fictitious names, in favour of polygamy, the most considerable of which is entitled "Polygamia triumphatrix," 1682, 4to. Brunsmanus, a minister of Copenhagen, has refuted this in a book entitled "Polygamia triumphata," 1689, 8vo; and again in another work, "Monogamia victrix,' 1689, 8vo. This poor man's attachment to a plurality of wives appears the more wonderful, Bayle observes, because he had been much embarrassed by one. In less than a century he was succeeded in his opinions by the rev. M. Madan, of whom hereafter.1 LYSIAS, an eminent Greek orator, was born at Syracuse, about the year 459 B. C. He was educated at Athens, and became a teacher of rhetoric, and composed orations for others, but does not appear to have been a pleader. Of his orations, which are said to have amounted to three or four hundred, only thirty-four remain. He died in the eighty-first year of his age, and in the 378th year B.C. Cicero and Quintilian give him a very high character, and suppose that there is nothing of their kind more perfect than his orations. Lysias lived at a somewhat earlier period than Isocrates; and exhibits a model of that manner which the ancients call the "tenuis vel subtilis." He has none of the pomp of Isocrates. He is He is every where pure and attic in the highest degree; simple and unaffected; but wants force, and is sometimes frigid in his compositions. In the judicious comparison which Dionysius of Halicarnassus makes of the merits of Lysias and Isocrates, he ascribes to Lysias, as the distinguishing character of his manner, a certain grace or elegance arising from simplicity "the style of Lysias has gracefulness for its nature; that of Isocrates seems to have it." In the art of narration, as distinct, probable, and persuasive, he holds Lysias to be superior to all orators; at the same time he admits, that his composition is more adapted to private litigation than to great subjects. He convinces, but he does not elevate nor animate. The magnificence and splen-. dour of Isocrates are more suited to great occasions. He is more agreeable than Lysias; and in dignity of sentiment far excels him. The first edition of Lysias is that by Aldus, folio, 1513, in the first part of the "Rhetorum Græcorum orationes." The best modern editions are that of Taylor, beautifully and correctly printed by Bowyer, in 1739, 4to; of Reiske, at Leipsic, 1772, 8vo; and of 1 Moreri-Gen. Dict. Auger at Paris, 1782. Auger also published an excellent French translation of Lysias in 1783.1 LYSIPPUS, a celebrated statuary among the ancients, was a native of Sicyon, and flourished in the time of Alexander the Great. He was bred a locksmith, and followed that business for a while; but, by the advice of Eupompus, a painter, he applied himself to painting, which, however, he soon quitted for sculpture, and being thought to execute his works with more ease than the ancients, he became more employed than any other artist. The statue of a man wiping and anointing himself after bathing was particularly excellent: Agrippa placed it before his baths at Rome. Tiberius, who was charmed with it, and not able to resist the desire of being master of it, when he came to the empire, took it into his own apartment, and placed another very fine one in its place. But the Roman people demanding, in a full theatre, that he would replace the first statue, he found it necessary, notwithstanding his power, to comply with their solicitations, in order to appease the tumult. Another of Lysippus's capital pieces was a statue of the sun, represented in a car drawn by four horses; this statue was worshipped at Rhodes. He made also several statues of Alexander and his favourites, which were brought to Rome by Metellus, after he had reduced the Macedonian empire. He particularly excelled in the representation of the hair, which he more happily expressed than any of his predecessors in the art. He also made his figures less than the life, that they might be seen such as statues appear when placed, as usual, at some height; and when he was charged with this fault, he answered, "That other artists had indeed represented men such as nature had made them, but, for his part, he chose to represent them such as they appeared to be to the eye." He had three sons, who were all his disciples, and acquired great reputation in the art.2 LYTTLETON. See LITTLETON. LYTTELTON (GEORGE), an elegant English writer, was the eldest son of sir Thomas Lyttelton, of Hagley, in Worcestershire, bart. and was born in 1709. He came into the world two months before the usual time, and was imagined by the nurse to be dead, but upon closer inspec 1 From his editors.-Saxii Onomast.-Moreri.-Diet. Hist.-Dibdin and Clarke, Blair's Lectures, 2 Plinii Hist. Nat. lib. III. cap. 8. tion was found alive, and with some difficulty reared. At Eton school, where he was educated, he was so much distinguished that his exercises were recommended as models to his school-fellows. From Eton he went to Christ Church, where he retained the same reputation of superiority, and displayed his abilities to the public in a poem on Blenheim. He was a very early writer, both in verse and prose; his "Progress of Love," and his "Persian Letters," having both been written when he was very young. After a short residence at Oxford, he began his travels in 1728, and visited France and Italy. From Rome he sent those elegant verses which are prefixed to the works of Pope, whom he consulted in 1730 respecting his four pastorals. Pope made some alterations in them, which may be seen in Bowles's late edition of that poet's works (vol. IV. p. 139). We find Pope, a few years afterwards, in a letter to Swift, speak thus of him: He is "one of those whom his own merit has forced me to contract an intimacy with, after I had sworn never to love a man more, since the sorrow it cost me to have loved so many now dead, banished, or unfortunate, I mean Mr. Lyttel ton, one of the worthiest of the rising generation," &c. In another letter Mr. Lyttelton is mentioned in a manner with which Dr. Warton says he was displeased *. When he