seric, though now at an advanced age, often commanded in person. He extended his hostilities to all parts of the Mediterranean, and not content with plunder, frequently indulged in acts of atrocity. At one time he massacred five hundred noble citizens of Zacynthus, and threw their bodies into the sea. The eastern emperor Leo at length resolved to free his dominions from this terrible scourge, and, joined by Anthemius emperor of the West, made vast preparations for an invasion of Africa. The conduct of this expedition was committed to Basiliscus, who landed his troops at cape Bona. But, amused with deceitful proposals from Genseric, he suffered the Vandal fleet to fall upon his unawares, and in the conflict above half his sea and land forces was destroyed. Basiliscus returned ingloriously to Constantinople with the remainder, and the fruits of all this mighty effort were lost. Genseric put to sea, recovered Sardinia which had been taken from him, reduced Sicily and all the islands between Italy and Africa, and became a greater terror to the empire than ever. In 476, however, he made a peace with Odoacer king of Italy, to whom he restored Sicily, but on the condition of receiving tribute. He also came to an agreement with the emperor Zeno, who relinquished to him and his successors all claim to the African provinces. This ferocious conqueror died in peace, full of years and the glory of success, in 477 Univers. Hist. Gibbon.-A.

GENTILI, ALBERICO, an eminent jurist, was born in 1550, at Castel S. Genesio in the marche of Ancona, where his father Matteo practised as a physician. He graduated in law at the university of Perugia, and was prætor or judge at Ascoli, when his father, becoming a convert to the reformed religion, resolved to leave Italy, and take with him his eldest son Alberico, and his youngest, Scipio. Alberico went to England, and in 1582 obtained the chair of jurisprudence in the university of Oxford, which he held with much reputation till his death in 1608. He was a man of vast and comprehensive erudition, and published various works, most of them in his own profession. From his "Six Dialogues on the Interpreters of Law," dedicated to his patron the earl of Leicester, it might be supposed that he was the idolater of the jurists of the preceding ages, and their barbarism, which he defends against the politer and more liberal method of Alciatus, but in a style and manner obviously imitating that of Alciatus himself; so that some have supposed that the dialogues were meant as an ironical satire upon

VOL. JV.

the ignorance and vulgarity of the jurists of his time. He was the first who carried his researches into the law of nature and of nations; and his three books "De Jure Belli" are much praised by Grotius, who confesses his obligations to them in the larger work which he composed on the same subject. His political doctrines were well suited to the reigns of Eliza beth and James, as appears from his disputation, "DeVi Civium in Regem semper injusta," and other pieces. He also wrote three books " De Legationibus," and several tracts relative to antiquities. His defence of the Latinity of the vulgar translation of the Bible, and of the authority of the first Book of Maccabees, proved that he was not entirely come over to the opinions of the Protestants. He also cultivated polite literature, of which he gave an essay in his "Lectiones Virgilianæ." Bayle. Tiraboschi.-A.

GENTILI, SCIPIO, brother of the preceding, born in 1563, was clandestinely conveyed from Italy by his father, while a child, and sent to study at Tubingen. He there greatly distinguished himself in Latin poetry, and also pursued the study of Greek and of jurisprudence, which he afterwards cultivated with increasing success at the universities of Wittemberg and Leyden. He received the degree of doctor at Basil in 1589, and then went to Heidelberg as a public expounder of law. After a short abode. in that city, he removed to Altdorf, where he was first colleague to Donellus, in the professorship, and afterwards principal professor of law. He was made a counsellor to the city of Nuremberg; and such was his reputation that he was invited to several universities, and even is said to have received liberal offers from pope Clement VIII. to settle at Bologna, all which he declined. He died at Altdorf in 1616. Scipio Gentili was accounted not inferior to his brother Alberico in extent of erudition and acuteness of argumentation, and he much surpassed him in elegant literature. He taught with great clearness, and relieved the dryness of legal topics by a mixture of belles-lettres. He wrote several works, of which the principal are: "De Jure publico Populi Romani;” “De Conjurationibus;" "De Donationibus inter Virum & Uxorem ;" "De Bonis maternis & secundis Nuptiis" "In Apulei Apologiam Comment. ;""De Jurisdictione;" "De Erroribus Testamentorum ;" "Comment. in Pauli Epist. ad Philemonem." He also wrote several elegant Latin poems, among which were Paraphrases of various Psalms, and a Translation of

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the two first cantos of Tasso's Jerusalem. All his works were lately reprinted at Naples in eight tomes 4to. Bayle. Tiraboschi.-A.

