Sir William (1725-1796), an eminent architect, was born at Stockholm. In his youth he made a voyage to China; and his drawings of Chinese costume and architecture were afterwards published. He was treasurer to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in London, and furnished the design for Somerset House.
David, a Scotch historian, priest, and lawyer, was born about the year 1530. He was educated in the university of Aberdeen, and afterwards went to France and Italy. At Bologna, in 1556, he was a pupil of Mariannus Soezenus.
After his return to Scotland, he was appointed by Queen Mary parson of Suddly and chancellor of Ross. He was soon afterwards employed in digesting the laws of Scotland, and was engaged in 1566 in publishing the acts of the Scottish parliament by authority. He was also appointed one of the lords of session, and continued faithful to the interests of the queen till her adherents were obliged to seek refuge in other kingdoms. Chambers went to Spain, where he was received by Philip; and thence to Paris, where he was welcomed by Charles IX., to whom, in 1572, he presented his History of Scotland. He died at Paris in the year 1592.
He wrote Histoire abregée de tous les Roys de France, Angleterre, et Ecosse; La recherche des Singularités plus remarquables concernant le Etat d'Ecosse; and a Discours de la legitime succession des Femmes.
Ephraim, author of the Cyclopaedia which bears his name, was born at Kendal, Westmoreland. His parents were Presbyterian Dissenters, and gave him a commercial education. By them he was apprenticed to Mr Senex the globe-maker. It was during Mr Chambers's residence with this skilful mechanician that he contracted that taste for science and learning which directed all his pursuits.
At this time he had formed the design of his great work, the Cyclopaedia; and some of the articles in it were written behind the counter. In order to devote himself wholly to this undertaking, he quitted Mr Senex, and took chambers at Gray's Inn, where he chiefly resided during the rest of his days. The first edition of the Cyclopaedia, which was the result of many years' intense application, appeared by subscription in 1728, in two vols. fol. It was dedicated to the king, and procured for Mr Chambers the honour of being elected fellow of the Royal Society. In less than ten years a second edition was printed, with corrections and additions (in 1738); and this was followed by a third in the following year.
In addition to the Cyclopaedia, Mr Chambers was concerned in the publication of The Literary Magazine (begun 1735), to which he contributed a variety of articles, and particularly a review of Morgan's Moral Philosophy. He was likewise engaged with Mr John Martyn, professor of botany at Cambridge, in preparing for the press a translation and abridgment of the Philosophical History and Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Paris. This undertaking was completed in 5 vols. 8vo, and published in 1742, some time after Chambers's decease, under the joint names of himself and Mr Martyn. In a subsequent publication, Mr Martyn severely censured the share which his colleague had had in the abridgment of the Parisian papers. The only other work ascribed to him is a translation of the Jesuit's Perspective, from the French. Mr Chambers's close attention to his studies at length impaired his health, and obliged him to go to the south of France. He died soon after his return to England in 1740, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a modest inscription, written by himself, marks the place of his burial.