returned from his continental tour, he was (May 4, 1729) made page of honour to the princess royal. He also obtained a seat in parliament, and soon distinguished himself among the most eager opponents of sir Robert Walpole, though his father, who was one of the fords of the admiralty, always voted with the court. For many years the name of George Lyttelton was seen in every account of every debate in the house of commons. Among the great leading questions, he opposed the standing army, and the excise, and supported the motion for petitioning the king to remove Walpole. The prince of Wales having, in consequence of a quarrel with the king, been obliged to leave St. James's in 1737, kept a separate court, and opened his arms to the opponents of the ministry. Mr. Lyttelton was made his secretary, and was supposed to have great influence in the direction of his conduct. His name consequently occurs, although not very often, in Doddington's Diary. He persuaded the * Pope's Works, vol. IX. Letter LXXXV. prince, whose business it was now to be popular, that he would advance his character by patronage. Mallet was made under-secretary, with 2001. a year; and Thomson had a pension of 100l. The disposition of the two men must account for the difference in the sums. Mallet could do more political service than the honest-hearted Thomson. For Thomson, however, Mr. Lyttelton always retained his kindness, and was able at last to place him at ease. Moore courted his favour by an apologetical poem called "The Trial of Selim," and was paid with kind words, which, as is common, says Dr. Johnson, raised great hopes, that at last were disappointed. This matter, however, is differently stated in our account of Moore. Mr. Lyttelton now stood in the first rank of opposition; and Pope, who was incited, it is not easy to say how, to increase the clamour against the ministry, commended him among the other patriots. This drew upon him the reproaches of Mr. Henry Fox, who, in the House of Commons, was weak enough to impute to him as a crime his intimacy with a lampooner so unjust and licentious. Lyttelton supported his friend, and replied, "that he thought it an honour to be received into the familiarity of so great a poet." While he was thus conspicuous, he married (1741) Miss Lucy Fortescue, sister to Matthew lord Fortescue, of Devonshire, by whom he had a son, Thomas, and two daughters, and with whom he appears to have lived in the highest degree of connubial felicity: but human pleasures are short; she died in childbed about six years afterwards (1747); and he solaced his grief by writing a "Monody" to her memory, without, however, con * This notice of the Monody, which is given in Dr. Johnson's words, has been thought too scanty praise. In truth, it is no praise at all, but an assertion, and not a just one, that lord Lyttelton" solaced his grief" by writing the poem. The praise or blame was usually reserved by Johnson for the conclusion of his lives, but in this case the Monody is not mentioned at all. We have on record, however, an opinion of Gray, which the admirers of the poem will perhaps scarcely think more sympathetic than Johnson's silence. In a letter to lord Orford, who had probably spoken with disrespect of the Monody, Gray says, "I am not totally of your mind as to Mr. Lyttelton's elegy, though I love kids Orford's Works, vol. V. p. 389. Dr. Johnson is undoubtedly ironical in saying that the author "solaced his grief" by writing the Monody. The poet's grief must have abated, and his mind demning himself to perpetual solitude and sorrow; for soon after he sought to find the same happiness again in a second marriage with the daughter of sir Robert Rich (1749); but the experiment was unsuccessful, and he was for some years before his death separated from this lady. "She was," says Gilbert West in a letter to Dr. Doddridge, "an intimate and dear friend of his former wife, which is some kind of proof of her merit; I mean of the goodness of her heart, for that is the chief merit which Mr. Lyttel ton esteems; and I hope she will not in this disappoint his expectations; in all other points she is well suited to him; being extremely well accomplished in languages, music, painting, &c. very sensible, and well bred." This lady died Sept. 17, 1795. When, after a long struggle, Walpole gave way, and honour and profit were distributed among his conquerors, Lyttelton was made in (1744) one of the lords of the treasury; and from that time was engaged in supporting the schemes of ministry. Politics did not, however, so much engage him as to withhold his thoughts from things of more importance. He had, in the pride of juvenile confidence, with the help of corrupt conversation, entertained doubts of the truth of Christianity; but he thought the time now come when it was no longer fit to doubt or believe by chance, and applied himself seriously to the great question. His studies being honest, ended in conviction. He found that Religion was true, and what he had learned he endeavoured to teach, by "Observations on the Conversion and Apostleship of St. Paul," printed in 1747; a treatise to which infidelity has never been able to fabricate a specious auswer. This book his father had the happiness of seeing, and expressed his pleasure in a letter which deserves to be inserted, and must have given to such a son a pleasure more easily conceived than described: "I have read your religious treatise with infinite pleasure and satisfaction. The style is fine and clear, the arguments close, cogent, and irresistible. May the King of kings, whose glorious cause you have so well defended, reward your pious labours, and grant that I may be found worthy, through the recovered its tone before he could write at all; and when this became Mr. Lyttelton's case, he felt it his duty to pay au affectionate tribute to the memory of his lady, who certainly was one of the best of women. His talents led him to do this in poetry, and he no more deserves the suspicion of hy pocrisy, than if he had, as an artist, painted an apotheosis, or executed a monument.. |