Smit with the love of sister arts we came, Whence comes SMITH, albe he knight or squire, He doth nothing but talk of his horse, and can SMITH (Adam), LL. D., the celebrated author he considered as the most useful part of his life. His lectures on moral philosophy were divided into four parts: the first contained natural theology; in which he considered the proofs of the being and attributes of God, and those truths on which religion is founded; the second comprehended ethics, strictly so called, and consisted chiefly of those doctrines which he afterwards published in his Theory of Moral Sentiments; in the third part he treated more at length of justice; and in the last part he examined those political regulations which are founded upon expediency, and are calculated to increase the riches, power, and prosperity of a state. In delivering his lectures he trusted almost entirely to extemporary elocution; his manner was plain and unaffected, and he never failed to interest his hearers. His reputation soon rose very high, and many students resorted to the university merely upon his account. When his acquaintance with Mr. Hume, first commenced is uncertain; but it had ripened into friendship before 1752. In 1759 he published his Theory of Moral Sentiments; a work which deservedly extended his reputation; for, though several of its conclusions are ill-founded, it must be allowed to be a singular effort of invention, in genuity, and subtilty. It abounds every where with the purest and most elevated maxims on the practical conduct of life; and, when the subject leads him to address the imagination, the variety and felicity of his illustrations, the richness and fluency of his eloquence, and the skill with which he wins the attention and commands the passions of his readers, leave him among our British moralists without a rival. Towards the end of 1763 Dr. Smith received an invitation from Mr. Charles Townsend to accompany the duke of Buccleugh on his travels; and the liberal terms on which this proposal was made induced him to resign his office at Glasgow, when he generously returned to his pupils the fees he had received from them. He joined the duke of Buccleugh at London early in 1764, and set out with him for the continent in March. After a stay of ten days at Paris they proceeded to Thoulouse, where they fixed their residence for eighteen months; whence they went by a pretty extensive route through the south of France to Geneva, where they passed two months. About Christmas 1765 they returned to Paris, and remained there till October 1766. The society in which Dr. Smith passed these ten months, by the recommendation of Mr. Hume, were chiefly Turgot, Quesnai, Necker, D'Alembert, Helvetius, Marmontel, and Madame Riccoboni; and some of them he continued ever after to reckon among his friends. In October 1766 the duke of Buccleugh and the doctor returned to England. Dr. Smith spent the next ten years of his life with his mother at Kirkaldy, occupied habitually in intense study, but unbending his mind at times in the company of some of his old school-fellows who still resided near the place of their birth. In 1776 he published his Enquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations; a book universally known, and esteemed the most perfect work which has yet appeared on the general principles of legislation. He spent the next two years in London, where he enjoyed the society of some of the most eminent men of the age; but he removed to Edinburgh in 1778, in consequence of having been appointed, at the request of the duke of Buccleugh, one of the commissioners of the customs in Scotland. Here he spent the last twelve years of his life in an affluence which was more than equal to all his wants. But his studies seemed entirely suspended till the infirmities of old age reminded him that it was now too late. The principal materials of the works which he had announced had long been collected, and little probably was wanting but a few years of health and retirement to complete them. The death of his mother, who had accompanied him to Edinburgh in 1784, together with that of his cousin Miss Douglas in 1788, contributed to frustrate these projects. They had been the objects of his affection for more than sixty years, and in their society he had enjoyed from his infancy all that he ever knew of the endearments of a family. He was now alone and helpless; and though he bore his loss with equanimity, and regained apparently his former cheerfulness, yet his health and strength gradually declined till July 1790, when he died. He left a few essays, which have since been published, but burnt all the rest of his MSS. before he died. To his private worth the most certain of all testimonies may be found in that confidence, respect, and attachment, which followed him through all the various relations of life. He was habitually absent in conversation. He was rarely known to start a new topic himself, or to appear unprepared upon those that were introduced by others. When warmed with conversation his gestures were animated, and not ungraceful; and