MAG 
more foluble and coloured parts of the plants that afford 
ir. Boyle.—Magijlery and precipitate are almort fynony- 
mous; hut magijlery has been lately applied to fonie par¬ 
ticular precipitates which are u(ed in medicine and the 
arts: fuch are the magifieries of bifmuth, coral, crabs- 
eyes, lead, fulphur, &cc. Chambers. —Thus we fee that this 
word has borne very different meanings at different times; 
but, fince the new nomenclature of chemiltry has been 
introduced, it has become entirely obfolete. See vol. iv. 
p. j 51 . 
MAGISTRACY,/ [magijlratus, Lat.] Office or dig¬ 
nity of a magiftrate.—Duelling is not only an ufurpation 
of the divine prerogative, but it is an infult upon magi- 
Jlracy and good government. Clarijfa. 
You (hare the world, her magijiracies, prieflhoods. 
Wealth, and felicity, amongit you, friends. Bcnjonfon. 
MAGTSTRAL, adj. [from magifier , Lat.] Magifterial; 
defpotical. Not much ujed. 
MAG'ISTRALLY, adv. [magifralis, low Latin.] De- 
fpotically ; authoritatively; magilferially,—What a pre- 
fumption is this for one, who will not allow liberty to 
others, to affume to himfelf fuch a licence to controul fo 
nagifirally ? Bramhall againjl Hobbes. 
MAG ISTRAN'TI A, /. in botany. See Imperatoria, 
vok x. p.864. 
MAGISTRATE, f. [magijlratus, Lat.] A man pub¬ 
licly inverted with authority ; a governor; an executor of 
the laws.—I treat here of thofe legal punifhments which 
magijlrates inflift upon their difobedient fubjedls. Decay of 
Piety. 
They chufe their magiflrate! 
And fuch a one as he, who puts his fliall, 
His popular (hall, againft a graver bench 
Than ever frown’d in Greece. Shakefpeare 1 s Coriolanus. 
Magistrate, properly fpeaking, is the name of any 
public officer, or ruler, to Whom the executive power of 
the law is committed, either wholly or in part. Of rna- 
gilfrates, fome are fupreme, in whom the fovereign power 
of the ftate refides; others are fubordinate, deriving all 
their authority from the fupreme magiftrate, accountable 
to him for their conduft, and afling in an inferior fecon- 
dary fphere. In defpotic governments, the fupreme raa- 
giftracy, or the right both of making and of enforcing the 
laws, is verted in one and the fame man, or one and the 
fame body of men ; and whenever thefe two powers are 
united together, there can be no public liberty. The 
magiftrate may enaft tyrannical laws, and execute them 
in a tyrannical manner, fince he is pofleffed, in quality of 
difpenfer of juftice, with all the power which he, as le- 
giflator, thinks proper to give himfelf. But, when the 
legifiative and executive authority are in diltinft hands, 
the former will take care not to entruft the latter with fo 
large a power as may tend to the fubverfion of its own 
independence, and therewith of the liberty of the fubjeft. 
With us in England, therefore, the fupreme power is di¬ 
vided into two branches; the one legifiative, viz. the par¬ 
liament, confiding of king, lords, and commons; the 
other executive, confiding of the king alone. 
MA'GIUS, a town of Perfia, in the province of Far- 
filtan : forty-rive miles fouth-weft of Yezd. 
MAGLASAN', a town of Perfia, in the province of 
Adirbeitzan : fixty-fix miles weft of Tauris. 
MAGLEBI'E, a town of Denmark, in the ifland of 
Zealand : four miles fouth of Copenhagen. 
MA'GLIA, a town of the illand of Candia: fixteen 
miles eaft-fouth-eaft of Candia. 
MAGLIABEC'CHI (Anthony), a perfon remarkable 
for his knowledge of books, was born at Florence in 1633. 
After learning the elements of the Latin language, he 
was placed in the (hop of a jeweller ; but it foon appeared 
that his foie paffion was that for reading, in which he em¬ 
ployed every leifure moment that he could command. It 
was not, however, till after the death of both his parents, 
in 1673, that he entirely abandoned the trade to which he 
ivr A G 103 
was brought up, and devoted himfelf to literature alone. 
