Pythoness, "or pretended witch of Endor, whom Saul consulted, likewise written against Origen, nothing now remains; nor any thing that is considerable, and that can be relied upon, of his "Commentaries" on Genesis, and the Canticles. In Photius there are large extracts from his treatise "On Free-Will, or, the Origin of Evil" and also extracts from another work of Methodius, written against Origen, and entitled, "Of the Creatures," which is not mentioned by Jerome. Thedoret has quoted a passage of Methodius out of a piece entitled, "A Discourse of Martyrs," of which there is nothing else remaining; neither have we any thing of a dialogue called "Xeno,' which is noticed by Socrates. There are also some other pieces extant which are ascribed to him: such as, "A Homily concerning Simeon and Anna ;" another "Upon our Upon our Saviour's Entrance into Jerusalem;" a work entitled, "Revelations," and "A Chronicle." Of these, the two last mentioned are generally rejected as not genuine; the second is defended by very few critics; but the first has met with many advocates, while it has had still more opponents. In Lardner the reader may find references to the writers on both sides of the question, and the reasons which have determined him to be of opinion, that it is either not genuine, which he rather thinks, or else, that it has been so interpolated as to be of very little value. A Latin version of the "Revelations," above mentioned is inserted in the third volume of the "Bibl. Patr;" and in 1644, father Combefis published at Paris, all the works and fragments of Methodius, which could then be met with, in Greek and Latin, together with the works of Amphilochius and Andrew Bishop of Crete, in folio; illustrated with notes. Fabricii Bibl. Eccles. ad Hieron. cap. lxxxiii. Sccrat. Hist. Eccl. lib. v. cap. 13. Epiphan. Har. Ixiv. cap. 11. Cave's Hist. Lit. vol. I. sub sac. Novat. Dupin. Mosh. Hist. Eccl. sac. iii. vol. 1. lib. ii. par. ii. cap. 2. Lardner's Cred. part vii. vol. V. ch. 57.-M.

METHODIUS, surnamed the Confessor, who flourished towards the middle of the ninth century, was a Sicilian by nation, and born at Syracuse. Being descended from a noble and wealthy family, he had the advantage of receiving a good education; and afterwards went to Constantinople, where he embraced the religious life, and took up his residence in a monastery in the isle of Chios. Afterwards he was ordained priest by the patriarch Nicephorus, and upon the expulsion of that prelate from the see of Constantinople,

was sent by him to Rome, to implore the assistance of pope Paschal on his behalf. Upon his return to Greece after the death of that patriarch, he signalized himself by his zeal for image-worship; on which account he was committed to prison, by order of the emperor Michael the stammerer, where he continued till the death of that monarch. Having regained his liberty on the accession of the emperor Thedosius, the recollection of the persecution which he had suffered did not deter him from again boldly defending the worship of images; by which means he acquired such credit with the superstitious populace, that when in the year 834 the emperor marched against the Saracens, he ordered Methodius to accompany the army, under the apprehension that he would otherwise excite tumults and sedition at Constantinople. Upon the emperor's return to that city, Methodius was again committed to close confinement, in which, it is said, he was treated with great hardship and cruelty, till by the death of that prince, and the succession of his son Michael III., under the regency of the empress Theodora, a zealous worshipper of images, he again recovered his liberty, in the year 842. In the same year he was preferred to the patriarchate of the church of Constantinople; and no sooner was he settled in his see, than he convened a synod in which the iconoclasts were condemned, and the odious superstition of image worship re-established in the Greek church. This prelate died in the year 847. He was the author of a "Constitution," or kind of manual for persons who, after having apostatized, either through constraint, or voluntarily, returned again to the profession of the christian faith; which may be seen in Greek and Latin, in Goar's "Rituale Græcor." There are also extant under his name, “An Encomium on St. Dionysius the Areopagite;"" An Encomium on St. Agatha, a Virgin and Martyr," of which a Latin version is given in Combefis's "Bibl. SS. Patr. Concion. ;" and of "Sermons" and fragments of sermons, of which some account may be seen in the first of our authorities. The contests which arose between the Greek and Latin churches, and the division of the former among themselves upon the question concerning images, occasioned a degree of celebrity to be given to the name and writings of this prelate in ecclesiastical history, greatly above their merit. Cave's Hist. Lit. vol. II. sub sac. Phot. Dupin. Moreri. Mosh. Hist. Eccl. sec. ix. par. ii. cap. 2.-M.

