latter office he alone appears to have filled—it was created for him, and ended with him. On his appointment as antiquary in 1533, he received a commission under the great seal to make search for English antiquities, and to examine the libraries of cathedrals, abbeys, priories, colleges, and all depositories of records, writings, and antiquarian documents. A stipend was granted him, a special license for non-residence, and for keeping a curate, while he was to reside wherever he would. For more than six years he travelled over England, making his collections for the history and antiquities of the nation. Of his multifarious labours he gives an interesting account in his "Newe Yeares gifte," printed at the commencement of his "Itinerary," and written in 1545. In this he tells us that he had "digested into four books" his notices of the illustrious writers of this realm, "with their lives and monuments of learning," promising a map of England, a description with the ancient names restored, antiquities or civil history in as many books as counties, a survey of the British isles in six books, and an account of the nobility in three books. Leland was indefatigable in his endeavours for the preservation of ancient manuscripts on the dissolution of the monasteries, where many precious documents lay neglected, and he wrote an earnest letter to Sir Thomas Cromwell upon the subject. According to his own account, and that of one of his biographers, it appears that not content with what libraries afforded, nor with the records to be found in windows and monuments in cathedrals, monasteries, &c., he wandered from place to place, whatever he thought to meet with the footsteps of Roman, Saxon, or Dane. "There was scarcely either cape or bay, haven, creek, or pier, river or confluence of rivers, breaches, washes, lakes, meres, fenny waters, mountains, valleys, moors, heaths, forests, chaces, woods, cities, boroughs, castles, principal manor places, monasteries and colleges, which he had not seen, and noted a world of things very memorable." In 1542 he was presented to the living of Hasely in Oxfordshire; in 1543 he was made a canon of King's college, now Christ Church college, Oxford; and afterwards prebendary in the cathedral of Sarum. When he had completed his collections he came to London, and resided in the parish of St. Michael le Querne, where he set about the accomplishment of his projected works. After some time he unhappily became insane, the causes of which are not well ascertained. Edward VI. committed him and all he possessed to his elder brother of the same name; but his reason never returned, and he died on the 18th of April, 1552. He left many valuable manuscripts, of which a list is given in the Biographia Britannica, and some of them are still in existence in om public libraries. Leland was unquestionably one of our greatest antiquarians; he was an accomplished scholar, an ardent and indefatigable labourer; one who has been laid under heavy contributions by some who have detracted from his merit. His published works are of varied interest; those which maybe mentioned here are—"Principum ac Illustrium aliquot et eruditorum in Anglia virorum Encomia," &c.; "Commentarii de Scriptoribus Britannicis;" "Itinerary;" "De rebus Britannicis Collectanea," nearly all of which have been printed since his death. The "Commentarii" were edited by A. Hall in 1709; the "Itinerary" and "Collectanea" by Thomas Hearne in 1710-15. Bishop Bale, his contemporary, speaks of Leland as the most diligent student of national antiquities England had ever produced, and one who had honoured the whole land by his admirable labours; and in proof of his great talent and learning appeals to his many publications in prose and verse, and his knowledge of many languages and all branches of science.—B. H. C.
