Page:Imperialdictiona03eadi Brandeis Vol3b.pdf/544

VOP  owed nothing to Milton, and just as little did Milton owe to Vondel. The truth is, both drank from the same deep well of poetic inspiration, and they were men of kindred, if unequal, genius. To the remaining works of Vondel our space will not permit us to refer. This remarkable person died in 1679.—J. J.  VOPISCUS, ), one, and probably the latest, of the six Scriptores Historiæ Augustæ. From the epithet of Syracusius he seems to have been a native of Sicily, but almost nothing is known respecting the history of his life. He tells us himself that his life of Aurelianus was written at the suggestion of Junius Tiberianus, prefect of the city, about 291, who gave him access to a number of important documents. He wrote also the lives of Tacitus, Florianus, Probus, Firmus, Saturninus, Proclus, Bonosus, Carus, Numerianus, and Carinus, comprised in the Historia Augusta. Vopiscus, though an industrious, is not a good writer. His narrative, like those indeed of the other five scriptores, wants symmetry and arrangement, and partakes more of the nature of a confused chronicle than of a thoroughly digested and proportioned history. Its principal value results from the original documents which he has inserted in it—letters written by Hadrianus, Valerianus, Aurelianus, Claudius, Zenobia, Tacitus, Probus, Carus, and other eminent characters, together with orations and extracts from acts of the senate.—R. M., A.  VÖRÖSMARTZ,, a distinguished Hungarian poet, was born in 1800 at Nyeck, Weissemburg, and was educated for the law at Pesth. Poetry withdrew him from graver studies, and in 1821 he published a tragedy founded on the history of King Solomon of Hungary. "King Sigismund," a drama, followed in 1822; in which year the poet also produced "The Triumph of Fidelity," a story in verse. He was called to the bar in 1824, but continued to devote himself to literature. His style was grave, polished, and stately, and his most important works are epic poems, such as "The Flight of Zaban," 1824; and "Cserhalom," 1826. That his fame would have been greater than it is had he addressed himself more generally to the mass of his fellow-countrymen in ballads, is suggested by the extraordinary and permanent popularity of his ballad, "The Appeal." The patriotism breathed in this song pointed out the author as a fit member of the national assembly of 1848, where, however, he did not please the extreme party. After the triumph of the Austrians the poet was imprisoned for a short time. On his release he remained in a state of painful dejection until the year before his death, when he began a translation of Shakspeare into the Hungarian language. He died in 1855.—R. H.  VORSTERMANN,, an eminent Flemish engraver, was born at Antwerp about 1580. He was a scholar of Rubens, by whose advice he gave up painting for engraving. In his own walk Vorstermann resembled his master, in preferring a bold, free, vigorous manner to minuteness or elegance of finish. He engraved a great many plates from the principal works of Rubens and under his superintendence, and the style of the great painter was never more characteristically rendered. The Descent from the Cross, the Adoration of the Magi, and the Battle of the Amazons—a print of unusual size, being on six sheets—are among the most famous of his Rubens prints. Vorstermann also engraved the Entombment, a Holy Family, and two or three more after Raphael; and others after Caravaggio, Annibale Carracci, Gentileschi, and other Italian masters; also a Bear Hunt, by Snyders, and several more from the painters of the Low Countries. In 1623 he came to England, and remained here about eight years. He engraved one or two of the pictures in the king's gallery, but was chiefly occupied on portraits of royal and noble personages after Vandyck, and a few by Holbein. In all, he engraved about one hundred and fifty plates. He died about the middle of the seventeenth century.—His son and pupil, , the younger, born at Antwerp about 1605, engraved historical and subject pieces after Rubens, Teniers, and others, and many portraits, some of which were from his own designs. He engraved the plates to the duke of Newcastle's curious work on Horsemanship. His plates are far inferior to those of his father.—J. T—e.  VORSTIUS,, son of the succeeding, died in 1663, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. He was a professor of medicine in the university of Leyden. One of his most intimate friends was the celebrated Salmasius, whose funeral oration he pronounced. He was author of some works on botanical and medical subjects, and published an edition of the translation of the Aphorisms of Hippocrates by John Opsopæus.