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GIL GILES,. See.  GILES. See.  GILES. See.  * GILFILLAN,, A.M., critic and miscellaneous writer, was born in 1813 at Comrie in Perthshire, where his father, the well-known Samuel Gilfillan, was pastor of a Secession congregation. He was educated at the university of Glasgow, where he acquired a respectable share of classical and other knowledge, but mainly distinguished himself by the extent of his reading in modern criticism and poetry. In 1835 he was licensed to preach the gospel, and shortly after was called to a church in Dundee, where he still officiates. His professional duties do not seem to have interrupted his literary studies, for in 1842 we find him sketching a series of literary portraits in the Dumfries Herald, a journal edited by Thomas Aird, the author of the Devil's Dream, and other poems. These sketches having attracted considerable notice, were collected, enlarged, and published in 1845, under the title of "A Gallery of Literary Portraits." The volume was extraordinarily successful, and for some years Mr. Gilfillan was probably the most popular critical writer in Scotland. In 1849 a second "Gallery" made its appearance, and met with a reception hardly inferior to the first. In 1850 Mr. Gilfillan published a work of a semi-religious character, the "Bards of the Bible," in which he sketched the sacred writers and their productions very much after the fashion of his Galleries. By some the work was intensely admired on account of its occasional bursts of glowing, though too rhapsodical eloquence; by others it was condemned as deficient in reverence, insight, and acumen; while the whole was declared to lack any definite purpose. In 1851 appeared his "Book of British Poesy," and in 1852 the "Heroes, Martyrs, and Bards of the Scottish Covenant," which Hugh Millar pronounced to be Mr. Gilfillan's best performance. The "Grand Discovery" was published in 1854; a third "Gallery of Literary Portraits" in 1855; the "History of a Man" in 1856; and "Christianity and our Era" in 1857. Recently Mr. Gilfillan has contributed another work to religious literature. Besides what we have mentioned, he has written a vast number of casual criticisms in various periodicals, and is at present engaged in editing an edition of the British Poets, published by Mr. Nichol of Edinburgh. His later works, although written on the grandest themes, have failed to excite much attention. Mr. Gilfillan's merits as a writer are as easily appreciated as his faults are quickly discerned. He is rich in metaphor, but deficient in thought. His criticism is rarely original or subtle, and is never remarkable for its judiciousness, yet it is enthusiastic, vigorous, and brilliant. Whatever intuition or insight into a man or his works he possesses, springs directly from his sympathies. When these happen to tend in the right direction, he generally contrives to say something very beautiful and very true. His great hold is upon young men entering on a career of literary study; to such he is one of the most stimulating, and perhaps one of the most beneficial, of living writers.—J. M. R.  GILFILLAN,, a Scottish song writer, was born at Dunfermline, Fifeshire, in 1798. He learned the trade of a cooper, but, on the expiry of his apprenticeship, obtained the situation of a clerk, and was employed in this capacity for several years in his native town and in Leith. In 1837 he was appointed collector of police rates in the burgh of Leith, and discharged the duties of the office faithfully till his death, which took place in December, 1850. From an early period of his life Mr. Gilfillan was a writer of songs, and some of these having been introduced with commendation into the Noctes Ambrosianæ, he was encouraged to persevere in the development of his powers. Many of his compositions appeared originally in the Dublin University Magazine and the Scotsman, and were at length collected in a goodly duodecimo, of which several editions have been issued. Some of his songs—particularly "O why left I my hame," and "Happy days o' youth"—have long enjoyed a remarkable popularity in Scotland; and his "Peter M'Craw" may be quoted as evidence that he combined with lyrical tenderness no inconsiderable gift of humour. Among the minor poets of Scotland Gilfillan has a high place.—J. B. J.  