LELAND, John, D.D., was born at Wigan in Lancashire on the 18th October, 1691, and was educated in Dublin, to which his father had removed for reasons of business, while he was still very young. His parents were pious presbyterians; and upon his discovering a serious disposition along with an uncommon aptitude for learning, they destined him to the presbyterian ministry. He does not appear to have studied at any college or theological academy, but to have been trained by private teachers along with the assistance of several ministers in Dublin, by whom he was at length encouraged to begin to preach. His preaching was much esteemed, and in 1716 he was ordained joint pastor of a congregation of protestant dissenters assembling in New Row, Dublin. On the death of Mr. Weld, his colleague, he became sole pastor; and in this office he continued till his death on the 16th January, 1766, in the seventy-fifth year of his age. The deistical controversy was the great question of his time, and to that subject he consecrated, during a long life, his whole talents and learning. His publications were numerous and important, and still retain much of their value. In 1733 he published an answer to Tyndal's book, entitled Christianity as Old as the Creation; and in 1739 his "Divine Authority of the Old and New Testaments Asserted," in reply to Morgan's Moral Philosopher, which was soon after translated into German, with a preface, by Professor S. J. Baumgarten. Mr. Francis Wrangham has remarked upon these earliest works of his pen, that "they justly procured for him marks of the highest respect from the most eminent members of the established church." In 1741 he exposed in two letters the disingenuous and dangerous pamphlet published by Henry Dodwell—Christianity not Founded in Argument; and in 1753 appeared his "Reflections upon the late Lord Bolingbroke's Letters on the Study and Use of History." After having thus closed with the principal infidel writers of the day in single combat, he gave to the world, in 1754, his valuable "View of the Principal Deistical Writers of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries," in which he supplied not only a short analysis and exposure of their several schemes, but also an account of their most able antagonists, followed up by an appendix of "Reflections on the Present State of Things in these Nations," which has a historical value as a picture of the religious and moral condition of those times. These "Reflections" he re-published with a preface in a separate form in 1758, upon the occasion of a general fast appointed by government on account of the threatening aspect of public affairs. His last work, by some considered also his greatest, and one which had cost him far more labour and pains than any of the rest, appeared in 1764, in 2 vols. 4to, under the title of "The Advantage and Necessity of the Christian Revelation," and to which is prefixed a preliminary discourse on natural and revealed religion. After his death four volumes of his "Discourses on Various Subjects" were brought out in 1769, with a preface containing some account of his life, by Isaac Weld. The value of his services to the cause of truth was recognized by the universities of Glasgow and Aberdeen, which presented him with the degrees of A.M. and D.D.—P. L.
LELAND, Thomas, was born in Dublin in 1722. After a preparatory education at the school of Dr. Thomas Sheridan, he entered the college of his native city in 1737, where he obtained a scholarship in 1741. In 1745 he was an unsuccessful candidate for a fellowship, which, however, he obtained the following year with distinction, taking holy orders in 1748. Leland wrote a discourse "On the helps and impediments to the a cquisition of knowledge in religious and moral subjects," which was highly commended. His character for classical and historical learning induced the board to commit to him the publication of an edition of Demosthenes, which he accomplished in conjunction with Dr. John Stokes; and this was followed in 1756 by a translation of the orations into Latin and English, completed in 1770—a work which took a high place, for its critical and historical merit, both in England and Ireland. The history of "Philip of Macedon," published in 1758, added to his reputation. In 1763 he was appointed professor of oratory. He published a dissertation upon eloquence, which led to a controversy with Warburton and Hurd, in which he obtained a decided victory over both. Leland's next undertaking was the "History of Ireland from the invasion of Henry II., with a preliminary discourse on the ancient state of that kingdom." Whatever may be the merits of the work in the eyes of antiquarians, it must be admitted that it is written in an impartial spirit, with judgment and accuracy; in style elegant, simple, and perspicuous; and in arrangement skilled and lucid. As a historian Dr. Leland has been highly praised by Johnson and Parr, the former of whom always spoke of Leland in terms of cordial regard and respect. Leland also wrote some sermons, which were published posthumously in three volumes, and had a high reputation as a preacher. Notwithstanding his merits, he obtained little professional advancement. In 1768 he was given the vicarage of Bray and the trifling prebend of Rathmichael, which he held with his fellowship. He died in 1785.—J. F. W.
LE LONG, Jacques, a distinguished historian and bibliographer, was born in Paris in 1665. While yet a child his mother died; and his father, who married again, sent him to a relative, a priest at Étampes, with whom he remained for two or three years. His father, having determined on his joining the order of the knights of Malta, sent him thither at about the
