latter days will be rendered comfortable by a provision legally secured for them. They are further stimulated to perseverance by the prospect of advancement in the church; few instances having occurred, in which the conductors of great schools, after spending some years in the honourable discharge of their painful office, have been passed over without some promotion. But in the present case, the tutors at Hackney were doomed to incessant fatigue, without the least chance of realizing a fund for their future support.

Every thing here was capricious; and the instability of the fabric soon became apparent in the declension of subscribers, the paucity of scholars, and the secession of instruct

ors.

Dr. Kippis, who was now far advanced in years, left Hackney to be near his congregation in Westminster; and Dr. Priestley, who, after his settlement as the successor of Dr. Price, had taken an active part in the management of the college, quitted the kingdom in disgust, to end his days in America. Thus Dr. Rees, having now passed the meridian of life, was left almost alone, surrounded with difficulties, oppressed by labours, and perplexed by anxieties. It should also be observed, that the period was remarkably gloomy, and the aspect of the times very unfavourable to an institution of this description. The horrors of the French revolution had filled the minds of many dissenters, as well as of other members of the community, with the dread of witnessing similar scenes in England. The political sentiments avowed by Dr. Price in his famous revolutionary sermon, increased the apprehension; and the allusion to that discourse by Mr. Burke, / in his celebrated "Reflections on the French Revolution," spread the alarm from one end of the kingdom to the other; insomuch, that numbers, whose doctrinal opinions coincided with those inculcated at Hackney, drew back from counten, ancing the academical establishment there, lest they should be suspected of republicanism.

Further than this, it cannot be denied, that the religious principles of the dissenters, speaking of them as a general body, were now undergoing a very material change; or ra

ther, reverting fast to the doctrinal standard of the old Puritans and Nonconformists. About the time when the college at Hackney was projecting, some writers of powerful intellect had accused the dissenters with having abandoned the faith of their forefathers. This occasioned some warm discussion; and particular congregations, in various districts, were adduced as proofs that the principles of the dissenters remained the same. In reply, it was observed, that these insulated societies were so far from furnishing a refutation of the charge, that, on the contrary, they strengthened and proved it; especially when it appeared, that the fountains of knowledge were entirely under the direction of Arians or Socinians. The agitation of this question was far from being favourable to the new college at Hackney; and while the institution was in this stage of decay, the death of Dr. Kippis put an end to it entirely.

On this melancholy loss, Dr. Rees preached a sermon at the meeting in the Old Jewry; in which discourse he drew the character of Dr. Kippis very ably, and then concluded as follows:

"Such are the general outlines of the character and labours of our deceased friend. The portrait, I am sensible, is not sufficiently just to the original. In delineating a character which exhibits so many excellencies, and so few defects, none can suspect me of approaching to adulation. My respect for him was great. I honoured him as a father.

I loved him as

a brother. But my affection, I am confident, has not misled my judgment. By the favour of Providence, which marks the bounds of our habitation, I was led in early life into an intimate acquaintance with him. Our acquaintance, as cotutors and co-adjutors in public business, ripened into an established friendship; and our friendship continued, without so much as a momentary interruption, and with increasing attachment, for more than thirty-two years, to the day of his death. It must have been my own fault, if I have not derived advantage from his extensive literary knowledge, from the wisdom of his counsels, and from the exemplariness of his

conduct. No apology, I trust, will be thought necessary for introducing myself on this occasion. As it was my ambition to cultivate the friendship I enjoyed, it is my pride to have it publicly known, that I valued that friendship as one of the chief honours and pleasures of my life. The friend I have lost cannot be easily replaced."

Having thus brought the history of this short-lived, but once noted, institution to a termination, we must now notice the literary career of Dr. Rees, which many probably will be disposed to regret, with us, was ever so interrupted.

About the year 1776 or 1777, the proprietors of Chambers's Cyclopædia having been disappointed in procuring a qualified person to superintend a new edition of that important and valuable compilation, were recommended to employ Dr. Rees, who undertook the Herculean labour; and in the course of the following year, the first weekly number made its appearance. The publication took up near nine years, being completed, in four folio volumes, in 1786; about which time, the learned editor was chosen a fellow of the Royal Society. As this undertaking forms an interesting feature in the history of general literature, we trust to be excused for giving a brief sketch of the origin of the Dictionary, with some account of its improvements, and the imitations to which it has given

rise.

