Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 33.djvu/275

Rh preserved shows the practical good sense of a family doctor. His advice to William Lily in a grave disorder was an instance of his accurate diagnosis and prognosis. Doubtless he practised well according to the knowledge of his day; but he has left no original observations of his own, which, if relating to the epidemics of his time, might have been of great value. In common, however, with other learned physicians, whom we may call the ‘medical humanists,’ he did medicine the great service of calling men back to the study of the classical medical writers, in place of the ‘Neoterics’ and ‘Arabists,’ who had long been regarded as the fountains of knowledge. The revival of classical medicine, though not without its drawbacks, led immediately to the revival of anatomy, of botany, and of clinical medicine as progressive sciences, and produced results quite comparable to those ascribed to the renascence in other departments of knowledge. Among the medical humanists certainly no one enjoyed a higher reputation than Linacre, or did better service to the cause of learning.

It was, however, as a scholar that he was most highly esteemed by his contemporaries. Erasmus, Budé, Melanchthon, Lascaris, Aldus, Vives, and many more pay him the highest eulogies. Erasmus said that Galen, in Linacre's version, spoke better Latin than he did Greek in the original, and Aristotle in Linacre's Latin had a grace of style hardly equalled in his own tongue. In Greek he was regarded as a prodigy of learning, while rhetoric and dialectic (according to Richard Pace) equally claimed him as their own. Finally, in the language of the time, he was a great philosopher, that is, deeply read in the ancient scientific and medical writers.

Linacre's personal character was highly esteemed by his contemporaries. He was evidently capable of absolute devotion to a great cause, animated by genuine public spirit, and a boundless zeal for learning. Erasmus is believed to have humorously sketched Linacre in the ‘Encomium Moriæ’ as an enthusiast in recondite studies, but no mere pedant. He had, it would seem, no enemies.

Linacre's writings fall under two heads, grammar and medicine. His grammatical works were: 1. ‘Linacri Progymnasmata Grammatices Vulgaria,’ 4to, b.l., no date (1525?); an elementary Latin grammar in English, to which are prefixed Latin verses by Linacre himself, by Thomas More, and by William Lily. The first, the only known specimen of Linacre's metrical composition, are a sort of dedication to the teachers and boys of England. Lily's verses refer to a former edition of the work, published under a false name and much corrupted, but now restored to its pristine purity, and published with the author's name. This is evidently the lost grammar prepared by Linacre for St. Paul's School, but rejected by Colet (see Erasmi Epistolæ, ed. Basel, 1521, p. 420). If so, it must have been written about 1512, and probably printed about that time. This work has a considerable resemblance to Colet and Lily's joint production, and may after all have served as the basis of the St. Paul's grammar. A unique copy is in the British Museum. 2. ‘Rudimenta Grammatices,’ composed for the use of the Princess Mary. The earliest complete copy accessible is ‘Rudimenta Grammatices Thomæ Linacri diligenter castigata denuo. Londini in ædibus Pynsonianis,’ 4to, roman letter, without date, but in style closely resembling Linacre's translations printed by Pynson about 1523–4. The copy in the British Museum is bound up with another on vellum, which wants the title-page, and was possibly printed earlier. Both contain a dedication to the Princess Mary, then accidence and construction with ‘Supplimenta;’ the latter might, from internal evidence, have been written by Lily or some one connected with him. This work is essentially the same as No. 1, though somewhat expanded, and it is clear that Linacre took up his earlier grammar and revised it for the use of the princess. This grammar was translated into Latin by Robert Buchanan, and printed at Paris by Robert Etienne in 1533, passing through at least ten editions in France in thirty years. 3. ‘De Emendata Structura Latini sermonis libri sex,’ London, by Richard Pynson, December 1524, 4to. This labour of many years was issued two months after Linacre's death. The passage in the ‘Encomium Moriæ’ (ed. Basel, 1521, p. 251), where Erasmus speaks of a sexagenarian scholar and physician who had tortured himself for twenty years in grammatical studies, and only hoped he might live long enough to distinguish rightly the eight parts of speech, evidently alludes to it. It contains no accidence, but rules of construction and syntax, with an immense number of examples from the classics and many Greek quotations. Such a work could not possibly have been intended for a school grammar. It was long regarded as a standard work, and even as late as 1669 was referred to by Milton as ‘though very learned, thought not fit to be read in schools’ (Accedence commenc't Grammar, 1669, preface). Though often reprinted on the continent (Paris, 1527, and frequently also at Basel, Venice, Lyons, &c.), often with a laudatory preface by Me-