in the society of those he loved his features were often brightened by a smile of inexpressible benignity. SMITH (Edmund), a distinguished English poet, the only son of Mr. Neale, an eminent merchant, by a daughter of baron Lechmere, was born in 1668. By his father's death he was left young to the care of Mr. Smith, who had married his father's sister, and who treated him with so much tenderness that at his death he took his name. His writings are scattered in miscellanies and collections: his celebrated tragedy of Phædra and Hippolitus was acted in 1707; and, being introduced at a time when the Italian opera so much engrossed the polite world, gave Mr. Addison, who wrote the prologue, an opportunity to rally the vitiated taste of the public. However, it is perhaps rather a fine poem than a good play. This tragedy, with a poem to the memory of Mr. John Philips, three or four odes, with a Latin oration spoken at Oxford in laudem Thomæ Bodleii, were published as his works by his friend Mr. Oldisworth. Mr. Smith died in 1710, sunk into indolence and intemperance by poverty and disappointments; the hard fate of many a man of genius. SMITH (Hugh), M. D., a celebrated English physician, son of Mr. Smith, an eminent surgeon at Hemel Hempstead. After serving an apprenticeship with his father, he went to Edinburgh, attended the university there, and graduated with much reputation. He then went to London, where, in 1759, he published An Essay on the Blood, with Reflections on Venesection. In 1760 he began a course of lectures on the theory and practice of physic, which were attended by great numbers of physicians, surgeons, apothecaries, and students of medicine. Within three years his lectures acquired him such fame that the pupils of St. George's hospital, &c., invited him to deliver his lectures at the west end of the city; which he did, and was numerously attended for many years. He also published his text book, which met with a very extensive sale. About 1765 Dr. Smith was unanimously chosen physician to the Middlesex Hospital, in which office he continued several years, highly esteemed by his colleagues. In 1770 he was elected alderman of Tower Ward, London; but his numerous professional engagements obliged him to resign that honorable office two years after. In 1780 he purchased an elegant house at Streatham, where he hoped to enjoy retirement; but this was a vain hope for a man of his abilities among the nobility and gentry of Surry. At length the death of his son, affecting his spirits, made him retire to Stratford, where he died, 26th December 1790. SMITH (John), M. A., a learned English divine, born at Abchurch, in Northamptonshire, and educated at Cambridge, where he graduated in 1640. He published his Select Discourses, in 4to., in 1660, and died in 1672, aged fifty-four. SMITH (John), D.D., an eminent English divine, born at Lowther, in Westmoreland, in 1659, where his father was rector, and gave him the rudiments of his education. His father must have been a man of liberal sentiments; for he put young John first under the tuition of Christopher Nessie, a Presbyterian dissenter, and next under that of Thomas Lawson, a Quaker, who was an excellent teacher of the dead languages. In 1674 he was admitted of St. John's College, Cambridge; and in 1686 attended lord Lansdown as chaplain in his embassy to Spain. On his return, about 1692, he became chaplain to bishop Crew of Durham; who, in 1695, made him rector of Gateshead, and a prebendary of Durham. In 1696 he graduated D. D. He was next made rector of Bishop's Wearmouth. He was deeply versed in northern literature and antiquities; and the admirers of the venerable Bede are indebted to him for an elegant edition of that ancient historian whose works he was engaged in preparing for the press when he died at Cambridge, in 1715 but the work was finished, according to his directions, by his son George Smith, esq., of the Inner Temple, in 1722, to whom he left a large fortune, which he had obtained by his wife: four of the doctor's Sermons were also published. SMITH (John), an excellent mezzotinto engraver, who flourished about 1700. He united softness with strength, and finished with freedom. He served with one Tillet, a painter in Moorfields; and learned from Becket the secret of mezzotinto; and, being farther instructed by Van der Vaart, was taken to work in Sir Godfrey Kneller's house. To posterity, perhaps, his prints,' says Mr. Walpole, will carry an idea of something burlesque; perukes of an enormous length, flowing over suits of armor, compose wonderful habits. Smith exhibited both, as he found them in the portraits of Kneller. In the Kit-cat club he has poured full bottoms chiefly over night-gowns. Smith composed two large volumes, with proofs of his own plates, for which he asked £50. His finest works are duke Schomberg on horseback; that duke's son Maynhard; the earls of Pembroke, Dorset, and Albemarle; three plates of children; William Cowper; Gibbons and his wife; queen Anne; the duke of Gloucester, a whole length; queen Mary, in a high head, fan, and gloves; the