John, D.D., an English divine, and ingenious writer, born at Rothbury in Northumberland in November 1715. He was the son of John Brown, a descendant of the Browns of Colstown, near Haddington; and who at the time of his son's birth was curate to Dr Tomlinson, rector of Rothbury. He was educated at St John's, Cambridge; and after taking the degree of bachelor of arts with great reputation, being senior wrangler, he returned to his father's house at Wigton; received deacon's and priest's orders from Sir George Fleming, bishop of Carlisle; and in 1739 went to Cambridge to take his degree of master of arts. In 1745 he distinguished himself as a volunteer in the king's service, and behaved with great intrepidity at the siege of Carlisle.

The attachment displayed by Brown to the royal cause and to the whig party, procured him the friendship of Dr Osbaldeston, afterwards bishop of Carlisle. This gentleman continued to be his friend through life; a remarkable fact, since the peculiarities of Brown's temper involved him in quarrels with almost all his acquaintances. When advanced to the see of Carlisle, Dr Osbaldeston appointed Brown one of his chaplains.

It was probably during his residence at Carlisle that Mr Brown wrote his poem entitled Honour, inscribed to Lord Viscount Lonsdale. His next poetical production was his Essay on Satire, addressed to Dr Warburton, to whom it was so acceptable, that he took Brown into his friendship. He also introduced him to Ralph Allen, Esq. of Prior Park, near Bath, who behaved to him with great generosity, and to whom in 1751 Brown dedicated his Essay on the characteristics of Lord Shaftesbury. In 1754 he was promoted by the Earl of Hardwicke to the living of Great Horksley in Essex; and in the following year took the degree of doctor of divinity at Cambridge. In this year also he published his tragedy of Barbarossa; which, under the management of Garrick, was acted with considerable applause, though when published it was sharply censured. This tragedy was followed by a second, entitled Athelstane, which was represented at Drury-Lane theatre. This was also well received by the public, but did not become so popular as Barbarossa.

In 1757 appeared his well-known Estimate of the Manners and Principles of the Times, which was shortly followed by a second volume, containing additional remarks on the ruling manners and principles, and on their public effects. This was treated with uncommon severity by the periodical critics; and such was the multitude of his antagonists, that he retired for a while into the country. In his retreat he wrote an explanatory defence of the work above mentioned.

In 1760 he published an Additional Dialogue of the Dead, between Pericles and Aristides; being a sequel to Lord Lyttleton's dialogue between Pericles and Cosmo. One design of this additional dialogue was to vindicate the measures of Mr Pitt, against whose administration Lord Lyttleton had been supposed to have thrown out some hints. His next work, in 1763, was the Care of Saul, a sacred ode; which was followed by A Dissertation on the Rise, Union, and Power, the Progressions, Separations, and Corruptions of Poetry and Music. This is one of the most pleasing of his performances, and abounds with a variety of critical discussions. In reply to various strictures on this piece, he wrote Remarks on some Observations on Dr Brown's Dissertation on Poetry and Music. In 1764 he published, in octavo, The History of the Rise and Progress of Poetry through its several Species; which is no more than the substance of the dissertation above mentioned. The same year he published a volume of sermons, dedicated to his patron Dr Oshaldston, bishop of London; but most of these had been separately published. In the beginning of 1765 he published Thoughts on Civil Liberty, Licentiousness, and Faction; and in conclusion prescribed a code of education, upon which Dr Priestley made remarks at the end of his Essay on the Course of a liberal Education for civil and active Life. The same year he published a sermon On the Female Character and Education, preached before the guardians of the asylum for deserted female orphans. His last work, published in 1766, was a Letter to the Rev. Dr Lowth, occasioned by his late "Letter to the Right Reverend Author of the Divine Legation of Moses," in which Dr Brown is pointed at as one of the extravagant adulaters of Bishop Warburton. Besides these works, Dr Brown published a poem on Liberty, and two or three anonymous pamphlets. Dr Brown, who had an hereditary tendency to insanity, and from early life had been subject at times to fits of excessive melancholy, put a period to his life on the 23rd of September 1766.

