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POL in the former place. His disposition, however, was haughty. As a rhetorician he was much esteemed, yet his style of speaking was pompous. Tortured by gout, he resolved to commit suicide, and for this purpose shut himself up in the family sepulchre, where he died of hunger, about 146, aged sixty-five. His funeral orations for Cynagirus and Callimachus who fell at Marathon, which are put into the mouths of their fathers, are the only extant compositions of Polemon. But he wrote several other speeches. The former have been best edited by the Orelli at Leipsic, 1819, 8vo.—S. D.  POLENI,, Marquis, a Venetian mathematician and engineer, was born in Venice on the 23d of August, 1683, and died at Padua on the 14th of November, 1761. He received his early education from his father, and afterwards studied at the university of Padua, where he obtained successively the appointments of professor of astronomy in 1709, of philosophy in 1715, and of mathematics in 1719. Soon afterwards he was appointed chief hydraulic engineer to the republic of Venice, and in that capacity planned, executed, and superintended many important works, and did good service to the state. He also contributed largely to the advancement of the science of hydraulics by experimental investigations. The Paduans honoured his memory by the erection of his statue by Canova.—W. J. M. R.  POLEVOY,, a Russian historian, critic, and miscellaneous writer, was born in 1796 at Irkoutsk in Siberia, where his father carried on the business of a distiller. Deprived of the advantages of a regular education, young Nicholas devoured every book and newspaper that came in his way, and having a tenacious memory, his unusual acquirements made him a local celebrity before he was fifteen. At that early age he wrote a tragedy and other dramatic pieces. In 1811 he preceded his father to Moscow, where he hoped to find an opportunity of exercising his talents for literature, but his father insisted on his paying attention to the business of the distillery. In 1812 both father and son had to fly from the French, and from Moscow in flames. After learning French and German, which dread of his father's displeasure compelled him to do clandestinely, he found his field of study greatly enlarged, and in 1817 first ventured into print with an article contributed to the Russian Courier. The career thus begun was zealously continued. In 1825 he established a magazine, entitled the Moscow Telegraph, his contributions to which were afterwards published separately under the title of "Sketches of Russian Literature." He wrote a history of Russia in 12 vols., 1829; several historical biographies, and various novels, plays, and translations. His labours, indeed, were greater than he could bear, and he died of nervous fever in 1846.—R. H.  POLHEM,, a Swedish engineer, whose original name was Pålhammer, was born at Wisby in Gothland on the 18th of November, 1661, and died on the 31st of August, 1751. In 1693 he held the office of engineer at the celebrated mines of Fahlun; in 1714 he became an assessor, and in 1716 a member of the council of mines; and on the latter occasion he was raised to the order of nobility, and assumed the surname Polhem. He travelled much over Europe, executed various important engineering works, and wrote many papers on engineering and mechanical subjects. He was one of the original members of the Academy of Sciences of Stockholm, founded in 1739. He was also a member of the Academy of Sciences of Upsala.—His son,, also an eminent engineer, and one of the original members of the Academy of Sciences of Stockholm, was born at Fahlun on the 11th of February, 1700, and died at Stockholm on the 1st of August, 1772.—W. J. M. R.  POLIDORO. See.  POLIGNAC,, Prince de, the prime minister of Charles X. of France, was born in 1782. An intimate friendship existed between Queen Marie Antoinette and Madame de Polignac, his mother; and when the Revolution broke out the favourite was obliged to seek safety in flight, and along with her husband and children, took up her residence in Vienna. She died of grief within a week, on receiving the news of the death of her mistress on the scaffold. Young Polignac took refuge first in Russia, and afterwards in England, where he resided for a year and a half. In 1804 he took part, along with his elder brother, in the conspiracy of George Cadoudal, and was arrested, tried, and found guilty. But through the intercession of Josephine and Madame Murat the penalty of death was commuted into imprisonment. Jules was confined in the dungeon of Vincennes, from 1804 to 1810, when he was permitted to retire to a maison de santé