Page:Imperial Dictionary of Universal Biography Volume 1.pdf/1112

CLA countries, and particularly to the East Indies." He subsequently settled at Newcastle and was employed to reform the gross abuses which had crept into the management of the public hospital, and to erect a dispensary for the poor. He subsequently published in 1780 "Observations on Fevers, especially those of the continued type," one vol. 8vo; and "A Collection of Memoirs on the Means of Preventing the Progress of Contagious Fevers," 12mo, 1802. Dr. Clark died at Bath in 1805.—J. T.  * CLARKE,, the authoress of the invaluable "Complete Concordance to Shakspeare," a work to which the author "devoted the untiring labour of sixteen years—twelve in the preparation of the MS., and four more in guiding it through the press." She is the daughter of Mr. Vincent Novello, and was born in June in 1809. In 1828 she married Mr. Charles Cowden Clarke, the friend of Lamb, Hazlitt, and Leigh Hunt, and the teacher as well as friend of Keats. Notwithstanding all that has been done for the elucidation of the test of Shakspeare by other modern authors, the literary world acknowledges a heavy debt of gratitude to the author of the "Concordance." Mrs. Clarke's "Girlhood of Shakspeare's Heroines;" "Shakspeare Proverbs;" "Kit Bam's Adventures;" "Iron Cousin, or Mutual Influence;" "World-noted Women, or Types of Particular Womanly Attributes of all Lands and Ages, Illustrated," which, published in New York, 1858, are also well-known and admirable works.—J. S., G.  CLARKE,, an estimable English divine, was born in 1599 at Woolston in Warwickshire, where his father had been a long time minister. He was educated at Cambridge; became assistant to the incumbent of Thornton in Cheshire; removed to Shotwick, and, after five years' residence there, was presented to the rectory of Alcester. He refused the et cetera oath, and drew up a petition on the subject, which he presented to the king at York. Having officiated nine years at Alcester, he went to London on some business connected with his petition to the king, and was there chosen preacher of the parish of St. Bennet Fink, where he remained till the Restoration. About the year 1662 he was ejected for nonconformity, having, although warmly attached to the constitution and the doctrines of the church, long entertained conscientious scruples respecting certain of its ceremonies and points of discipline. Till his death, which occurred in 1682, he continued to attend as a hearer the service he had formerly conducted, not daring, as he said, to gather a private church out of a true church, which the church of England in his judgment was. His principal works are—"A Mirror or Looking-glass for Saints and Sinners," &c.; "The Marrow of Ecclesiastical History," &c.; A General Martyrology, and an English Martyrology; "The Lives of Sundry Eminent Persons in this latter Age;" and "The Marrow of Divinity," &c.—His son published "Annotations on the Bible," which Dr. Owen and Mr. Baxter commended as able and judicious, and which have been of great although unacknowledged service to many modern commentators.—The great-grandson of the martyrologist, also called, pastor of a congregation of dissenters at St. Albans, published a work entitled "Scripture Promises," which has been frequently reprinted.—J. S., G.  CLARKE,, born at Brackley in Northamptonshire, in 1623, was "right famous," according to Wood, "for Oriental learning." After studying at Oxford, he became master of a boarding-school at Islington. While there he assisted Walton in his Polyglott Bible. In 1658 the university elected him architypographus and superior beadle of the civil law. His death occurred in 1669. He published "Variæ Lectiones et Observationes in Chaldaicam Paraphrasim," "Scientia Metrica et Rhythmica," &c. Some other works of his, printed and in MS., are noticed by Wood.—J. S., G.  CLARKE,, D.D., distinguished as a theologian and philosopher, the son of Edward Clarke, alderman of Norwich, was born there in 1675. He received the early part of his education in the free school of that city, and entered Caius college, Cambridge, in 1691. In order to his degree in arts, he performed a public exercise on a question taken from the philosophy of Newton. Having obtained orders, he became in 1698 chaplain to Dr. Moore, bishop of Norwich, who presented him to the rectory of Drayton. In 1704 he was appointed to preach at the Boyle lecture, and chose for his subject, "A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God." He preached at the same lecture next year on "The Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion." These were first printed in two separate volumes in 1705 and 1706. They have since been printed in