ment. He was wont to say, that "matter lay in a little room;" and in his pleadings he was concise, though in set speeches and in his writings too diffuse. He was certainly a great master of his profession, as even his enemies allow; had studied it regularly, and was perfectly acquainted with every thing relating to it. Hence he gained so high an esteem in Westminster-hall, and came to enjoy so large a share in the favour of the great lord Burleigh. He valued himself, and indeed not without reason, upon this, that he obtained all his preferments without employing either prayers or pence; and that he became the queen's solicitor, speaker of the house of commons, attorney-general, chief justice of both benches, high-steward of Cambridge, and a member of the privy-council, without either begging or bribing. As he derived his fortune, his credit, and his greatness, from the law, so he loved it to a degree of intemperance. He committed every thing to writing with an industry beyond example, and, as we shall relate just now, published a great deal. He met with many changes of fortune; was sometimes in power, and sometimes in disgrace. He was, however, so excellent at making the best of a disgrace, that king James used to compare him to a cat, who always fell upon her legs. He was upon occasion a friend to the church and clergy and thus, when he had lost his public employments, and a great peer was inclined to question the rights of the church of Norwich, he hindered it, by telling him plainly, that "if he proceeded, he would put on his cap and gown again, and follow the cause through Westminster-ball." He had many benefices in his own patronage, which he is said to have given freely to men of merit; declaring in his law language, that he would have law livings pass by livery and seisin, and not by bargain and sale.

"His learned and laborious works on the laws," says a certain author, "will be admired by judicious posterity, while Fame has a trumpet left her, or any breath to blow therein." This is indisputably a just character of his writings in general: the particulars of which are as follow. About 1600 were published, in folio, the first part of the Reports of sir Edward Coke, knt. her majesty's attorneygeneral, of divers resolutions and judgments given with great deliberation by the reverend judges and sages of the law, of cases and matters in law, which were never resolved

or adjudged before: and the reasons and causes of the said resolutions and judgments during the most happy reign of the most illustrious and renowned queen Elizabeth, the fountain of all justice, and the life of the law." The second, third, and so on to the eleventh part of the "Reports" were all published by himself in the reign of James I. The twelfth part of his Reports has a certificate printed before it, dated Feb. 2, 1655, and subscribed E. Bulstrod; signifying, that he conceives it to be the genuine work of sir Edward Coke. The title of the thirteenth part is, "Select cases in law, reported by sir Edward Coke ;" and these are asserted to be his in a preface signed with the initials J. G.

All these Reports have been uniformly received by our courts with the utmost deference; and as a mark of distinguished eminence, they are frequently cited as, 1, 2, 3, &c. Rep. without mentioning the author's name, and in his own writings they are usually described as Lib. 1, 2, 3, &c. There have been many editions of these Reports, the last in 1776, in 7 vols. 8vo, by Wilson. They have also been abstractedly versified in an 8vo volume, 1742, in a very curious manner, for the help of the memory, and the method seems to have been recommended by the practice of lord Coke himself.

In 1614 there was published, "A speech and charge at Norwich assizes," intended to pass for sir Edward Coke's; but he clearly disclaims it, in the preface to the seventh part of his Reports. He did indeed make a speech at that time, and in some measure to this purpose; but these notes of it were gathered and published without his knowledge in a very incorrect and miserable manner, and published with a design to prejudice and expose him. In 1614 was published in folio, "A book of entries, containing perfect and approved precedents of courts, declarations, informations, plaints, indictments, bars, duplications, rejoinders, pleadings, processes, continuances, essoigns, issues, defaults, departure in despight of the court, demurrers, trials, judgments, executions, and all other matters and proceedings, in effect, concerning the practic part of the laws of England, in actions real, personal, mixed, and in appeals : being very necessary to be known, and of excellent use for the modern practice of the law, many of them containing matters in law, and points of great learning; collected and published for the common good and benefit of all the stu dious and learned professors of the laws of England."

His "Institutes" are divided into four parts. The first is the translation and comment upon the "Tenures of Sir Thomas Littleton," one of the judges of the common-pleas in the reign of Edward IV. It was published in his lifetime, in 1628; but that edition was very incorrect. There was a second published in 1629, said to be revised by the author, and in which this work is much amended; yet several mistakes remained even in that. The second part of the "Institutes" gives us magna charta, and other select statutes, in the languages in which they were first enacted, and much more correct than they were to be had any where else. He adds to these a commentary full of excellent learning, wherein he shews how the common law stood before those statutes were made, how far they are introductory of new laws, and how far declaratory of the old; what were the causes of making them, to what ends they were made, and in what degree, at the time of his writing, they were either altered or repealed. The third part of the "Institutes" contains the criminal law or pleas of the crown : where, among other things, he shews, in regard to pardons and restitutions, how far the king may proceed by his prerogative, and where the assistance of parliament is necessary. The fourth part of the "Institutes" comprehends the jurisdiction of all the courts in this kingdom, from the high court of parliament down to the court-baron. This part not being published till after his decease, there are many inaccuracies and some greater faults in it, which were animadverted upon and amended in a book written by William Prynne, esq. and published in 1669. The thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth editions of the "Institutes," 1788, 1789, and 1794, by Hargrave and Butler, are esteemed the best.