METIUS, ADRIAN, a celebrated Dutch

mathematical professor at the close of the sixteenth and in the early part of the seventeenth century, was a native of Alkmaer; but of the date either of his birth or death we have no account. He pursued his studies at some German university, and after teaching the mathematics there for several years with great reputation, became professor of those sciences at the university of Franeker. He was the author of "Doctrine Sphærice Lib. V." 1591, octavo; "Astronomie universe Institutio Lib. III. quorum I. Sphæræ Disciplinam tradat: II. Fabricam Planisphærii et Trigonometriam astronomicam: III. Historiam astronomicam, Astrorum Situm ac Motum," 1605, octavo; "Arithmetica et Geometricæ practica, &c." 1611, quarto; "Geometrices per usum Circini nova Praxis," 1623, octavo; "De gemino Usu utriusque Globi," 1611, quarto; and "Primum Mobile, astronomicè sciographicè, geometrice, et hydrographicè explicatum," 1611, quarto. He had a brother, named JAMES METIUS, for whom he claimed. the honour of having been the first inventor of the telescope; in which he is mistakenly followed by Des Cartes. However, Borelli's account of the discovery of that instrument is so circumstantial, and so well authenticated, as to render it very probable that Zacharias Jansen, a spectacle-maker at Middleburg in Zealand, was the original inventor; and he adds, that James Metius came with Drebel to Middleburg, and there purchased telescopes of Jansen's children, who had made them public. Valer. Andra Bibl. Belg. Moreri. Hutton's Math. Dict. Article Telescope.-M.

METKERKE, ADOLPHUS, VAN, a jurist and man of letters, was born of a good family at Bruges in 1528. He was of the protestant persuasion, and spent the greatest part of his life in the service of the revolted states of the Low-Countries, in the quality of counsellor of state, and envoy to foreign potentates. He was in the latter station at the court of queen Elizabeth, when he died at London in 1591, of grief, it was supposed, on account of the loss of his son Nicholas, an active commander, before Deventer. Adolphus was a man of accurate and extensive learning, and the author of the following works, "A Translation, with Annotations, of some Pieces of Theocritus, Bion and Moschus:" "Latin Poems:" "A Treatise in Latin on the true Pronunciation of the Greek Language:" "A Collection of the Proceedings at the Peace concluded at Cologne in 1579." He also assisted in the Lives

of the Cæsars; the Medals of Magna Græcia ; and the Fasti Consulares; published by Goltzius. Thuani Hist. Newv. Dict. Hist.-A.

METOCHITA, THEODORE, a modern Greek historian, flourished in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. He was made great logothete of the Constantinopolitan empire by Andronicus Palæologus the elder, but was banished by Andronicus the younger, and his goods confiscated. He was afterwards recalled, but without being restored to his dignities, and he ended his life in a monastery of his own foundation in 1332. He was a man of very extensive erudition, so that he has been entitled a living library; but it does not appear that his literary taste was proportional, for instead of forming his style upon the best ancient models, he adopted a very harsh and cloudy diction. He wrote a compendium of Roman history from Julius Cæsar to Constantine, first publish ed with a Latin version and notes by Meursius, Leyd. 1618. This publication is however only the second out of three books, and the two others, which were promised by the editor, never appeared. He was also the author of a sacred history in two books; a Constantinopolitan history in one book; and a paraphrase on the physics of Aristotle, the latter translated into Latin by Gentianus Hervetus. Vossii Hist. Grac. Moreri.-A.

METO, or METON, a famous mathematician of Athens, who flourished 432 years B. C. was the son of Pausanias, and the disciple of Phainus, of whom mention is made by Theophrastus, and Vitruvius. In the first year of the eighty-seventh Olympiad, he observed the solstice at Athens, and published his enneadecaeteride, that is, his cycle of nineteen years; by which he endeavoured to adjust the course of the sun to that of the moon, and to make the solar and lunar years begin at the same point of time. This invention is called from him the metonic period, or, cycle. It is also called the golden number, from its excellent use in the calendar: though, properly speaking, the golden number is the particular number which shews the year of the lunar cycle, which any given year is in. This cycle of the moon holds only true for 310 years; for, though the new moons do return to the same day after nineteen years, yet it is not to the same time of the day, but near an hour and a half sooner: an error which in 310 years amounts to an entire day. Yet those employed in reforming the calendar went on a supposition, that the lunations return precisely from nineteen years

to nineteen years, for ever.

