Page:A catalogue of notable Middle Templars, with brief biographical notices.djvu/94

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74
Dillon — Disney.
DILLON, Sir LUCAS.
Irish Judge
d. 1593.

Admitted 11 May, 1551.

He appears on the Register as "Luke Dyllon," without description, but he was in all probability the son of Sir Robert Dillon of Newtown, Ireland, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, 1559. He became Solicitor-General for Ireland in 1565, Attorney-General the following year, and Chief Baron of the Exchequer in 1570. He was regarded as one of the ablest of the judges of his time, and was knighted in 1576. In 1584 he was one of the Lords Justices appointed to carry on the government pending the arrival of the Lord Deputy, and in 1587 one of the Commissioners for the plantation of Munster. He died early in 1593.


DILLON, WENTWORTH, fourth EARL of ROSCOMMON.
Poet.
About 1633—1685.

Admitted 9 February, 1682-3.

Son of Sir James Dillon, the third Earl. Through his mother he was a nephew to the Earl of Strafford. He was educated and brought up abroad, but returned to England at the Restoration, and became Master of the Horse to the Duchess of York, at the same time cultivating letters and associating with the Wits of the time, particularly with Dryden. He died 17 Jan. 1684-5.

His principal compositions were, An Essay on Translated Verse, and translations from Horace and Virgil; but the best known of them is his rendering of the Dies Iræ, or Last Judgment. Dr. Johnson speaks of him as "one of the benefactors of English literature."


DISNEY, JOHN.
Magistrate and Divine.
1677—1730.

Admitted 19 November, 1702.

Son and heir of Daniel Disney of Lincoln, where he was born on 26 Dec. 1677. After some years residence at the Temple he returned to his native county, where he distinguished himself as an active magistrate and zealous reformer of morals. After twenty years thus spent, he applied for Holy Orders in the Church of England, was ordained by Dr. Gibson, Bishop of Lincoln in 1719, and instituted to the vicarage of St. Mary, Nottingham, in 1722, a cure which he held till his death in 1730.

During his life he published the following treatises: Primitiæ Sacræ … Meditations and Poems (1701); Flora [with Gardiner's Rapin on Gardens] (1705); Essay on the Execution of the Laws against Immorality and Profaneness (1708); Second Essay on the same subject (1710); Remarks on a Sermon of Dr. Sacheverell (1711); The Genealogy of the House of Brunswick (1714); A View of the Ancient Laws against Immorality and Profaneness (1729). Mr. Disney also collected materials for a work to be entitled Corpus legum de Moribus Reformandis, but this was never published.


DISNEY, JOHN.
Unitarian Writer.
1746-1816.

Admitted 11 November, 1762.

Third son of John Disney, of Lincoln and the Middle Temple, and grandson of John Disney (q.v.). He was born at Lincoln, 28 Sept. 1746. After entering at the Inn he relinquished the study of the law, and proceeded to Cambridge, where he graduated and was ordained in 1768. He was presented to the living of Swinderby, in Lincolnshire, but from doctrinal scruples seceded from the Church and joined the Unitarian body, becoming in 1783