Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/415

 L E C L E C 397 occupied by the prefecture, the old convent of the Capuchins, and the marble church of St Nicholas. Bene volent institutions are specially numerous, and include a hospital dating from 1389, and a communal orphanage from 1608. A public library was founded in 1863. The name of Lecce lias long been familiar throughout Italy in connexion with the great tobacco factory now located in the Dominican convent ; and cotton and woollen goods, lace, artificial ilowers, hats, &c., are among the products of the local industry. The population increased from 17,836 in 1S61 to 18,460 in 1871. Lccce is identified with Lupin;, a city of the Salentines, and, though remains of ancient editices are no longer to be seen, there is evidence of the existence of extensive substructions as late as the loth century. The name Lyce a, or Lycia, begins to appear in the 6th century. The city was tor some time held by counts of Nor man blood, among whom the most noteworthy is Bohemond, son of Robert Guiscard. It afterwards passed to the Orsini. The rank of provincial capital was bestowed by Ferdinand of Aragon iu acknowledgment of the fidelity of Lecce to his cause. Scipione Ammirato (Florentine historian), Domenico do Angelis, and G. B.iglivi the anatomist were natives of the city. LECCO, a city of Italy, in the province of Como, situated near the southern extremity of the eastern branch of the Lake of Como, which is frequently distinguished as the Lake of Lecco. It is the meeting place of several important roads, and the terminus of a railway from Bergamo, which joins the line from Milan. To the south the Adda is crossed by a fine bridge originally canstructed in 1335, and rebuilt in 1609 by Fuentes. Lecco, in spite of its real antiquity, presents quite a modern appearance ; and it is the seat of no small industrial activity. Besides the iron works, which are particularly important, there are brass foundries and oil- works; and silk spinning, cotton spinning, and wood carving are successfully prosecuted. The annual cattle fair lasts fifteen days. In the neighbourhood of the town is Culeotto, the residence of Manzoni, who in his Promessi Sposi has left a full description of the district. The population of Lecco was 6815 in 1871. In the llth century Lecco, which had previously been the seat of a marquisate, was presented to the bishops of Como by Otto II. ; but in the 12th century it passed to the archbishops of Milan, and in 1127 it assisted the Milanese in the destruction of Como. During the 13th century it was struggling for its existence with the metro politan city ; and its fate seemed to be sealed when the Yisconti drove its inhabitants across the lake to Valmadrera, and forbade them to raise their town from its ashes. But in a few years the people returned ; and Azzone Yisconti made Lecco a strong fortress, and united it with the Milanese territory by a bridge across the Adda. During tha 15th and 16th centuries the rock of Lecco was an object of endless contention. In 1647 the town with its terri tory was made a countship. The fortifications were finally sold by Joseph II. to Count Serponti. Merlinis, one of the first Italian printers, and Morone, Charles V. s Italian chancellor, were born in Lecco. See Apostolo, Lecco c suo tcrritorio, Lecco, 1855. LE CLERC, JEAX (1657-1736), or CLERICUS, theo logian and man of letters, was born March 19, 1657 (o.s.), at Geneva, where his father Stephen Le Clerc was pro fessor of Greek. The family had originally belonged to the neighbourhood of Beauvais in France, and several of its members have acquired some name in literature. On the completion of his grammar school course (in which he made himself remarkable for his omnivorous reading), he applied himself to the study of philosophy under Chouet the Cartesian, and from his nineteenth to his twenty-first year he attended the theological lectures of Mestrezat, Turretin, and Louis Tronchin. In 1678-79 he spent some time at Grenoble as tutor in a private family ; on his return to Geneva he passed his examinations and received ordina tion. Soon afterwards he went to Saumur, where in 1679 were published Liberii df Sancfo-Amore Epistolx Theologicx (Irenopoli : Typis Philalethianis), usually attributed to his pen ; they deal with such subjects as the doctrine of the Trinity, the hypostatical union of the two natures in Jesus Christ, original sin, and the like, in a manner sufficiently far removed from that of the conventional orthodoxy of the period. From Geneva, which he still continued to regard as his home, Le Clerc in 