breathe a more tolerant and loftier Christianity, giving to all her sons the example of a life devoted to the search for truth.
Lessing's Works have been, often collected, notably by Lachmann (13 vols., 1838-40). Most of them are published separately. There are translations of the Laokoon, Minna von Barnhelm, Emilia Galotti, and Nathan der Weise. Consult: Danzel and Guhrauer, Lessing, sein Leben und Seine Werke (Leipzig, 1850-54); Erich Schmidt, Lessing (Berlin, 1899); Fischer, G. A. Lessing, als Reformator der deutschen Litteratur (Stuttgart, 1881); Düntzer, Erläuterungen zu Lessings Werken (Leipzig, 1883); Spicker, Lessings Weltanschauung (ib., 1883); Braun, Lessing im Urteile seiner Zeitgenossen (Berlin, 1884-97); Kort, Lessing et l'antiquité (Paris, 1894); Consentius, Lessing und die Vossische Zeitung (Leipzig, 1900); Blumner, Lessings Laokoon (Berlin, 1879); Schröter und Thiele, Lessings Hamburgische Dramaturgie (Halle, 1877); Strauss, Nathan der Weise (Berlin, 1866); Pabst, Vorlesungen über Nathan der Weise (Bern, 1881). There are English Lives by Sime (London, 1877), Zimmern (ib., 1878), and Rolleston (ib., 1889).
LESSING, Karl Friedrich (1808-80). A German historical and landscape painter, grandnephew of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. He was born near Breslau, February 15, 1808, and was a pupil of the Berlin Academy. He first devoted himself to landscape, and in 1826 obtained a prize with his “Cemetery in Ruins.” He accompanied his master, Schadow, to Düsseldorf, where he continued his studies, devoting himself to historical paintings. In 1830, when Schadow went to Italy, Lessing occupied his place as director of the Academy, exercising great influence upon the Düsseldorf school. His picture “Das trauernde Königspaar” (“Mourning Royal Couple”) brought him great popularity. In 1837 lie received a gold medal at Paris; he was a member of the Berlin Academy, and was the recipient of several orders. In 1858 he was appointed director of the gallery at Karlsruhe, where he continued his activity as a painter until his death, January 4, 1880. His historical paintings were mostly executed in the service of Protestantism. The best known are: “Hussite Sermon” (1830), and the “Martyrdom of Huss” (1850), in the National Gallery at Berlin; “Huss Before the Council of Constance” (1842), in the Museum of Frankfort; “Dispute Between Luther and Dr. Eek,” in the Gallery of Karlsruhe; “Luther Burning the Pope's Bull” (1853); “Pope Paschal II., a Prisoner of Henry V.” (1857), in the possession of the German Emperor. As a landscape painter Lessing occupies an important place, being the chief master of the Romantic School in Germany. His landscapes were chiefly mountain scenery, painted directly from nature, only the figures being reminiscent of Romanticism. Consult M. Jordan, Ausstellung der Werke Karl Friedrich Lessings (Berlin, 1880).
LESSON (OF., Fr. leçon, It. lezione, from Lat. lectio, reading, lesson, from legere, to read, Gk. λέγειν, legein, to say). In the liturgical sense, a portion of the Church service appointed to be read, chiefly with a view to instruction and exhortation, as distinguished from prayer and praise addressed to God. In this sense it includes the epistle and gospel (qq.v.), but the term is more commonly applied to the selections read in the ancient breviary office of matins and in the morning and evening prayer of the Anglican churches. The earliest notices we have of services of the first Christians describe them as maintaining a practice which had been traditional for centuries in the Jewish synagogues. Besides what we now know as the Old and New Testaments, the letters of various bishops, especially those of Saint Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas, and other edifying writings were read. When the canon of Scripture came to be definitely fixed, the reading during divine service was usually restricted to it. At first books were read continuously from beginning to end; but with the gradual development of the liturgical year selections were made in order to have the reading appropriate to the mystery or event commemorated. The arrangement of this order is commonly attributed to Saint Jerome.
The lessons in the breviary (q.v.) for matins on Sundays and greater festivals are nine—the first three from Scripture, the next three usually from the lives of the saints or some historical matter, and the last from a homily of one of the fathers on the gospel for the day. On smaller festivals and ordinary week-days only three are read. Some monastic rites have four lessons in each nocturne. In the Anglican Prayer-Book two lessons, much longer than those in the breviary, and of course in English, are appointed for morning and for evening prayer on each Sunday, festival, or week-day; the first is always taken from the Old Testament, and the second from the New.
LESSON, lā̇′sōN′, René Primevère (1794-1849). A French naturalist, born at Rochefort. He was largely self-educated, save for a medical course at Rochefort, which fitted him for ship's surgeon; and was on board the Regulus when it was burned at Bordeaux by the British. He was director of the botanical gardens at Rochefort in 1822, when he was ordered on board the Coquille for her famous voyage around the world. With Garnot and Guérin he wrote Voyage autour du monde sur la corvette La Coquille (1830); and alone published supplements to Buffon (1828, 1835-41), a popular description of the cruise of La Coquille (1838), and many works on zoölogy and natural history, especially as relating to medicine.
LESSON IN ANATOMY, or School of Anatomy, The, a celebrated painting by Rembrandt, painted in 1632 for the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons, and now in the museum of The Hague, Holland. The renowned anatomist Níkolaas Tulp is represented dissecting an arm of a corpse lying on a table before him. The audience consists of seven persons, two of them members of the Guild of Surgeons.
LES′TER, Charles Edwards (1815-90). An American author, born at Griswold, Conn., a descendant of Jonathan Edwards. He was of a roving disposition and traveled widely in the United States and Europe. He was admitted to the bar in Mississippi and later was ordained a minister in the Presbyterian Church. In 1840 he addressed anti-slavery meetings in Massachusetts, and was elected a delegate to the London anti-slavery conference of that year. He did not return to the United States after the close of the conference, but remained in England, where he published a book entitled The Glory and Shame
