Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 21.djvu/271

Gibbons &c., 2 vols. Douay, 1616, 4to.  ‘Opera Divi Ælredi Rhievallensis … ex vetustis MSS. nunc primum in lucem producta,’ Douay, 1616 and 1631, 4to; Douay and Paris, 1654, 4to.  ‘Beati Gosvini Vita celeberrimi Aquicinctensis Monasterii Abbatis septimi, a duobus diversis ejusdem Cœnobii Monachis separatim exarata, e veteribus MSS. nunc primum edita,’ Douay, 1620, 12mo.  ‘Historia Anglicana Ecclesiastica a primis gentis susceptæ fidei incunabulis ad nostra fere tempora deducta … auctore Nicholao Harpsfeldio Archidiacono Cantuariensi … nunc primum in lucem producta,’ Douay, 1622, fol.  ‘Christian Doctrine,’ from the Italian of Cardinal Bellarmine.  ‘Opuscula F. Androtii, S.J.’



GIBBONS, THOMAS (1720–1785), dissenting minister and miscellaneous writer, was the son of Thomas Gibbons, who was at one time minister of a dissenting congregation at Olney in Buckinghamshire, and afterwards of a congregation at Royston in Hertfordshire. He was born at Reak, Swaffham Prior, near Cambridge, on 31 May 1720, and received the early part of his education at various schools in Cambridgeshire. When about fifteen years of age he was sent to Dr. Taylor's academy in Deptford, and afterwards to that of [q. v.] in Moorfields. In 1742 he was appointed assistant to the Rev. Thomas Bures, minister of the Silver Street presbyterian congregation, and in the next year he was chosen minister of the independent congregation of Haberdashers' Hall. In 1754 he was elected one of the three tutors of the Mile End academy, where he gave instruction in logic, metaphysics, ethics, and rhetoric, till the end of his life. He was chosen Sunday evening lecturer in the Monkwell Street meeting-house in 1759. He received the degree of M.A. from New Jersey in 1760, and that of D.D. from Aberdeen in 1764. He died in the Hoxton Square coffee-house, 22 Feb. 1785.

A list of between forty and fifty works by him may be found in the ‘Protestant Dissenters' Magazine,’ ii. 492, 493, and in Wilson's ‘Dissenting Churches,’ iii. 181, 182. The following appear to have been the chief of them: His favourite form of composition seems to have consisted in elegies on the death of his friends and others. For this, and for the want of poetical power which he showed in all his efforts, he was ridiculed in ‘An Epistle to the Rev. Mr. Tho. G-bb-ns on his Juvenilia,’ 1750. He was also satirised by Robert Sanders in ‘Gaffer Greybeard’ as ‘Dr. Hymnmaker’ (, Lit. Anecd. ii. 730). Dr. Johnson enjoyed his society (, Johnson, 3 June 1781, 17 May 1784).
 * 1) ‘Juvenilia; poems on various subjects of devotion and virtue,’ 8vo, 1750.
 * 2) ‘Rhetoric,’ 8vo, 1767.
 * 3) ‘Hymns adapted to Divine Worship,’ 12mo, 1769.
 * 4) ‘The Christian Minister, in three Poetic Epistles,’ 8vo, 1772.
 * 5) ‘Female Worthies,’ 2 vols. 8vo, 1777.
 * 6) ‘Memoirs of the Rev. Isaac Watts, D.D.,’ 8vo, 1780.
 * 7) ‘Sermons on evangelical and practical subjects,’ 3 vols. 8vo, 1787.



GIBBONS, WILLIAM, M.D. (1649–1728), physician, born at Wolverhampton 25 Sept. 1649, was the son of John Gibbons of that town. From Merchant Taylors' School he went to St. John's College, Oxford, graduating B.A. in 1672, M.B. in 1675, and M.D. in 1683. He practised as a physician in London, joined the College of Physicians in 1691, became fellow in 1692, and censor in 1716. He is not remembered by any writings, but chiefly as the Mirmillo of the ‘Dispensary’ of Sir [q. v.] He was one of the few college fellows who opposed the project of dispensaries for the poor, and so incurred the satire of Garth, who makes him say:

He is described by a contemporary (, Lit. Illustr. ii. 801) as ‘pretty old Dr. Gibbons,’ and as taking his fees with alacrity. The Harveian oration of the year following his death (1729) ascribes to him erudition, honesty, candour, love of letters, piety, benevolence, and other Christian virtues. According to Wadd (Mems., Maxims, and Memoirs, p. 148), the credit of making mahogany fashionable belongs to Gibbons. His brother, a West Indian shipmaster, brought home some of that wood as ballast, and gave it to the doctor, who was building a house. The carpenters finding it too hard for their tools, it was thrown aside; but some of it was afterwards used to make a candle-box, which looked so well that a bureau of the same wood was taken in hand. When finished and polished,