Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/15

  Mag. and Statistical Journal.] 

MILNE, WILLIAM (1785–1822), missionary, was born in 1785, in the parish of Kinnethmont, Aberdeenshire, and employed in his early years as a shepherd. At the age of twenty he resolved to become a missionary, and passing through the regular course of studies at the college of the London Missionary Society at Gosport, he was ordained there in 1812. In September he sailed for the east, arriving at Macao in July 1813. An order from the Portuguese governor compelled him to leave the settlement, and Milne proceeded in a small boat to Canton, where he was joined by his colleague, [q. v.] Shortly afterwards Milne made a year's tour through the Malay Archipelago. Settling down at Malacca he mastered the Chinese language, opened a school for Chinese converts, and set up a printing-press, from which was issued the ‘Chinese Gleaner.’ He also translated portions of the Old Testament into Chinese, and became principal of an Anglo-Chinese College, which he was mainly instrumental in founding at Malacca. In 1818 he received the degree of D.D. from Glasgow University, and in 1822 his health failed, and he went on a visit to Singapore and Penang, but died on 27 May, four days after his return to Malacca. Milne married in 1812 a daughter of Charles Gowrie of Aberdeen, who predeceased him in 1819.

Milne was author of:
 * 1) ‘The Sacred Edict,’ London, 1817, 8vo.
 * 2) ‘A Retrospect of the First Ten Years of the Protestant Mission to China,’ Malacca, 1820, 8vo.
 * 3) ‘Some Account of a Secret Association,’ a paper read before the Royal Asiatic Society by the Rev. Robert Morrison, 5 Feb. 1825.

One of his sons, (1815-1863), missionary to China, ordained 19 July, and appointed to Canton, sailed on 28 July 1837, arriving on 18 Dec. at Macao, where he assisted until 1842 in the Morrison Education Society's House. Proceeding via Chusan, Tinghae, Ningpo, and Canton, he arrived at Hongkong in August 1843, and was nominated with [q. v.] to commence a station at Shanghai. In 1844 Milne visited England, but, returning to China in 1846, he served on the Translation Committee, part of whose work he subsequently attacked. In 1852 he again visited England, and terminated his connection with the London Missionary Society. He afterwards went back to China as an interpreter under the British government, became assistant Chinese secretary to the legation at Pekin, and died there on 15 May 1863. Milne married Frances Williamina, daughter of the Rev. Dr. Beaumont. He was author of:
 * 1) ‘Life in China,’ 1858.
 * 2) ‘Critical Remarks on Dr. Medhurst's Version of the First Chapter of St. John,’ and contributed to the ‘Edinburgh Review,’ of October 1855, an ‘Account of the Political Disturbances in China.’



MILNER. [See also .]

MILNER, ISAAC (1750–1820), mathematician and divine, was born at Leeds on 11 Jan. 1750. His education began at the grammar school, but on the sudden death of his father, who had been unsuccessful in business, he was taken away when only ten years old, and set to earn his livelihood as a weaver. He followed this trade until his eldest brother, [q. v.], who had been sent to Cambridge by the kindness of friends, had taken his degree, and obtained the mastership of the grammar school at Hull. As soon as he was established there he appointed Isaac his usher (1768). It is said that the friend whom he sent to make inquiries as to his brother's fitness for the post found him at his loom with Tacitus and a Greek author by his side. It seems certain that he had obtained considerable knowledge of Latin, Greek, and mathematics before he went to Hull, and that while there he became, as he said himself, ‘a tolerably good classic, and acquainted with six books of Euclid’ (Life, p. 523). In 1770 Joseph Milner found means to enter him as a sizar at Queens' College, Cambridge. The brothers came up together on foot, with occasional lifts in a wagon (ib. p. 128).

Milner found the menial duties then incumbent on sizars so distasteful, that when reproved for upsetting a tureen of soup, he exclaimed, ‘When I get into power I will abolish this nuisance’ (which he did). He refused to sign a petition against subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles; and, when keeping the ‘opponency,’ then required of all candidates for the B.A. degree, he used an argument so ingenious as to puzzle even the moderator, who said, ‘Domine opponens, argumentum sane novum et difficile, nec pudet fateri meipsum nodum solvere non posse’ (ib. p. 8). Hard reading combined with his natural talents secured for him the first place in the mathematical tripos of 1774, and enabled him to outstrip his competitors so