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SOU of paintings was famous, and was sold after his death for a million and a half of francs. It had not been obtained by the most reputable means, chiefly consisting of spoils from the duke of Dalmatia's peninsular campaigns. Indeed, disinterestedness was not one of Soult's virtues. Soult's son adopted diplomacy as a profession, and was on several occasions and in various countries French ambassador. A younger brother of the marshal was a soldier, and rose to be a general. In actual warfare Soult does not appear to have been a scientific strategist; he trusted to his naturally clear eye, and sharp, strong intellect.—W. M—l.  * SOUTH,, a distinguished English astronomer, was bred to the medical profession, which he abandoned in order to devote himself entirely to the cultivation of astronomy. He was one of the founders of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1820, and is a fellow of the Royal Society. He possesses a private observatory at Kensington, where he has for many years carried on a valuable series of observations, for part of which the Copley medal was awarded to him in 1826.—W. J. M. R.  SOUTH,, the son of a London merchant, was born at Hackney in 1633. At the age of fourteen he became a king's scholar under Dr. Busby at Westminster. So zealously loyal was he even in youth, that he publicly prayed for the king on the day of his execution. In 1651 he became a student of Christ's church, Oxford, Locke entering at the same time. In 1655 he took the degree of B.A., published during that year a juvenile poem, "Musica Incantans," and wrote some Latin verses in congratulation of Cromwell on the conclusion of peace with Holland. He took his degree of A.M. in 1657, and was privately ordained in 1658 by one of the deprived bishops. During his residence at college, under the deanery of John Owen, he took no pains to conceal his anti-puritan sentiments, and boldly revolted against the Cromwellian discipline. In the pulpit he was no less intrepid and caustic, and in 1660 he became university orator—having previously preached a characteristic sermon, full of witty invective, before the king's commissioners—"The Laitie Instructed." A clever address delivered by him at Lord Clarendon's installation as chancellor of the university, led to his appointment as domestic chaplain to that nobleman. In 1663 he obtained a prebend in Westminster, and in 1670 became a canon of Christ's church, Oxford. When Laurence Hyde, son of Lord Clarendon, went to Poland as ambassador in 1676, to congratulate John Sobieski on his election to the Polish crown. South went with him as chaplain. A long letter to Pocock contains his remarks on Poland, its population, appearance and manners, and on the high talent and acquirements of the newly-appointed sovereign. On his return South was presented to the rectory of Islip, near Oxford, and here he rebuilt the parsonage and a portion of the church. He steadily refused all other preferment, though his fierce loyalty and virulent treatment of republicans and sectaries would have rewarded him with higher honours. He disapproved strongly of King James' measures for the restoration of popery, but he would not sign the invitation to the prince of Orange, alleging that "prayers and tears" were the only weapons he could employ against his sovereign. He ultimately took the oaths to the new government, but continued to refuse all preferment, even an archbishopric in Ireland. The toleration act was very distasteful to him, and he spoke of it and all similar plans with unmeasured vituperation and scorn. South's great controversy was with Dean Sherlock on the doctrine of the Trinity. Sherlock's Vindication was published in 1690, and South's "Animadversions" in 1693. Sherlock replied by a Defence, in 1694, and next year South published "Tritheism charged on Dr. Sherlock's new notion of the Trinity." The book is furious and contemptuous, full of misplaced humour and ingenious hits; but in his revolt from imagined Tritheism the author fell under the opposite charge of Sabellianism. South was so hostile to innovation that he was jealous even of the Royal Society, and seems on some public occasions to have inveighed against it. In his later years the bishopric of Rochester with the deanery of Westminster was offered him, but he declined, and Atterbury was appointed to the vacant see. Infirmities were now growing upon him, and after a long period of illness, he died July 8th, 1716, and was buried in Westminster abbey. South's great ability is as undoubted as his loyalty, but he could never conceal his scornful estimate of all his opponents, nor refrain even in his sermons from contempt, invective, and satire. His keen and fertile wit is well set off in nervous racy English, all the more terse and telling from its Saxon plainness and ease. But he is sometimes coarse in his epithets and allusions. Perspicuous, concise, idiomatic, and often daringly metaphorical, he despised long-drawn periods and images. His style is that of graphic vivacity. On the high points of Calvinism he was as proudly defiant as any puritan, but he lacked the tender evangelical spirit. His whole works issued in seven octavos from the Clarendon press in 1823, and in five volumes, 1843; also four volumes, London, 1843; and two volumes, 1850.