DANIEL, a distinguished Dutch scholar, was born at Ghent, of a noble family, in 1580. The Low Countries were then distracted by civil wars, which compelled his father to fly with him for safety to England. After a short residence in that country, the family returned home, and the young Heinsius was sent to Franeker to study law. He soon exchanged law for Greek, however, and removed from Franeker to Leyden to enjoy the tuition of Joseph Scaliger. After holding some minor appointments at that university, he was made professor of politics and history at the age of twenty-five, and, on the death of Paul Merula, librarian and secretary of the university. His editions of the classics made him so famous that his services were courted by nearly every crowned head in Europe, but he steadily refused to leave his country, whose historiographer he had now become. In 1618 he acted as secretary to the synod of Dort, having already distinguished himself in the theological controversies of the day. In his later years he suffered greatly from the failure of his memory. He died Feb. 23, 1655. His works consist of—Editions of the Greek and Latin classics, or works of criticism connected with them, amounting to eighteen in number—Latin poetry, particularly Iambi; Auricouos, a tragedy; Herodes Infanticidus, also a tragedy; De Contemptu Mortis, a poem in four books; fugitive pieces under the titles of Extemporanea and Juvenilia, and some Greek poems; Latin harangues, which have been collected under the title of Orationes de Viritatibus Argumentis, Leyden, 1615, 1620, in 12mo; Rerum ad Sylcam Ducis atque alibi in Belgio aut a Belgis anno 1629 gestarum Historia, Leyden, 1631, in folio.

Heinsius, Nicolas, was the son of Daniel Heinsius, and obtained nearly equal eminence with his father as a scholar. He was born at Leyden in 1629, and was educated there by his father, as well as by Grotius, Gronovius, and other celebrated scholars. In 1642 he visited England previous to commencing a literary tour through France, Italy, and Sweden. In 1659, on the invitation of Queen Christina, he settled at Stockholm, and remained there till his father's death in 1655 recalled him home. After his return to Sweden he was in 1667 sent as ambassador to the Czar of Moscow, from which he returned with broken health and spirits. The remaining ten years of his life he spent for the most part in Holland, and died at the Hague, October 7, 1681. His principal works were his Claudian, with notes, Leyden, 1650, in 12mo, and Amsterdam, 1665, in 8vo; Oeïd, with notes, ibid., 1652, 1661, 1668, in three vols. 12mo; Virgil, without notes, Amsterdam, 1676, and Utrecht, 1704, in 12mo; Valerius Flaccus, without notes, Amsterdam, 1680, in 12mo; Remarks on Silius Italicus, Petronius, and Phaedrus; A great number of Letters, which may be found in the Syllae Epistolae Burmanni, in 5 vols. 4to; Poemata, the best edition of which is that of Elzevir, Amsterdam, 1666, in 8vo, dedicated by the author to the Duke of Montausier. Peter Burmann the younger also published Nic. Heinsii Adversariae, libri e., followed by the notes of Heinsius on Catullus and Propertius; and the same author also cites inedited notes of Heinsius on Tacitus, on the dialogue De Claris Oratoribus, and on the Catalecta veterum Poetarum.