Page:Imperialdictiona02eadi Brandeis.pdf/365

FAU which resulted in his being brought before the house in 1733, and reprimanded upon his knees. He was not more fortunate with the house of commons two years afterwards, having printed a work which reflected on one of its members, Serjeant Bettesworth, so unenviably immortalized by Swift. He was committed to Newgate, and on obtaining his liberty, commuted the officers' fees by presenting to each a copy of his edition of Swift's works. These collisions with the legislature brought him both notoriety and popularity, and his shop became the chief resort of the literary and political characters of the day. He now undertook the printing of the Ancient Universal History, which he completed and published in seven volumes folio, in 1744; and as Mr. Gilbert observes, its typography and illustrations will bear honourable comparison with the productions of the contemporary English or continental presses. Faulkner now became on intimate terms with Lord Chesterfield, then viceroy of Ireland; and it is even said that he refused the offer of knighthood at his hand. Certain it is, that he was highly esteemed by that nobleman, who to the end of his life maintained a correspondence with him, entertaining him whenever he visited London, and urging him to undertake some literary work, to transmit his name to posterity, after the example of the Aldi and Stephani, especially suggesting a Typographia Hibernica. Faulkner accordingly projected an illustrated work, the "Vitruvius Hibernicus," which, it is to be regretted, was never executed. In 1772 Faulkner published an edition of Swift's works, in twenty volumes, 8vo.; and the notes of which, written by himself, form the groundwork of all subsequent commentaries, and were largely appropriated by Sir Walter Scott. He died on the 30th August, 1775. No man of his time in Ireland mixed more with men of learning, or was more unsparingly made the butt of their merriment; they used and abused him at their pleasure, and in truth his weak points were so numerous and unguarded, that they invited assault. He was vain, had a lisp, and lost one of his legs by an accident in London, replacing which by a wooden prop, he acquired the classic title of ", or "the wooden-footed Elzèvir." Foote ridiculed him so inimitably in the character of Peter Paragraph in his comedy of "The Orators," that the very persons whom Faulkner had hired to hiss the play off the stage, loudly applauded the representation; actually believing that their patron was really the person who trod the boards. On one occasion, on his return from London, he visited "the Dean" in a laced coat, bag wig, and other fopperies. Swift received him as a stranger—"Pray, sir, who are you?" "George Faulkner, the printer." "You George Faulkner, the printer! why, thou art the most impudent, bare-faced impostor I ever heard of. George Faulkner is a sober, sedate citizen, and would never trick himself out in lace and other fopperies. Get about your business, and thank your stars that I do not send you to the house of correction." George disappeared, and returned in his ordinary apparel. "My good friend," said the dean, cordially taking him by the hand, "I am heartily glad to see you safe returned. Here was an impudent fellow in a laced waistcoat, who would fain have passed for you; but I soon sent him packing with a flea in his ear." To his honour it must be recorded, that Faulkner was a warm advocate for relaxation of the penal code, and, as O'Connor says, "the first protestant who stretched his hand to the prostrate catholic." Nor is it to be forgotten that he was unbounded in his hospitality, and that the best company, both in rank and intellect, were constantly to be found at his table, making merry at their host's expense in more ways than one. He attained to the dignity of alderman of his native city.—(Gilbert's Dublin.)—J. F. W.  FAUQUES, : the precise dates of this lady's birth and death are not known. She was born at Avignon about 1720, and is known to have been living in London in 1777. She had taken the veil in a French convent in early life, through an arrangement of her parents, which she resisted. She succeeded, after ten years of suffering, in freeing herself from this imprisonment. Her family refused to receive her, and she threw herself into the arms of an Englishman of rank, who took her to London and deserted her. She found employment, however, as governess in families of rank, and is said to have been Sir William Jones' first instructress in French. She managed to obtain a precarious livelihood by writing novels and memoirs.—J. A., D.  