BINTANG, one of the Dutch East India islands, S.E. of Singapore, in Lat. 1.5. N. Long. 104.30. E. It is about 24 miles in length by 12 in breadth, and is surrounded by numerous rocky islets, which render the navigation dangerous. Its principal exports are pepper, rice, and particularly gambier, from its chief town Rhio on the S.W. coast. Pop. 15,000.
BIOGRAPHY (βίος, life, and γραφία, a writing), the history of a life. Of this species of literary composition examples are preserved in the earliest records of antiquity. In Sacred Scripture we have the history of the lives of Abraham, Joseph, David, &c. In the first rank in Grecian literature stand the Parallel Lives of Plutarch, which comprise the biographies of forty-six of the most celebrated Greeks and Romans who flourished prior to his own time. The Lives of the Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius, the Lives of Philosophers and Sophists by Eunapius, and the Lives of the Sophists by Philostratus, are the other principal works of this class in the Greek language. Among Roman writers of biography the principal are Cornelius Nepos and Suetonius. Besides these there are other writers whose works, though in a certain degree biographical, more strictly
belong to the province of history; as, for example, Sallust's Biography account of the conspiracy of Catiline, the Commentaries of Julius Caesar, and Quintus Curtius's account of the expedition of Alexander.
In all civilized countries biography has always formed a favourite subject of study. France has been especially prolific in biographical publications, and our own country can show a goodly array of volumes in this department of literature; and, indeed, the same may be said of Italy, Germany, and Spain. To enumerate even the principal works of this class, whether single lives or biographical collections and dictionaries, in any of these languages, would far exceed our limits. We shall therefore content ourselves with a few general reflections on the uses and peculiarities of biographical composition.
It is pleasant no less than instructive to be, as it were, introduced to the companionship of men who have been distinguished in the sphere which they occupied. If they be great and good men, we love to be made acquainted with the motives of their actions, to follow them in their wanderings, to mark the difficulties and the opposition they had to encounter in their honourable struggles through life, the energy and skill by which these were overcome, and the courage that animated them to persevere in their career of usefulness and honour.
If the author honestly exhibit the failings as well as the excellences of his subject, the reader will be warned of the quicksands and dangers that beset the path of life; and should he succeed in portraying aright the attractive lineaments of a virtuous character, he will insensibly arouse in the mind of the reader aspirations after the excellences which he is led to admire. The mind has a tendency to assimilate to the character of those with whom we associate; and to peruse the memoirs of wise and good men is living for the time in their company.
Every man, whatever be his sphere in life, has an influence for good or for evil on the society around him; and he who gives to the world the history of an exemplary life, reproduces in a certain degree the influence which had been extinguished by the hand of death. The biographer not only revives the lost influence, but by the circulation of his narrative he becomes the medium of more extended usefulness, and in some degree a benefactor of mankind.
Where personal character and habits form the principal subject of interest, a stranger stands at too great a distance to give to his portrait a faithful outline or correct colouring; a true picture can only be drawn by one whose friendly intercourse gave opportunity of marking the peculiar characteristics of his subject.
Autobiography, or memoirs of one's self, is preferable to biography only when the writer has something to communicate, by way of confession or explanation, of which no other person is cognisant. But it is almost impossible, nor is it perhaps desirable, that an autobiographer should disclose with unflinching impartiality the whole particulars of his life, and unveil the real motives of his actions.
"Thus conscience does make cowards of us all."
Nevertheless, in autobiography concealment itself is a species of disclosure. The moment a man begins to speak of himself, however cautious his mode of expression, the discerning reader will have little difficulty in appreciating his real character and the quality of his actions. What reader is blind to the bad temper, meanness, and impracticableness of Rousseau, notwithstanding his cunning attempts to disguise them? The autobiographer always betrays himself when he least suspects it: he exhibits his greatest weakness when he flatters himself that he is putting forth his strength. The task of the autobiographer is not only delicate but difficult. How frequently does the consciousness of sitting for one's portrait to another alter at once the
whole demeanour; but still more marked is the change when a man becomes the limner of his own mental likeness. In short, the obstacles to a successful execution of this experiment are almost insuperable.
Of autobiographies which interest principally as histories of the mind, the examples are rare; but those which are intended to amuse or instruct, as delineations of the times in which the writer lived, are innumerable. Of biography of all kinds the same may be said. The unparalleled increase of this department of literature in our own time may be regarded as one of the most characteristic features of the age; and, as must therefore be the case, the number of obscure or unimportant lives thus chronicled forms an enormous proportion to the histories that are truly deserving of record.