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pish writers have not spoken so favourably of it, but represent it as very faulty: "As Tremellius," says father Simon, was a Jew, before he was a Protestant, he has retained something peculiar to himself in his translation, and deviates often from the true sense. His Latin is affected, and full of faults." 1

TRENCHARD (JOHN), an English political writer, of the democratic cast, was descended of an ancient family, the son of sir John Trenchard, secretary of state to king William III. and was born in 1669. He had a liberal education, and was bred to the law, in which he was well skilled; but politics, and his place of commissioner of the forfeited estates in Ireland, which he had enjoyed in the reign of king William, took him from the bar, whither he had never any inclination to return. He was also rendered independent by the death of an uncle, and by his marriage, and determined to employ his time in political discussions. His first publication of this kind, in conjunction with Mr. Moyle, appeared in 1698, entitled "An Argument, shewing that a standing army is inconsistent with a free govern-ment, and absolutely destructive to the constitution of the English monarchy ;" and, in 1698, "A short history of Standing Armies in England;" which two pamphlets produced several answers. In November 1720, in conjunction with Mr. Thomas Gordon, he began to publish, in the "Loudon," and afterwards in the "British Journal," a series of letters, under the name of "Cato," upon various and important subjects relating to the public. These were continued for almost three years with very great reputation among those who were not very closely attached to the government or the church; but there were some papers among them, written by Mr. Trenchard, under the name of "Diogenes," upon several points of religion, which were thought exceptionable, and animadverted upon, particularly by Mr. John Jackson, in a "Defence of human Liberty." Dr. Clarke also wrote some animadversions upon Trenchard's principles, but which were never published. They are inserted in the General Dictionary. Mr. Gordon afterwards collected the papers written by Mr. Trenchard and himself, and published them in four volumes, 12mo, under the title of "Cato's Letters, or Essays on

1 Melchior Adam.-Tiraboschi,- Blount's Censura.-Fuller's "Abel Redivivus."Saxii Onomast.

Liberty, civil or religious, and other important subjects;" the fourth edition of which, corrected, was printed in 1737. It was imagined at the time, that lord Molesworth had a chief, at least a considerable, hand in those letters; but Mr. Gordon assures us, in the dedication of them to John Milner, esq. that this noble person never wrote a line in them, nor contributed a thought towards them. As to the purport and design of them, Mr. Gordon says, that "as they were the work of no faction or cabal, nor calculated for lucrative or ambitious ends, or to serve the purany poses of any party whatsoever, but attacked falsehood and dishonesty in all shapes and parties, without temporising with any, doing justice to all, even to the weakest and most unfashionable, and maintaining the principles of liberty against the practices of both parties; so they were dropped without any sordid composition, and without any consideration, save that it was judged that the public, after all its terrible convulsions, was become calm and safe. They had treated of most of the subjects important to the world, and meddled with public measures and public men only in great instances." He wrote also in "The Independent Whig,' another paper hostile to the hierarchy.

Mr. Trenchard was member of parliament for Taunton in Somersetshire, and died Dec. 17, 1723, of an ulcer in his kidneys. He is said to have thought too much, and with too much solicitude, to have done what he did too intensely and with too much vigour and activity of the head, which caused him many bodily disorders, and is supposed at last to have worn out the springs of life. He left no writings at all behind him, but two or three loose. pers, once intended for Cato's Letters. Mr. Anthony Collins, in the manuscript catalogue of his library, ascribes to him the following pieces: "The natural history of Superstition," 1709. "Considerations on the public debts," 1709. "Comparison of the proposals of the Bank and South-Sea Company," 1719. "Letter of thanks, &c." 1719. "Thoughts on the Peerage-bill," 1719. And "Reflections on the Old Whig," 1719. Mr. Gordon, who has drawn his character at large in the preface above cited, tells us in his dedication, that "he has set him no higher than his own great abilities and many virtues set him; that his failings were small, his talents extraordinary, his probity equal; and that he was one of the worthiest, one of the

ablest, one of the most useful, men that ever any country was blessed withal.1

TRESHAM (HENRY), an excellent artist of the English school, and a member of the Royal Academy of London, and of the academies of Rome and Bologna, was a native of Ireland, which country he left at an early age; and having devoted himself to the arts, repaired to Italy, at a time when an acquaintance with the master-pieces of the arts which that country possessed, was considered as an essential requisite for completing the education of a gentleman. The friendships and acquaintance formed by Mr. Tresham while abroad, were not a little conducive to the promotion of his interests on his return to this country; and their advantages were experienced by him to the last moment of his life. As an artist, Mr. Tresham possessed very considerable talents; and, while his health permitted him to exert them, they were honourably directed to the higher departments of his art. A long residence in Italy, together with a diligent study of the antique, had given him a lasting predilection for the Roman school; and his works display many of the powers and peculiarities which distinguish the productions of those great masters whose taste he had adopted. He had much facility of composition, and his fancy was well stored with materials; but his oil pictures are deficient in that richness of colouring and spirit of execution which characterize the Venetian pencil, and which have been displayed, in many instances, with rival excellence in this country. His drawings with pen and ink, and in black chalk, evince uncommon ability; the latter, in particular, are executed with a spirit, boldness, and breadth which are not often to be found in such productions. In that which may be termed the erudition of taste, Mr. Tresham was deeply skilled: a long acquaintance with the most eminent masters of the Italian schools made him familiar with their merits and defects; he could discriminate between all their varieties of style and manner; and as to every estimable quality of a picture, he was considered one of the ablest criticks of his day in the just appreciation, also, of those various remains of antiquity which come under the different classifications of virtú, his opinion was sought, with eagerness, by the connoisseur as

