many of the clergy to give their assent to it. Sharpe bitterly resented such a step as beneath the dignity of government, and as coming ill from men who had forced their covenant on all ranks. "For that very reason," retorted Leighton, "it ought to be granted, that the world may perceive the difference between the present mild government and their severity"—words of wisdom far above the comprehension of a partisan like Sharpe, or indeed of any party of his time. He laboured to build up the church in his diocese by enjoining upon the clergy the constant reading of scripture, which had begun to fall into disuse at public worship, and by strongly urging upon them to lecture or expound from large portions of scripture instead of insisting through a whole sermon or more upon a single text. He desired that the Lord's prayer, and the creed and doxology, be restored to more frequent use; also that the Lord's supper be more frequently celebrated; and, as far as possible, daily prayer and the reading of scriptures morning and evening in the churches. Leighton, however, felt all his schemes frustrated by the violence of his colleagues. He was not even left at peace to pursue his own quiet labours in his diocese. In 1665 he announced to his clergy his intention to resign, and he supplicated the king for leave to do so. He was persuaded for a time to retain his office by the promise of more lenient measures. The intolerable persecutions of Sharpe and others, however, had in the meantime driven the covenanters to rebellion. Rising in the west, and obtaining some slight advantages, they marched towards Edinburgh; but General Dalziel fast pursued on their track, and attacking them on the slope of the Pentland hills completely routed them. This was in the end of 1665. The government, in alarm at the determination of the people, attempted a more conciliatory course. The earl of Tweeddale and Sir Robert Murray counselled a milder policy in opposition to Sharpe and Rothes, and they obtained a temporary ascendancy. Leighton aided them effectually. He went to London to represent the state of matters to his majesty. The proclamation of "indulgence" was the result of these negotiations, which however effected but little in the pacification of the country, while it greatly complicated the relations of parties. As the extreme presbyterians saw only sin in the "indulgence," so the extreme episcopalians saw in it a surrender of their privileges. Dr. Alexander Burnet, archbishop of Glasgow, made himself particularly conspicuous by opposition to it. He was forced to retire from his position with a pension, and Leighton was induced after much persuasion to accept it. He removed to Glasgow in 1670; and as his friend Dr. Gilbert Burnet, afterwards the well-known bishop of Salisbury, had been appointed professor of divinity there about a year before, he found in his companionship some solace and encouragement in the midst of his difficulties. It is to Burnet's record of him that we are indebted for so many traits of his personal excellence and evangelical earnestness. He laboured to spread among the clergy of the west something of his own self-denying spirit. At his first meeting with them, when they complained of being deserted by the people, he exhorted them to lay aside all resentful feelings, and to humble themselves before God. "This was a new strain to the clergy. So they went home as little edified with their new bishop as he was with them." He sought interviews, in company with Burnet, with some of the most eminent of the presbyterian ministers; he held two conferences at Edinburgh with them; but neither his kindness nor his arguments availed anything. He tried to have the law against conventicles mitigated, and protested to Lord Tweeddale against its inhumanity. He used his influence to induce his friend Burnet to accept a bishopric, and to co-operate with activity in the work of moderation. At length he felt that he could stand the misery and failure of his position no longer. Despised by the presbyterians, hated by the prelatists, he found himself powerless for good, and in despair he set out for London in 1672, to obtain the royal permission to resign his preferment. With difficulty and after some interval he was enabled to do so. After his retirement he resided for some time within the precincts of the college of Edinburgh, and afterwards withdrew to England and took up his abode with one of his sisters at Broadhurst in the county of Sussex. Here he spent in privacy and devotion the rest of his years, "devoting his time," says Burnet, "between study and retirement and the doing of good; for in the parish where he lived, and in the parishes round about, he was always employed in preaching and reading prayers. He distributed all he had in charities. He had gathered a well-chosen library of curious as well as useful books, which he left to the diocese of Dunblane for the use of the clergy there, that country being ill provided with books." He was not destined to die in the country amidst his books. In 1684 he came to London at Burnet's request, to have an interview with the earl of Perth, the chancellor of Scotland, who had expressed an earnest desire to see him. He looked well and fresh, although above seventy. "His hair was still black, and all his motions were lively." When Burnet congratulated him on his hale looks, he made the significant remark, that "he was very near his end for all that, and that his work and his journey were almost done." The very next day he was seized with a pleurisy, and in two days further, on the 25th of June, 1684, he expired at an inn in Warwick Lane. Curiously enough, he had been in the habit of saying that if he was to choose a place to die in, it would be an inn, as suitable to the pilgrim character of life.