earl of Godolphin; the duchess of Ormond, a whole length, with a black; Sir George Rooke, &c. There is a print by him of James II. with an anchor, but no inscription; which, not being finished when the king went away, is so scarce that it is sometimes sold for above a guinea. Smith also performed many historic pieces; as the loves of the gods, from Titian, at Blenheim, in ten plates; the holy family with angels, after C. Maratti, &c. SMITH (Sir Thomas) was born at Walden, in Essex, in 1512. At fourteen he was sent to Queen's College, Cambridge, where he distinguished himself so much that he was made Henry VIII's scholar together with John Cheke. He was chosen a fellow of his college in 1531; and, in 1533, appointed to read the public Greek lecture. The common mode of reading Greek at that time was very faulty; the same sound being given to the letters and dipthongs 6, 71, v, El, ol, vi. Hle and Cheke were sensible that this pronunciation was wrong: and, after a good deal of consultation, they agreed to introduce that mode of reading which prevails at present. Mr. Smith was lecturing on Aristotle de Republica in Greek. At first he dropped a word or two at intervals in the new pronunciation. No notice was taken of this for some days; but, as he continued, his audience began to wonder at the unusual sounds, and at last some of his friends spoke of them to him. He discovered his project, and great numbers soon resorted to him for information. The new pronunciation was adopted with enthusiasm, and soon became universal at Cambridge. It was opposed by bishop Gardiner the chancellor; but its superiority was so evident that in a few years it spread over all England. In 1539 he travelled and studied in France and Italy. On his return he was made regius professor of civil law at Cambridge. About this time he published a treatise on the mode of pronouncing English. He also promoted the Reformation. Having gone into the family of the duke of Somerset, the protector during the minority of Edward VI., he was employed in public affairs; and, in 1548, was made secretary of state, and knighted. He was then sent ambassador to Brussels and France. Upon Mary's accession he lost all his places; but, having preserved the friendship of Gardiner and Bonner, he was not only exempted from persecution, but allowed a pension of £100. During Elizabeth's reign he was employed in public affairs, and was sent thrice as her ambassador to France. He died at Mounthall, in Essex, in 1577. His abilities were excellent, and his attainments uncommonly great. He was a philosopher, physician, chemist, mathematician, linguist, historian, and architect. Ile wrote, 1. The English Commonwealth. 2. A letter De Recta et Emendata Linguæ Græcæ SMITH (Thomas), D. D., an eminently learned English divine, born in London in 1638, and admitted of Queen's College, Oxford, in 1657. In 1663 he was made master of a free-school near Magdalen College; and, in 1666, was elected a fellow, being now famed for his skill in the oriental languages. In June 1668 he went as chaplain to Sir Daniel Harvey, ambassador to Constantinople, and returned thence in 1671. In 1676 he travelled into France; and, on his return, became chaplain to Sir Joseph Williamson, secretary of state. In 1679 it was proposed that he should collate and translate the Alexandrian Manuscript of the Bible(see SEPTUAGINT), and Charles II. promised him a benefice for it; but this excellent design was never executed. His reputation was high among the learned. In 1683 he graduated. In 1687 he was made prebendary of Heyghbury, Wilts. In August 1688 he was deprived of his fellowship by Dr. Giffard, the popish president, but restored in October; yet afterwards he lost it, upon refusing to take the oaths to William and Mary. He died at London, May 11th, 1710. He published four letters in Latin, which he translated afterwards, entitled, 1. Remarks on the Manners, Religion, and Government of the Turks, 8vo., 1678. 2. An Account of the Greek Church, English and Latin, 8vo., 1680. 3. A Life of Camden, Latin, 4to., 1691. 4. Vitæ quorundam Eruditissimorum et illustrium Virorum, 4to., 1707; with many other learned tracts. SMITH (William), D. D., son of the Rev. Richard Smith, minister of St. Andrew's Worcester, a learned English divine, born in Worcester, May 30th, 1711, where he was educated. He was matriculated at New College, Oxford, in 1728, where he became A. B. in 1732, and A. M. in 1737. After this he was patronised by James, earl of Derby, with whom he spent some years, and who, in 1735, appointed him rector of Trinity Church, Chester. He published a translation of Longinus on the Sublime, with notes, and a life of the author; by which he acquired great reputation. On June 8th, 1753, he was appointed a minister of St. George's church, Liverpool. This year he published a translation of Thucydides's History of the Peloponnesian War; 2 vols. 4to., dedicated to the prince of Wales. On the 28th July, 1758, king George II. appointed him dean of Chester; and on the 30th April, 1766, he was elected rector of Handley. În 1782 he