GILIBERT,, was born at Lyons, 21st June, 1741, and died thereon 2nd September, 1814. He first studied theology, and subsequently relinquished it for medicine. In 1775 he went to Poland, and founded a botanic garden at Grodno, where he lectured on clinical medicine. He was afterwards transferred to Wilna, and became professor of natural history and of materia medica in that university. In 1783 he relinquished this office and went to Lyons, where he became physician to the Hotel Dieu, and professor in the College of medicine. In 1793 he was elected mayor of the city. During the disturbances at that epoch he was put in prison by Challier. During the siege of Lyons he accepted the office of president; and, after the taking of the town, he made his escape, and wandered through France and other countries for eighteen months. When the danger was past, he again repaired to his native city, and was elected professor of natural history in the central school. Ill health caused him to retire in 1810. A genus of plants has been named Gilibertia after him by Ruiz and Pavon. He published a flora of Lithuania, a history of the common plants of Europe, a synopsis of the plants in the Lyons garden, various botanical memoirs, and delineations of the Linnæan system, and several medical works.—J. H. B.  GILIMER. See.  GILL,, son of Alexander Gill, head-master of St. Paul's school from 1608 till 1635, was born in 1597, educated at Trinity college, Oxford, served as usher to his father, and succeeded him in the head-mastership. He held this office for only five years, when he was dismissed, according to one statement, for excessive severity. A small retiring pension, however, was allowed him, and he set up a school in Aldersgate Street, where he died in 1642. Amongst Gill's favourite scholars when usher to his father, was John Milton, three of whose letters to him survive. Gill excelled in Latin poetry, on which Milton compliments him. He is stated to have suffered imprisonment; and gossiping Aubrey has a story that Gill and Chillingworth used to correspond weekly, and that Gill having spoken of King James and his son as the old fool and the young one, Chillingworth showed the letter to Laud, and poor Gill was consequently imprisoned.—W. J. P. <section end="664H" /> <section begin="664I" />GILL,, an eminently learned minister of the Baptist body, was born at Kettering, November 23, 1697. With the exception of a short period of instruction at the grammar-school of Kettering he was a self-taught scholar. In his eleventh year he had not only gone through the common schoolbooks but had read the principal Latin classics and made considerable progress in Greek. Obliged to assist his father in his business, he could only give a few spare hours daily to his favourite pursuits, but in a few years he made himself master not only of Latin and Greek, but of Hebrew, and of the principles of logic, rhetoric, and natural and moral philosophy. In 1716 he was baptized, and soon after began to preach. His first charge was at Higham Ferrars, where he was ordained in 1718, and from thence he removed to Horsleydown, London, in 1719, where his auditory soon became very numerous. Devoting himself to oriental and rabbinical studies in connection with his preparations for the pulpit, he published in 1728 an "Exposition of the Song of Solomon." In the same year he gave to the public a treatise on the "Prophecies of the Old Testament respecting the Messiah," in answer to Collins. These publications brought him much into notice, and in 1729 a lectureship was instituted by several gentlemen of different evangelical denominations, in order that they might enjoy the benefit of his instructions. This lecture he delivered weekly on Wednesday evenings in Great Eastcheap, and continued till 1756. In 1731 he published a work on the Trinity, designed to check the spread of sabellianism among the Baptists, and in 1735-38 an elaborate treatise entitled "The cause of God and Truth," in answer to Dr. Whitby's Discourse on the Five Points. But the principal labour of his life was his celebrated "Exposition of the Holy Scriptures," of which the exposition of the New Testament appeared in 3 vols. folio, in 1746-48, and that of the Old Testament, in 6 vols. folio, at various subsequent periods as late as 1766—a work of Herculean labour and extraordinary research. Its chief characteristic is its extensive application of rabbinical learning to the elucidation of scripture. His latest writings were a "Dissertation on the Antiquities of the Hebrew Language," a "Body of Doctrinal Divinity," and a "Body of Practical Divinity." He died at Camberwell, October, 1771. His sermons and tracts were collected after his death and published in 3 vols. 4to. The edition of his "Exposition," published in 1810-12, extended to 9 vols. 4to—P. L. <section end="664I" /> <section begin="664Zcontin" />GILLES, : the date of his birth is unknown; he died in 1503. He wrote annals of France dating from the destruction of Troy to the reign of Louis XI. His account of the reign of <section end="664Zcontin" />