(Gregorio), an eminent Italian writer, was descended of a family which once made a considerable figure at Bologna: Jerom, his father, was page to prince Charles de Medicis; served some time in the troops of the grand duke as captain of foot; and settling at Milan, married there in 1628. He was afterward governor of Almantea in Calabria, and died at Salerno in 1639. Our author was born at Milan in 1630, studied under the Jesuits at Cofenza, and was afterward sent by an uncle to Rome, who would have him enter into the church; but he being adverse to it, went into Geneva, where he studied the government and the religion there. Thence he went to Lausanne; and contracting an acquaintance with John Anthony Guerin, an eminent physician, lodged at his house, made profession of the Calvinist religion, and married his daughter. He settled at Geneva; where he spent almost twenty years, carrying on a correspondence with learned men, especially those of Italy. Some contests obliged him to leave that city in 1679; upon which he went to France, and then into England, where he was received with great civility by Charles II. who, after his first audience, made him a present of a thousand crowns, with a promise of the place of historiographer. He wrote there the History of England; but that work not pleasing the court on account of his too great liberty in writing, he was ordered to leave the kingdom. He went to Amsterdam in 1682, and was honoured with the place of historiographer to that city. He died suddenly in 1701. He was a man of indefatigable application, as the multiplicity of his works show. The principal of these are, 1. The universal monarchy of Louis XIV. 2. The life of Pope Sixtus V. 3. The life of Philip II. king of Spain. 4. The life of the emperor Charles V. 5. The life of Elizabeth, queen of England. 6. The history of Oliver Cromwell. 7. The history of Great Britain, 5 vols 12mo. 8. The history of Geneva, &c.