Leighton is eminently one of those men who, while deficient in the practical character which secures success in life, and enables them to turn the very difficulty of their circumstances into an instrumentality for their advancement, are distinguished by a meditative idealizing genius and lofty purity of spirit, which becomes in the future a far more powerful influence than any mere practical success. If we measure Leighton's life in relation to the ecclesiastical troubles which mingle in it so largely, it seems absolutely without force or beneficial effect of any kind. At every stage he sank under his difficulties, and retired out of sight. But if we measure it on the other hand in relation to the great thoughts and the religious inspiration with which his writings have animated other minds—such as Coleridge's, which in their turn have exerted a wide spiritual influence on the world—there is no contemporary life appears more marked and influential. It is the triumph of real greatness of soul over every other and lesser greatness—a greatness unknown and unappreciated in his day, but which grows and strengthens as every material weakness which may have obscured it is forgotten, and all other greatness becomes dim and transitory. The works of Leighton, besides his "Prælectiones Theologicæ," are his well-known "Commentary on the First Epistle of St. Peter," and his "Sermons and Charges." The best edition of his works is that edited by Pearson, London, 1828.—T.
LEJAY, Gabriel François, a French scholar and theologian, born at Paris in 1657; died in 1734. He studied among the jesuits, joined their order, and became eminent as a professor. Lejay wrote various works, some of which are not in a very tolerant spirit, on religious subjects, and others characterized by considerable research and learning. He translated the works of Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and published a "Bibliotheca Rhetorum," which became popular.—B. H. C.
LEJAY, Gui Michel, editor of the great Polyglott Bible, which generally bears his name; but which is otherwise called the Paris Polyglott, was born at Paris in 1588, and died in 1674. The project of his Bible was formed as early as 1615, but its publication did not commence till 1628. Several learned men had agreed upon the carrying out of such an enterprise, with the view of producing a more perfect work than that of Antwerp; but when the scheme was well-nigh abandoned, Lejay, who was a good linguist, although an advocate in parliament, took it up. The best type-founders and engravers, and Vitré the king's printer, were set to work, and a new paper was expressly made for it. Eminent scholars were engaged by the editor to help him, and he supplied great part of the necessary funds. Owing partly to the obstacles raised at the court of Rome, and partly to the disputes between Lejay and Gabriel Sionita, a learned Maronite professor of oriental languages at Rome, the execution of the work extended over the long period of seventeen years. Gabriel supplied the Syriac and Arabic versions which he copied from ancient manuscripts, and furnished with the vowel points. He did not, however, complete his portion of the task, and it was carried on by Abraham Ecchellensis, also a Maronite. The following is the full title of this remarkable work—"Biblia Hebraica, Samaritana, Chaldaica, Græca, Syriaca, Latina, Arabica; quibus textus originales totius Scripturæ sacræ, quorum pars in editione Complutensi, deinde in Antwerpiensi regiis sumptibus extat, nunc integri, ex manuscriptis toto fere orbe quæsitis exemplaribus, exhibentur." An admirable account of the progress and character of the Paris Polyglott is given by Le Long in his Bibliotheca Sacra; it is also described by Father Simon in his Critical History; by Walton in his Prolegomena;
