For his judicial appointments Lord Clarendon is entitled to unqualified praise. Hale, Bridgeman, and other judges of the highest eminence for learning and independence, were appointed by him immediately after the Restoration, and contributed in a great degree to give stability and moral strength to the new government, by the confidence which their characters inspired in the due administration of the law.

As an historian Lord Clarendon was unquestionably careless and inexact to a surprising degree, which may in some measure be excused by the necessity of writing very much from recollection; and he was a perpetual advocate and partisan of the Royal cause, though by no means of most of its supporters. But though his narration constantly betrays the bias of party, and cannot therefore be safely relied upon for our historical conclusions, his misrepresentations arise from the avowed partiality and intense concern he feels for the cause he is advocating, and not from any design to suppress or distort facts. His style is luxuriant and undisciplined, and his expression in the narrative parts of his history is diffuse and inaccurate; but his fervent loyalty and the warmth of his attachment to his political friends have infused a richness of eloquence into his delineations of character, which has perhaps never been surpassed in any language.

BORN June 15, 1606. His father was a miller, named Gerretz, who lived near Leyden, on the banks of the Rhine. Hence Rembrandt assumed the higher-sounding title of Van Ryn, in exchange for his paternal appellation. The miller was sagacious enough to perceive that his son had talent, but not to discover the direction in which it lay; and sent him to study Latin, and qualify himself for one of the learned professions at the University of Leyden. He had no turn for scholarship; indeed, through life, his literary acquirements were decidedly below par; but he showed great expertness in drawing any object which caught his notice. The miller wisely yielded to what appeared the natural bent of his son's genius, and suffered him to pursue painting as a profession. He studied first for three months at Amsterdam, in the school of Jacob Van Swannenberg, then six months with Peter Lastman, and six with Jacob Pinas. It is somewhat surprising that he should have continued so

long with these masters, from whom he could learn no more than the rudiments of execution. Had they been better, he would have gained little but manual skill from them; for, from the first, his style was essentially his own. Nature was his preceptress, and his academy was his father's mill. There he found those unique effects of light and shadow which distinguish his pictures from all others. The style of art which astonished his contemporaries by its novelty and power, and will ever continue to influence the practice of later artists, was founded on and formed out of the brilliant contrasts exhibited by a beam of light admitted through a narrow aperture, and rapidly subsiding into darkness: a spectacle which, familiar to his childhood, seems to have left an indelible impression on his imagination. He studied with great assiduity, but seems to have scarcely been conscious of his own strength until the commendation of his fellow-students roused him. At the suggestion of one of them he took a painting which he had just finished to an amateur at the Hague, who gave the best proof of his approbation by paying a hundred florins for it on the spot. The sudden acquisition of so much wealth almost turned the young artist's head. He went on foot to the Hague; but he posted home to his father's mill in a chariot. Extravagance, however, was not one of his characteristics, and this was his last, as it was his first act of ostentatious disbursement.

He remained for some time in his native village, induced, perhaps, by the facilities which the banks of the Rhine presented to him for the study of landscape. Even in that department of art he selected those phases of nature which harmonised with his usual management of chiar' oscuro: such as effects of twilight, or the setting sun, or any combinations of clouds, rocks, trees, or other objects, which formed

large masses of shade relieved by light concentrated in one spot. But being frequently summoned to Amsterdam by commissions for portraits, he settled in that city in 1630. At the same time he married a pretty peasant girl from Ramsdorp, whose portrait he has often introduced in his pictures. He received several pupils into his house, who paid largely for his instructions.

One of Rembrandt's earnest and most steadfast patrous was the burgomaster Six, for whom he painted the celebrated picture now in the National Gallery, of The Woman taken in Adultery.' If this be an average specimen of his style at this time, no wonder can be felt that his reputation rose to a prodigious height, and that he obtained large prices for his performances. The style of this picture, though approaching to the elaborate finishing of Mieris or Gerard Dow, is yet as broad as any of his subsequent works, after he had adopted a bolder method of execution. Refinement of character we never must expect in Rembrandt; but in this picture we are not shocked by that uncalled-for coarseness which debases many of his later works. In the figure of Christ especially, there is some attempt to rise above the level of common life, which he usually contents himself with copying. The picture exhibits his usual grandeur and solemnity of light and shade, and is remarkable for brilliancy of colouring.

As Rembrandt's practice became more and more lucrative, he gave way to a vice which certainly is not the besetting one of artists, and grew insatiably avaricious. His engravings were sought with even more avidity than his pictures; and he left unemployed no artifice by which their popularity might be turned to account. Impressions were taken off and circulated when the plates were half finished; then the work was completed, and the sale recommenced.

Alterations were then made in the perfect engraving, and these botched prints were again sent into the market. Impressions of the same plate in all these stages of transformation were eagerly sought by the idle foppery of collectorship; and it was held a serious impeachment of taste not to possess proofs of the little Juno with and without a crown; the young Joseph with the face light, and the same Joseph with his face dark; the woman with the white bonnet, and the same woman without a bonnet; the horse with a tail, and a horse without a tail, &c. Ungentlemanly tricks were practised to enhance the price of his works. He often expressed an intention of quitting Amsterdam altogether. Once he was announced to be dangerously ill; at another time he was reported to be dead. It is strange that he should not have felt these petty artifices to be unworthy of his genius, and unnecessary to his fame or fortune; but it seems not improbable that some of his eccentricities were played off to attract attention. Being occupied one day in painting the picture of a burgomaster and his family, word was brought that his favourite monkey was dead. He made great parade of his distress, and, as some alleviation of it, proceeded to paint the monkey into the picture. The civic dignitary remonstrated in vain against this extraordinary addition to the family group: Rembrandt refused to finish the picture unless the monkey kept his place, and accordingly it was allowed to remain. That he was not unconscious of the absurdity of such caprices, may be inferred from his quick turn for humour, and the shrewdness and sagacity of his remarks.

The roughness and apparent negligence in the execution of his works astonished many of the Dutch connoisseurs, who had been so used to minute delicacy of finish as to consider it essential to excellence. To