GENTILIS, JOHN-VALENTINE, a martyr to protestant persecution in the sixteenth century, was born at Cosenza in Calabria. Having become a convert to the principles of the Reformation, he was obliged to fly from his native country towards the middle of the sixteenth century, and to take refuge at Geneva, where several Italian families had already formed a congregation. In the course of his enquiries he became dissatisfied with the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity, and together with the celebrated George Blandrata, John Paul Alciati, a Milanese, and an advocate named Matthew Grimbaldi, formed a private society, in which the sense of the passages of Scripture produced in support of that doctrine was discussed, both in conversation and writing. The result of their discussions was a conviction, that the terms co-essential, co-equal, and co-existent, were improperly applied to the Son and Spirit, and that they were subordinate in nature and dignity to the Father. But however privately their meetings were held, such information was conveyed to the Italian consistory as led them to suspect that the associates had departed from the orthodox creed; upon which, in conformity to the inquisitorial system which Calvin had established against heresy, they drew up articles of faith, subscription to which was demanded from all the members of their communion. These articles consisted of Calvin's confession of faith, which had been lately approved of by the ministers, syndics, councils, and general assembly of the people; to which a promise was annexed, never to do any thing directly or indirectly, that should controvert the doctrine of the Trinity as therein defined. Gentilis is said at first to have refused signing these articles; but afterwards he was prevailed upon to comply, influenced, not improbably, by his recollection of the late tragical fate of Servetus, and not finding himself sufficiently courageous to hazard the like barbarous treatment. In private, however, he still avowed and maintained his change of sentiment; which coming to the ears of the magistrates, they committed him to prison. The charge preferred against him was, that he had violated his subscription: and when he endeavoured to excuse himself by urging that he had only obeyed the suggestions of his conscience, those very men who had no other plea to offer in defence of their revolt from the yoke of Rome, would not per

mit it to have any weight on behalf of a supposed erring brother. From his prison he addressed several writings to the magistrates, endeavouring to shew the inoffensiveness of his opinions, and at length, to pacify Calvin, declared his readiness to abjure whatever should be pronounced erroneous. Upon this he was sentenced to make the amende honorable, to throw his writings into the fire, and to take an oath not to go out of Geneva without the leave of the magistrates. Being now at liberty, and fearful of the effects of the jealous and vindictive spirit which prevailed in Geneva against persons who had afforded any ground of suspicion concerning their orthodoxy, he satisfied himself that he was justifiable in breaking an oath which had been extorted from him by terror, and withdrew into the country of Gex, where he joined his friend Matthew Grimbaldi. Afterwards he went to Lyons, and then wandered from place to place in Dauphiné and Savoy; but finding that he was safe no-where, returned again to Gex. As soon as he was known there, he was sent to prison; but was liberated within a few days, when, upon the bailiff's demanding from him a confession of faith, that he might cause it to be examined by some ministers, and sent to Bern, Gentilis printed the same, with a dedication to the bailiff. This step the latter resented, as it was taken without his permission, and occasioned his being suspected at Bern of favouring the principles in the Confession; on which account, he afterwards became the instrument of subjecting Gentilis to the iniquitous proceedings to which he fell a sacrifice. From Gex, Gentilis went again to Lyons, where he was imprisoned for his opinions; but he was not long before he obtained his liberty, having had the address to shew, if we are to credit the accounts which are given of him, that he had only opposed Calvin, and not the doctrine of the Trinity. Afterwards he went to Poland, where he joined Blandrata and Alciati, who were very successful in propagating their opinions, until in the year 1566 the king of Poland, at the instigation of the Calvinists as well as Catholics, published an edict, by which all strangers who taught doctrines inconsistent with the orthodox notion concerning the Trinity, were ordered to quit the kingdom. From Poland, Gentilis withdrew into Moravia, whence he went to Vienna, `and then resolved to return to Savoy, where he hoped still to find his friend Grimbaldi, and flattered himself that he might be suffered to remain unmolested, as Calvin, his most dreaded

