Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/45

COLBURN minister of the navy in 1669, and the French fleet, which then consisted of but 50 ships, numbered in a few years 198 men-of-war. Colbert also encouraged literature, science, and art. He founded the academies of in- scriptions and belles-lettres, of science, and of architecture, sculpture, and painting, and at Rome reestablished the French school of paint- ing. He founded the observatory and the jar din des plantes; increased the royal library and the collection of coins and medals; be- stowed pensions on eminent artists and schol- ars; and enriched Paris with the garden of the Tuileries and the colonnade of the Louvre, and with many quays, bridges, boulevards, public buildings, triumphal arches, and monu- ments. He opposed the wars and follies of Louis XIV., and succeeded for many years in restraining him within the limits of reasonable ambition. But about 1670 his favor was on the wane, and the influence of Louvois, the min- ister of war, prevailed. Then commenced a series of European wars that partly exhausted the wealth and resources accumulated by Col- bert. He continued however serving the gov- ernment, but the reckless course which was now pursued impaired his usefulness. He had been so long engaged in public affairs that he was loath to retire, but he suffered much from the ingratitude of the king. During his last moments he gave vent to his feelings by say- ing : "If I had done for God what I have for that man (Louis XIV.), I would have more than deserved salvation, and I do not know now what will become of me." Thus died one of the greatest ministers of France. He was hated by his colleagues, perhaps by the king, and certainly by the people, who held him respon- sible for taxes which had been established not- withstanding his remonstrances, and for vexa- tions of which he was not the author. To protect his funeral against the attacks of the mob, it took place at night, attended by a military escort. A monument was erected by his family in the church of St. Eustace, and his statue was placed in 1844 in the Palais Bour- bon. Posterity has placed Colbert among the most eminent statesmen ; and although his commercial policy has been the object of se- vere animadversion, it cannot be denied that it was perhaps the best adapted to his time and country. An edition of the Lettres, instruc- tions et memoires de Colbert was published at Paris in 1872. II. Jean Baptiste, marquis de Seignelay, son of the preceding, born in Paris in 1651, died Nov. 3, 1690. He succeeded his father as minister of the navy, and raised the French navy to its highest power by his capa- city and energy. In 1684 he led in person the maritime expedition against Genoa. COLBURN, Warren, an American mathemati- cian, born at Dedham, Mass., March 1, 1793, died at Lowell, Sept. 15, 1833. He was the eldest son of a large family. His parents were poor, and during his childhood made frequent removals to different manufacturing villages, where Warren as well as some of the other children found employment in the factories. He early manifested a remarkable taste for mathematics, and having acquired the trade of a machinist, he entered Harvard college in 1816. He graduated in 1820, and soon after- ward opened a select school in Boston. In the autumn of 1821 the first edition of his "First Lessons in Mental Arithmetic " was is- sued. ^ While in college the necessity of such a work 'had been forced upon his mind, and its plan digested. He was accustomed to say that "the pupils who were under his tuition made his arithmetic for him ; " that the questions they asked, and the necessary answers and ex- planations which he gave in reply, were em- bodied in that book. No other elementary work on arithmetic ever had such a sale. It has been translated into most of the languages of Europe, and into several of those of India. After teaching nearly three years, he accepted the situation of superintendent of the Boston manufacturing company at Waltham, in April, 1823 ; and in August, 1824, he was appointed su- perintendent of the Merrimack manufacturing company at Lowell. Here he projected a sys- tem of lectures of an instructive character, pre- senting commerce and useful subjects in such a way as to gain attention. In the autumn of 1825 he commenced a course of lectures on the natural history of animals. This he followed in subsequent years with lectures on light, the eye, the seasons, electricity, hydraulics, astron- omy, &c. His " Sequel " had been published just before he left Waltham. In 1828 he pub- lished his " Algebra." In May. 1827, he was elected a fellow of the American academy of arts and sciences. He was also for a number of years one of the examining committee on mathematics in Harvard college, and some time superintendent of schools at Lowell. COLBURN, Zerah, an arithmetical prodigy, born at Cabot, Vt., Sept. 1, 1804, died March 2, 1840. In his 6th year he began to give evi- dence of those extraordinary powers of compu- tation which afterward excited the wonder of the learned and curious in the United States and Europe. His father decided to exhibit them in public, and accordingly left Vermont with Zerah in the winter of 1810-'!!. Passing through Hanover, N. H., Dr. Wheelock, then president of Dartmouth college, offered to take upon himself the whole care and expense of his edu- cation, but his father rejected the offer. At Boston the performances of the boy excited much attention. He was visited by the pro- fessors of Harvard college, and by eminent men in all professions, and the newspapers were filled with articles concerning his wonderful powers of computation. Questions in multipli- cation of four and five places of figures, reduc- tion, rule of three, practice, involution, evolu- tion, compound fractions, and the obtaining of factors even of large numbers, were answered with accuracy and with a rapidity to which the most experienced mathematicians could not at-