1 Gen. Dict.-Biog. Brit. Supplement.-Toulmin's Hist. of Taunton, p. 81.See our account of Thomas Gordon.

well as the artist, and held as an authority, from which few would venture lightly to dissent. This kind of knowledge proved not a little beneficial to him. Some years since, Mr. Thomas Hope, whose choice collections of every kind are well known, had given to one of his servants a number of Etruscan vases, as the refuse of a quantity which he had purchased. Accident made Mr. Tresham acquainted with the circumstance; and the whole lot was bought by him of the new owner for 100l. It was not long before he received 800/. from Mr. Samuel Rogers, for one moiety; and the other, increased by subsequent acquisitions, he transferred a few years ago to the earl of Carlisle. That nobleman, with a munificence and liberality which have invariably marked all his transactions, settled on the artist an annuity of 300l. for life, as the price of this collection. With such honour was this engagement fulfilled, that the amount of the last quarter, though due only a few days before Mr. Tresham's death, was found to have been punctually paid. When Messrs. Longman and Co. commenced their splendid publication of engravings from the works of the ancient masters, in the collections of the British nobility, and others who have distinguished themselves by their patronage of the fine arts, they, with a discernment which does them credit, deputed Mr. Tresham to superintend the undertaking. To the honour of the owners of those master-pieces it must be recorded, that every facility was afforded to this artist, not only in the loan of pictures, but in the communication of such facts relating to the respective works as they were able to furnish. The salary paid him by these spirited publishers, contributed materially to the comfort of his declining years. We should not omit to mention, to the credit of Mr. Tresham, that, regardless as he had been in early life of providing those resourses for old age which prudence would suggest, yet so high were his principles, that the most celebrated dealers in virtú, auctioneers, and others, never hesitated to deliver lots to any amount purchased by him; and we may venture to assert, that he never abused their confidence. But the talents of Tresham were not confined to objects immediately connected with his profession; he had considerable taste for poetry, and his published performances in that art display a lively fancy, and powers of versification, of no ordinary kind. In society, which he loved and enjoyed to the last, he was always considered as an acquisition by

his friends; and amongst those friends were included many of the most elevated and estimable characters of the time. In conversation, he was fluent, humourous, and animated, abounding in anecdote, and ready of reply. During the latter years of his life, the contrast exhibited between the playful vivacity of his manners and the occasional exclamations of agony, produced by the spasmodic affections with which he was so long afflicted, gave an interest to his appearance that enhanced the entertainment which his eolloquial powers afforded. His existence seemed to hang upon so slight a thread that those who enjoyed his society were commonly under an impression that the pleasure derived from it might not be again renewed, and that a frame so feeble could scarcely survive the exertion which the vigour of his spirit for a moment sustained. The principle of life, however, was in him so strong, as to contradict all ordinary indications; and he lived on, through many years of infirmity, as much to the surprise as the gratification of his friends: his spirits unsubdued by pain, and his mind uninfluenced by the decay of his body. Though partaking, in some degree, of the proverbial irritability of the poet and the painter, no man was more free from envious and malignant feelings, or could be more ready to do justice to the claims of his competitors. So true a relish had he for the sallies of wit and humour, that he could enjoy them even at his own expense: and he has been frequently known to repeat, with unaffected glee, the jest that has been pointed against himself. By his death, which took place June 17, 1814, the Royal Academy was deprived of one of its most enlightened members, and his profession of a liberal and accomplished artist.

Mr. Tresham's poetical publications, all which he made in some measure the vehicle of his sentiments on subjects of art, were, 1. "The sea-sick Minstrel, or Maritime Sorrows," in six cantos, 1796, 4to, an extraordinary, but, perhaps, irregular, effusion of real genius. 2. "Rome at close of the eighteenth century," 1799, 4to, the subject, the plunder of that city by the French. 3. "Britannicus to Bonaparte, an heroic epistle, with notes," 1803, 4to. '

TRESSAN. See VERGNE.

TREW (CHRISTOPHER JAMES), an eminent naturalist, and liberal patron of that science, was the son and grand

1 Gent. Mag. vol. LXXXIV.

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