a place in the Royal Academy of Sciences from 1699, and was assiduous in his attendance upon their meetings. His health at length gave way under his toils, and he died in January, 1731 As a chemist, Geoffroy is known by the table of affinities which in 1718 he gave to the public, and which was the first of the kind. The utility of such concise views of the mutual relations of different substances was so apparent, that many of the ablest chemists have employed themselves in drawing them up in an enlarged form. His principal work in medicine was a "History of the Materia Medica," published after his death in three volumes 8vo. 1741, in Latin, and since translated into French, English, and German. Though an unfinished work, it was the most complete, as far as it went, that had hitherto appeared. The first volume contains all the mineral part; the se cond, the exotic vegetables; the third, the indigenous. He also wrote several papers, chemical and botanical, in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences. Eloge par Fontenelle, Halleri Bibl. Botan.-A.

father kept an apothecary's shop, and had passed through the principal offices of magistracy. His education was conducted upon a very liberal plan, and while he was engaged in the study of physic, conferences were held at his father's house attended by Cassini, du Verney, Homberg, and other men of professional eminence. At the age of twenty he was sent to an eminent apothecary at Montpellier, and there attended upon the lectures of the celebrated professors of that school of medicine. He then travelled into the southern provinces of France, and viewed every object worthy of curiosity. In 1698 he accompanied the count de Tallard in his embassy to England, where he became known to the principal men of science, and obtained admission into the Royal Society. Thence he passed into Holland; and in 1700 he attended the abbé de Louvois in a tour in Italy. Upon his return he quitted his original destination, which was that of pharmacy, and entered upon the higher order of the profession, for which his education had so well qualified him. He was created bachelor of physic in 1702, and doctor in 1704. The subjects of his theses were all curious: one of them "An Hominis Primordia Vermis ?" was thought so interesting by some ladies of high rank, that it was necessary to translate it into French. In this, he asserts the sexes of plants, and supposes the stamina to be the male organs.

Geoffroy was in no haste to commence practice. He continued his studies in retirement for some years, and seems never to have pushed himself forwards, though his merit caused him to be consulted by his brethren in important cases. His extreme anxiety for his patients gave him a melancholy and anxious air which at first alarmed them, till they were able to make due allowances for temper. In 1709 the king nominated him to the post of professor of physic in the College-royal, vacant by the death of the celebrated Tournefort. He began his functions by a course of Materia Medica, for which he had long been collecting materials. M. Fagon, in 1712, resigned to him his office of professor of chemistry in the royal garden, which he had some time already filled as his substitute. After this appointment, he joined lectures on the Materia Medica to those of che mistry, so that both together occupied him four, and sometimes five, hours in continuance; but his zeal and industry were equal to the fatigue. The faculty of Paris chose him twice to the office of dean, which was at that time particularly laborious on account of their disputes with the company of surgeons. He also occupied

GEORGE, surnamed THE CAPPADOCIAN, either from his parents or his education, was made bishop of Alexandria when Athanasius was driven from that see by the persecutions of the emperor Constantius. He was born at Epiphania in Cilicia, where his father pursued the employment of a fuller. From this obscure and servile situation George raised himself by meanly practising the talents of a parasite, and obtaining through the influence of the persons whom he flattered, a lucrative commission to supply the army with bacon. This appointment afforded him the opportunity of accumulating wealth by the basest arts of fraud and corrup tion, until his malversations became so notorious that he was compelled to fly from the pursuits. of justice. After this disgrace, in which he appears to have saved his fortune at the expence of his honour, he withdrew to Alexandria, where he professed great zeal for the principles of Arius, and acquired considerable influence with his disciples in that city. He likewise, either from the love or ostentation of learning, collected a large and valuable library of history, rhetoric, philosophy, and theology, which the emperor Julian afterwards made the foundation of the noble library established by him in the temple erected in honour of the emperor Trajan at Antioch, but which, to the great loss of the republic of letters, was malignantly permitted to be burnt by the emperor Jovian. When about the year 356 Athanasius was obliged to abscond from the fury of the savage military, who had

