on the 30th of June 1861. After a short time spent on the missions of Baltimore, he was called to be secretary to Archbishop Martin J. Spalding and assistant at the cathedral. When in 1866 the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore considered the matter of new diocesan developments, he was selected to organize the new Vicariate Apostolic of North Carolina; and was consecrated bishop in August 1868. During the four successful years spent in North Carolina he wrote, for the benefit of his mission work, The Faith of our Fathers, a brief presentation of the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church, especially intended to reach Protestants; the books passed through more than forty editions in America and about seventy in England, and an answer was made to it in Faith of our Forefathers (1879), by Edward J. Stearns. Gibbons was transferred to the see of Richmond, Virginia, in 1872, and in 1877 was made coadjutor, with the right of succession, to the Archbishop (James R. Bayley) of Baltimore. In October of the same year he succeeded to the archbishopric. Pope Leo XIII. in 1883 selected him to preside over the Third Plenary Council in Baltimore (1884), and on the 30th of June 1886 created him a cardinal priest, with the title of Santa Maria Trastevere. His simplicity of life, foresight and prudence made him a power in the church. Thoroughly American, and a lover of the people, he greatly altered the attitude of the Roman Catholic Church toward the Knights of Labor and other labour organizations, and his public utterances displayed the true instincts of a popular leader. He contributed frequently to periodicals, but as an author is known principally by his works on religious subjects, including Our Christian Heritage (1889) and The Ambassador of Christ (1896). For many years an ardent advocate of the establishment of a Catholic university, at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884) he saw the realization of his desires in the establishment of the Catholic University of America at Washington, of which he became first chancellor and president of the board of trustees.
GIBBONS, ORLANDO (1583–1625), English musical composer,
was the most illustrious of a family of musicians all more or
less able. We know of at least three generations, for Orlando’s
father, William Gibbons, having been one of the waits of Cambridge,
may be assumed to have acquired some proficiency in
the art. His three sons and at least one of his grandsons inherited
and further developed his talent. The eldest, Edward, was made
bachelor of music at Cambridge, and successively held important
musical appointments at the cathedrals of Bristol and Exeter;
Ellis, the second son, was organist of Salisbury cathedral, and
is the composer of two madrigals in the collection known as the
The Triumphs of Oriana. Orlando Gibbons, the youngest and
by far the most celebrated of the brothers, was born at Cambridge
in 1583. Where and under whom he studied is not known, but
in his twenty-first year he was sufficiently advanced and celebrated
to receive the important post of organist of the Chapel
Royal. His first published composition “Fantasies in three
parts, composed for viols,” appeared in 1610. It seems to have
been the first piece of music printed in England from engraved
plates, or “cut in copper, the like not heretofore extant.” In
1622 he was created doctor of music by the university of Oxford.
For this occasion he composed an anthem for eight parts, O clap your Hands,
still extant. In the following year he became
organist of Westminster Abbey. Orlando Gibbons died before
the beginning of the civil war, or it may be supposed that, like
his eldest brother, he would have been a staunch royalist. In
a different sense, however, he died in the cause of his master;
for having been summoned to Canterbury to produce a composition
written in celebration of Charles’s marriage, he there
fell a victim to smallpox on the 5th of June 1625.
For a full list of his compositions, see Grove’s Dictionary of Music. His portrait may be found in Hawkins’s well-known History. His vocal pieces, madrigals, motets, canons, &c., are admirable, and prove him to have been a great master of pure polyphony. We have also some specimens of his instrumental music, such as the six pieces for the virginals published in Parthenia, a collection of instrumental music produced by Gibbons in conjunction with Dr Bull and Byrd.
GIBBS, JOSIAH WILLARD (1839–1903), American mathematical physicist, the fourth child and only son of Josiah Willard Gibbs (1790–1861), who was professor of sacred literature in Yale Divinity School from 1824 till his death, was born at New Haven on the 11th of February 1839. Entering Yale College in 1854 he graduated in 1858, and continuing his studies there was appointed tutor in 1863. He taught Latin in the first two years, and natural philosophy in the third. He then went to Europe, studying in Paris in 1866–1867, in Berlin in 1867 and in Heidelberg in 1868. Returning to New Haven in 1869, he was appointed professor of mathematical physics in Yale College in 1871, and held that position till his death, which occurred at New Haven on the 28th of April 1903. His first contributions to mathematical physics were two papers published in 1873 in the Transactions of the Connecticut Academy on “Graphical Methods in the Thermodynamics of Fluids,” and “Method of Geometrical Representation of the Thermodynamic Properties of Substances by means of Surfaces.” His next and most important publication was his famous paper “On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances” (in two parts, 1876 and 1878), which, it has been said, founded a new department of chemical science that is becoming comparable in importance to that created by Lavoisier. This work was translated into German by W. Ostwald (who styled its author the “founder of chemical energetics”) in 1891 and into French by H. le Chatelier in 1899. In 1881 and 1884 he printed some notes on the elements of vector analysis for the use of his students; these were never formally published, but they formed the basis of a text-book on Vector Analysis which was published by his pupil, E. B. Wilson, in 1901. Between 1882 and 1889 a series of papers on certain points in the electromagnetic theory of light and its relation to the various elastic solid theories appeared in the American Journal of Science, and his last work, Elementary Principles in Statistical Mechanics, was issued in 1902. The name of Willard Gibbs, who was the most distinguished American mathematical physicist of his day, is especially associated with the “Phase Rule,” of which some account will be found in the article Energetics. In 1901 the Copley medal of the Royal Society of London was awarded him as being “the first to apply the second law of thermodynamics to the exhaustive discussion of the relation between chemical, electrical and thermal energy and capacity for external work.”
A biographical sketch will be found in his collected Scientific Papers (2 vols., 1906).
GIBBS, OLIVER WOLCOTT (1822–1908), American chemist,
was born at New York on the 21st of February 1822. His
father, Colonel George Gibbs, was an ardent mineralogist; the
mineral gibbsite was named after him, and his collection was
finally bought by Yale College. Entering Columbia College
in 1837, Wolcott (the Oliver he dropped at an early date)
graduated in 1841, and, having assisted Robert Hare at Pennsylvania
University for several months, he next entered the
College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, qualifying as
a doctor of medicine in 1845. Leaving America he studied in
Germany with K. F. Rammelsberg, H. Rose and J. von Liebig,
and in Paris with A. Laurent, J. B. Dumas, and H. V. Regnault,
returning in 1848. In that year he became professor of chemistry
at the Free Academy, now the College of the City of New York,
and in 1863 he obtained the Rumford professorship in Harvard
University, a post retained until his retirement in 1887 as professor
emeritus. He died on the 9th of December 1908. Gibbs’
researches were mainly in analytical and inorganic chemistry,
the cobaltammines, platinum metals and complex acids being
especially investigated. He was an excellent teacher, and
contributed many articles to scientific journals.
See the Memorial Lecture by F. W. Clarke in the J.C.S. (1909), p. 1299.
GIBEON, a town in Palestine whose inhabitants wrested a truce from Joshua by a trick (Josh. ix., x.); where the champions of David fought those of Ish-bosheth (2 Sam. ii. 12-32); where Joab murdered Amasa (ib. xx. 8-10); and where Johanan went against Ishmael to avenge the murder of Gedaliah (Jer. xli. 12).