We have besides of his, 1. A treatise of Bail and Mainprize, 1637, 4to. 2. Reading on the state of Fines, 27 Edw. I. French, 1662, 4to. 3. Complete Copyholder, 1640, 4to. There was added in another edition of this book in 1650, 4to, Calthorpe's reading between a lord of a manor and a copyholder his tenant, &c. And in the editions in 12mo, 1668 and 1673, there is a supplement; but a more complete specification of the various editions may be found in Bridgman's "Legal Bibliography."!

1 Biog. Brit.-Lloyd's Worthies.-Fuller's Worthies.-Lodge's Illustrations, vol. III. Seward's Anecdotes, vol. I. and Biographiana, vol. II.—Archæologia, vol. I. p. xx.-Roger Coke's Detection of the Court and State of England, &c. 1697, 8vo. He was grandson of lord Coke,

COLARDEAU (CHARLES PETER), a French poet, was born at Janville in the Orleanois in 1735, and was a votary of the muses from his very infancy. He made his first appearance in the literary world in 1758, by a poetical translation of Pope's Eloisa to Abelard; in which he was said to have retained the warmth of the original, with the richness of its images. His tragedies of Astarbè and Calisto, the one performed in 1758, and the other in 1760, were not so successful. The complexion of them is indeed sorrowful, and even gloomy, but never tragical. The "Temple of Gnidos," and two of the "Nights" of Young, in French verse, the epistle to M. Duhamel, and the poem of Prometheus, which appeared afterwards, are in general versified in a soft and harmonious manner. The epistle to M. Duhamel, which is replete with rural descriptions and sentiments of beneficence, has been ranked by many of its enthusiastic admirers with the best epistles of Boileau. These several performances excited the attention of the French academy towards the author, who elected him a member at the beginning of 1776; but before he had nounced his inaugural discourse, he was snatched away by death, in the flower of his age, the 7th of April in the same year, after he had risen from his bed in a state of extreme weakness, and burnt what he had written of a translation of Tasso. This poet, who has so well described the charms of nature in his poems, and who even understood the art of drawing, yet in all the variety of colours saw only white and black, and only the different combinations of light and shade. This singular organization, however, did not weaken the charms of his imagination. His works were collected in two vols. 8vo, Paris, 1779, and have been since reprinted in 12mo. Among these is a comedy entitled "Les perfidies à la mode," in which are some agreeable verses, two or three characters well enough drawn, but not a single spark of the vis comica.'

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COLBERT (JOHN BAPTIST), marquis of Segnelai, one of the greatest statesmen that France ever had, was born at Paris in 1619, and descended from a family that lived at Rheims in Champaigne, originally from Scotland (the Cuthberts), but at that time no way considerable for its splendour. His grandfather is said to have been a winemerchant, and his father at first followed the same occu

Dict. Hist.-D'Israeli's Curiosities, vol. I. p. 85.

pation; but afterwards traded in cloth, and at last in silk. Our Colbert was instructed in the arts of merchandize, and afterwards became clerk to a notary. In 1648 his relation John Baptist Colbert, lord of S. Pouange, preferred him to the service of Michael le Tellier, secretary of state, whose sister he had married; and here he discovered such diligence and exactness in executing all the commissions that were entrusted to his care, that he quickly grew distinguished. One day his master sent him to cardinal Mazarine, who was then at Sedan, with a letter written by the queen mother; and ordered him to bring it back after that minister had seen it. Colbert carried the letter, and would not return without it, though the cardinal treated him roughly, used several arts to deceive him, and obliged him to wait for it several days. Some time after, the cardinal returning to court, and wanting one to write his agenda or memoranda, desired le Tellier to furnish him with a fit person for that employment; and Colbert being presented to him, the cardinal had some remembrance of him, and desired to know where he had seen him. Colbert was afraid of putting him in mind of Sedan, lest the remembrance of his behaviour in demanding the queen's letter should renew his anger. But the cardinal was so far from disliking him for his faithfulness to his late master, that he received him on condition that he should serve him with the like zeal and fidelity.

Colbert applied himself wholly to the advancement of his master's interests, and gave him so many marks of his diligence and skill that afterwards he made him his intendant. He accommodated himself so dexterously to the inclinations of that minister, by retrenching his superfluous expences, that he was entrusted with the sale of benefices and governments, and it was by Colbert's counsel that the cardinal obliged the governors of frontier places to maintain their garrisons with the contributions they exacted. He was sent to Rome, to negociate the reconciliation of cardinal de Retz, for which the pope had shewed some concern; and to persuade his holiness to fulfill the treaty concluded with his predecessor Urban VIII. From all these services Mazarine conceived so high an opinion of Colbert's abilities, that at his death in 1661, he earnestly recommended him to Louis XIV. as the most proper person to regulate the finances, which at that time were in great confusion. Louis accepted the recommendation, and