BROWN

BROWN, William Laurence, born at Utrecht on the 7th of January 1755, was the son of the Rev. William Brown, minister of the English church in that city, and of his wife Janet Ogilvie, daughter of the Rev. George Ogilvie, minister of Kirriemuir. The father, having been appointed professor of ecclesiastical history in the university of St Andrews, returned to his native country in the year 1757; and the son was in due time sent to the grammar school, but his early education was chiefly of a more domestic nature. The professor was regarded as a great proficient in Latin literature, and his public lectures were

partly delivered in that language. At the early age, we may safely say at the too early age, of twelve, his son became a student in the university. It is still a prevalent error in the same country, to send boys to college at a period of life when they are scarcely prepared for a high form in a well-appointed grammar school; and till we depart from this common practice, we shall have too much reason to regret the condition of our public seminaries of learning. Brown was however a youth of superior talents, and he possessed some domestic advantages beyond the ordinary lot. The branches of study to which he chiefly devoted his attention were classical literature, logic, and ethics; and notwithstanding his premature age, he passed through his academic course with no small distinction. Of the prizes distributed by the chancellor of that period, the earl of Kinnoull, he obtained a greater number than fell to the share of any other competitor. Two of his college friends were William Thomson, LL.D., well known in the literary world, and Mr Gray, who afterwards resided in a diplomatic capacity at some of the courts of Germany. When he was of five years standing, he became a student of divinity; and after a further residence of two years, namely in 1774, he removed to the university of Utrecht, where he not only prosecuted the study of theology, but likewise of the civil law. Leyden and Utrecht had long been eminently distinguished as schools of jurisprudence; and Mr Brown, whose views were liberal and enlarged, perceived the various advantages which a knowledge of the Roman law confers, not merely upon the professional lawyer, but even upon the classical scholar. From this study he frequently declared that he had derived essential benefit.

His uncle, Dr Robert Brown, had succeeded as minister of the English church at Utrecht; and after his decease, which took place in the year 1777, the magistrates of that city, in compliance with the general wishes of the congregation, offered the vacant charge to his young relation. This invitation he finally accepted, though not without some degree of reluctance. After having spent nearly a year in Scotland, where he was licensed and ordained by the presbytery of St Andrews, he was admitted minister of the English church at Utrecht in the month of March 1778. His congregation was highly respectable, but at the same time was far from being numerous, and consequently his sphere of professional utility was very circumscribed. We are informed that although the congregation seldom exceeded forty persons, his preparation for the pulpit was not less assiduous than at Aberdeen, where he had to address a larger audience; for he was of opinion that the minister of the gospel who cannot find, in the dignity and importance of his office, and in his attachment to the spiritual interests of his flock, however small, a stimulus to exertion sufficiently powerful, will never find it in what is termed a wider field, or what is considered as a more important station. As it was only incumbent upon him to preach once every Sunday, he possessed a sufficient degree of literary leisure; and he increased his income as well as his avocations by receiving pupils into his house. He was intrusted with the education of many young men of rank and fortune; nor is it superfluous to mention that one of these was the present Lord Dacre, of whom he has spoken in very favourable terms. His character and conduct were such as could not fail to secure the cordial attachment of his own little flock: he gradually extended his acquaintance among individuals distinguished by their talents and learning, as well as by their station and influence; and he enlarged his sphere of knowledge and observation by various excursions in France, Germany, and Switzerland. On the 28th of May 1786, he married his own cousin, Anne Eliza-

beth Brown, the daughter of his immediate predecessor. This excellent woman, who was likewise a native of Holland, became the mother of five sons and four daughters, and all of them still survive.