The principal director of his ftudi.es was Michael Erinini,- 
librarian to cardinal Leopold de Medici; and he was like- 
wife affifted by many other learned men refident in Flo¬ 
rence. By means of an artonifhing memory and inceifant. 
application, he became more converfant with literary hif- 
tory than any man of his time ; and was very properly 
appointed by the grand duke Cofmo III. the keeper of 
the fplendid library colleSfed by him, with free admiffion, 
to the Laurentian library, to copy from its manufcripts- 
whatever he chofe. Magliabecchi was a man of a molt 
forbidding and lavage afpeCl, aggravated by total negleft. 
of his perlon, amounting to fqualid filthinefs. His babies 
of life were folitary and cynical; never indulging in the 
pleafures of lociety or the gratifications of fenfe, but al¬ 
ways immerfed in his books. He would not be waited, 
upon by a fingle fervant, till, after a fevere illnefs in 1708, 
he was induced by the importunity of his friends to ad¬ 
mit of the attendance of one in the day-time, but dif- 
miffed him as foon as it was candle-light. He ufually. 
parted the whole night in ftudy, except when, opprelfed 
by fieep, he took a littie repofe in a kind of cradle-chair 
on which he fat. He very rarely took off his clothes to 
go to bed ; and, in the midft of the coldeft winter, he 
would lie down wrapt up in his cloak, which ferved for 
a-robe de chambre in the day and a quilt at night. His. 
dinner was ufually three hard eggs and a draught of wa¬ 
ter ; and he never left his houfe after it. In the morning 
he went only to the palace-library, where he commonly 
parted three hours; and he is faid never in his life to have 
gone farther from Florence than Prato, whither he once 
accompanied cardinal Norris to fee a manufeript. He had 
accumulated a copious and valuable library of hi's own, 
which was piled about his chamber and fmall houfe in 
lingular diforder; the books heaped upon one another, 
fo that it was often neceffary to remove a hundred volumes 
to get at one that was wanted: yet fuch was the locality, 
of his memory, /that, when any one came to confult 
him about a paffage, he could not only diredl to the very, 
page in the book, but to the book itfelf by its place in 
the pile under which it was buried. It is not to be fup- 
pofed that fuch a man would be very courteous to thofe 
who vifited him out of .mere curiofity; but to the trulv 
learned no man was more communicative of his know¬ 
ledge, and many of the moft eminent fcholars of the time 
have expreffed their obligarions to him. He could at 
once direct an author to all the works which treated upon 
the fubjedft on which he was writing. Father Mabilion, 
who had been much obliged to him in this way, calls him 
a walking mufeum and a living library. He had made a 
hole in his door, through which hefpied all approaching vi- 
fitors; and, if he did not choofe their campany,he would 
not admit them. From the diftinguiffied port he occu¬ 
pied, and the wonderful extent of his erudition, he was 
a well-known character throughout Europe, not only to 
the learned, but to princes and men of rank, many of 
whom Cent him tokens of their regard. Louis XIV. al¬ 
ways commiffioned the French literati who vifited Italy, 
to falute Magliabecchi in his name. The grand-dukes 
and their families excufed his unfitnefs to adt the cour¬ 
tier, and often converfed with him at the library. A, 
great number of letters were written to him from the 
learned in various parts of Europe, many of them filled 
with the moft fulfome flattery. Although fo repleniftied 
with erudition, he himfelf. publifhed fcarcely any thing 3 
and a few letters, and a fhort catalogue of oriental manu- 
feripts in the Laurentian library, are all his printed re¬ 
mains. He alfo edited, fome works of authors of the 
lower ages. Notwithftanding his fingular mode of life, he 
preferved a good general lfate of health. After his illnefs 
in 1708, the grand-duke Ferdinand wifiied him to lodge 
in the palace ; and prepared for him a commodious apart¬ 
ment, and a large room for his books. Againft his incli- 
nation he made trial of his new habitation for four months, 
and then returned to his cottage, leaving behind him all 
his 