Brown, John, D.D., author of the Self-interpreting Bible, was born at Kerpoo in Perthshire in 1729. He was, for a great part of his life, minister of the United Secession church in Haddington. Though he had not enjoyed the advantages of a regular education, he speedily made himself master of the classical tongues, and gained a great reputation for learning, piety, and eloquence. David Hume, hearing him preach on one occasion, exclaimed, "That man preaches as if his Master were at his elbow." He died in 1787. The best of his works, which are very numerous, is his Self-interpreting Bible, a work that is still very popular in Scotland.

Brown, John, the founder of the Brunonian Theory of Physic, was born in 1735 at Lintlaws or at Preston, Berwickshire. While very young he was apprenticed to a weaver; but having a strong aversion for the drudgery of such a mechanical employment, he was placed at the grammar-school of Dunse, where he soon distinguished himself. His parents, who belonged to the religious body called Sekeders, were flattered with their son's rapid and successful progress in the Latin language, and through the benevolent assistance of his teacher (Mr Cruickshank), young Brown was destined to the ministerial office. But an accident, it is said, made him at once renounce this plan and the sect. Having, while at the grammar-school, been prevailed on to attend a meeting of synod held in the Established church at Dunse, young Brown was called upon to appear before the session of his congregation, and required either to submit to ecclesiastical censure or to suffer expulsion. He spared them all trouble by renouncing their communion, and joining the Established church.

Brown then became a private tutor in a gentleman's family in the country; and at the same time acted as an assistant in the grammar-school of Dunse, where he remained till about his twentieth year. He then went to Edinburgh, and after passing through the preliminary classes, entered himself as a student of divinity in the university. He supported himself for some time by private teaching; and then resumed his former labours as assistant in the grammar-school of Dunse for a year; but returning to Edinburgh about 1759, he finally renounced the study of theology, and commenced that of physic.

During his medical studies, he supported himself by giving private instructions in Latin to students of medicine, preparatory to the examinations, which formerly were conducted in that language; as well as by translating their theses into Latin. Thus occupied, he soon attracted the notice of Dr Cullen. This eminent man not only employed Brown as a tutor in his own family, but was assiduous in recommending him to others; and he likewise gave him permission to deliver to private pupils illustrations of his own public lectures. Brown now married, and received students to board in his house; but either through recklessness or misconduct, his affairs were soon involved in total bankruptcy. Irritated by this misfortune, and still more, perhaps, by the disappointment he experienced in regard to a medical chair in the university, from which he imagined he was excluded by the interference of Dr Cullen, he quarrelled with his friend and patron, and became from that moment a keen opponent of his doctrines.

It was in 1780 that Brown's Elements Medicinae appeared. It is a compendium of his opinions, which he continued for several years to illustrate by public lectures. The excitement produced by the appearance of this work, both in this country and on the Continent, seems now almost incredible; but although it has passed through numerous editions, and its doctrine is detailed in all systematic works on medicine, the Brunonian theory is now maintained by few. Mr Brown now proposed to become a medical practitioner; but as he had quarrelled with all the professors at Edinburgh, he took the degree of M.D. at St Andrews.

The terms, however, on which he lived with his medical brethren, and his intemperate habits, precluded him from all rational hopes of success, and he therefore removed to London in 1786; but after he had delivered one course of lectures he was cut off by apoplexy in October 1788.

Brown, Robert, a schismatic divine, the founder of the Brownists, a numerous sect of dissenters in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He was the son of Mr Anthony Brown of Tolthorpe in Rutlandshire, whose father obtained, by a charter of Henry VIII., the singular privilege of wearing his cap in the king's presence. Robert was educated at Cambridge, in Corpus Christi, or, according to Collier, at Bennet College, and was afterwards a schoolmaster in Southwark. About the year 1580 he began to promulgate his principles of dissent from the Established church; and the following year he preached at Norwich, where he soon attracted a numerous congregation. His violent abuse of the Church of England, and his pretensions to divine in- spiration, gained for him many followers among the ignorant and unwary. His sect daily increasing, Dr Freake bishop of Norwich, with other ecclesiastical commissioners, called him before them. Being insolent to the court, he was committed to the custody of the sheriff's officer, but was released at the intercession of his relative the lord treasurer Burghley. Brown now left the kingdom, and with permission of the States, settled at Middleburg in Zealand, where he formed a church after his own plan, and preached without molestation. In 1585 he returned to England; and at last fixed his residence at Northampton, where, for his indiscreet attempts to gain proselytes, he was cited by the Bishop of Peterborough, and, refusing to appear, was finally excommunicated for contempt. The solemnity of this censure, we are told, immediately effected his reformation. He moved for absolution, which he obtained, and from that time became a dutiful member of the Church of England. This happened about the year 1590; and, in a short time afterwards, Brown was preferred to a rectory in Northamptonshire, where he kept a curate to his duty, and where he might probably have died in peace; but having some dispute with the constable of his parish, he proceeded to blows, and was afterwards so insolent to the justice, that he was committed to Northampton jail, where he died in 1630, aged eighty. Brown boasted on his death-bed that he had been confined in thirty-two different prisons. He wrote a "Treatise of Reformation without tarrying for any;" and two other pieces; making together a thin quarto, published at Middleburg, 1582. See Brownists.