Meto was living in the ninety second Olympiad, or about 412 years B. C.: for when the Athenian fleet was sent to Sicily, he escaped from being embarked on that disastrous expedition by counterfeiting folly. This astronomer was assisted in making his observations by a fellow citizen named Euctemon. Fabrici Bibl. Græc. vol. II. lib. iii. cap. 5. sect. vii. Moreri. Hutton's Math. Dict.-M.

METROPHANES, bishop of Smyrna in the ninth century, was a native of Constantinople, who was distinguished in the disputes which terminated in the schism between the Greek and Latin churches. In the year 858, when Ignatius was deposed from the patriarchate of Constantinople, he used every effort in his power to prevent that event; but, notwithstanding, acknowledged Photius for patriarch, whom the emperor Michael appointed to fill the vacant see. In the following year how ever, a warm contest arising between the partizans of Photius and Ignatius, in which Metrophanes espoused anew the interests of the latter, he was deposed in a synod held at Constantinople, and committed to the same place of confinement with his friend. Photius was deposed in his turn in 867, by Basilius the Ma cedonian; in consequence of which change of affairs Metrophanes recovered possession of his bishopric, and was one of the most active persecutors of Photius at the council of Constantinople, held in the year 870. Upon the death of Ignatius, which happened in the year 678, the emperor took Photius into favour, and replaced him in the patriarchal dignity of which he had been deprived; but Metrophanes refused to acknowledge him; and as he continued to persist steadily in that refusal, he was ponounced an obstinate schismatic by a council held at Constantinople in 880, and at the same time deposed from his episcopate, and cut off from the communion of the faithful. He wrote "A Letter to Manuel, a Patrician," containing a narrative of what was done by Photius, from 858, to 870, which serves to throw light on the history of the schism between the Greek and Latin churches. It is extant in Baronius, under the year 870; and is also to be met with, in Greek and Latin, together with the acts of the fourth council of Constantinople, in the eighth volume of the "Collect. Concil." There is also extant a work "On the Procession of the Holy Ghost, &c.," which has been ascribed to him in some ancient MSS. and in others to Pho

tius; but to whom it ought to be adjusted, cannot, perhaps, now be determined. Fabricii Bibl. Græc. vol. X. lib. v. cap. 45. apud Scriptores Grac. var. Cave's Hist. Lit. vol. II. sub sac. Phot. Mosh. Hist. Eccl. sac. ix. par. ii. cap. 3.-M.

He

METTRIE, JULIEN OFFRAY DE LA, a physician and physiologist, was the son of a merchant of St. Malo, where he was born in 1709. He studied physic at Leyden under Boerhaave, and then came to Paris, where the duke de Gramont patronised him, and appointed him physician to his regiment of French guards. La Mettrie accompanied his patron to the siege of Freyberg, where he fell dangerously ill; and it is said that this illness, instead of inspiring those religious sentiments which are often consequent upon disease, had in him the opposite effect of making him doubt of the existence of an immortal principle in man, and precipitated him into a system of materialism. He wrote, under the feigned name of Charpe, a work, entitled "Histoire naturelle de l'Ame," 1745, in which he denied the immateriality of the human soul, and asserted that man was an animal of the ape genus. was protected by the duke de Gramont from the storm this doctrine, regarded as the height of impiety, brought upon him; but on the death of that nobleman he lost his place. Having further rendered his brethren of the faculty his enemies by his "Pénélope, ou le Machiavel en Médecine," three volumes, 1748, in which he attacked almost all the physicians of his time, especially his master Boerhaave, he thought proper to retire to Holland. He there published his most celebrated work, "L'Homme machine," 1748, which he had the confidence to dedicate to Haller, on account of the theory of the latter of the innate irritability of the animal fibre. Haller, one of the most religious of philosophers, was highly offended with this liberty, and has not spared him in the account of his writings in his Bibliotheca Anatom., where he calls la Mettrie "omnis religionis publicus adversarius, homo demum undique levissimus." Although it is certain that philosophical materialism is not necessarily connected with irreligion or the disbelief of a future state, yet it cannot be doubted to have been so in the instance of this author, who had nothing respectable or decorous in his character, and was rather a hot-headed declaimer than a sober reasoner. His book was burnt in Holland, and he retired to Berlin, where he was made reader to the king, and a member of

