business. In the interval, he had published in 1836 another pamphlet, "Russia," in which the views of his former one, still more boldly enforced, were defended from some of the numerous attacks which "England, Ireland, and America" had provoked. It may be added that Mr. Cobden took a prominent part in several local movements. He helped to found the Manchester Athenæum, and to procure a charter of incorporation for the borough of Manchester. He had been already a member of the Manchester chamber of commerce, and one of the members of the first Manchester town council was "Mr. Alderman Cobden." His first attempt to add parliamentary to his other honours was unsuccessful. Stockport, which accepted him as one of its representatives in 1841, rejected him in 1837.
Much had elapsed in the interval to give Mr. Cobden claims to the suffrages of a manufacturing constituency. Soon after his second return from the continent in 1838, the Manchester Anticorn-law Association was formed. This was in the autumn; on the 13th of December a meeting of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce was convoked to deliberate on the propriety of sending a free-trade petition to parliament, and Mr. Cobden was the member who spoke most ably in favour of the step. He was one of the delegates sent the following year to London from the north, to co-operate with the free-trade members of the house of commons; and it was at a delegate meeting in Palace Yard that, recalling the memory of the Hanseatic league, he proposed to give to the Anticorn-law Association the designation which has become so famous. The League took its name from this suggestion of Mr. Cobden. Early in the following year, 1840, the Free-trade hall was erected at Manchester, on ground belonging to Mr Cobden, and curiously enough, the site had been the scene of the famous Peterloo massacre in 1819. At the crowded and enthusiastic inauguration of the temporary pavilion, afterwards the Free-trade hall, in January 13, 1840, the lion of the occasion, the late Daniel O'Connell, was immediately followed, as a speaker, by Mr. Cobden. The year 1840 was, owing to various causes, one of the busiest in the career of the league, and, before its close, Mr. Cobden's indefatigable activity and skilful oratory, vigorous and persuasive without vehemence or declamation, had secured him the leadership of the movement. At the general election of 1841 he was returned for Stockport, and made his first speech in the house of commons in the course of the debate on the address; the date was the 25th of August. Mr. Cobden's success in the house of commons was rapid, if not immediate. Though never a commanding parliamentary orator of the highest class, he enjoyed from first to last the "ear of the house." In 1846 the long and arduous struggle was successful, and Sir Robert Peel proclaimed that the person to whom the honour of the triumph was mainly due was Richard Cobden. At home a national subscription, which resulted in the collection of £70,000, was raised as a substantial recognition of the labour devoted by Mr. Cobden to the cause of corn-law repeal, at the sacrifice of his own commercial interests. The hero of free-trade now gave himself what was intended to be a holiday; he made another and an extensive continental tour. Numerous ovations, however, from the admirers of free-trade abroad, accompanied his progress, and made it appear the mission of an active propagandist. It was during this continental tour that he received one of the highest honours bestowed on him during his life. He had been requested to allow himself to be nominated a candidate for the representation of Manchester, but he declined; chiefly, perhaps, out of consideration for the claims of Mr. Bright. At the general election of 1847, his old constituents of Stockport re-elected him without opposition. Almost at the same time the greatest constituency in England, that of the West Riding of Yorkshire, semi-spontaneously elected him one of their representatives. Mr. Cobden bade farewell to Stockport, and accepted the trust reposed in him by the electors of the West Riding. Returning to England towards the close of 1847, Mr. Cobden at once declared war against the military and naval expenditure of the country. Early in the following year, the great revolutionary year of 1848, he became vice-chairman of an association of which Joseph Hume was chairman, for parliamentary reform and its corollaries. In 1851 he figured at the opening of the Exhibition of Industry as one of the royal commissioners. In 1854, on the breaking out of the war with Russia, Mr. Cobden joined Mr. Bright in his unpopular crusade against the war, and subsequently against Lord Palmerston's Chinese policy. One gleam of success at last irradiated his long and seemingly fruitless advocacy of peace-principles. It was when, on the 3rd of March, 1857, the house of commons affirmed a resolution brought forward by Mr. Cobden and Mr. Gibson, condemnatory of Sir John Bowring's proceedings at Canton, and therefore of the last China war. But the victory lost him a seat in parliament. In 1857 Mr. Cobden stood for Salford and Huddersfield, but was defeated at both, and in 1859 set out to visit America. At the dissolution of parliament by the Derby ministry in 1859, Mr. Cobden, who was still in America, was elected M.P. for Rochdale. On his return he was offered a seat in the cabinet and the presidentship of the Board of Trade by Lord Palmerston; but his uncompromising opposition to the noble lord's foreign policy compelled him to decline the offer. In 1860, however, he was destined to accomplish another great triumph of free-trade principles, having been eminently successful in negotiating a treaty of commerce with France, the mutual benefits of which are every year being realized more fully, and which holds out the best pledge of peace between the two countries.