published Nine Discourses on the Beatitudes. He died 12th January 1787. SMITH (William, George, and John), of Chichester, three eminent English painters, brothers. William was born in 1707; painted portraits and landscapes well, and especially fruits and flowers. He died in 1764, aged fifty-seven. George was born in 1714, proved the most eminent of the three, and excelled in landscape painting. He died in 1776, aged sixty-two. John was born in 1717, and was thought by some superior to George in landscape painting. He died in 1764, aged forty-seven. SMITH (Thomas), another landscape painter, who, to distinguish him from the preceding, is usually called Smith of Derby, of which town he was a native. He was wholly self-taught, and yet attained distinction in the line which he followed. Several prints have been engraved by Vivares from his pictures. He died in 1769, leaving a son, John Raphael Smith, who became an eminent engraver in mezzotinto, and died in 1811. SMITH (John Raphael), was the son of Thomas Smith, the landscape painter of Derby, from whom he received instruction in drawing; but, losing him at an early age, he had no other teacher. He practised portrait painting in crayons, and rose to pre-eminence in that line, as appeared in his whole lengths of Charles Fox and earl Stanhope. He also became distinguished as a mezzotinto engraver, and scraped a great number of fine prints from the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds. Among his scholars were the two Wards, Hilton, and De Wint. Mr. Smith was the first who brought into public notice that eccentric genius, George Morland. He died in 1812. SMITH (William), a traveller, born about the end of the seventeenth century, was sent in 1726 by a commercial company to Guinea, to make plans and views of the forts, and to survey the country from the mouth of the river Gambia to Juidah. He returned to England in September, 1727, after having visited Barbadoes; and he subsequently published the result of his labors, under the title of A New Voyage to Guinea, containing an exact Description of the country and of the Manners and Customs of the inhabitants, London, 1744, 8vo., which work was translated into French; and Draughts of Forts on the coast of Guinea, 4to.-Another WILLIAM SMITH was the author of The History of the Province of New York, North America, to the year 1732, London 1757, 4to.; reprinted 1765, 8vo., and published in French, Paris, 1767, 12mo. SMITH (William), an eminent performer, born about 1730 in the city of London, where his father carried on business as, a wholesale grocer and tea-dealer. He was educated at Eton and St. John's College, Cambridge, with a view to the clerical profession; but, having subjected himself to the danger of censure by some youthful irregularities, he left the university, and, returning to London, directed his attention to the stage. In January 1753 he made his first appearance at Covent Garden, in the character of Theodosius, in the tragedy of The Force of Love. He was successful; and continued to fill some of the principal parts in a variety of plays for twenty-two years. In 1774 he removed to Drury Lane, and continued to belong to the company there till 1788, when he retired in consequence of having married a lady of fortune, the widow of Kelland Courtenay, esq., and daughter of viscount Hinchinbrooke. He then devoted his time to the cultivation of polite literature and the enjoyment of rural pleasures, especially fox-hunting. His death took place September 13th, 1819, at Bury St. Edmunds, in Suffolk, where he had long resided. SMITH (Mrs. Charlotte) was the eldest daughter of Nicholas Turner, esq., a gentleman of fortune, who inherited considerable estates in the counties of Surry and Sussex, and was born in 1749. Mr. Turner early discovered such indications of genius in her infant mind that he determined no expense should be spared in the cultivation of those talents which she seemed to have inherited from both parents; and therefore bestowed on her what was thought the best education. She was placed in one of the most distinguished seminaries in the neighbourhood of London; and, on quitting school, was attended by various masters; and, if expense constituted a good education, she may be said to have received the best that could have been given: but Mrs. Smith frequently regretted that in the conduct of it so little judgment was shown, and that the time lost in the attainment of superficial accomplishments was not employed in more useful studies. After having been accustomed to the most boundless indulgence from her own family, she was suddenly involved in household cares, transplanted into a soil totally ungenial to her habits and repugnant to her taste, and became subject to the will of a man who, far from possessing the power of regulating the conduct of a wife scarcely emerged from childhood, knew not how to govern himself. From this fatal marriage, which had been brought about by the officiousness of friends, and which was by no means the effect of attachment on either side, all the future misfortunes of this