FAURIEL,, born at St. Etienne in 1772; died at Paris in 1844. Fauriel's school education was at Tournon and Lyons. In 1793 he passed into the army, and had the opportunity of making himself acquainted with the Breton language, and with some of the provincial dialects of France. Fauriel's political prejudices were in favour of a republic, and the course which the Revolution took, together with his wish to devote himself to literature, led him to give up an office which he held in the police of Paris on Bonaparte's becoming in 1802 consul for life. A review by Fauriel of madame de Stael's work on literature, introduced him to her parties. Fauriel now studied Arabic and Sanscrit, and occupied himself with poetical translations from the works of Baggesen and Manzoni. In 1824 and 1825 he published a work of great interest, "The Songs of Modern Greece," with a preface on the character of popular poetry, as distinguished from that which we find in what is called literature. He planned a history of the south of France, of which he executed one part, describing the south of France under its German conquerors. In 1830 a chair of foreign literature was created for him in Paris, and to the lectures delivered from that chair we owe his history of Provençal literature, and his work on Dante. He contributed largely to the Revue des Deux Mondes, and the Histoire Litteraire de France.—J. A., D.  FAUST. See.  FAUST or FAUSTUS,, said to have been born at the commencement of the sixteenth century. Weimar and Kundlingen in Suabia contend for the honour of his birth. He took the degrees of doctor of theology and of medicine at Wittemberg. In his studies, as the story goes, he passed on to the highest stages of astrology and magic, and had as his companion a demon, with whom he made the bargain of exchanging his hopes of heaven for twenty-four years of happiness on earth. His demon had the power of annihilating time and space, if not of making lovers happy, and Faustus, with his assistance, marries Helen of Troy. He shows the emperor of Germany the apparition, nay, it would seem, the corporeal and spiritual essence of Alexander the Great. At the end of the twenty-four years the devil claims and gets his own, and carries off Faustus body and soul. The story was the subject of folk-books and puppet plays in every country in Europe. The first of these, which still circulates in Germany, was early translated into English, and was the foundation of Marlowe's tragedy. Lessing and other German writers took up the subject, and in Göthe's early life he published a few scenes, which he afterwards extended into his great drama. The first part, which appeared in a complete form in 1808, concludes with a scene which leaves doubtful the issue of his engagement with the demon. After Göthe's death the second part appeared, which represents the devil as having lost his expected prize. He has not succeeded in giving Faust one moment of happiness. He, however, claims to have won the bet—for in Göthe's treatment of the subject there is a bet in heaven and another on earth, in substitution for the old contract of the legend—as Faust utters, though in a meaning different from what was intended at the time the bargain was made, the words on the utterance of which the demon's right is to become absolute. Some of the Germans have sought to identify the conjuror with the Faust or Fust for whom the invention of printing has been claimed, and a romance has been framed on the supposition that, though he is finally to escape from the demon, he is in a state of purgatorial suffering, and that his punishment is to continue till the good effected by the art of printing overcomes the intervening evil.—J. A., D.  FAUSTA CORNELIA, the daughter of Sulla the Roman dictator, was born about the year 88. She was married at an early age to C. Memmius; and being divorced, she married T. Annius Milo who killed Clodius, and was along with her husband when the murder was committed. She was a woman of profligate character, and infamous for her adulteries.—J. B. J.  FAUSTA FLAVIA MAXIMIANA, the second wife of Constantine the Great, was the daughter of Maximianus Herculeus, the Roman emperor. Her father attempted to induce her to destroy Constantine, or betray him into the hands of his enemies, but she steadily resisted, and acquired great influence over her husband by her fidelity and courage. Animated by an apprehension that Crispus Cæsar—Constantino's son by a previous marriage—would supplant her own children, she made such representations as irritated the mind of Constantine, and led him to order his son to be put to death; but being afterwards convinced that Fausta had deceived him, he caused her to be shut up in a bath, heated to excess, in which she was suffocated. Attempts have been made to free Fausta from blame in the matter of Crispus, 