Brown, Thomas, of fictitious memory, as he is styled by Addison, was the son of a farmer at Shifnal in Shropshire, and was entered of Christ-church College, Oxford, whence he soon was obliged to abscond on account of the irregularities of his life. He afterwards went to London, where he had recourse to the usual refuge of half-starved wits, scribbling for bread. He published a great variety of poems, letters, dialogues, &c., full of humour and erudition, but coarse and indecent. Though a good-natured man, he had one pernicious quality, which was—rather to lose his friend than his joke.

Towards the end of his life, as we are informed by Jacob, Brown was invited by the Earl of Dorset to a Christmas dinner along with Dryden and several other wits; on which occasion, to his agreeable surprise, he found a L50 bank-note under his plate, and Dryden at the same time received one of L100. Brown died in 1704, and was interred in the cloister of Westminster Abbey. His works were published in 1707, in 4 vols. 12mo.

Brown, Thomas, an eminent metaphysician, was born at Kirkmaibreck, in the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, on the 9th of January 1778, and was the youngest son of the Rev. Samuel Brown, minister of the parish of Kirkmaibreck, and of Mary Smith, daughter of John Smith, Esq., of Wigton. His father survived his birth only a short time, and he received the first rudiments of his education from his mother. In the first lesson he learned all the letters of the alphabet, and every succeeding step was equally remarkable. From his seventh till his fourteenth year he was placed, under the protection of a maternal uncle, at different schools in the neighbourhood of London, at all of which he distinguished himself, and made great progress in classical literature. Upon the death of his uncle in 1792, he returned to his mother's house in Edinburgh, and entered as a student in the university.

His attention was first directed to metaphysical subjects by the elegant and benevolent biographer of Burns, Dr Currie of Liverpool, to whom he was introduced in the summer of 1793. About that time the first volume of Mr Stewart's Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind was published. Dr Currie put a copy of the work into his hands, and was struck not more with the warmth of admiration which the young philosopher expressed, than with the acuteness he displayed in many of his remarks. The next winter he attended Mr Stewart's class; and at the close of one of the lectures of that celebrated philosopher, he went up, though personally unknown, and modestly submitted some difficulties which had occurred to him respecting one of Mr Stewart's theories. Mr Stewart listened to him patiently, and, with a candour which did him infinite honour, informed him that he had just received a communication from the distinguished M. Prevost of Geneva, containing a similar objection. This proved the commencement of a friendship which Dr Brown continued to enjoy till the time of his death.

It has already been mentioned in one of the preliminary dissertations to this work (p. 411, vol. i.), that at the age of nineteen he took a part with others (some of whom became the most memorable men of their time), in the foundation of a private society in Edinburgh under the name of the Academy of Physics. This society is interesting in the history of letters, as having given rise to the publication of the Edinburgh Review. Some articles in the early numbers of that work were written by Dr Brown, and bear the marks of his genius.

In 1798 he published Observations on the Zoonomia of Dr Darwin. When it is considered that the greater part of this work was written in his eighteenth year, it may perhaps be regarded as the most remarkable of his productions; and it may be doubted if, in the history of philosophy, there is to be found any work exhibiting an equal prematurity of talents and attainments. Those who take an interest in tracing the progress of intellect will find in it the germ of all his subsequent views in regard to mind, and of those principles of philosophizing by which he was guided in his future inquiries.

