JULIEN OFFRAY DE LA, a materialistic writer, was the son of a wealthy merchant, and was born at St Malo in 1709. After he had received his classical education at Paris he began his medical studies at Rheims, and finished them under the celebrated Boerhaave at Leyden. In 1742, the Duke de Grammont, colonel of the French guards, appointed him surgeon to his regiment. It was while present in this capacity at the siege of Fribourg, that being attacked with a dangerous sickness, and feeling that his body and mind were enfeebled simultaneously, he drew the inference that the soul must perish along with the organic structure with which it is connected. On his recovery in 1745 he divulged this doctrine in his Histoire Naturelle de l'Adam, a book full of the grossest materialism and impiety. The death of his patron at the battle of Fontenoy, in the same year, left him exposed to the storm of indignation that his vagaries had raised. He was expelled from his situation in the guards, and on daring to attack his professional brethren in his Pétilope, ou le Machiavel en Médecine, 12mo, 1748, he was driven from his native country. Scarcely had he taken refuge in Leyden when the publication of his revolting opinions in a book entitled Homme Machine, 12mo, 1748, subjected him once more to persecution. The work was publicly burnt, and its author was glad to avail himself of an opportune invitation from Frederick the Great to fix his residence at Berlin. The society of wits and philosophers from all parts of Europe, whom the Prussian monarch entertained at Potsdam, received Mettrie with all the distinction and respect due to a victim of intolerance. A pension, the title of reader to the king, and a place in the academy, were conferred upon him. He was admitted to the most intimate familiarity with his master. When he was tired he lounged upon the royal sofas, and when he was over-heated he unbuttoned his vest and threw his periuke upon the floor. At length, however, the brilliant yet no less galling slavery under which the literary dependants of Frederick lived became intolerable to Mettrie. He besought Voltaire, with all the passionate weeping of a child, to obtain for him from the French government leave to return to France; but before that request had time to be granted he was attacked by a severe fit of indigestion. The disorder was aggravated by the absurd treatment he used, and he died in November 1751, deriving no consolation from his own philosophy, or from the maxims of his irreligious associates. After his death his friend Voltaire gave no friendly estimate either of his intellectual or moral character. "Mettrie," said he, "was a fool that never wrote except when intol- The collected works of Mettrie were published in 2 vols., Berlin, 1751.