At an early period of his life he had begun to distinguish himself by his superior talents, and by his superior proficiency in various branches of knowledge. The curators of the Stolpian Legacy at Leyden, appropriated to the encouragement of theological learning, having in the year 1783 proposed as the subject of their annual prize that most difficult of all questions, the origin of evil, he appeared in the list of twenty-five competitors. The first prize was awarded to Joseph Paap de Fagoras, a learned Hungarian; but the second honour, namely, that of publication at the expense of the trust, was adjudged to the dissertation of Mr Brown. It was accordingly printed among the memoirs of the society, under the title of "Disputatio de Fabrica Mundi, in quo Mala insunt, Naturæ Dei perfectissimæ haud repugnante." Other honours awaited him about the same period. He had formerly taken the degree of A. M. at St Andrews, and in 1784 the same university created him D. D. On three different occasions he obtained the medals awarded by the Teylerian Society at Haarlem for the best compositions in Latin, Dutch, French, or English, on certain prescribed subjects. His essay on scepticism obtained the gold medal in 1786, his dissertation on the immortality of the soul the silver medal in 1787, and his essay on the natural equality of men the silver medal in 1792. The dissertation, which was written in Latin, has never been printed, but the two English essays were in due time given to the public. "An Essay on the Folly of Scepticism, the Absurdity of Dogmatizing on Religious Subjects, and the proper Medium to be observed between these two extremes." Lond. 1788, 8vo. "An Essay on the natural Equality of Men, the Rights that result from it, and the Duties which it imposes." Edinb. 1793, 8vo. The latter work, which was the most successful of all his publications, was reprinted at London in the course of the following year. Many of us are old enough to remember the political and intellectual fermentation of that eventful period, when the wildest reveries of one class of men were opposed by the superannuated bigotry of another. Dr Brown's work, although it evinces sufficient liberality, is at the same time sober and discriminating: it was considered as an able and a seasonable discussion of topics which had been so egregiously perverted; it even attracted the attention of the British government, and had no small influence in preparing the way for his subsequent preferment.

Before this period he had been appointed to a professorship in the university of Utrecht. He had for some time been involved in considerable difficulties, in consequence of the civil commotions which arose between the partizans of the house of Nassau and those who delighted in the name of patriots. He was led to regard the authority and influence of the prince as the best security against the tyranny of the aristocracy, and he accordingly became a decided adherent of the Orange party.¹ Although he was not exposed to any direct molestation on account of his political opinions and connexions, yet during the temporary triumph of the opposite party, he found himself placed in a situation both precarious and harassing. In

the expectation of removing himself beyond their power, he began to cast an anxious glance towards the land of his fathers; but after he had repaired to London with the view of obtaining some literary or ecclesiastical appointment in Scotland, the armed interposition of the Prussians occasioned a sudden change in the government of Holland. The friends of Dr Brown had now regained their ascendancy, and were anxious to testify their approbation of his public conduct and personal merit: the states and the magistrates of Utrecht jointly instituted a professorship of moral philosophy and ecclesiastical history, and appointed him to this new office. The lectures were to be delivered in the Latin language; and two courses, to be continued during a session of nearly eight months, were to be commenced after an interval of not many weeks. So great an effort was very prejudicial to his health, and laid the foundation of complaints by which he was frequently harassed during the remainder of his life.

On entering upon the duties of his office, he pronounced an inaugural oration, which was immediately published under the title of "Oratio de Religionis et Philosophiæ Societate et Concordia maxime salutari." Traj. ad Rhen. 1788, 4to. Two years afterwards he was nominated rector of the university; and on depositing his temporary dignity, he pronounced an "Oratio de Imaginatione, in Vitæ Institutione, regunda." Traj. ad Rhen. 1790, 4to. During this interval he had been offered the Greek professorship at St Andrews; but the curators of the university of Utrecht induced him, by a promise of augmenting his salary, to retain a situation in which he had acquitted himself with eminent ability. To his other offices was now added the professorship of the law of nature; a branch of study to which a great degree of attention had long been devoted in the universities of Holland and Germany. It has usually been conjoined with the law of nations, and taught by members of the law faculty; but we have already seen that the previous studies of Dr Brown had been partly juridical, and indeed this department is most intimately connected with ethics. By the professors of moral philosophy in the Scottish universities, particularly by Dr Hutcheson, and his predecessor Mr Carmichael, the law of nature was at one period regularly discussed as an essential part of their course; nor were the general principles of law excluded from the ethical course of a more recent professor of eminence, the late Dr Ferguson.