In 1803, after attending the usual course pursued by medical students, he took his degree of doctor of medicine. In the same year he brought out the first edition of his poems, in two volumes. The greater number of the pieces contained in them were written while he was at college. They are of a very miscellaneous description, and are certainly inferior to many of his subsequent compositions; at the same time they all exhibit marks of an original mind, and of a singularly refined taste.

His next publication was an examination of the principles of Mr Hume respecting causation. Though this tract was occasioned by a local controversy, it is entirely of an abstract nature, and all reference to the circumstances that led to the publication is studiously avoided. Its great merits have been universally acknowledged. It was alluded to in the most flattering manner in the Edinburgh Review, in a very able article by Mr Horner; Mr Stewart also gave a valuable testimony as to its excellence; and Sir James Mackintosh has pronounced it the finest model in mental philosophy since Berkeley and Hume. A second edition, considerably enlarged, was published in 1806; and in 1818 it appeared in a third edition, with so many additions and alterations, as to constitute it almost a new work, under the title of An Inquiry into the Relation of Cause and Effect.

From the time when Dr Brown had taken his degree, he continued for several years to practise as a physician in Edinburgh. In 1806 he was associated in partnership with the late Dr Gregory; and there was every prospect of his attaining in due time the highest eminence in his profession. But success as a physician was not sufficient to satisfy his ambition. The discharge of his professional duties was marked by that assiduous tenderness of attention which might have been expected from a disposition so truly amiable; but still philosophy was his passion, from which he felt it as a misfortune that his duty should so much estrange him. The period, however, at last arrived when he was to be elevated to a situation suited to his tastes and habits, and where his public duties corresponded with his inclinations. Mr Stewart, in consequence of the gradual decline of his health, being frequently prevented from attending to the duties of his class, found it necessary to have recourse to the assistance of some of his friends during his temporary absence. He therefore applied to Dr Brown, who undertook the arduous task of supplying his place with lectures of his own composition. He first appeared in the moral philosophy class in the winter of 1808-9. At this time, however, there was no great call for his exertions, as Mr Stewart was soon able to resume his professional duties. In the following winter he again presented himself as Mr Stewart's substitute, and by a succession of eloquent lectures during several weeks, he so decidedly established his character, that when Mr Stewart signified a desire to have Dr Brown united with him in the professorship, but little opposition was made, and in 1810 he was appointed professor of moral philosophy in conjunction with Mr Stewart.

Immediately after his appointment he retired to the country, where he remained till within a few weeks of the meeting of the college; judging that, with a constitution not naturally strong, nothing was so important for his approaching labours as a confirmed state of health and spirits. For many years he had devoted his attention to the science of mind, and was intimately acquainted with the subject; and, from the experience of the two preceding winters, he had acquired sufficient confidence in his own powers to be assured that he could prepare his lectures upon the spur of the occasion. Accordingly, when the college opened, except the lectures that were written during Mr Stewart's absence, he had no other preparation in writing. His exertions during the whole of the winter were very great, and completely successful. The expectations that had been excited among his friends were more than realized, and he secured the highest place in the respect and affections of his students.

For some years after his appointment to the moral philosophy chair, Dr Brown had little leisure for engaging in any literary undertaking. Even the long summer vacation he found to be no more than sufficient for restoring his energies for the exertions of the succeeding season. By degrees, however, he became familiarized with the duties of his situation, and was enabled to indulge occasionally in other pursuits. In the summer of 1814 he brought to a conclusion his Paradise of Coquettes which he published anonymously, and which met with a favourable reception. In succeeding seasons he published various other poetical works.

Any notice of the life of Dr Brown would be incomplete if it did not contain a reference to his mother, whom he loved with a tenderness and reverence of affection that formed a distinguishing feature of his character. This excellent woman died in 1817. Her character is faithfully delineated in the beautiful lines addressed to her memory, prefixed to one of his poetical productions.

In the autumn of 1819, at a favourite retreat in the neighbourhood of Dunkeld, he commenced his text-book, a work which he long intended to prepare for the benefit of his students. At that time he was in excellent health; but towards the end of December of the same year he became indisposed, and after the recess he was in such a state of weakness as to be unable for some time to resume his official duties. When he again met his class, his lecture unfortunately happened to be one which he was never able to deliver without being much moved, and from the manner in which he recited the very affecting lines from Beattie's Hermit, it was conceived by many that the emotion he displayed arose from a foreboding of his own approaching dissolution.

