theory, the truth of which is very questionable, yet it is allowed that he displayed much candour and modesty as well as ingenuity in the prosecution of his reasonings, and that he fully merits that distinguished place among experimental philosophers, which the association of his name with a set of curious and interesting natural phenomena will probably ever secure

him.

In conjunction with these enquiries, his duties as a professor, and his employment as a surgeon and accoucheur, in which branches he was very eminent, gave full occupation to his industry. He drew up various memoirs upon professional topics which have remained inedited; and regularly held learned conversations with a few literary friends, in which new works were read and commented upon. He was a man of an amiable character in private life, and possessed of great sensibility, which he had the misfortune of being called to display on the death of his wife in 1790, an event which threw him into a profound melancholy. He rarely suffered a day to pass without visiting her tomb in the nunnery of St. Catharine, and pouring out his prayers and lamentations over her remains. He was always, indeed, punctual in practising the minutest rites of his religion, the early strong impressions of which never left him. It was probably this attachment to religion which caused him steadily to refuse taking the civic oath exacted by the new constitution of the Cisalpine republic, and in consequence he incurred the deprivation of his posts and dignities. A prey to melancholy, and reduced almost to indigence, he retired to the house of his brother James, a man of very respectable character, and there fell into a state of debility and extenuation. The republican governors, probably ashamed of their conduct towards such a man, passed a decree for his restoration to his professorial chair and its emoluments; but it He expired on November 5, 1798, at the age of sixty, amid the tears of his friends and the public regret. Eloge de Galvani par Alibert, en Mém. de la Société Medi

was now too late.

cale.-A.

GAMA,VASCO or VASQUES DE, a celebrated navigator and naval commander, was born of a noble family at Sines, a maritime town in the Portuguese province of Alenteio. When king Emanuel resolved to push the discoveries already made of the southern parts of Africa and the interjacent seas to the East Indies, de Gama's reputation for courage and prudence caused him to be fixed upon to conduct the enterprise.

He set sail from Lisbon with a squadron of only three small armed vessels and a store-ship, in July, 1497, and was four months contending with contrary winds before he reached the Cape of Good Hope. He doubled that promontory, and coasted along the south-eastern side of Africa, touching at various ports, till he reached Melinda. There he procured a mahometan pilot, who conducted him to the Malabar coast, and in May he arrived at Calicut. He was at first received in a friendly manner by the zamorin or prince; but the intrigues of the mahometan merchants at length caused a plot to be laid for his destruction, upon the discovery of which he set sail upon his return to Europe. He entered the port of Lisbon again in September, 1499, after having lost the greater part of his crew by disease and fatigue. He spent some time in devctional exercises at a hermitage, and then made a very pompous entry into the capital, where he was received with great favour by the king, who rewarded him liberally with pecuniary advantages, and the title of count of Videgueira. count of Videgueira. This expedition completely established the practicability of a new road to the Indies, and others were sent out in consequence. De Gama himself was employed in a second voyage, in which he commanded a fleet of twenty ships, and bore the title of admiral of the Indian, Persian, and Arabian seas. He sailed in February, 1502, and after compelling tribute or alliance from some of the petty princes in his route, arrived at Cochin, where he received a deputation from the Christians of St. Thomas, to whom he promised protection. The zamorin, whose suspicions of these new visitors were now thoroughly awakened, fitted out a fleet to intercept the Portuguese; but de Gama, boldly beginning the attack, boarded and took two of the largest ships, which proved to be prizes of immense value. After this success, leaving a squadron at Cananor, he himself sailed homewards, and arrived at Lisbon in September, 1503. The success of this voyage occasioned great triumph in Portugal, and the force of the nation was directed to securing the establishments it had made in the Indies, and extending them by conquest. After the accession of John III., de Gama, now in a very advanced age, was prevailed upon, in 1524, to undertake a third voyage, with the high rank of viceroy of the Indies. He defeated the people of Calicut by sea, and then proceeded to Cochin, where he died in 1525. Mod. Univers. Hist. Moreri. Robertson's America.-A.

GAMACHES, PHILIP DE, a learned French.

asserted, and the Right which Churches and Colleges have in their Estates defended," 1731, 8vo.; Some Considerations upon Clandestine Marriages," 1750, 8vo.; " A Dissertation against pronouncing the Greek Language according to Accents," 1754, 8vo.; and "A Second Dissertation on the same Subject, in Answer to Mr. Forster's Essay on the different Nature of Accent and Quantity," 1763, 8vo. Nichols's Anecdotes of Bowyer.-M.

