Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 4.djvu/433

Rh method and extend its use. To him probably more than to any other man is due the abandonment of the radically vicious principle of interpretation according to the &quot; analogy of faith,&quot; which practically subordinated the Bible to the Creed. To his favourite task of exegesis, which he him self described as the main object of his public life, Dr Brown brought a rare critical sagacity, exact and extensive scholarship, unswerving honesty, and a clear, logical style. His expository works, noted below, have accordingly a permanent value. Dr Brown was naturally of a retiring disposition, but the strength of his convictions forced him to take a prominent part in the chief religious and political discussions of his time. He had a considerable share in the Apocrypha controversy, and he was throughout life a vigorous and consistent upholder of anti-state-church or &quot; voluntary &quot; views. His two sermons on The Law of Christ rcspectiny civil obedience, especially in the payment of tribute, called forth by a local grievance from which he had personally suffered, were afterwards published with exten sive additions and notes, and are still regarded as an admirable statement and defence of the voluntary prin ciple. In a discussion which agitated his denomination for several years in regard to the nature and extent of the atonement, Dr Brown took a part which led to a formal charge of heresy being preferred against him. In 1845, after the to him peculiarly painful ordeal of a somewhat protracted trial, he was acquitted by the Synod. From that time he enjoyed the thorough confidence of his deno mination (after 1847 &quot;the United Presbyterian Church&quot;), of which in his later years he was generally regarded as the leading representative. Dr Brown died on the 13th October 1858.

1em  BROWN,, an American abolitionist, celebrated as the originator of the Harper s Ferry insurrection, was born in Torrington, Connecticut, on the 9th May 1800. Originally intended for the church, he was compelled to give up study for this purpose on account of inflammation in the eyes. He then took up the business of a tanner, which he carried on for twenty years. Not being very successful in trade, he started business as a wool-dealer in Ohio in 1840. Failing also in this he removed to Essex county, New York, in 1849, and began to reclaim a large tract of land which had been granted to him. After two years he returned to Ohio and resumed his business as a wool-dealer. In 1855, with his four sons, he migrated to Kansas, and at once took a prominent position as an anti-slavery man. He became renowned in the fierce border warfare which was carried on for some years in Kansas and Missouri, and gained particular celebrity by his victory at Ossowattomie. About this time he seems to have formed the idea of effecting slave liberation by arming the slaves and inciting them to rise in revolt against their oppressors. As the first step in this scheme, he designed to seize the arsenal of Harper s Ferry, where an immense stock of arms was kept. On the night of the 10th October 1859, he, with a handful of well-armed and resolute companions, overpowered the small guard and gained possession of the arsenal. During the next morning he made prisoners of some of the chief men of the town, but there was no rising of slaves as had been expected. The townsmen, too, recovered from their astonishment at the audacity of the act, and a bold attack was made on the arsenal. Fresh assailants poured in from the country round, and on the morning of the 18th the arsenal was recaptured, and Brown, severely wounded, was taken prisoner. On the 27th October he was tried at Charlcstown for treason and murder, and was found guilty. The sentence passed upon him, death by hanging, was carried into execution on the 2d December. His fate made an extraordinary impression on the excited feelings of the Americans, and his name has become a household word among the Abolitionists.  BROWN,, the founder of the, a numerous sect of dissenters in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, was born in 1550. He was the son of Anthony Brown of Tolthorp in Rutlandshire, whose father obtained, by a charter of Henry VIII. , the singular privilege of wearing his cap in the king s presence. Robert was educated at Cambridge, and was afterwards a schoolmaster in South wark. About the year 1580 he began to pro mulgate his principles of dissent from the Established Church ; and the following year he preached at Norwich, where he soon attracted a numerous congregation. His unmeasured assaults upon the Church of England form of government gained for him many followers. His sect daily increasing, Dr Freake, bishop of Norwich, with other ecclesiastical commissioners, called him before them. Being insolent to the court, he was committed to the custody of the sheriff s officer, but was released at the inter cession of his relative the Lord Treasurer Burghley. Brown now left the kingdom, and with permission of the States, settled at Middleburg in Zealand, where he formed a church after his own plan, and preached without molesta tion. The removal of persecution, however, broke up the unity of the party ; numerous sects appeared, and Brown soon returned to England. He fixed his residence at Northampton, where, for his indiscreet attempts to gain proselytes, he was cited by the bishop of Peterborough, and, refusing to appear, was finally excommunicated for contempt. The solemnity of this censure, we are told, immediately effected his reformation. He moved for absolution, which he obtained, and from that time became a dutiful member of the Church of England. This happened about the year 1590; and, in a short time afterwards, Brown was preferred to a rectory in Northamp tonshire, where he kept a curate, and where he might probably have died in peace ; but having some dispute with the constable of his parish relative to the payment of rates, he proceeded to blows, and was afterwards so insolent to the justice, that he was committed to Northampton jail, where he died in 1630, aged eighty. Brown boasted on his death-bed that he had been confined in thirty- two different prisons. He wrote a Treatise of Reforma tion without tarrying for any, and two other pieces, making together a thin quarto, published at Middleburg in 1582. See.  BROWN,, a celebrated botanist, who may be said to be the founder of the modern science of vegetable physiology, and to have placed the natural system of the classification of plants, originally introduced by Jussieu, upon that sure and ever-widening basis on which it has ever since remained. With the exception of the early years of his life his career was uneventful. His private life is little known ; and though his researches w^ere familiar to the learned members of nearly all the European and American academies, which numbered him among their members, his very existence, until the journals of the day proclaimed his decease, was almost unsuspected by the fashionable world of the great city in which he had passed upwards of half a century. His biography may be best read in his works, a very few words sufficing to record the salient points of his life. Robert Brown was the second and only surviving son of the Rev. Jas. Brown, Episcopalian minister of Montrose. by Helen, daughter of the Rev. Robert 