foment the general flame of reformation ; and his political speculations are evidently those of a man who had soared beyond the narrow limits of his age."
All these remarks the reader will observe refer to the original Latin in which all the works of Buchanan, with the exception of the two which we have particularized, are written. The Dialogue has been frequently re-printed, and several times translated. Of the History, which was printed by Alexander Arbuthnot at Edinburgh, 1582, there have been published seventeen editions. It was translated into the Scottish language by John Reid, who, according to Calderwood's MS., was servitor to Mr George Buchanan. A MS. of this unpublished version is in the library of the university of Glasgow. Another unpublished version is in the British museum. In 1690, an English translation, with a portrait of the author, was printed in folio. This version has gone through five or six editions, and is to be frequently met with. It is a clumsy performance, and gives some such idea of Buchanan as a block from the quarry gives of the highly finished statue. A much better translation has recently appeared, from the pen of James Aikman, Esq. It is an honour yet awaiting some future scholar, to give to his unlettered countrymen to feel somewhat of the grace and strength that characterize the performances of George Buchanan.
BURNET, Gilbert, bishop of Salisbury, and an historian of great eminence, was born at Edinburgh on the 18th of September, 1643. His father was a younger brother of a family possessing considerable interest in the shire of Aberdeen, and was bred to the law, which he followed with great success. He was eminent for his probity, and his generosity was such that he never took a fee from the poor, nor from any clergyman, when he sued in the right of his church. In his morals he was strict, and his piety procured him the reproach of being a puritan; yet he was episcopal in his judgment, and adhered to the bishops and the rights of the crown with great constancy, and three several times he left the kingdom to avoid taking the covenant. On one of these occasions, he was an exile for several years, and though his return was latterly connived at, he was not permitted to resume the practice of the law, but lived in retirement upon his estate in the country till the Restoration, when he was promoted to be a lord of session. The mother of our author was not less conspicuous than his father, being a sister of Lord Warriston's, and, like him, a great admirer of the presbyterian discipline.
In consequence of his seclusion from business, Mr Burnet took the education of his son, in the early part of it, wholly upon himself, and he conducted it so successfully, that at the age of ten years, Gilbert was sufficiently acquainted with the Latin tongue, as to be entered a student in the college of Aberdeen, where he perfected himself in Greek, went through the common methods of the Aristotelian logic and philosophy, and took his degree of M. A. before he was fourteen. After this, much to the regret of his father, who had all along intended him for the church, he commenced the study of the law, both civil and feudal, in which he made very considerable progress. In the course of a year, however, he altered his resolution, and, agreeably to the will of his father, devoted himself wholly to the study of divinity, in which, with indefatigable diligence, studying commonly fourteen hours a day, he made a rapid progress, having gone through the Old and New Testaments, with all the commentaries then in repute, as well as some of the most approved systems of school divinity, before he was eighteen years of age; when having passed the usual routine of previous exercises, which at that time were nearly the same in the presbyterian and episcopalian churches, he was licensed as a probationer or preacher of the gospel. His father was about this time appointed a lord of session, and his cousin-german, Sir Alexander Burnet, gave him the presentation to an