GALVANI, LEWIS, a modern physiologist, who has had the honour of giving his name to a supposed new principle in nature, was born in 1737 at Bologna, where several of his relations had distinguished themselves in jurisprudence and theology. From his early youth he was much disposed to the greatest austerities of the catholic religion, and particularly frequented a convent, the monks of which attached themselves to the solemn duty of visit. ing the dying. He shewed an inclination to enter into this order, but was diverted from it by one of the fraternity. Thenceforth he devoted himself to the study of medicine in its different branches. His masters were the doctors Beccari, Tacconi, Galli, and especially the professor Galeazzi, who received him into his house, and gave him his daughter in marriage. In 1762 he sustained with reputation an inaugural thesis, "De Ossibus," and was then created public lecturer in the university of Bologna, and appointed reader in anatomy to the institute in that city. His excellent method of lecturing drew a crowd of auditors; and he employed his leisure in experiments and in the study of comparative anatomy. He made a number of curious observations on the urinary organs, and on the organ of hearing in birds, which were published in the Memoirs of the Institute. His reputation as an anatomist and physiologist was established in the schools of Italy, when accident gave birth to the discovery which has immortalised his name. His beloved wife, with whom he lived many years in the tenderest union, was at this time in a declining state of health. As a restorative she made use of a soup of frogs; and some of these animals, skinned for the purpose, happened to lie upon a table in her husband's laboratory, upon which was placed an electrical machine. One of the assistants in his experiments chanced carelessly to bring the point of a scalpel near the crural nerves of a frog lying not far from the conductor. Instantly the muscles of the limb were agitated with strong convulsions. Madame Galvani, a woman of quick understanding and a scientific turn, was present; and struck with

the phenomenon, she immediately went to in-
form her husband of it. He came and repeated
the experiment; and soon found that the con-
vulsion only took place when a spark was drawn
from the conductor at the time the scalpel was
in contact with the nerve. It would be tedious,
and in this place unnecessary, to mention the
long series of experiments, most ingeniously
varied, by which he proceeded to investigate
the law of nature of which accident had thus
given him a glimpse. His conclusion from the
whole was, that all animals are.endued with an
electricity of a peculiar nature, and inherent in
their economy, to which he gives the name of
animal electricity; that it is contained in most
parts, but chiefly manifests itself in the nerves
and muscles; and that it is secreted by the brain
and distributed by the nerves to the different
parts of the body. He compares each muscular
fibre to a small Leyden phial, and endeavours to
explain the phenomena of muscular motion by
analogies drawn from the charging and dis-
charging of that instrument. He applies his
theory to explain various facts in pathology,
relative to rheumatic, convulsive, paralytic, and
other nervous affections. The first publication
of Galvani on this new subject was, " Aloysi
Galvani de Viribus Electricitatis in Motu Mus-
culari Commentarius," 1791, 4to. printed for
the institute of Bologna. It immediately excited
the notice of philosophers both in Italy and
other countries, and was followed by numerous
publications in which new experiments were
related, and different opinions supported. In
particular, the celebrated Volta took up the
subject, and adduced many arguments to prove
that Galvani's notion of a peculiar animal elec-
tricity is erroneous, and that the phenomena
are derived only from the general electric mat-
ter of the atmosphere, of the action of which
the nerves are more sensible tests than any
other substances. This latter opinion seems to
have been gaining ground among philosophical
enquirers, though the notion of a peculiar gal-
vanic fluid still meets with supporters. Gal-
vani still proceeded in his enquiries, and made
many experiments upon the innate electricity in
the torpedo, as a subject intimately connected
with his discovery. He also examined with
minuteness into the different effects of the
homogeneity and heterogeneity of the metals
employed in forming the arch of communication
by which the galvanic phenomena are excited;
a circumstance which promises much future

information of the nature of
been particularly
the whole, thoug

and "Caprarola ;" and it would seem that he possessed rather a facility of versification than the genius of a real poet. He had written a great number of poems of the free cast in his youth, which he committed to the flames in an advanced age; and in a prose treatise on the art of poetry he not only condemns every thing licentious, but even that use of the heathen mythology which few modern poets have scrupled. Gambara died at the age of ninety in 1586. Baillet. Moreri. Tiraboschi.-A.