—J. E.  SOUTHAMPTON,, third earl of, the patron of Shakspeare, was the grandson of Henry VIII.'s chancellor, and born in 1573. Only eight years old when he inherited the earldom on the death of his father, he was sent at the age of twelve to St. John's college, Cambridge. He was scarcely twenty when, in 1593, Shakspeare dedicated to him Venus and Adonis; and it was to Lord Southampton again that, in 1594, Shakspeare's second poem, the Rape of Lucrece, was dedicated. About the same time, according to Mr. Charles Knight, Nash, dedicating a work to Southampton, addresses him as "a dear lover and cherisher, as well of the lovers of poets, as of poets themselves." Southampton's patronage of Floris has been recorded in our memoir of the latter. Rowe, in his Life of Shakspeare, tells, on the authority of Davenant, a story of Southampton's munificence to Shakspeare, the truth of which has been doubted, but which must be repeated in any biography, however slight, of the poet-loving earl. "My Lord Southampton," says Rowe, "at one time gave him," Shakspeare, "a thousand pounds to enable him to go through with a purchase which he heard he had a mind to." Of Southampton's love of the drama there is a record in a letter of 1599, in which the writer, speaking of him and Rutland, says:—"They pass away the time in London merely in going to plays every day." Southampton, however, did not always content himself with such an employment of his time. He engaged in the insurrection of his friend Essex, February, 1601, was tried along with Essex, and, like his friend, condemned to death. More fortunate than Essex, however, he was not executed, but merely imprisoned, remaining in the Tower until he was released by the accession of James. He is said to have been a favourite of that monarch, and to have died in the Netherlands in 1624.—F. E.  SOUTHCOTT,, one of the most remarkable of modern religious fanatics, was of humble extraction, and was born in Devonshire in 1750. She passed the first part of her life in tranquillity, employed in a menial capacity in the neighbourhood of Exeter. She joined the Methodists, and was an example of assiduity in attendance at their devotional meetings. Among the visitors who frequented the house of her master was a man named Sanderson, who believed himself to be inspired. Joanna's acquaintance with him seems to have first diverted her thoughts from her sphere of domestic service, and she soon afterwards asserted her claim to the gift of prophecy. At first she exercised her powers in a humble way, limiting herself to foretelling changes in the weather; but by and by she went further, and began to deliver political predictions. Some of these proving true, and being published in the newspapers of the time, Joanna obtained great notoriety. In 1792 she formally established herself as a prophetess, and claimed to be the woman spoken of in the Revelations, who wore a crown of twelve stars. The publication of her prophecies, which were composed, some in prose and some in doggerel rhymes, extended the circle of her influence. In order to obtain means to carry on her designs she sold seals, which, it was asserted, secured the eternal salvation of the purchasers. She issued a challenge to the bishop and clergy of Exeter to test her miraculous powers, but they treated her pretensions with contempt. This neglect only tended to increase the confidence of her followers in her divine mission. Exeter being too narrow a stage for operations, she was removed to London at the expense of the celebrated wood engraver, Sharp, who, though a shrewd man in worldly matters, was singularly liable to be duped by any religious impostor. Being very illiterate, and finding the writing of her compositions a difficult matter, Joanna received an order from on high to throw aside the pen, and so promptly did the words flow from her lips, that it was scarcely possible to take them down. Her utterances were mere ungrammatical, incoherent rhapsodies. She confirmed the mission of Brothers, and recognized his claim to the title of King of the Jews. A number of publications succeeded, the most important of which were her "Warning to the whole World from the Sealed Prophecies of Joanna Southcott;" her "Book of Wonders;" and 