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nefs as a medicine bordering upon poifon. He quitted at the fame time all his practice in the city, and confined it to the poor of his neighboured, and his visits at the Hotel Dieu; but his weakness increasing, he was forced to increase his quantity of wine, which yet he always continued to adjust by weight *.

At 78 his legs could carry him no longer, and he fcarcely left his bed; but his intellects continued unimpaired, except in the laft fix months of his life. He expired, or, to ufe a more proper term, went out, on the first of March 1714, at the age of 80 years, without any diftemper, and merely for want of ftrength, having enjoyed by the benefit of his regimen a long and healthy life, and a gentle and easy death.

This extraordinary regimen was but part of the daily regulation of his life, of which all the offices were carried on with a regularity and exactness nearly approaching to that of the planetary motions.

He went to bed at feven, and rofe at two, throughout the year. He spent in the morning three hours at his devotions, and went to the Hotel Dieu in the fummer between five and fix, and in the winter between fix and feven, hearing mafs for the most part at Notre Dame. After his return he read the holy

*The practice of Dr. Morin is forbidden, I believe, by every writer that has left rules for the preservation of health, and is directly oppofite to that of Cornaro, who by his regimen repaired a broken conftitution, and protracted his life, without any painful infirmities, or any decay of his intellectual abilities, to more than a hundred years; it is generally agreed, that as men advance in years, they ought to take lighter fuftenance, and in lefs quantities; and rea fon feems cafily to difcover that as the concoctive powers grow weaker, they ought to labour lefs. Orig. Edit.

fcripture,

fcripture, dined at eleven, and when it was fair weather walked till two in the royal garden, where he examined the new plants, and gratified his earliest and strongest paffion. For the remaining part of the day, if he had no poor to vifit, he fhut himself up, and read books of literature or phyfic, but chiefly phyfic, as the duty of his profeffion required. This likewife was the time he received vifits, if any were paid him. He often used this expreffion, "Thofe that come to fee me, do me honour; and those that stay away, do me a favour." It is easy to conceive that a man of this temper was not crouded with falutations: there was only now and then an Antony that would pay Paul a vifit.

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Among his papers was found a Greek and Latin index to Hippocrates, more copious and exact than that of Pini, which he had finished only a year before his death. Such a work required the affiduity and patience of an hermit *.

There is likewife a journal of the weather, kept without interruption, for more than forty years, in which he has accurately fet down the state of the barometer and thermometer, the drynefs and moisture of the air, the variations of the wind in the courfe of the day, the rain, the thunders, and even the fudden ftorms, in a very commodious and concife method, which exhibits, in a little room, a great train of different obfervations. What numbers of fuch remarks

*This is an inftance of the difpofition generally found in writers of lives, to exalt every common occurrence and action into wonders. Are not indexes daily written by men who neither receive nor expect very loud applaufes for their labours? Orig. Edit.

had

had escaped a man lefs uniform in his life, and whose attention had been extended to common objects!

All the estate which he left is a collection of medals, another of herbs, and a library rated at two thousand crowns. Which make it evident that he spent much more upon his mind than upon his body.

BURMAN.

BURM A N*.

P

ETER BURMAN was born at Utrecht, on

the 26th day of June, 1668. The family from which he defcended has for feveral generations produced men of great eminence for piety and learning; and his father, who was profeffor of divinity in the univerfity, and paftor of the city of Utrecht, was equally celebrated for the ftrictnefs of his life, the efficacy and orthodoxy of his fermons, and the learning and perfpicuity of his academical lectures.

From the affiftance and inftruction which fuch a father would doubtlefs have been encouraged by the genius of this fon not to have omitted, he was unhappily cut off at eleven years of age, being at that time by his father's death thrown entirely under the care of his mother, by whofe diligence, piety, and prudence, his education was fo regulated, that he had scarcely any reafon, but filial tendernefs, to regret the lofs of his father.

He was about this time fent to the public school of Utrecht, to be inftructed in the learned languages; and

*First printed in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1742.

it

it will convey no common idea of his capacity and industry to relate, that he had paffed through the claffes, and was admitted into the university in his thirteenth year.

This account of the rapidity of his progress in the firft part of his ftudies is fo ftupendous, that though it is attested by his friend, Dr. Ofterdyke, of whom it cannot be reasonably fufpected that he is himself deceived, or that he can defire to deceive others, it must be allowed far to exceed the limits of probability, if it be confidered, with regard to the methods of education practifed in our country, where it is not uncommon for the highest genius, and most comprehenfive capacity, to be entangled for ten years, in those thorny paths of literature, which Burman is reprefented to haye paffed in lefs than two; and we muft doubtless confefs the most skilful of our mafters much excelled by the address of the Dutch teachers, or the abilities of our greatest scholars far furpaffed by thofe of Bur

man.

But, to reduce this narrative to credibility, it is peceffary that admiration fhould give place to inquiry, and that it be discovered what proficiency in literature is expected from a ftudent, requefting to be admitted into a Dutch univerfity. It is to be obferved, that in the universities in foreign countries, they have profes fors of philology, or humanity, whofe employment is to inftruct the younger claffes in grammar, rhetoric, and languages; nor do they engage in the ftudy of philofophy, till they have paffed through a courfe of philological lectures and exercises, to which in fome places two years are commonly allotted.

VOL. IV.

I i

The

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