Dr Brown resided at Utrecht, and discharged his public duties with credit and reputation, till the war which followed the French revolution finally drove him from the place of his nativity. After a long interval of painful anxiety and suspense, he was at length impelled, by the rapid approach of the invading army, to seek a place of refuge. In the course of a very severe winter, he embarked in the month of January 1795, and with his wife and five children, together with some other relations, quitted the coast of Holland in an open boat, and landed in England after a stormy passage. Having proceeded to London, he experienced such a reception as was due to his literary talents and moral worth. During the late Lord Auckland's embassy at the Hague, he had formed more than a common acquaintance with that nobleman, who was himself a person of literature, and a judge of li-

terary merit: his Principles of Penal Law are a respectable monument of his intellectual attainments, and he published other works of a more temporary nature. Having conceived a very favourable opinion of the professor, he had some years before recommended him to the notice of Dr Moore, archbishop of Canterbury; and it was to their united influence that he was chiefly indebted for the honourable station in which he terminated his long and useful life. A distant prospect of succeeding to the divinity chair at Aberdeen had presented itself at a much earlier period. Dr Campbell, who was bending beneath the load of years, had expressed a wish to resign his offices. The proposal of a pension, which his public services had well earned, and the nomination of a successor with whose acquirements he was duly acquainted, now led to the completion of such an arrangement as he entirely approved: he first resigned the professorship of divinity, and in the summer of 1795 the magistrates of Aberdeen presented Dr Brown to that chair; the office of principal of Marischal College having been vacated soon afterwards, he received a presentation from the crown, and entered upon his new functions at the commencement of the ensuing session. With his distinguished predecessor he formed a most cordial friendship, which however was suspended by the feeble thread of a very lengthened life. Dr Campbell died in the ensuing month of April, and Dr Brown honoured his memory by a funeral sermon, which was immediately printed. Aberdeen, 1796, 8vo. This venerable person, long the chief ornament of the university, was a man of great acuteness and perspicacity, united with accurate and extensive learning: his Philosophy of Rhetoric is a work of very singular merit, and the value of his theological writings has been universally acknowledged. Dr Beattie, an elegant and accomplished writer of verse as well as prose, was still a member of the same college; and to these conspicuous names we must add that of Dr Hamilton, professor of mathematics, whose Inquiry into the National Debt first exposed the futility and delusion of the sinking fund.

This new professorship imposed upon him a very serious task. He composed, as we are informed, a course of theological lectures, extending over five sessions. After a review of the different systems of religion, those laying claim to a divine origin, he discussed most amply the evidences and doctrines of natural religion. He then proceeded to the evidences of revealed religion, of which he gave a very full and learned view. The Christian scheme formed the next subject of an enquiry, in which the peculiar doctrines of Christianity were very extensively unfolded. Christian ethics were also explained; and it formed part of his original plan to treat of all the great controversies that have agitated the religious world. This portion of the course was not however completed.—It is observable that, in this extensive outline, no department is allotted to biblical literature, which in the Scottish universities has been too much neglected. But in King's College two successive professors of the same family assigned a particular part of their academic course to this very important subject; and the younger of them, Dr Gilbert Gerard, further recommended the study by the publication of his Institutes of Biblical Criticism, printed at Edinburgh in the year 1808.

