December 1688. In 1692 he began his Lettres historiques, containing an account of the most important transactions in Europe; he carried on this work till the end of 1698, after which it was continued by others. When Le Clerc discontinued his Bibliothèque universelle in 1691. Bernard wrote the greater part of the twentieth volume and the five following volumes. In 1698 he collected and published Actes et négotiations de la paix de Ryswic, in four volumes 12mo. In 1699 he began a continuation of Bayle’s Nouvelles de la république des lettres, which continued till December 1710. In 1705 he was unanimously elected one of the ministers of the Walloon church at Leiden; and about the same time he succeeded M. de Valder in the chair of philosophy and mathematics at Leiden. In 1716 he published a supplement to Moreri’s dictionary, in two volumes folio. The same year he resumed his Nouvelles de la république des lettres, and continued it till his death, on the 27th of April 1718. Besides the works above mentioned, he was the author of two practical treatises, one on late repentance (1712), the other on the excellence of religion (1714).
BERNARD, MOUNTAGUE (1820–1882), English international lawyer, the third son of Charles Bernard of Jamaica, the descendant of a Huguenot family, was born at Tibberton Court, Gloucestershire, on the 28th of January 1820. He was educated at Sherborne school, and Trinity College, Oxford. Graduating B.A. in 1842, he took his B.C.L., was elected Vinerian scholar and fellow, and having read in chambers with Roundell Palmer (afterwards Lord Selborne), was called to the bar at Lincoln’s Inn in 1846. He was specially interested in legal history and in church questions, and was one of the founders of the Guardian. In 1852 he was elected to the new professorship of international law and diplomacy at Oxford, attached to All Souls’ College, of which he afterwards was made a fellow. But besides his duties at Oxford he undertook a good deal of non-collegiate work; he was a member of several royal commissions; in 1871 he went as one of the high commissioners to the United States, and signed the treaty of Washington, and in 1872 he assisted Sir Roundell Palmer before the tribunal of arbitration at Geneva. In 1874 he resigned his professorship at Oxford, but as member of the university of Oxford commission of 1876 he was mainly responsible for bringing about the compromise ultimately adopted between the university and the colleges. Bernard’s reputation as an international lawyer was widespread, and he was an original member of the Institut de Droit International (1873). His published works include An Historical Account of the Neutrality of Great Britain during the American Civil War (London, 1870), and many lectures on international law and diplomacy.
BERNARD, SIMON (1779–1839), French general of engineers, was born at Dôle, educated at the École Polytechnique, and entered the army in the corps of engineers. He rose rapidly, and served (1805–1812) as aide-de-camp to Napoleon. He was wounded in the retreat after Leipzig, and distinguished himself the same year (1813) in the gallant defence of Torgau against the allies. After the emperor’s fall he emigrated to the United States, where, being made a brigadier-general of engineers, he executed a number of extensive military works for the government, notably at Fortress Monroe, Va., and around New York, and did a large amount of the civil engineering connected with the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal and the Delaware Breakwater. He returned to France after the revolution of 1830, was made a lieu tenant-general by Louis Philippe, and in 1836 served as minister of war.
BERNARD, SIR THOMAS, Bart. (1750–1818), English social reformer, was born at Lincoln on the 27th of April 1750, the younger son of Sir Francis Bernard, 1st bart. (1711–1779), who as governor of Massachusetts Bay (1760–1770) played a responsible part in directing the British policy which led to the revolt of the American colonies. On the death of his elder brother in 1810, Bernard succeeded to the baronetcy conferred on his father in 1769. His early education was obtained in America, partly at Harvard, in which college his father took a great interest. He then acted as confidential secretary to his father during the troubles which led (1769) to the governor’s recall, and accompanied Sir Francis to England, where he was called to the bar, and practised as a conveyancer. He married a rich wife, and acquired a considerable fortune, and then devoted most of his time to social work for the benefit of the poor. He was treasurer of the Foundling Hospital, in the concerns of which he took an important part. He helped to establish in 1796 the “Society for Bettering the Condition and Increasing the Comforts of the Poor,” in 1800 a school for indigent blind, and in 1801 a fever institution. He was active in promoting vaccination, improving the conditions of child labour, advocating rural allotments, and agitating against the salt duties. He took great interest in education, and with Count Rumford he was an originator of the Royal Institution in London. He died without issue on the 1st of July 1818.
BERNARDIN OF SIENA, ST (1380–1444), Franciscan friar and preacher, was born of a noble family in 1380. His parents died in his childhood, and on the completion of his education he spent some years in the service of the sick in the hospitals, and thus caught the plague, of which he nearly died. In 1402 he entered the Franciscan order in the strict branch called Observant, of which he became one of the chief promoters (see Franciscans). Shortly after his profession the work of preaching was laid upon him, and for more than thirty years he preached with wonderful effect all over Italy, and played a great part in the religious revival of the beginning of the 15th century. In 1437 he became vicar-general of the Observant branch of the Franciscans. He refused three bishoprics. He died in 1444 at Aquila in the Abruzzi, and was canonized in 1450.
The first edition of his works, for the most part elaborate sermons, was printed at Lyons in 1501; later ones in 1636, 1650 and 1745. His Life will be found in the Bollandists and in Lives of the Saints on the 20th of May: a good modern biography has been written by Paul Thureau-Dangin (1896), and translated into English by Gertrude von Hügel (1906). (E. C. B.)
BERNAUER, AGNES (d. 1435), daughter of an Augsburg baker, was secretly married about 1432 to Albert (1401–1460), son of Ernest, duke of Bavaria-Munich. Ignorant of the fact that this union was a lawful one, Ernest urged his son to marry, and reproached him with his connexion with Agnes. Albert then declared she was his lawful wife; and subsequently, during his absence, she was seized by order of Duke Ernest and condemned to death for witchcraft. On the 12th of October 1435 she was drowned in the Danube near Straubing, in which town her remains were afterwards buried by Albert. This story lived long in the memory of the people, and its chief interest lies in its literary associations. It has afforded material for several dramas, and Adolf Böttger, Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig have each written one entitled Agnes Bernauer.
BERNAY, a town of north-western France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Eure, on the left bank of the Charentonne, 31 m. W.N.W. of Evreux, on the Western railway between that town and Lisieux. Pop. (1906) 5973. It is beautifully situated in the midst of green wooded hills, and still justifies Madame de Stael’s description of it as “a basket of flowers.” Of great antiquity, it possesses numerous quaint wooden houses and ancient ecclesiastical buildings of considerable interest. The abbey church is now used as a market, and the abbey, which was founded by Judith of Brittany early in the 11th century, and underwent a restoration in the 17th century, serves for municipal and legal purposes. The church of Ste Croix, which has a remarkable marble figure of the infant Jesus, dates from the 14th and 15th centuries, that of Notre-Dame de la Couture, which preserves some good stained glass, from the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, Bernay has a sub-prefecture, a communal college, tribunals of commerce and of first instance, and a board of trade-arbitrators. Among the industrial establishments of the place are manufactories of cotton and woollen goods, bleacheries and dye-works. Large numbers of Norman horses are sold in Lent, at the fair known as the Foire fleurie, and there is also a trade in grain. Bernay grew up round the Benedictine abbey mentioned above, and early in the 13th century was the seat of a viscount. The town, formerly fortified