'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more,— I mourn, but ye woodlands, I mourn not for you, For morn is approaching her charms to restore, Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glittering with dew; Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn, Kind Nature the embryo blossom shall save; But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn, O when will it dawn on the night of the grave?

This was the last lecture he ever delivered.

From this period his health rapidly declined. Having upon a former occasion derived great benefit from a sea voyage, he proceeded, by the advice of his medical attendants, to London, accompanied by his two sisters, with the intention of removing, as soon as the season allowed, to a milder climate. But all means of remedy were now too late, and nothing could permanently retard the progress of his disease. Day after day he became weaker.

During the whole period of his illness he was never heard to utter a complaint. Gentle as he ever was, sickness and pain made him still more so. His only anxiety seemed to be the distress which his sufferings occasioned to those around him. A few days after his arrival in London he went to Brompton, where he died on the 2d of April 1820. His remains were put into a leaden coffin, and laid, according to his own request, in the churchyard of his native parish, beside those of his father and mother.

Dr Brown was in height rather above the middle size. The expression of his countenance was that of calm reflection. His likeness is well preserved in a picture by Watson in 1806. Among the more prominent features of Dr Brown's character may be enumerated the most perfect gentleness, and kindness, and delicacy of mind, united with great independence of spirit, a truly British love of liberty, and a most ardent desire for the diffusion of knowledge, and virtue, and happiness among mankind. All his habits were simple, temperate, studious, and domestic; and he was remarkable for nothing more than his love of home, and the happiness he shed around him there.

As a philosopher he was possessed in an eminent degree of that comprehensive energy which, according to his own description, "sees through a long train of thought, a distant conclusion, and separating at every stage the essential from the accessory circumstances, and gathering and combining analogies as it proceeds, arrives at length at a system of harmonious truth." The predominating quality of his intellectual character was unquestionably the power of analysis, in which he had few equals. In all his prose Dr Brown has shown great powers of eloquence. His poetry has never been popular, though it contains many passages of exquisite beauty. As a writer, simplicity is the quality in which he is most deficient, and subtlety that in which he most excels.

His character as a philosopher will chiefly rest upon his lectures, which were published after his death. It would be foreign to the object of the present sketch to give an account of the principles of his philosophy, or to enter upon a discussion of any of the questions that have been agitated upon the subject. We shall merely observe that the estimation in which his lectures are held by the public appears from the number of editions which, under all the disadvantages of a posthumous publication, have been called for; and his virtues as a man are almost universally allowed to have been in beautiful accordance with his talents as a philosopher.

An account of the life and writings of Dr Brown was published in 1825, in 8vo, by the Rev. Dr Welsh.

Ulysses Maximillian, a celebrated general in the imperial armies, son of Ulysses, Baron Brown and Camus, colonel of cuirassiers in the emperor's service, was descended of an ancient Irish family, and was born at Basle in 1705. After studying at Limerick in Ireland, he was sent for into Hungary by his uncle, Count George Brown, who was a colonel of infantry. He was present at the battle of Belgrade in 1717; and he afterwards continued his studies in the Clementine College at Rome till 1721, when he went to Prague to study the civil law. At the end of 1723 he became captain in his uncle's regiment, and in 1725 lieutenant-colonel. In 1730 he served in Corsica, and contributed greatly to the taking of Callansara. In 1732 the emperor made him chamberlain. He was raised to the rank of colonel in 1734, and distinguished himself greatly in Italy, especially at the battles of Parma and Guastalla, and in burning in the presence of the French army the bridge which the Marshal de Noailles had thrown over the Adige. He was made general in 1736; and in the following year, by an excellent manoeuvre, he secured the retreat of the army, after the unhappy battle of Banjaluka, and saved the baggage.