The value of such services to the nation has been well expressed by Mr. Gladstone, chancellor of the exchequer, who, when moving the alterations in the tariff for the year 1860, to give effect to the provisions of the treaty, said—"With regard to Mr. Cobden, speaking as I do at a time when every angry passion has passed away, I cannot help expressing our obligations to him for the labours he has at no small personal sacrifice bestowed upon a measure, which he, not the least among the apostles of free trade, believes to be one of the most memorable triumphs free trade has ever achieved. Rare is the privilege of any man, who, having fourteen years ago rendered to his country one signal and splendid service, now again, within the same brief span of life, decorated neither by rank nor title, bearing no mark to distinguish him from the people whom he loves, has been permitted to perform another great and memorable service to his sovereign and to his country." Mr. Cobden possessed conversational powers of the highest kind. Unselfish in his private capacity, as his public career was of stainless purity, posterity will regard him as one of the noblest specimens of the statesman and patriot.
Mr. Cobden died in London of bronchitis, April 2nd, 1865. For his successful negotiation of the French treaty, although far from being a rich man, he refused any official acknowledgment; and in the same spirit, his widow declined to accept a pension of 1500l. per annum, which the government offered her. Mr. Cobden has left a family of five daughters; his only son, a very promising young man, having died several years before him.—F. E.
COCCEIUS, Nerva. See Nerva.
COCCEIUS or COCK, John, an eminent biblical scholar, whose opinions respecting the rules of scriptural interpretation gave rise to much controversy in the Netherlands during the latter part of the seventeenth century, was born at Bremen in 1603, and died professor of theology at Leyden in 1669. His complete works were published at Amsterdam in 1673-1675.
COCCEJI, Heinrich Freiherr von, an eminent German jurisconsult, was born at Bremen, 24th March, 1644, studied at Leyden and in England, and was successively professor of jurisprudence in the universities of Heidelberg, Utrecht, and Frankfort-on-the-Oder. In 1712 he was sent on an extraordinary mission to the Hague by King Frederick I., and after his return appointed privy councillor. He died at Berlin, 18th August, 1719. His principal works are—"Juris publici prudentia;" "Anatomia Juris Gentium;" "Exercitationes Curiosæ."—K. E.
COCCEJI, Samuel Freiherr von, the youngest son of the above, was born at Heidelberg in 1679, and like his father devoted himself to the study of law. By degrees he attained to the highest office in the Prussian service, and in 1746 was even made high chancellor of the kingdom. He was the great reformer of the administration of justice in Prussia. Overwhelming as the duties of his offices must have been, he yet found leisure for literary labours. We mention his "Codex Fridericianus, 1747-50; his "Corpus Juris Fridericianum," 1749-52; his "Jus Civile Controversum" (new edition by Emminghaus); and his introduction to a new edition of his father's Grotius Illustratus—all of them works which are still held in the highest esteem. He died at Berlin 22nd October, 1755.—K. E.
COCCHI, Antonio, an Italian physician of high repute for learning and professional skill, who visited this country on an invitation from the earl of Huntingdon, made the acquaintance
