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Sayers monastery of Monte Cassino, and he was professor of moral philosophy there for several years. On his entrance into religion he took the christian name of Gregory. In 1595, having acquired a great name on account of his learning, he was invited to the monastery of St. George in Venice, where he died in October 1602, being buried on the 30th of that month.

His works are: 1. ‘De Sacramentis in Communi,’ Venice, 1599, 1600, 4to. 2. ‘Casuum conscientiæ, sive theologiæ moralis thesauri tomus primus,’ Venice, 1601, 1606, 1609, fol. 3. ‘Flores Decisionum sive Casuum Conscientiæ, ex doctrina Consiliorum Martini ab Azpilcueta Doctoris Navari collecti, & iuxta librorum Juris Canonici dispositionem in suos titulos distributi,’ Venice, 1601, 4to. 4. ‘Summa Sacramenti Pœnitentiæ,’ Venice, 1601, 12mo. 5. ‘Clavis Regia Sacerdotum Casuum Conscientiæ sive Theologiæ Moralis thesauri locos omnes aperiens, et canonistarum atque summistarum difficultates ad communem praxim pertinentes doctissimè decidens, et copiosissimè explicans,’ Venice, 1605, fol.; Antwerp, 1619, fol.; Munster, 1628, fol.; Antwerp, 1659, fol. 6. ‘Compendium Clavis Regiæ,’ Venice, 1621, 4to, pt. i. In 1624 appeared ‘De ecclesiasticis Censuris, et aliis in admod. R.P.D. Gregorii Sayri Thesauro contentis, Unà cum Regulis, pro cuiuscunque Bullæ in Cœna Domini facili explicatione, ex eodem desumptis, Formale Compendium. Per R. P. F. Antonium Ninum Venetum Ord. Erem. S. P. August. Artium, Sacræq. Theol. Doct. Perill. ac adm. R. P. D. Carolo Zono Canon. Regul. S. Spiritus Venet. dicatum,’ Venice, 12mo. Sayer is also credited with ‘Epitome Conciliorum Navarri’ and a treatise of moral divinity, which are not known to be extant.

A collected edition of his principal works in Latin appeared at Douay, 4 vols. 1620, fol., under the editorship of Father Leander à Sancto Martino, i.e. John Jones, D.D. (1575–1636) [q. v.]

[Addit. MS. 5880, f. 170; Dodd's Church Hist. ii. 142; Duthillœul's Bibl. Douaisienne, 1842, pp. 376, 377; Foley's Records, vi. 155; Fuller's Church Hist. (Brewer), v. 98; Latimer's Works (Corrie), ii. 63; Oliver's Cornwall, p. 523; Snow's Necrology, p. 29; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.; Weldon's Chronological Notes, p. 39.]

 SAYERS, FRANK (1763–1817), poet and metaphysician, born in London on 3 March 1763 (baptised at St. Margaret Pattens on 3 April), was son of Francis Sayers, an insurance broker, by his wife Anne, daughter of John Morris, esq., of Great Yarmouth. The elder Sayers died within a year of his son's birth, and the boy accompanied his mother to her father's house in Friar's Lane, Yarmouth. At the age of ten he was sent to a boarding-school at North Walsham, where Nelson was his schoolfellow. A year later he was transferred to a school at Palgrave, Suffolk, kept by Rochemont Barbauld, the husband of Mrs. Barbauld [q. v.], who gave the boys lessons in English composition. There he remained three years, and made the acquaintance of his lifelong friend, William Taylor (1765–1836) [q. v.], the German scholar. In October 1778 his mother's father died, leaving him a small estate at Parkfield, and he went to learn farming at Oulton. Subsequently he determined to adopt the medical profession. He attended John Hunter's surgery lectures in London, where he saw much of his cousin, James Sayers [q. v.], the caricaturist. For two years from the autumn of 1786 he pursued medical and scientific study at Edinburgh, at the same time reading much history and philosophy. Failing health necessitated a tour in the lake country in June 1788, and later in the year he went abroad. After graduating M.D. from Hardervyck, he returned to Norwich at the end of 1789.

Sayers abandoned medicine and entered upon a literary career. The study of Gray's versions of the Runic poems and of Percy's ‘Northern Antiquities’ suggested to him his ‘Dramatic Sketches of Northern Mythology,’ which he issued in 1790. The volume consisted of three tragedies, ‘Moina,’ ‘Starno,’ and ‘The Descent of Frea.’ Jann Ewald's Danish tragedy ‘The Death of Balder,’ on which the last piece is based, was subsequently englished by Borrow. In 1792 a reissue of the volume included an ‘Ode to Aurora,’ in Sayers's own view the most finished of his works, and a monodrama, ‘Pandora.’ A third edition is dated 1803, and the last in 1807. The poems were well received in England and Germany. Two German translations appeared, one in blank verse by F. D. Gräter, with notes, and another in rhyme by Dr. J. W. Neubeck (1793).

In 1792, on his mother's death, Sayers moved to the Close at Norwich, and obtained an assured position in Norwich society. Among his friends and guests at various times were Southey, Sir James Mackintosh, Thomas Fanshawe Middleton, and Thomas Amyot. The death of an aunt in 1799 greatly increased his resources. In 1793 he published ‘Disquisitions, Metaphysical and Literary.’ He followed Hartley and Priestley in his metaphysical essays. The second edition of 1808 omits an essay on English metres.