Dr Brown soon became a very conspicuous member of the church of Scotland. He was an impressive preacher, a prompt and forcible speaker, and some of his appearances in the general assembly produced a powerful effect. The manly temperament of his mind rendered him incapable of cowering to mere rank and station; and his first aspect, with the first sound of his voice, conveyed to those who saw and heard him the idea that he was no ordinary person. His speech on the case of Dr Arnot, delivered

in the first assembly of which he was a member, classed him among the best public speakers of the time. It was printed in a separate form, under the title of "Substance of a Speech delivered in the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, on Wednesday the 28th of May 1800, on the Question respecting the Settlement, at Kingsburn, of the Rev. Dr Robert Arnot, Professor of Divinity in St Mary's College, St Andrews." Edinburgh, 1800, 8vo. His public opposition to pluralities in the church has very frequently been represented as inconsistent with his private practice; but this inconsistency was less real than apparent. The office of principal, though honourable, was not very lucrative: for a considerable time it had generally been united with the professorship of divinity; but in one instance it was held by a layman, Dr Blackwell, the learned professor of Greek. And for the same reason, the want of an adequate endowment, the divinity professorship had been conjoined with the charge of a minister of the West Church; but the professor was only bound to preach alternately with his colleague, and was exempted from all the other routine of parochial duties. Most of the other preferments subsequently bestowed upon him were altogether unconnected with professional exertion.

For several years he regularly attended the assembly, and, steadily adhering to the popular party, took a conspicuous share in its public deliberations; but it has been truly remarked that although he could be roused to the most lively interest in general questions, he felt no inclination to learn or to practise the tactics of a leader in the ecclesiastical courts. The discharge of his academic and pastoral duties was better adapted to his taste and disposition. These duties he discharged with much zeal and ability; and his ordinary habits being sedentary and studious, he found sufficient leisure for his favourite pursuits of literature. Together with genuine piety and theological knowledge, he was particularly anxious to disseminate a taste for classical learning. It was his practice to deliver a Latin oration to the professors and students of his college at the commencement of each session; and he bestowed particular attention on the style of the Latin exercises read in the divinity hall.

Of the energy of his pulpit discourses he has left an adequate specimen in his printed volume of Sermons. Edinburgh, 1803, 8vo. But the most serious of his intellectual efforts was the essay which obtained Burnet's first prize, amounting to £1250. The competitors were about fifty in number; and the judges were Dr Gerard, professor of divinity, Dr Glennie, professor of moral philosophy, and Dr Hamilton, professor of mathematics. The second prize, amounting to £400, was awarded to Dr Summer, the present bishop of Chester. Dr Brown's work was published under the title of "An Essay on the Existence of a Supreme Creator," &c. Aberdeen, 1816, 2 vols. 8vo. The last considerable work which he committed to the press was "A comparative View of Christianity, and of the other Forms of Religion which have existed, and still exist, in the World, particularly with regard to their moral Tendency." Edinburgh, 1826, 2 vols. 8vo. This is a production of varied learning and of solid merit, but being the result of mature thought, and being written in a sober and manly style, it was less calculated to attract the mobility of readers; for there is a fashion in theology as well as in novels.

In the year 1800 Dr Brown had been appointed chaplain in ordinary to his majesty, and in 1804 dean of the chapel royal, and of the most ancient and most noble order of the Thistle. He was last of all appointed to read the Gordon lecture in Marischal College, and he delivered his inaugural discourse on the 22d of November 1825. It was published under the title of a "Lecture introductory

to the Course of Practical Religion, instituted by the Will of John Gordon, Esq. of Murtle." Aberd. 1826, 8vo.