divine and professor in the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century, was born in the year 1568. He received the degree of doctor from the faculty of the Sorbonne, in the year 1598, and was appointed professor of theology in the university of Paris during the following year. After having discharged the duties of his oflice for twenty-five years, with great applause, and with the reputation of being one of the most able divines of his time, he died in 1625, when about fifty-seven years of age. He was a zealous and able supporter of Edmund Richer, in the opposition which he made to the encroachments of the papal power on the liberties of the Gallican church. His "Commentaries on the Summa Theologiæ," of Aquinas, printed at Paris in 1625, in two volumes folio, are held in much estimation by Catholics. Bayle. Moreri. Nouv. Dict. Hist. -M.

GAMACHES, STEPHEN-SIMON, a French ecclesiastic, and various writer, was born at, Meulan about the year 1672. He became one of the canons of the Holy Cross de la Bretonniere, and acquired such reputation by his proficiency in science and literature, that he was chosen a member of the French Academy of Sciences. He died in 1756, in the eighty fourth year of his age. He was the author of "Physical Astronomy, &c." 1740, in two volumes 4to.; "Literary and Philosophical Dissertations," 1755, Svo.; "The System of a Christian Philosopher," 1721, 8vo.; "The System of the "The System of the Heart," 1708, 12mo. published under the assumed name of Clarigny; and "The Elegancies of Language reduced to their Principles," 1757, 12mo. The work last mentioned has obtained considerable reputation, and has been denominated by a writer of taste, "A dictionary of fine thoughts.' It is recommended as worthy of the perusal of every person who wishes to write well. Nouv. Dict. Hist.-M.

GAMBARA, LORENZO, a modern Latin poet, a native of Brescia, was born about 1496. He acquired considerable reputation in his time, and is mentioned with honour by Manutius, Lipsius, Gyraldus, and others. His works, of which several editions have been given, consist of smaller and larger pieces. Of the latter the most known is his "Columbus," written at the instigation of cardinal Granvelle. It is a poem in four cantos, the subject of which is the discovery of America by Columbus. It follows the narration of the great navigator, without any decorations of fiction, whence it is not admitted into the rank of epic poems. Others of his piecesare descriptive, as his "Venetia,'

GAMBARA, VERONICA, an Italian lady of poetical fame, the daughter of count Gianfrancesco Gambara, was born at Brescia in 1485. She received a liberal education, and was particularly aided in her literary pursuits by a correspondence with cardinal Bembo, who formed her taste, and directed her in the rules of Italian verse. In 1509 she married Giberto the lord of Corregio, with whom she lived nine years. After his death she devoted herself to the education of her two sons, and to the composition of those works which have perpetuated her memory. When her brother Überto was made governor of Bologna in 1528, she fixed. her residence in that city; and at the time of the coronation of the emperor Charles V. her house was the resort of a number of the most distinguished geniuses in Europe who followed his court. She afterwards returned to Corregio, where she died in 1550. Her poems were first published in various collections; but a complete edition of them, with her letters, was printed at Brescia in 1759. They may rank with the most elegant and polished productions of the time. Tiraboschi.-A.

GAMBOLD, JOHN, a pious English divine, and bishop among the Moravian brethren, or sect known by the name of Unitas Fratrum, was born near Haverfordwest in Pembrokeshire, and became a member of Christ-church college, in the university of Oxford. Of that institution he was made one of the chaplains, and took his degree of M.A. in the year 1734 About the year 1739, most probably, he was presented by Dr. Secker, then bishop of Oxe ford, to the vicarage of Stanton Harcourt, in Oxfordshire. When Peter Boehler, a disciple of count Zinzendorf, visited Oxford in 1738, and held frequent conferences with John and Charles Wesley, and others of the party who were then laying the foundations of what was afterwards called Methodism, Mr. Gambold interpreted his discourses, which were delivered in the Latin language to mixed meetings of learned and unlearned persons, who assumed to themselves the title of awakened people. From.

