PREFACE.

NOTHING is more gratifying than to invite others to participate our honourable pleastres, especially those of a mental and moral description. The lives of great and good men if related with impartiality cannot fail of being at once entertaining and instructive. Invited to watch their progress and observe their character, we may learn the most valuable lessons. We are allowed to detect, in order to shun, their errors; to trace, in order to imitate, their virtues;— to follow them into their retirements;-to

become their associates and friends. From

the forum of public debate and of unremitted exertion, we accompany them to the fireside, and the closet. Divested of the insignia of office, the pomp of authority and the glory of popular applause, we see them in the undress of friendship and private life. We sit with them in the domestic circle, and hear them converse and see them act at home. Human nature is developed ;—we gain comprehensive views of inen and things.

Such a scene must be improving to every well-ordered mind, and if the biographer fail of exciting interest, it can only be in consequence of having performed his task badly, from the defect of necessary documents, or from having chosen an insignificant character.

The execution of this work I submit

to the judgment of the public, not doubting that I shall meet with a due degree of justice and candour.

The requisite materials I have found by no means scanty, and whenever they were important or difficult to obtain I have spared no pains to procure them. My object has been to render MELANCTHON more fully known, that his character may be more completely understood and more justly appreciated. For these purposes SECKENDORF, DUPIN, MOSHEIM, CAMERARIUS, MELCHIOR ADAM, BAYLE, BRUCKER, and a variety of other writers have been carefully consulted, so that whatever information is communicated respecting persons or things may be deemed authentic.

Every reader must be aware that it is not an obscure or insignificant character which claims his attention in the following pages. As the intimate friend and distinguished coadjutor of Martin Luther, his name is already familiar and must be dear to every enlightened Protestant; for who can be uninterested in the lives of those illustrious heroes who first led on to the great conflict, in which the liberties of mankind, the rights of conscience, the independence of nations were contested, and by whose struggles they were secured?

In detailing the life of the celebrated MELANCTHON, I am deeply conscious of one disadvantage. Thoroughly to understand a character and to render the narrative of his life complete, who does not perceive the

importance of personal knowledge? It is true, indeed, the colouring may be a little too high and glowing, yet the picture is almost sure to be truer to nature when the artist has drawn from life. It is likely to possess a certain character and expression which a mere copy will seldom exhibit, The tout ensemble will be far better preserved. But in the present case, the picture cannot be taken from life; the great original cannot sit to the artist! Though necessitated however to be in some degree a copyist, this misfortune is in part remedied by the well-drawn portrait of a very intimate friend and a learned man. I refer to the Latin life of Melancthon, by Joachim Camerarius.

I have long cherished a reverence mingled with affection for the interesting