In religion he first became a Presbyterian (1822); was a Universalist minister from 1826 to 1831, editing for some time the chief journal of this church, the Gospel Advocate; was an independent preacher at Ithaca, N.Y., in 1831; became a Unitarian minister in 1832, and in 1836 organized in Boston the Society for Christian Union and Progress, of which he was the pastor for seven years. In 1844 he became a Roman Catholic and so remained, though the question of the orthodoxy of his writings was at one time submitted by the pope to Cardinal Franzelin, who recommended Brownson, to little purpose, to express his views with more moderation. In his philosophy Brownson was a more or less independent follower of Comte for a short time, and of Victor Cousin, who, in his Fragmens philosophiques, praised him; he may be said to have taught a modified intuitionalism. In his schemes for social reform he was at first a student of Robert Owen, until his later views led him to accept Roman Catholicism. His first quarterly was followed, in 1844, by Brownson’s Quarterly Review (first published in Boston and after 1855 in New York), in which he expressed his opinions on many themes until its suspension in 1864, and after its revival for a brief period in 1873–1875. Of his numerous publications in book form, the chief during his lifetime were Charles Elwood, or the Infidel Converted (1840, autobiographical), in which he strongly favoured the Roman Catholic Church; and The American Republic: its Constitution, Tendencies and Destiny (1865), in which he based government on ethics, declaring the national existence to be a moral and even a theocratic entity, not depending for validity upon the sovereignty of the people. Brownson died in Detroit, Michigan, on the 17th of April 1876.
After his death, his son, Henry F. Brownson, collected and published his various political, religious, philosophical, scientific and literary writings, in twenty octavo volumes (Detroit, 1883–1887), of which a condensed summary appeared in a single volume, also prepared by his son, entitled Literary and Political Views (New York, 1893). The son also published a biography in three volumes (Detroit, 1898–1900).
His daughter, Sarah M. Brownson (1839–1876), who married in 1873 William J. Tenney, was the author of several novels, and wrote a Life of Demetrius Augustine Gallitzin, Prince and Priest (1873).
BROWNSVILLE, a city and the county-seat of Cameron county, Texas, U.S.A., situated near the S. extremity of the state, on the Rio Grande river about 22 m. above its mouth, and opposite Matamoras, Mexico. Pop. (1890) 6134; (1900) 6305, including 2462 foreign-born and 18 negroes; (1910) 10,517. It is served by the St Louis, Brownsville & Mexico, and the Rio Grande railways, being connected by the former with Houston and Galveston and by the latter with Point Isabel on the Gulf coast. Its chief importance lies in its being the commercial and distributing centre for a rich and extensive agricultural region in southern Texas and northern Mexico, and an important market for rice, sugar-cane, fruit, vegetables and live-stock. It has a United States custom house, the Cameron county court house, a Roman Catholic cathedral, St Joseph’s College (Roman Catholic), and the Incarnate Word Academy (Roman Catholic). Before the Mexican War there was a small Mexican settlement on the site of Brownsville. In March 1846 General Zachary Taylor erected fortifications here, and upon his withdrawal to Point Isabel, left a small garrison in command of Major Jacob Brown. The fort was assaulted by General Arista and shelled by batteries from the Mexican shore, and at last on the 10th of May was relieved by General Taylor, who in advancing to its aid had won the battles of Palo Alto (8th of May) and Resaca de la Palma (9th of May). The fort, originally named Fort Taylor, was renamed Fort Brown, by order of General Taylor, in memory of Major Brown, who was mortally wounded during the bombardment. In 1859 Brownsville was captured by a band of Mexican raiders under Juan Nepomuceno Cortina. During the Civil War, until its temporary occupation by Federal forces in 1863, and subsequent effective blockade, it was an active centre of operations of Confederate blockade runners. At Palmetto Ranch, near the battlefield of Palo Alto, took place (13th of May 1865), more than a month after General Lee’s surrender, the last engagement between Federal and Confederate troops in the Civil War. In Brownsville, on the night of the 13th of August 1906, certain persons unknown fired into houses and at citizens on the streets, killing one man and injuring two. Suspicion pointed to negro soldiers of Companies B, C and D of the 25th Infantry, stationed at Fort Brown, and as it appeared that the culprits were being shielded by their comrades by a “conspiracy of silence,” President Roosevelt dismissed the 170 men of the three companies “without honor.” Both in Congress and in the press a bitter attack was made on the president for his action. In 1907 the military reservation of Fort Brown was transferred to the Department of Agriculture. In March 1909 Congress provided for a commission of army officers to report as to the eligibility of members of the negro regiments for re-enlistment.
BRUAY, a town of northern France, in the department of Pas-de-Calais, on the Lawe, 19 m. N.N.W. of Arras by road. Pop. (1906) 16,169. The town is situated in a rich coal-mining district. Brewing is also a leading industry.
BRUCE, the name of an old Scottish family of Norman descent, taken from Bruis between Cherbourg and Vallonges. Variations of the name are Braose, Breaux and Brus. The first Robert de Brus, a follower of William the Conqueror, was rewarded by the gift of many manors, chiefly in Yorkshire, of which Skelton was the principal. His son, the second Robert, received from David I., his comrade at the court of Henry I., a grant of the lordship of Annandale. The fourth Robert married Isabel, natural daughter of William the Lion, and their son, the fifth Robert, married Isabel, second daughter of David, earl of Huntingdon, niece of the same Scottish king. The most famous member of the family is the eighth Robert, “the Bruce,” who became king of Scotland in 1306. (See Robert the Bruce.)
BRUCE, ALEXANDER BALMAIN (1831–1899), Scottish divine, was born at Aberargie near Perth on the 31st of January 1831. His father suffered for his adherence to the Free Church at the Disruption in 1843, and removed to Edinburgh, where the son was educated, showing exceptional ability from the first. His early religious doubts, awakened especially by Strauss’s Life of Jesus, made him throughout life sympathetic with those who underwent a similar stress. After serving as assistant first at Ancrum, then at Lochwinnoch, he was called to Cardross in Dumbartonshire in 1859, and to Broughty Ferry in 1868. There he published his first considerable exegetical work, the Training of the Twelve. In 1874 he delivered his Cunningham Lectures, afterwards published as The Humiliation of Christ, and in the following year was appointed to the chair of Apologetics and New Testament exegesis at the Free Church College, Glasgow. This post he held for twenty-four years. He was one of the first British New Testament students whose work was received with consideration by German scholars of repute. The character and work of Christ were, he held, the ultimate proof and the best defence of Christianity; and his tendency was to concentrate attention somewhat narrowly on the historic Jesus. In The Kingdom of God (1889), which first encountered serious hostile criticism in his own communion, he accounted for some of the differences between the first and third evangelists on the principle of accommodation—maintaining that Luke had altered both the text and the spirit of his sources to suit the needs of those for whom he wrote. It was held that these admissions were not consistent with the views of inspiration professed by the Free Church. When the case was tried, the assembly held that the charge of heresy was based on a misunderstanding, but that “by want of due care in his mode of statement he had given some ground for the painful impressions which had existed.”
Bruce rendered signal service to his own communion in connexion with its service of praise. He was convener of the committee which issued the Free Church hymn book, and he threw into this work the same energy and catholicity of mind which marked the rest of his activities. He died on the 7th of August 1899, and was buried at Broughty Ferry. His chief works, beside the above, are: The Chief End of Revelation (Lond., 1881); The Parabolic Teaching of Christ (Lond., 1882); F. C. Baur and his Theory of the Origin of Christianity and of the