his academy, and where he lived in tranquillity till his death in 1751, which event seems to have been caused by his preposterous treatment of himself under a slight indisposition. The king of Prussia thought so well of him, that he deigned to compose his funeral eulogy, which was read at the academy. His brother philosophers, however, have treated him with little respect, and represented him as a frivolous and inconsequent reasoner, full of immoral and illogical sophisms, set off with a kind of false brilliancy, and enlivened by ludicrous sallies. His "Oeuvres philosophiques" were published at Berlin in one volume quarto, and two volumes 12mo., 1751, containing "L'Homme machine," "L'Homme plante;". l'Histoire de l'Ame;" "Recherches sur l'Origine des Animaux;""Discours sur la Bonheur," &c. As a physician he had set out with a translation and commentary on Boerhaave's aphorisms and institutions, of which last, the best part was copied from Haller, with the admixture of some extraordinary and ridiculous blunders. He also in the last year of his life published "Oeuvres de Médecine," of a practical nature, but his authority would probably stand for little among his brethren of the faculty. Halleri Bibl. Anatom. Nouv. Dict. Hist.-A.

METZU, GABRIEL, an excellent painter of the Dutch school, born at Leyden in 1615, was made an artist by his admiration of the works of Gerard Douw and Mieris. He imitated their style; but being likewise a student of nature, he formed a manner of his own, distinguished by great truth and delicacy of pencil, with a fine tone of colouring. His subjects were usually conversations and scenes of common life, women with fruit, herbs, game, &c., chemists in their laboratories, doctors with their patients, and the like, all which he represented with wonderful nature and accuracy. He took a long time in finishing his pictures, on which account they are scarce, and they are so much valued in Holland, that few have been suffered to go out of the country. His works are by no means devoid of elegance, as he often chose beautiful forms and pleasing subjects for his imitation. A lady tuning her lute, and another washing her hands in a silver bason held by her maid, are among his most admired pieces. This artist was regular in his conduct, and laboured with great assiduity. His sedentary life made him subject to the stone, for which disease he underwent the operation of lithotomy, and died in consequence of it, at Amsterdam, his usual

place of residence, in 1658. Pilkington.-A.

D'Argenville.

MEVIUS, DAVID, a learned jurist, privycounsellor to the king of Sweden, and president of the sovereign council of Wismar, was employed in various negociations with the imperial court and the German princes by Charles XI., and drew up the regulations by which the German provinces occupied by Sweden were to be governed. He died in 1681. He wrote "Commentaries on the Law of Lubeck," much esteemed, and several times reprinted: various treatises on different branches of law: "Counsels or Deliberations:" and "Universal Jurisprudence," reprinted with augmentations by his son-in-law M. d'Engelbrechten, counsellor of state to the king of Sweden. Moreri.-A.

MEUN or MEUNG, JOHN DE, an old French poet, also named Clopinel from the lameness of one leg, was born at Meun on the Loire, in 1280. Although he early entered into the service of the great, he seems to have been well acquainted with the studies of the age, consisting of theology, philosophy, chemistry, astronomy, and arithmetic. Poetry, however, was his favourite pursuit; and by the vivacity of his parts he became the delight of the court of Philip le Bel. He had a great turn to satire and lampoon, which he freely exercised upon the court ladies. It is said that a party of them, who had smarted under his lash, once seized him with the resolution of treating him. with a good flogging, and that he escaped the punishment by desiring that the most unchaste among them would give the first blow. He is supposed to have died about 1364. By his will he directed that he should be interred in. the church of the Dominicans at Paris, and by way of recompence, bequeathed to that order a heavy chest not to be opened till after the funeral. When the fathers examined their legacy, expecting some valuable treasure, they found only a number of slates scrawled with sums and figures. In their resentment they disinterred the body; but the parliament of Paris obliged them to give it fresh and honourable burial in their cloyster. The principal work of John de Meun was his continuation of the "Roman de la Rose," begun by William de Lorris (see his article.) The addition of de Meun, which constitutes more than three parts of the whole, is less poetical than the first part, but has more of satire and manners, To Lenglet du Fresnoy's edition of his poem in three volumes 12mo. 1735, are subjoined