one volume, and have gone through several editions. To the later editions are generally appended some Letters from Butler, then attending a dissenting academy in Gloucestershire, and afterwards bishop of Durham, expressing some hesitation and difficulty as to the conclusiveness of the "demonstration." Clarke saw the ingenuousness and ability of his correspondent, and replied so as to satisfy him; for Butler, in the Analogy which he afterwards wrote, accepts the "demonstration" as valid. Clarke did not farther interfere in the discussions to which the "demonstration" gave rise. Law, who was afterwards bishop of Carlisle, animadverted upon it in his Notes to King's Essay on the Origin of Evil. He was replied to by Mr. John Clarke. He answered this, and received a second reply; and a controversy of some length followed, in which Mr. John Jackson and Mr. Joseph Clarke took part. In 1706 Dr. Clarke published a "Letter to Mr. Dodwell," in answer to his arguments against the immortality of the soul; and during the same year he translated Newton's Optics into Latin. Sir Isaac was so pleased with this translation, that he made Dr. Clarke a present of £500. During this same year, Bishop Moore procured for him the rectory of St. Bennet's, London; and having recommended him to the favour of Queen Anne, she appointed him one of her chaplains-in-ordinary, and presented him to the rectory of St. James', Westminster, in 1709. At this time he took the degree of D.D. with much applause. In 1712 he published "The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity," a work which gave rise to much controversy. It was brought under the notice of the two houses of convocation, to whom Dr. Clarke made an explanation. In 1715 and 1716, a correspondence on the principles of natural philosophy and religion took place between him and the celebrated Leibnitz. This was published in 1717, along with "Remarks upon a Philosophical Enquiry concerning Human Liberty, by Anthony Collins." In 1718 he printed "Select Psalms and Hymns," in which some alterations were made in the forms of doxology, which occasioned considerable discussion. On the death of Sir Isaac Newton in 1727, he was offered, but declined, the place of master of the mint, worth £1200 or £1500 a-year—a proof of his attachment to the church and the cause of religion. In 1729 he published the first twelve books of Homer's Iliad, with an entirely new Latin version. And it was while occupied with the remaining books that he was interrupted by an illness, which terminated in death on the 17th May of that year. During the same year were printed by his brother, Dr. John Clarke, dean of Sarum, his "Exposition of the Church Catechism," and "Sermons," in ten volumes. His sermons are full of plain and clear explanations of scripture, and of vigorous inculcation of sound morality. On the doctrine of the trinity he was charged with Arianism, a charge countenanced by the fact, that Mr. Winston heard him say that he never read the Athanasian creed in his parish, at or near Norwich, but once; and that was by mistake, at a time when it was not appointed by the rubric. As a philosopher. Dr. Clarke cannot be said to have founded a school, neither can he be said to have been a follower of any school. But he was the strenuous advocate of every cause that could advance the dignity and the virtue of man. He defended human liberty against Collins, and the spirituality and immortality of the soul against Dodwell. He opposed the selfish philosophers, by showing the eternal and immutable obligation of morality; and he combated the atheism of Hobbes, and the pantheism of Spinoza, by his "Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God." His fame now rests on these two books, especially the last, and it will be proper to give a glance, however slight, at the tenor of its argument. The "demonstration" proceeds à priori, and consists of the three following propositions:—I. As something now exists, something must always have existed; otherwise something must have sprung out of nothing. II. That which has always existed must be either one independent and unchangeable being, or an infinite series of changeable and dependent beings. But an infinite series of changeable and dependent beings is absurd, as it has no cause of its existence from without nor from within; and, therefore, that which has always existed must be one independent and unchangeable being. III. This independent and unchangeable being must be self-existent, that is, must exist by necessity of nature. For even when we try to think that nothing has existed always, the idea of something which exists necessarily forces itself upon us, and we cannot dismiss it. But may not that which has existed 