Heinrich, a German divine, was born at Embsen in 1583. His father was minister of the church of Embsen, and early destined his son to the same profession. In the year 1602, after a grammatical course, he was sent to the university of Herborn. There he studied with so much assiduity and success, that he had the honour of being appointed tutor to the three young counts of Nassau, Solms, and Isenburg, who studied with the elector prince palatine, first at Sedan, and afterwards at Heidelberg. Alting was appointed preceptor to the prince in 1608, and was chosen to accompany the elector into England. There, among the number of celebrated men to whose acquaintance he was introduced, was Dr Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury. In 1613, returning to Heidelberg after the marriage of the elector with the princess of England, he was appointed professor of theology, and in 1616, director of the College of Wisdom. In 1618, along with Scultetus, he represented the university in the Synod of Dort.

In 1622 Count Tilly took the city of Heidelberg, and devoted it to plunder. In order to escape the fury of the soldiers, Alting endeavoured to pass by a back door into the chancellor's house, which was under guard; but as he was entering, the commanding officer said to him,— "With this battle-axe I have to-day killed ten men, and

Alting, if I knew where to find him, should be the eleventh: who are you?" Alting, with singular presence of mind replied—"I am a teacher in the College of Wisdom." The officer took him under his protection; but the Jesuits unfortunately taking possession of the house next day, left the generous officer no time, at his departure, to take care of the teacher in the College of Wisdom. Alting evaded the hands of the Jesuits by hiding himself in a garret; and a cook of the electoral court, who happened to be employed by Count Tilly in the kitchen occupied by him in the chancellor's house, supplied him with food. In this perilous situation he remained till an opportunity offered of making his escape to Heilbronn, whither his family had been previously conducted.

But Alting was now as much harassed by ecclesiastical intolerance as he had formerly been endangered by military hostility. With the permission of the duke of Württemberg, he retired for a few months to Schorndorf; after the desolation of the palatinate by the victorious forces of Count Tilly.

In 1623 Alting retired with his family to Embsen, and afterwards followed to the Hague his late pupil, now king of Bohemia. Such was the unfeigned esteem of this prince for Alting that he still retained him as preceptor to his eldest son, and prevented him from accepting the charge of the church at Embsen, and likewise of a professorship in the university of Franeker. In 1627, Alting, with some difficulty, obtained leave from his patron to remove to Groningen, where he was appointed to the chair of divinity; and there he continued to lecture with increasing reputation until his death, which took place in 1644. The ardent desire and repeated endeavours of several universities to appropriate to themselves the honour and benefit of his services, is the most unequivocal proof of the general esteem in which his character was held.

The states of Groningen refused to give their consent to his removal, when the university of Leyden solicited him to come and labour among them. But some time after, the prospect of extensive usefulness in re-establishing the university of Heidelberg, and restoring the churches of the palatinate, determined him to accept the office of professor of divinity and ecclesiastical senator, presented to him by Prince Lewis Philip. In the year 1634, amidst numerous hardships, to which the existing war exposed him, he set out for Heidelberg, and pursued his journey as far as Frankfurt; when the battle of Norlingen, in which the imperialists were victorious, rendered his further progress impracticable. He therefore with great difficulty returned to Groningen.

Alting was a man of eminent talents, extensive learning, and amiable dispositions, and always more solicitous to serve the public than to benefit himself. He was averse to quarrels and disputes about trifles, although no friend to the innovations introduced at this period by the Socinians; and, adhering to what he considered the plain doctrine of Scripture, he was equally desirous to avoid fanatical scrupulousness and sophistical subtlety. The productions of his pen are, Notae in Decadem Problematum Jacobi Behm, Heidelbergae, 1618, Notes on a Decade of Jacob Boehmen's Problems; Loci Communes, Common Places; Problemata, Problems; Explicatio Catecheseos Palatinae, Explanation of the Palatine Catechism; Exegesis Augustanae Confessionis, &c., Amst. 1647, Exposition of the Augsburg Confession; Methodus Theologiae Didacticae et Catecheticae, Amst. 1650, A Method of Didactic and Catechetic Theology. The Medulla Historiae Profanae, Marrow of Profane History, published under the name of Pareus, was written by Alting.

Alting, Jacob, son of the preceding, was born at Hei- delberg, in 1618. After the usual course of grammatical studies he became a student, and soon after professor of divinity in the university of Groningen. The oriental languages were his favourite studies, and in 1638 he put himself under the tuition of a Jewish rabbi at Emblem. Determining to take up his residence in England, he arrived there in 1640, and was admitted to clerical orders by Dr Prideaux, bishop of Worcester. By an offer of the Hebrew professorship in the university of Groningen, he was soon induced to alter his plan of life, and consequently returned to Germany in 1643. His active assiduity in the study of the languages, and his knowledge in other sciences, procured him universal esteem and great reputation as a scholar. About this time he received many academic honours; he was admitted doctor of philosophy, academic preacher, and last professor of divinity in conjunction with a colleague, Samuel des Marets, with whom, as being an admirer and follower of the subtleties of the scholastics, Alting had a long and painful controversy, which was only terminated by a formal reconciliation when Marets was on his deathbed.

By the permission of the curators of the university, Des Marets appeared as public accuser of Alting, and produced a long list of erroneous propositions to the divines of Leyden, for their opinion. The divines pronounced Alting innocent of heresy, but imprudently fond of innovation; and they declared Des Marets deficient in modesty and candour. Such was the protection given to Alting, that whenever any of the order of ecclesiastics proposed any further measures against him, they were immediately rejected by the civil power.

Alting died of a fever in 1679. The fondness which he showed for rabbinical learning, gave birth to the general report that he was inclined to become a Jew. His opinions, which seem to have excited more general attention than they deserve, may be seen at large in his writings, which were collected a few years after his death, and published in five volumes folio, by his pupil, the well-known Balthasar Bekker.

Menso, the elder, father of Heinrich Alting, a distinguished divine of the Reformed Church, was born in 1541, and died in 1612. He was president of the Consistory of the Calvinist church at Emblem, and took a prominent part in the controversy with the Lutheran party. His grandson, of the same name, was a burgomaster of Groningen, and wrote a valuable geographical work entitled Notitia Germaniae Inferioris, &c. He was born in 1636, and died in 1713.