In 1739 the emperor Charles VI. made him field-marshal-lieutenant, and counsellor in the aulic council of war. After the death of that prince, when the king of Prussia entered Silesia, Count Brown with a small body of troops disputed his progress inch by inch. He signalized himself on several occasions; and in 1743 the queen of Hungary made him a privy-counsellor at her coronation in Bohemia. Having passed into Bavaria, where he commanded the vanguard of the Austrian army, he seized Deckendorf, with a great quantity of baggage; and obliged the French to abandon the banks of the Danube, which the Austrians passed in security. In the same year, 1743, he was sent by the queen of Hungary to Worms, as plenipotentiary to the king of Britain, and did his utmost to bring about the treaty of alliance between the courts of Vienna, London, and Turin. In 1744 he followed Prince Lobkowitz into Italy; took Velletri on the 4th of August, in spite of the superior number of the enemy; entered their camp, overthrew several regiments, and took many prisoners. The following year he was recalled into Bavaria, where he took the town of Wilshozen by assault. The same year he was made general of artillery; and in January 1746 he marched for Italy at the head of 18,000 men, drove the Spaniards out of the Milanese; and having joined the forces under Prince de Lichtenstein, he commanded the left wing of the Austrian army at the battle of Placentia, June 15, 1746, and defeated the right wing of the enemy's forces commanded by Marshal de Maillebois. As commander-in-chief of the army against the Genoese, he seized the pass of Bocchetta, though defended by above four thousand men, and took Genoa. Count Brown at length joined the king of Sardinia's troops, and, in conjunction with them, took Mont-Alban and the county of Nice. On the 30th of November he passed the Var in spite of the French troops, entered Provence, and had taken the isles of St Margaret and St Honorat, when the revolution which happened in Genoa, and the advance of Marshal Belleisle obliged him to execute that masterly retreat which has elicited so much admiration. He employed the remainder of 1747 in defending the states of the house of Austria in Italy; and after the peace in 1748 he was sent to Nice, to regulate there, in conjunction with the Duke of Belleisle and the Marquis de la Minas, the differences that had arisen with respect to the execution of some of the articles of the definitive treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.

The empress queen, to reward his services, made him governor of Transylvania, where he was generally esteemed for his probity and disinterestedness. In 1752 he obtained the government of Prague, with the chief command of the troops in that kingdom; in 1753 the king of Poland, elector of Saxony, honoured him with the collar of the order of the White Eagle; and the next year he was declared field-marshal.

When the king of Prussia, in 1756 entered Saxony, and attacked Bohemia, Count Brown encountered and repulsed him at the battle of Lowositz, October 1, with only 27,000 men, while the Prussians numbered at least 40,000. Seven days after this battle he undertook the famous march into Saxony, to deliver the Saxon troops shut up between Pirna and Konigstein. He at length obliged the Prussians to retire from Bohemia, for which service he was made a knight of the Golden Fleece. Soon afterwards Count Brown hastily assembled an army in Bohemia to oppose the king of Prussia; and on the 6th of May was fought the famous battle of Prague, in which, while employed in giving his orders for maintaining the advantages he had gained, he received a deadly wound. To be disabled at such a crisis was doubly unfortunate, as he had broken the Prussians, and the Count Schwerin, one of their greatest generals, was slain. Count Brown was carried to Prague, where he died of his wounds June 26, 1757, aged fifty-two.

Brown, William, an English poet, descended of a good family, and born at Tavistock in Devonshire, in 1590. Having passed through the grammar-school of his native place, he was sent to Exeter College, Oxford, and became tutor to Robert Dormer, afterwards Earl of Caernarvon. On leaving college, he was taken into the family of William Earl of Pembroke; and he improved his fortune so much that he purchased an estate. His poetical works which procured him a very great reputation, are entitled Britannia's Pastoral; The Shepherd's Pipe; An Elegy on the death of Prince Henry, eldest son of James I. The date of his death is uncertain. (Wood's Athen. Oxon.)

Browne, William Laurence, born at Utrecht, January 7, 1755, was the son of the Rev. William Browne, minister of the English church in that city. The father, having been appointed professor of ecclesiastical history at St Andrews, returned to Scotland in 1757; and his son was in due time sent to the grammar-school of that city. At the early age of twelve he became a student in the university, and obtained a greater number of prizes than fell to the share of any other competitor. After completing the preliminary curriculum, he became a student of divinity; and in 1774 he removed to the university of Utrecht, where he combined with the study of theology that of the civil law; and from this study he frequently declared that he had derived essential benefit.