—R. M., A.  VORSTIUS,, was born at Ruremonde in 1565. At an early age he studied medicine, and subsequently went to Italy, where he was recommended by Alfonso Catanæus, physician to the duke of Ferrara, to Nicholas Grano, bishop of Anglona in the kingdom of Naples. He became physician to the bishop, and was employed in this capacity for three years. On the death of Grano he passed into the service of Fabricius Pignatelli, marquis of Querceto, and at length returned to his native country in 1595, after an absence of fourteen years. He then commenced practitioner at Delft in 1598, and was appointed professor of medicine in the university of Leyden, where he died in 1624. He was author of a number of medical works.—R. M., A.  VORSTIUS,, an eminent divine, was born at Cologne, on 19th July, 1569. His father was a secret seceder from the Romish church, though his son was ostensibly brought up in that communion. The youth studied first at the college of St. Lawrence in his native city, then at Haarlem and Heidelberg, and at the last university became a doctor of divinity in 1594. He then travelled in Holland, Switzerland, and France, held theological disputations at Basle, and gave theological lectures at Geneva. At length he settled at Steinfurt as preacher, consistorial assessor, and teacher of theology, and remained in this position till 1610, when he was called to succeed Arminius at Leyden. A book which he published soon after, "Tractatus Theologicus de Deo, sive de natura et attributis Dei," created a great sensation. The Gomarists, or Calvinists, accused him of heresy, got declarations in their favour, not only from several universities but from King James of England, who scribbled numerous charges of error against it, and caused it to be burned in London. A treatise approaching Socinian ground, by one of his pupils, increased the cry against him; the synod of Dort deprived him of his professorship; and the states of Holland banished him. For two years the exile wandered from place to place, sometimes in danger of his life. At length the duke of Holstein had pity on the persecuted party, and gave them a refuge. Vorstius gladly availed himself of it, and shortly after died at Tonningen in September, 1622. Vorstius is supposed to have had a leaning towards antitrinitarian views, and was at all events rationalistic in his theology. He left behind him a variety of works, many of them polemical, and also notes on the New Testament.—J. E.  VORSTIUS,, an eminent scholar, born in 1623, and died in 1676. After holding various situations in different places, he became chief librarian to the elector of Brandenburg. Among his numerous works, principally of a polemical kind, his "De Hebraismis Novi Testamenti" still survives, and is not without its uses.—J. E. <section end="544H" /> <section begin="544I" />VOS,, born at Antwerp in 1531, was the scholar of Floris, and one of the able early Italianizers of Flemish art. He studied under Tintoretto at Venice, was elected a member of the Antwerp guild of painters in 1559, and died there in 1663. The "Incredulity of St. Thomas" by him, in the Antwerp gallery, is an excellent work.—R. N. W. <section end="544I" /> <section begin="544Zcontin" />VOSS,, commonly called , an eminent Latinist, was born of a Dutch family in 1577, in a village near Heidelberg, where his father was clergyman. He devoted himself to classical learning at Dordrecht and Leyden, and soon after became rector of the Dordrecht school. In 1614 he was appointed director of the theological college, and some time later professor of eloquence at Leyden. In 1643 he was called to the chair of history in the newly-founded gymnasium at Amsterdam, where he died, 17th March, 1649. "To Vossius," says Hallam, "perhaps rather than to any other one man, we may refer the establishment of as much correctness of writing as is attainable in a dead language." He did, indeed, excellent service to Latin grammar, especially by his "Aristarchus, sive de Arte Grammatica;" his "Grammatica Latina;" his "De Vitiis Sermonis et Glossematis Latino-Barbaris," and other works of vast erudition and sound criticism. By far the greatest noise, however, was produced by his "Historia Pelagiana," Amsterdam, 1618, in which he admitted, to use the words of Hallam, that the first four centuries did not countenance the predestinarian scheme of Augustine. This gave offence in Holland; his book was publicly censured; he was excommunicated, and forbidden to teach in public or private. Vossius, like others, remembered that he had a large family, and made after some years a sort of retractation, which of course did not express his real opinion. The "Historia Pelagiana" was much more <section end="544Zcontin" />