1682 went to London, where he remained six months, preaching on alternate Sundays in the Walloon church and in the Savoy chapel. Passing over to Amsterdam he was introduced to Lo:ke and Limborch ; the acquaintance with the latter soon ripened into a close friendship, which naturally strengthened his preference for the Remonstrant theology, already favour ably known to him by the writings of his granduncle Curcellceus, and by those of Episcopius. A final attempt to live at Geneva, made at the request of his relatives there, satisfied him of the unwholesomeness of its stifling theological atmosphere, and in 1684 he finally settled at Amsterdam, first as a moderately successful preacher until ecclesiastical jealousy shut him out from that career, and afterwards as professor of philosophy, belles-lettres, and Hebrew in the Remonstrant seminary. This appointment, which he owed to his friend Limborch, he held from 1684 till 1712, when on the death of the latter he was called to occupy the chair of church history also. His suspected Socinianism was the cause, it is said, of his exclusion from the chair of dogmatic theology. Apart from its varied and immense literary labours, his life at Amsterdam was quite uneventful. His marriage to the daughter of Gregorio Leti took place in 1691. In 1728 and following years repeated strokes of paralysis gradually reduced him to a state of mental imbecility, from which he was released by death on January 8, 1736. A full catalogue of the publications of Le Clerc will be found, along with adequate biographical material, in Haag s France Pro- tcstantc (where seventy-three works are enumerated), or in Chaufie- pie s Dictionnaire. Only the most important of these can be men tioned here. In 1685 he published Scntimens dc quclqucs theologicns dcHoUandcsur THistoire Critique du Vicux Testament composecpar le P. Packard Simon, in which, while pointing out what he believed to be the faults of that author, he undertook to make some positive contributions towards a right understanding of the Bible. Among these last may be noted his argument against the Mosaic author ship of the Pentateuch, his views as to the manner in which the five books actually were composed, his opinions (singularly free for the time in which he lived) on the subject of inspiration in general, and particularly as to the inspiration of Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles. Simon s Reponsc (1686) elicited from Le Clerc a Defense des Scntimens in the same year, which was followed by a new Reponsc (1687). In 1692 appeared his Lorjica sire Ars Ratiocinandi, and also Ontologia ct Pncumatologia ; these, with the Physica (1695), are incorporated with the Opera Philosophica which have passed through several editions. In 1693 his series of Biblical commentaries began with that on Genesis ; it was not completed until 1731. The portion relating to the New Testament books in cluded the paraphrase and notes of Hammond. Le Clerc s com mentary had a great influence in breaking up traditional prejudices and opening men s eyes to the necessity for a more scientific inquiry into the origin and meaning of the Biblical books. It was on all sides hotly attacked, often for opinions which now seem innocent to the most orthodox. Le Clerc s new edition of the Apostolic Fathers of Cotelerius, published in 1698, marked an advance in the critical study of these documents. But the greatest literary influence of Le Clerc was probably that which he exercised over his contemporaries by means of the serials, or, if one may so call them, reviews, of which he was editor. These were the Bibliothequc univcrselle ct historique (Amsterdam, 25 vols. 12mo, 1686-93), begun along with De la Croze ; the Bibliothequc choisie, Amsterdam, 28 vols. 18mo, 1703-13 ; and the Bibliothequc ancicnne ct modernc, 29 vols. 18mo, 1714-26. See Le Clerc s Parrhasiana ou Pcnsecs sur des matiercs de critique, d histoire, dc morale, ct dc fiolitiquc : avcc la defense de divers ouvraycs de M. L. C. par Theodore Farrhasc, Amsterdam, 1699 ; and Vita ct opera ad annum MDCCXI. , amid cjus opusculum, philosophicis Clcrici operibus subjicicndum, also attributed to himself. The supplement to Hammond s notes was translated into English in 1699, Parrhasiana, or Thoughts on Several Subjects, in 1700, and the Harmony of the Gospels in 1701. Twelve Dissertations out of If. Lc Clerc s Genesis appeared in 1696. LECTION, LECTIONARY, LECTOR. The Jewish custom of reading the books of Moses in the synagogues every Sabbath day was already ancient in the apostolic age, and we learn from Luke iv. 16, 17, that portions were also