The first performance of the kind, was the "Lexicon Technicum" of Dr. John Harris, which appeared in the year 1708, in two volumes folio; and was afterwards enlarged by a supplemental volume; the last edition being in 1735. This Dictionary possesses great merit, and may, even now, as far as relates to the mathematics, be consulted with advantage. It was by frequently consulting this work in the shop of his master, Senex, the globe-maker, that Ephraim Chambers was led to conceive the idea of a more comprehensive and general dictionary of science. Having formed his plan, he quitted the counter to devote himself entirely to the execution of his project, and in 1728 appeared the first edition of the Cyclo

pædia, in two folio volumes, dedicated to the King. The reputation which the author gained by this performance, procured his election into the Royal Society; and in 1738 a new edition came out, which sold so rapidly that the very next year a third impression was called for; which was almost as quickly followed by a fourth in 1741; and a fifth in 1746. After this, and while a sixth edition was in contemplation, the proprietors thought it might be supplied by a supplement in two more volumes, for which purpose Mr. George Lewis Scott, mathematical tutor to His late Majesty, and the indefatigable Dr. John Hill, were selected as the compilers. In this state the Cyclopædia continued some years, when the proprietors formed the resolution of blending the original and supplement together in one alphabet, with additions. To execute this design, Owen Ruffhead was engaged: but he had not proceeded far, when he died; and the work stood still for a considerable time. Dr. Kippis was the next person, we believe, to whom the intended new edition was intrusted; but finding the labour above his strength, he relinquished it, and was succeeded by Dr. Rees.

In the "Biographia Britannica," under the article Chambers, Dr. Kippis pays this just compliment to his friend: : "It would have been difficult to have found a single person more equal to the completing of the Cyclopædia than Dr. Rees; who, to a capacious mind, to a large compass of general knowledge, and an unremitting application, unites that intimate acquaintance with all the branches of mathematics and philosophy, without which the other qualifications would be ineffectual. The success of the work, thus improved, and digested into one alphabet, in four volumes folio, hath exceeded the most sanguine expectations. This last and best edition of the Cyclopædia began to be published in weekly numbers in 1778, and at the time of writing this article, (1783) the third volume was finished. The sale is at the rate of four or five thousand numbers in a week, and the demand is continually increasing. The names, therefore, of Chambers and

Rees will be handed down with great reputation to posterity; the first as the original author, and the second as the completer, of this grand undertaking."

When the popularity of the work is considered, it is not surprising that it should give rise to imitations. The principal of these were, "Barrow's Dictionary of Arts and Sciences," in two volumes folio, 1751; "A new and complete Dictionary of Arts and Sciences," in four large octavo volumes, published without a name, but compiled chiefly by Benjamin Martin, in 1763; "The Complete Dictionary of Arts and Sciences," by Temple Croker and others, three volumes folio, in the same year; "The Encyclopædia Britannica," originally published in three volumes, quarto, at Edinburgh, in 1773; and progressively extended to above twenty volumes. Since that time, the number of rival publications, in different forms, has multiplied to an amazing extent. But by far the most celebrated work of all that has hitherto arisen upon the model of Chambers, is the " Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire Raisonné des Sciences," begun at Paris in 1743, by Diderot, with whom, soon afterwards, was associated D'Alembert; the latter a mathematician of the first order, and the other a second-rate metaphysician; but both sceptics, if not indeed positive atheists. From translating the English dictionary, they proceeded to form an entire new one, and at length procured co-adjutors in the different branches of literature, by whose united efforts the work grew to the enormous magnitude of twenty-one folio volumes, without reckoning those which contain the plates. The third edition, in thirty-six quarto volumes, appeared at Geneva in 1779; after which another, still more extended, was begun at Paris, the joint labour of Lalande, Condorcet, Monge, and other distinguished literary and scientific cha

racters,

Thus the old saying, that the French invent and the English improve, was reversed; for here, the Encyclopedists were certainly the copiers of an original desigu; and it is only to be regretted, that, when they adopted the plan of Chambers, they did not at the same time observe the same integrity of