at Tours, under surveillance. At the restoration of the Bourbons, the count became one of the chiefs of the priestly party by whom the throne was overshadowed, and the moderate policy of M. de Villèle thwarted. That minister, however, by way of conciliating his ultra-royalist opponent and getting rid of his intrigues, appointed him in 1823 ambassador to England. He held that office for six years, and on the downfall of the Villèle ministry, made a vigorous but unsuccessful attempt to obtain the post of prime minister. Martignac, who succeeded to the vacant office, however, was speedily overthrown by the intrigues of "the Congregation," and Polignac was installed in his room, to the great dissatisfaction of the French people. His bigoted and arbitrary policy soon brought about a collision between the government and the chambers. A dissolution had the effect of swelling the hostile majority, and strengthening their dislike to the prime minister and his party. The famous ordinances were issued suspending the charter; the people rose in arms in defence of their rights; Charles X. ceased to reign; and his devoted but incapable minister, who was profoundly ignorant of the popular feeling, and totally unprepared to meet the hostility he had provoked, took to flight. He was arrested at Granville, tried before the chamber of peers, and in spite of an eloquent defence by Martignac he was found guilty, and condemned to death. His life, however, was spared, and his penalty commuted into perpetual imprisonment. Count Mole ultimately changed this sentence into exile, and the prince left France for Munich. After some years he was permitted to return to his native country, but not to enter Paris. He took up his residence at St. Germains, and died there in 1847, in the sixty-fifth year of his age.—J. T.  POLIGNAC,, Cardinal de, was born at Puyen-en-Velay, in 1661, of an ancient and illustrious family in Languedoc. He received his education at Paris, where he took holy orders in 1689. He accompanied Cardinal de Bouillon to Rome, where he was employed in some important affairs. In the disputes at that time existent between the pope and the court of France, Polignac rendered essential service by bringing about a reconciliation. In 1693 Louis XIV. sent him ambassador to Poland, to procure the election of the prince of Conti to the throne of that realm, after the death of John Sobieski. In this he failed, the elector of Saxony having been exalted to the regal power and acknowledged by the whole nation. The French monarch in displeasure, recalled the Abbé de Polignac, and banished him to the abbacy of Bonport, where the disgraced envoy employed himself in writing his poem in refutation of Lucretius. He afterwards, however, recovered the royal favour, and in 1710 was one of the plenipotentiaries at Gertruydenberg for negotiating a peace, while in 1713 he assisted in a similar capacity at the treaty of Utrecht. The same year he was nominated a cardinal. In 1724 he went to Rome as minister of France; in 1726 he was made archbishop of Audi, and a few years afterwards commander of the order of the Holy Ghost. From Rome he returned in 1732, and died at Paris in 1741, at the advanced age of eighty. Cardinal de Polignac was a member of various learned societies. His fame as an author rests on the already-mentioned Latin poem, "Anti-Lucretius, sive de Deo et Natura libri novem," published posthumously in 1754. This work is intended to counteract the principles of Lucretius, and to prove from the evidence afforded in the works of nature the great fact of a Supreme Being, at once the all-creator and the all-preserver. There are fine and noble things in the "Anti-Lucretius," and it fairly deserves the honour it has received, of translation into several European languages. The poem was left unfinished by its author, the ninth book not having been completed.—J. J.  POLITI,, a philosophic and theologic author, born in Florence, 10th July, 1679; died there 23rd July, 1752, of apoplexy, following an accident to the right arm and hand. He was a clerk-regular of the Pious schools, professor in Genoa and Pisa, and author, among several other works, of a learned edition of Eustathius' Comment on Homer, 1730-35, and of a revised Roman Martyrology, 1751. Politi was of a vigorous, independent character; correct in the discharge of his duties; not noticeable for literary good-nature, but keeping himself clear of quarrels, unless in self-defence.—W. M. R. <section end="765H" /> <section begin="765Zcontin" />POLIZIANO,, or , one of the greatest poets and classicists of the age of Lorenzo de' Medici, born 14th or 24th July, 1454, at Montepulciano (in Latin, <section end="765Zcontin" />