Jerome, one of the most learned men of his time, was born at Verona in the year 1483. Two singular circumstances are related of him in his infancy; one that his lips adhered so closely when he came into the world, that a surgeon was obliged to divide them with his incision knife; and the other, that his mother was killed by lightning, whilst lie, though in her arms at the moment, escaped unhurt. Fracastor was a man of such admirable parts, and made so great progress in every thing he undertook, that in time he became eminently skilled not only in the belles lettres, but in most arts and sciences.
---
1 Character of Mr Fox, by Sir James Mackintosh. Published in Dr Parr's Collection, entitled Characters of Mr Fox, by Philopatris Varicencis.
2 This is true of Mr Fox in the latter part of his life only. Till his separation from his old friends in 1793 his mind was too full of political subjects not to take an eager part in political conversation even in private; and, when a young man, instead of being somewhat inactive in conversation, he was very much the reverse. Dr Johnson was mistaken in supposing him habitually silent when in company, and has assigned a reason for his supposed taciturnity quite inconsistent with his real character. He was a poet, a philosopher, a physician, an astronomer, and a mathematician; and he was also a man of consequence in his time, as appears from the fact of Paul III. having made use of his authority to remove the council of Trent to Bologna, under the pretext of a contagious distemper, which, as Fracastor declared, made it no longer safe to continue at Trent. He was intimately acquainted with Cardinal Bembo, Julius Scaliger, and most of the great men of his time. Fracastor died of apoplexy at Casi, near Verona, on the 8th of August 1559; and in 1559 the town of Verona erected a statue in honour of him. Fracastor was the author of many works, both as a poet and a physician; but never man was more disinterested in both capacities, for as a physician he practised without fees, and as a poet he was indifferent to fame, after which the tuneful tribe in general so ardently aspire. It is owing to this that we have so little of his poetry in comparison of what he wrote; and that, not to mention other compositions, his odes and epigrams, which were read in manuscript with infinite admiration, have now been lost. His medical productions are as follow: 1. *Syphilidus, sive Morbi Gallici libri tres*, Verona, 1530, in 4to, afterwards frequently reprinted; 2. *De Vini Temperatura*, Venice, 1534, in 4to; 3. *Homocentricorum, sive de Stellis liber unus*, and *De Caussis Criticorum Dierum libellas*, Venice, 1535, in 4to; 4. *De Sympathia et Antipathia Rerum liber unus*; *De Contagionibus et contagiosis Morbis, et eorum curatione, libri tres*, Venice, 1546, in 4to. All the poetical productions of Fracastor were collected and printed at Padua, 1728, 8vo.
His complete works appeared for the first time under the title of *Hieronymi Frascatorii Veronensis Opera Omnia, in unum proxime post illius mortem collecta; accesserunt Andrea Naugeri patriae Veneti Orationes dua, Carminaque nonnulla*. Venetis apud Juntas, 1555, in 4to. Besides the works already mentioned, there are included in this collection the three following, which appeared for the first time, viz.: 1. *Naugerius, sive de Poetica dialogus; Turria, sive de Intellectione dialogus, libri ii.*; 2. *Alcon, sive de cura Canum Venaticorum; 3. Frascatorius, sive de Anima dialogus*.