Page:A new and general biographical dictionary; containing an historical and critical account of the lives and writings of the most eminent persons in every nation v1.djvu/302

 266 ANTONINUS. tionof this work into Engli/h, dedicated " performed what he exhorted others to. to Dr. W. Laud zrchbifhop of Canter- " Be it therefore fpoken to the immortal bury. "Of all bocks" (fjys Cafaubon, " praife and commendation of Antoni- ' in his preface, p, 5, &c.) that have " nus, that as he did write, fo he did " ever been written by any heathen, I " live. Never did writings fo cenlpire ' know not any, which either in regard " to give all pofiible teftimony of good- " ofitlelf, (for the bulic thereof) or in " nefs, uprightnefs, innocency, and " regard of the author, deferves more " whatever could, amongft heathens, be " refpeft thnn this of Marcus Antoni- " more commendable, as they have " nus. The chiefeft fubjecl of the done to coma'.end this one: they " book is the vanity of the world, and " commend him, not as the h=ft prince ' all worldly things, as wealth and ' only, but abfolntely as the beft man " honour, life, &c. and the end and '< and bed philofopher that ever vva--, " fcope of ir, to teach a man how to " And it is his proper commendation, " fubmit himfelf wholly to God's pro- " that, being fo commended, he is com- " vidence, and to live content and " mended without exception. It" any " thankful in what eftate or calling fo- " thing rud ever been talked againft " ever. In the author of it, two main " him, thehifiorians mention it but as " things I conceive very confiderable ; " a talk; not credited by them, nor by ' fuft, that he was a very great man, " any that ever were of any credit. " one that had had good experience of " His Meditations were his actions : ' whathefpake: and feconJly, that he " his deeds (if you confider him a man " was a very good man; one that had " and a hea'hen) did agiee with his " Jived as he did write, and exactly (as " fentences." " far as was poifible to a natural man) ANTONIO (NICHOLAS), knight of the order of St. James and canon of Seville, did great honour to the Spanifh nation by his Bibliotheque of their writers. He was born at Seville, in 1617, being the fon of a gentleman, whom king Philip IV. made prefident of the admiralty eftablifhed in that city in 1626. After having gone through a courfe of philo- lophy and divinity in his own country, he went to fludv law at Salamanca, where heclofely attended the leisures ofFran- cifco Ramos del Manzano, afcerwards counfellor to the king, and preceptor to Charles II. Upon his return to Se- ville, after he had finiflied his law-fludies at Salamanca, he fliut himfelf up in the royal monaftery of Benedictines, where he employed himfelf feveral years in writing his " Bibliotheca Hifpanica," having the uie of the books of Bennet de la Sana abbot of that monaftery, and dean of the journal des faculty of divinity at Salamanca. In 1659, he was fent to Savans, Rome by Philip IV. in the chara&er of agent-general from i6o7. 10> *h' s prince: he had alfo particular commiffions from the in- P. 410. quifition of Spain, the viceroys of Naples and Sicily, and Dutch edit. t h e governor of Milan, to negociate their affairs at Rome. The cardinal of Arragon procured him, from pope Alexan- der VII. a canonry in the church of Seville, the income whereof he employed in charity and purchaiing of books : he had above thirty thoufand volumes in his library. By this help, joined to a continual labour and indefatigable ap*. plication,