received directions from the emperor Constantius to expel him from his see, George was elected bishop by the prevailing party. His conduct in this station was in the highest degree oppressive, cruel, and infamous. The Catholics he persecuted with unrelenting rage, plundering their houses, burning their monasteries, putting great numbers of their priests to the sword, and sending others into exile. Nor did the rest of the inhabitants of his extensive diocese escape the effects of his tyranny and avarice. The merchants of Alexandria were impoverished by an unjust, and almost universal monopoly,which he acquired of nitre, salt, paper, &c, ; and he incensed the inhabitants in general, by suggesting an invidious tax upon all the houses of that city. The Pagans, likewise, who had been flattered with the hopes of freedom and toleration, excited his rapacity; and the rich temples of Alexandria were either pillaged or insulted by him, who exclaimed, in a haughty and threatening tone, "How long will these sepulchres be permitted to stand?" The resentment of the people at length rose to fury, and he was for a time expelled from the city; nor was it without a violent struggle that the civil and military powers were able to restore his authority. When, however, in the year 362, information arrived at Alexandria of the accession of Julian to the empire, the public rage against the bishop again broke forth, and after he had been seized, together with two of the ministers of his atrocities, they were ignominiously dragged in chains to the public prison. When they had been confined for some days, the pagan populace, fearful lest they should escape their vengeance, forced open the prison, and with cruel insults massacred the vile wretches, who would otherwise, most probably,, have fallen under the sword of public justice. After their lifeless bodies had been carried in triumph through the streets, according to some accounts they were burnt, but according to others thrown into the sea; "and the popular leaders of the tumult," says Gibbon," declared their resolution to disappoint the devotion of the Christians, and to intercept the future honours of these martyrs, who had been punished, like their predecessors, by the enemies of their religion. The fears of the Pagans were just, and their precautions ineffectual. The meritorious death of the archbishop obliterated the memory of his life. The rival of Athanasius was dear and sacred to the Arians, and the seeming conversion of those sectaries introduced his worship into the bosom of the catholic church. The odious stranger, disguising every

circumstance of time and place, assumed the mask of a martyr, a saint, a christian hero; and the infamous George of Cappadocia has been transformed into the renowned St. George of England, the patron of arms, of chivalry, and of the Garter." Fabricii Bibl. Grac. vol. X. p. 599, &c. Moreri. Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. II.-M.

GEORGE, called also AMIRA, a learned Maronite, who flourished towards the latter end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century, came to Rome under the pontificate of Clement VIII. He there published "A Syriac and Chaldee Grammar," 1596, 4to. which is much esteemed in the learned world. On his return to his native country he was elected patriarch of the Maronites, among whom he introduced the use of the gregorian calendar, and died about the year 1641. Moreri.-M.

GEORGE-LEWIS I. king of Great Britain and elector of Hanover, was the son of the elector Ernest-Augustus, by Sophia, daughter of Frederic elector-palatine, and grand-daughter of James I. king of England. He was born in 1660, and was early trained to arms under his father. After the peace of Nimeguen he visited the English court, upon some overtures of marriage between him and the princess Anne, afterwards queen. His father, however, united him in 1682 to his cousin Sophia-Dorothea, only daughter of the duke of Zell; a match attended with little domestic happiness. He then engaged in the service of the emperor against the Turks, and signalised his valour in three campaigns in Hungary. In the ensuing war between the empire and France, he commanded the Lunenburg troops. In 1700, on his father's death, he succeeded to the electorate. In the next year he marched to the assistance of the duke of Holstein, attacked by the king of Denmark, and obliged the Danes to raise the siege of Tonningen. He joined the alliance against France in the succession-war, and marching. into the country of Wolfenbuttle, forced the princes of that house to quit their alliance with the French. The command of the army of the empire was conferred upon him in 1707, after the battle of Blenheim; but the usual backwardness of the princes and states prevented him from being able to do more than act upon the defensive. He therefore resigned his command at the end of three campaigns, but left his own troops in the service of the allies. At the peace of Rastadt, Lewis XIV. solemnly recognised the electoral dignity in the house of Lunenburg; as he had before, at the peace of