ingenious lady originated. It was in consequence of her husband's embarrassments, that Mrs. Smith thought of collecting such poems as she had originally written for her amusement; they were first offered to Dodsley and refused; they were afterwards shown to Dilly in the Poultry, who also declined having any thing to do with them. It has been seen with what degree of judgment these decisions were made; through the interest of Mr. Hayley they were at length printed by Dodsley on Mrs. Smith's account, and the rapid sale, and almost immediate demand for a second edition, sufficiently justified the author's confidence in her own powers, and encouraged her to proceed in a line, which, as it might render her in a great degree independent of the persons who had now the management of her family's affairs, contributed to divert her thoughts, and to render the sad realities she was suffering in some measure less poignant. The still increasing derangement of Mr. Smith's affairs soon after obliged him to leave England, and, in the autumn of 1784, he established his family in a gloomy and inconvenient house in Normandy, nine miles from any town. His wife's sufferings in this comfortless situation, where she gave birth to her youngest child, were such that few women could have borne with fortitude; but her admirable mind and persevering spirit still supported her; and again literary pursuits served to lighten her cares during the very severe winter which happened that year; and, when her health would not admit of her going out, she translated into English the novel of Manon l'Escaut, by the abbé Prevost. It was afterwards published and censured as being immoral; but the fact was, it fell accidentally in her way when she had not much opportunity of selection, and at a time when she eagerly sought for any resource to mitigate her anxieties. In the spring of 1785 the family returned to England. Domestic calamities again overtook her soon afterwards; and circumstances, which delicacy forbids us to detail, determined her to quit her husband's house, and withdraw with most of her children to a small cottage near Chichester. The charming novel of Emmeline was written at this place in the course of a few months; the novelty of the descriptive scenery which Mrs. Smith first introduced, and the elegance of the style, obtained for it the most unbounded success, and increased the ardor and persevering application of the author, which brought forward several other works of the same kind, almost all equally pleasing, and which followed with a rapidity and variety truly astonishing. In 1803 Mrs. Smith again changed her habitation, and removed from the neighbourhood of Tunbridge Wells to a village in Surry, regarding it as her native soil, having passed her infancy at her father's place at Stoke, and there she had long expressed a desire that all her sorrows might repose. Death closed her long sufferings in her fifty-seventh year, on the 28th of October 1806, after a most tedious and painful illness, which had totally exhausted her frame; but the powers of her extraordinary mind lost neither their strength nor their brilliancy. Mrs. Smith's poetical works are well known, and the number of editions through which they passed sufficiently establishes the public opinion of their merit. Those which have been published since her decease offer great proof of the energy of her genius; for they were all written while she was undergoing much bodily suffering, and while her mind was harassed with many cares. SMITH (Elizabeth), a young lady of very uncommon talents and acquirements, was born in the county of Durham in the year 1776, and died in the summer of 1806, at the age of thirty. Miss Bowdler, the author of Sermons on the Doctrines and Duties of Christianity, published, in 1809, Fragments in Prose and Verse, by this young lady, with some account of her life and character. At a very early age Miss Smith discovered that love of reading, and that close application to whatever she engaged in, which marked her character through life. She acquired a wonderful knowledge of languages both ancient and modern, while she displayed an acuteness and accuracy of thinking, combined with the most unassuming modesty, which have probably never been surpassed. Besides the fragments above mentioned, we have from her pen an excellent Translation of Letters and Memoirs, relating to Mr. and Mrs. Klopstock, from the original German; and a Translation of the Book of Job, from the original Hebrew; which while it remained in MS. was considered by more than one eminent divine a work too valuable to be withheld from the lovers of Biblical literature. In the volume of Fragments we find several pieces of poetry, original and translated, of great beauty; some metaphysical and moral discussions of great acuteness and accuracy; with a display of religious principle, and proofs of religious practice, equally salutary and unaffected. Her life and death were equally Christian, the recollection of which added sanctity, while it furnished consolation to the sorrow of her surviving friends and family. |