Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 07.djvu/382

 statements are generally very precise. For a schoolman he is a good writer.’  BURLEY, WILLIAM (fl. 1436), speaker of the House of Commons, was the son of John Burley of Bromcroft Castle, high sheriff of Salop in 1409. Sir Simon Burley [q. v.], who was beheaded on 5 May 1388, but whose attainder was reversed in the following year, was his great-great-uncle. In 1417 William Burley was first elected a knight of the shire for Salop. In the returns of the next twenty-four parliaments his name is to he found as one of the members of this county no less than eighteen times. The last parliament in which he was returned was that which was summoned to meet at Westminster on 9 July 1455. He was chosen speaker of the House of Commons on 19 March 1436, in the place of Sir John Tyrrel, kt., who was compelled by illness to retire from the chair. In the following parliament William Tresham was elected speaker; however, on 26 Feb. 1444 Burley was again voted to the chair, and continued to preside over the house until the dissolution of that parliament.

Little is known either of his domestic or political life. In 1426 he executed the office of sheriff of Salop. He died without male issue, leaving two daughters and coheiresses, the eldest of whom married, first, Sir Philip Chetwynd of Ingestrie, and, secondly, Sir Thomas Lyttelton, the author of the 'Tenures.’ From this last marriage the resent Barons Lyttelton and Hatherton are descended. The youngest daughter, Elizabeth, married Sir Thomas Trussel of Billesley, Warwickshire.

 BURLINGTON,. [See, 1695-17 53.]

BURLOWE, HENRY BEHNES. [See .]

BURLY, CAPTAIN JOHN. [See .]

BURMAN, THOMAS (fl. 1674), sculptor, whose works were devoid of merit, is only remembered as the master of John Bushnell [q. v.] He died on 17 March 1673-4, and was buried at St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields. In Henry Beale’s notebook an entry occurs on 18 May 1672 of the payment of 45l. to Burman for a monument set up for Beale’s father and mother at Walton in Buckinghamshire.

 BURN, EDWARD (1762–1837), polemical writer, born on 29 Nov. 1762, was educated for the ministry at the Countess of Huntingdon’s college at Trevecca, and, after taking orders and obtaining a Birmingham curacy, he entered at St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, and graduated B.A. on 20 Feb. 1790, M.A. on 22 June 1791. In 1785 he became curate and lecturer at St. Mary’s Chapel, Birmingham, and was ‘justly celebrated for extemporary oratory.’ He retained this position till his death. In 1830 he is mentioned as minister of St. James’s Chapel, Ashted, Birmingham, and at the time of his death he held, with St. Mary’s, the rectory of Smethcott, Salop. His first appearance as an author was in opposition to Dr. Priestley, with whom he was personally acquainted (see curious anecdote in ), but their controversy, which took the form of letters to each other, dissolved the friendship. The initiative was with Burn, who received the thanks of Beilby Porteus, bishop of London. Burn’s later judgment (1820) was ‘that the doctor handled him much too roughly.' This applies particularly to their subsequent encounter in reference to the Birmingham riots of 14 July 1791. Priestley’s ‘Appeal to the Public,' 1792, though amply provoked by what had occurred, was not quite in the strain of his famous sermon on the ‘Duty of Forgiveness of Injuries,' 