All his publications have not yet been enumerated. Before he quitted Utrecht, he had published a poem entitled "An Essay on Sensibility;" and at a more recent period he sent to the press "Philemon, or the Progress of Virtue; a Poem." Edinb. 1809, 2 vols. 8vo. Beside the works which we have mentioned, he printed several detached sermons, and likewise the following tracts. An Examination of the Causes and Conduct of the present War with France, and of the most effectual Means of obtaining a speedy, a secure, and an honourable Peace: together with some Observations on the late Negotiations at Lisle. Lond. 1798, 8vo. This pamphlet was published without the author's name. Letters to the Rev. Dr. George Hill, Principal of St Mary College, St Andrews. Aberd. 1801, 8vo. Remarks on certain Passages of "An Examination of Mr Dugald Stewart's Pamphlet, by one of the Ministers of Edinburgh;" relative to subjects nearly connected with the Interests of Religion and Learning. Aberd. 1806, 8vo. A Letter to George Hill, D.D. Principal of St Mary's College, St Andrews; occasioned by the publication of the Substance of his Speech in the General Assembly, May 23, 1807. Edinb. 1807, 8vo. Nobilissimi Viri, Georgii Marchionis de Huntly, Domini de Gordon, Provinciae Aberdonensis Praefecti Regii, Academiae Marischallianae Cancellarii, xxii^o Decembris die anno Christi M.DCCC.XV^o inaugurandi Formula atque Modus. Aberdoniae, 1816, 4to. Librorum Societas; Carmen, recitatum in Comitibus Academicis quae prima post Ferias aestivas an. M.DCCC.XIX. habebantur. Aberd. 1830, 8vo.

Although his health had never been robust, and he reached a very advanced period of life, he retained his mental faculties till the day of his death; and his dissolution was rather occasioned by the gradual decay of his bodily frame, than by any acute suffering. For two years his strength had imperceptibly declined; and although the decline became rapid about a week before his decease, yet he did not relinquish his usual employments. Reduced as he was to extreme weakness, he wrote part of a letter to two of his sons on the very last day of his mortal existence: to his third son, the Greek professor in Marischal College, he dictated a few sentences within six hours of his decease. Having been assisted to move from his bed-chamber to the parlour, he continued till midnight in the society of his family: after joining in their domestic devotions, he was with much difficulty removed to his bed; he then slept quietly for three hours, and having repeatedly spoken in a cool and intelligible manner, he calmly breathed his last at four in the morning. So gently was the spark of life extinguished, that his family did not mark the precise time. He died on the eleventh of May 1830, in the seventy-sixth year of his age. It has been faithfully stated that the regrets of his fellow-citizens, and of a numerous circle of friends in various parts of the kingdom, have paid to his character the most affecting and unequivocal tribute which can be offered to the memory of those who have neither lived unnoticed nor died unhonoured. And we cannot refrain from adding, in the words of Minucius Felix, "Nec immerito discedens vir eximius et sanctus, immensum sui desiderium nobis reliquit."

Dr Brown was of the middle size, and had a very intelligent countenance. He had been much accustomed to elegant society, and his manners were easy and polished, but, in a certain sense, he never could be initiated in the ways of the world: he possessed an unusual singleness of heart, and so habitual a regard for what is upright and manly in the human character, that he not unfrequently displayed his caution less prominently than his honesty. He was not without considerable warmth of temper, but at the

same time he was open, sincere, and generous: nor is this ardour and intensity of feeling so easily separated from quickness of discernment and vigour of perception. Men of a colder temperament, possessing less than one half of his moral excellence, may pass through life with a very decent share of respectability. His talents and learning are not unknown to the public; but his warmth of affection, his rectitude of purpose, and his fervour of piety, are best known to those who had frequent opportunities of seeing him in the circle of his own family, or in the house of an intimate friend. To an unusual share of classical learning Dr Brown added a very familiar acquaintance with several of the modern languages. Latin and French he wrote and spoke with great facility. His successive study of ethics, jurisprudence, and theology, had habituated his mind with the most important topics of speculation, relating to the present condition of man and to his future destiny. His political sentiments were liberal and expansive, not cautiously circumscribed by one party-circle, or coldly limited to one small spot of earth, but connected with ardent aspirations after the general improvement and happiness of the human race. The liberality of his theological opinions was widely removed from indifference. His reading in divinity had been very extensive: he was well acquainted with the works of British and foreign theologians, particularly of those who wrote in the Latin language during the seventeenth century. In his more elaborate publications he evinces no mean portion of erudition, ingenuity, and judgment; but the intellectual vigour and promptitude which he displayed in conversation, were such as to impress many of his friends with a still higher opinion of his capabilities than they derived from any of the numerous works which he communicated to the public. (x.)