In 1777, on the death of his uncle, Dr Robert Brown, who had succeeded as minister of the English church at Utrecht, the magistrates of that city offered the vacant charge to his young relation, an invitation which he finally accepted. He was licensed and ordained by the presbytery of St Andrews, and admitted minister of the English church at Utrecht in March 1778. His congregation, though respectable, was far from being numerous, seldom exceeding forty persons; yet his preparation for the pulpit was not less assiduous than at Aberdeen, where he had to address a larger audience. He increased his income by receiving pupils into his house; and he gradually extended his acquaintance among individuals distinguished by their talents and learning, as well as by their station and influence; while he enlarged his sphere of observation by various excursions in France, Germany, and Switzerland.

The curators of the Stolpian Legacy at Leyden having in 1783 proposed "The Origin of Evil," as the subject of their annual prize, Mr Brown obtained the second honour, namely, that of publication at the expense of the trust. His dissertation was accordingly printed, under the title of Disputatio de Fabrica Mundi, in quo Mala insunt, Natura Dei perfectissime haud repugnante. In 1784 the university of St Andrews created him D.D. On three different occasions he obtained the medals awarded by the Teylerian Society at Haarlem for the best compositions on certain prescribed subjects. These were, a dissertation On the Immortality of the Soul, which was never printed; An Essay on the Folly of Scepticism, &c., Lond. 1788, 8vo; An Essay on the natural Equality of Men, Edinb. 1793, 8vo. The latter work was the most successful of all his publications.

Before this period he had been appointed to a professor- ship in the university of Utrecht. He had for some time been placed in a position of some difficulty, in consequence of the civil commotions, and his attachment to the Orange party. But when the armed interposition of the Prussians occasioned a sudden change in the government of Holland, and the friends of Dr Brown had regained their ascendancy, the states and the magistrates of Utrecht jointly instituted a professorship of moral philosophy and ecclesiastical history, and appointed him to this new office.

On entering upon his duties, he pronounced an inaugural oration, which was published under the title of "Oratio de Religiosis et Philosophiae Societate et Concordia maxime salutari." Traj. ad Rhen. 1788, 4to. Two years afterwards he was nominated rector of the university; and on resigning his temporary dignity, he pronounced an Oratio de Imaginatiorum, in Vitae Institutione, regunda. Traj. ad Rhen. 1790, 4to. During this interval he had been offered the Greek professorship at St Andrews; but this honour he was induced to decline. To his other offices was now added the professorship of the law of nature; a branch of study intimately connected with ethics, and which, indeed, was at one period regularly discussed by the professors of moral philosophy in the Scottish universities, particularly by Dr Hutcheson, and his predecessor Mr Carmichael, as an essential part of their course.

The war which followed the French revolution finally drove Dr Brown from the place of his nativity. In the course of a very severe winter, he embarked in January 1795, with his wife, five children, and some other relations, in an open boat, and landed in England after a stormy passage. In London he experienced such a reception as was due to his literary talents and moral worth; and in 1795 the magistrates of Aberdeen appointed him to the chair of divinity on the retirement of Dr Campbell, and soon afterwards he was made principal of Marischal College.

Dr Brown soon became a very conspicuous member of the church, and some of his appearances in the General Assembly produced a powerful effect. His speech on the case of Dr Arnot was printed 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 Kingsarms, of the Rev. Dr Robert Arnot, Professor of Divinity in St Mary's College, St Andrews." Edinb. 1800, 8vo.

His essay "On the Existence of a Supreme Creator" obtained Burnet's first prize, amounting to L1250. The second prize, amounting to L400, was awarded to Dr Sumner, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury. Dr Brown's work was published at Aberdeen, 1816, 2 vols. 8vo. His last considerable work 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." Edinb. 1826, 2 vols. 8vo.

In the year 1800 Dr Brown had been appointed chaplain in ordinary to the king, 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 in November 1825. This was published in 1826, 8vo. His other publications were, a poem entitled "An Essay on Sensibility;" Sermons, Edinb. 1803, 8vo; "Philémon, a Poem," Edinb. 1809, 2 vols. 8vo; several detached sermons, and various tracts. He died on the 11th of May 1830, in the seventy-sixth year of his age.