
refutation of the pofllnimous works of Bolingbroke. 
Sarah Fielding, third lifter of Henry, made herfe'f 
known among the literary females of England by two 
novels, David Simple, and The Cry; and Xenophon’s 
Memoirs cf Socrates, tranflated from the Greek. Sir 
John Fielding, his half-brother, long took the lead in 
the management of the police of London. 
FIELEWEER', an ifiand of Norway, near the weft 
coaft, twenty-two.miles long, and four wide, with a town 
of the fame name : forty-eight miles weft-nerth-weft of 
Drontheim, 
FIEND, f. [pent?, pionD, Sax. a foe.] An enemy ; 
the great enemy of mankind ; Satan; the deviL—Tom is 
followed by the foul fiend. Skakefpeare .— An infernal be¬ 
ing.—The fiend remounts his courfer. Dry den . 
O woman ! woman ! when to ill thy mind 
Is bent, all hell contains no fouler fiend. ■ Pope. 
FIE'NES, or Fines, [of Ingram Fienes, Inifband of Sy- 
bylla, heirefs of Faram of Bononia.] A furname. 
FIENVIL'LER, a town of France, in the department 
of the Somme : five miles fouth-weft of Dourlens. 
FIE'NUS (Thomas), an ingenious and learned phyfi- 
cian, born at Antwerp in 1566. He went into Italy to 
ftudy phyfic under Mercurialis and Aldrovandus ; and on 
his return diftinguifhed himfelf fo much in the univerfity 
of Louvain, that he was there chofen profeffior of phyfic, 
and was afterwards made phyfician to the duke of Ba¬ 
varia. Lie wrote feveral works; the moft efteemed of 
which were, De viribus lmaginationis ; and De Formatione Foe¬ 
tus. He died at Louvain in 1631. 
FIE'RAS, a town of Sweden, in the province, of Hol¬ 
land : twelve miles north-weft of Ward-berg. 
FIERCE, ad], \_fier, Fr. /croxyLat. ] Savage; rave¬ 
nous; eafily enraged.—Thou hunteft me as a fierce lion. 
Job. —Vehement in rage ; eager of mifehief: 
With that the god, whofe earthquakes rock the ground. 
Fierce to Phceacia croft the vaft profound. Pope. 
Violent; outrageous; vehement.—Curfed be their an¬ 
ger, for it was fierce-, and their wrath, for it was cruel. 
Gen. xlix. 7. — Paflionate ; angry ; furious.—A man brings 
his. mind to be pofitive and fierce for pofitions whofe evi- 
4 dcnce 
