Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 04.djvu/96

  generals, and few officers knew so well how to make the most of a small force.'

 BECON, JOHN, LL.D. (d. 1587), divine, a native of Suffolk, received his education at St. John's College, Cambridge. He was admitted a scholar of that society on the Lady Margaret's foundation in 1559, proceeded B.A. in 1560-1, was admitted a fellow 21 March 1561-2, and commenced M.A. 1564. Subsequently he became principal lecturer of the college. In July 1571 he was elected public orator of the university, and he served the office of proctor for the year 1571-2. During his tenure of the latter office he headed the opposition of the senate to the code of university statutes which had passed the great seal in 1570. Much disorder was the result, and the heads of colleges exhibited articles against him and his adherents. Ultimately the two archbishops and the bishops of London and Ely decided that the new statutes should stand, and censured the opponents for going from college to college to solicit subscriptions against the same. Becon resigned the oratorship in 1573. The following year he was installed a canon of Norwich, and in 1575 he became chancellor of that diocese. He took the degree of LL.D. in 1576.

On 16 Feb. 1579-80 Becon was collated to the precentorship of the church of Chichester, and in 1581 was admitted to a prebend in the church of Lichfield. In 1582 a great contest took place between him and William Overton, bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, about the chancellorship of that diocese. The bishop, who had in the first instance granted it to Becon only, subsequently granted the office to him and one Babington, and to the longer liver of them. This occasioned a great disturbance and riot in the cathedral. The case came successively before the Star-chamber, the privy council, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, who remitted it to four visitors, and they finally induced the contending parties to compromise the matter. Becon was buried at St. Giles's, Cripplegate, on 4 Sept. 1587.

Various documents written by Becon in reference to the disputes in which he was engaged have been printed, and are enumerated in Cooper's 'Athenæ Cantabrigienses.'

 BECON or BEACON, RICHARD (fl. 1594), Irish administrator and author, was a native of Suffolk, and was educated at Cambridge. He entered St. John's College on 12 Nov. 1567, and proceeded B.A. in 1571 and M.A. in 1575. Admitted a student of Gray's Inn on 19 June 1577, he was called to the bar on 27 Jan. 1584-5. He was appointed 'her majesty's attorney for the province of Munster' on 17 Dec. 1586 at an annual salary of little more than 17l. He was chiefly employed in regulating crown grants of land, and two letters on the subject, dated in the one case 17 Oct. 1587 from Clonmel, and in the other 2 Dec. 1587 from Limerick, addressed by him with other commissioners to Walsingham, are at the Record Office. Beacon himself received grants of land—Clandonnell and Clan Derrnott—in Cork, and of Torcraigh in Waterford, all of which he appears to have sublet to other Englishmen. In 1591 the post of attorney in Munster was conferred on another, but Beacon, although no longer in Ireland, is described as the owner of land there in a visitation of 1611. Beacon was the author of an interesting political pamphlet on Ireland. It is entitled: 'Solon his follie; or a politique discourse touching the reformation of common weales conquered, declined, or corrupted,' Oxford, 1594. It is dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, and is in the form of a conversation between Solon, Epimenides, and Pisistratus as to the policy that Athens should pursue towards Salamina. Old manuscript notes in the copies in the Cambridge University and British Museum libraries state that 'for the better understanding of this allegoricall discourse &hellip; by Salamina must be understood Ireland, and by Athens England.' Beacon urges on the English government the adoption of strong coercive measures in order to eradicate Irish national feeling.

 BECON, THOMAS, D.D. (1512–1567), protestant divine, was of Norfolk, as he expressly states in the general preface to the folio (1564) of his works. Strype, in his