this time his mind appears to have been influenced by an inclination towards the tenets of the Moravian school; and in the year 1742 he became so thoroughly a convert to them, that, without giving any notice to his diocesan and patron, he deserted his flock, and joined himself to the new sect, which by an act of the legislature in the year 1749 was permitted to erect its establishments in this country. For many years he was the regular minister of the congregation settled in London, and preached at the chapel of the brethren in Fetter-lane. In the year 1754 he was consecrated a bishop at an English provincial synod held at Lindsay-house, Chelsea, and was greatly esteemed for his piety and learning by several English bishops, who were his contemporaries in the university of Oxford. In the year 1768 he retired to his native country, where he died, at Haverfordwest, universally respected, in the year 1771. He was characterised by a friend who knew him well in his younger years, as "a singular, over-zealous, but innocent enthusiast. He had not quite fire enough in him to form a second Simeon Stylites." As he was a good scholar, Mr. Bowyer frequently applied to him as an occasional assistant in correcting the press; in which capacity he superintended (among many other valuable publications) the beautiful and very accurate edition of Lord Chancellor Bacon's works in 1765; and in 1767 he was professedly the editor, and took an active part in the translation of David Crantz's "History of Greenland, containing a Description of the Country and its Inhabitants, and particularly of the Mission carried on for above thirty Years by the Unitas Fratrum, &c." in two volumes 8vo. He was also the author or editor of the following pieces: a neat edition of the Greek Testament, but without his name, "Textu per omnia Milliano, cum Divisione Pericoparum & Interpunctura A. Bengelii," 1742, in two volumes 12mo.; "A short Summary of Christian Doctrine in the way of Question and Answer, &c." intended to shew the consistency of his connection with, and ministry in, the church of the Brethren, with a steady attachment to the church of England; "Maxims and Theological Ideas, collected out of the several Dissertations and Discourses of Count Zinzendorf, from 1738 till 1747" "Hymns for the Use of the Brethren," 1748, 12mo.; "Sixteen Discourses on the Second Article of the Creed, preached at Berlin, by the Ordinary of the Brethren," 1752, 12mo.; "The Ordinary of the Brethren's Churches his short and peremptory Remarks on the Way and Manner wherein he has been

hitherto treated in Controversies, &c. translated from the high Dutch, with a Preface by J. Gambold," 1753; "Twenty-one Discourses, or Dissertations upon the Augsburg Confession, which is also the Brethren's Confession of Faith, &c. translated from the high Dutch by F. Okeley, B.A." 1753; "A modest Plea for the Church of the Brethren, &c." 1754, 8vo. with a Preface by himself; "The Martyrdom of Ignatius, a Tragedy," published after his death by the rev. Benjamin La Trobe, in 1773, with the Life of Ignatius, &c.; some single Sermons; and other pieces which he assisted in drawing up, or publishing, of which the subjects are particularised in Nichols's Anecdotes of Bowyer.-M.

GARASSE, FRANCIS, a French Jesuit, noted for the violence and scurrility of his controver sial writings, was born at Angoulême, in the year 1585. When he was fifteen years of age he entered into the Jesuits' college, and by the liveliness of his parts, and diligent application to his studies, secured the favour of his superiors. While he was in his noviciate he published a defence of the Jesuits against three different attacks upon the order, in a piece entitled "Andreæ Schioppii Casparis Fratris Horoscopus, &c." 1614, 4to, which is drawn up in an ironical strain, and is not destitute of wit, but disgraced by much low buffoonery. Of the same character is his "Andreæ Schioppii Casparis Fratris Elixir Calvinisticum, &c." 8vo. published in the following year, against some strictures on his order by ministers of the protestant communion. For the subjects of some of his other smaller pieces, either satirical or panegyrical, we refer our readers to our authorities. When he had completed his noviciate, and taken the four vows, father Garasse · appeared frequently in the pulpit; and as he wanted neither genius nor reading, and possess ed much vivacity, a good voice, and an im-pressive manner of delivery, he became a very popular preacher, and maintained that character for many years in the principal cities of France and Lorrain. He most commonly made choice of singular subjects, which, together with his peculiar turn of wit, were.suited to the vicious taste of the age, and secured to him numerous admirers and followers. In the year 1623 he ventured on the production of a large work, intended to controvert the principles of atheists and libertines, and entitled. "The curious Doctrine of the Wits, or Pretenders to Wit, of this Age, containing several Maxims pernicious to the tate, Religion, and good Man - • ners, refuted and overthrown by Father Garasse,,