AMYNTAS, son of Andromenes, one of Alexander the Great's officers, suspected of being implicated in the plot of Philotas (330 b.c.), but acquitted. He was killed in the course of the Asiatic campaigns of Alexander.
AMYNTAS, a Greek author, whose work entitled Σταθμοί, descriptive of certain districts of Asia, has been lost. Athenæus quotes some portions of it. (See Müller's Fragment. Hist. Græc., published by Didot Frères.)
AMYNTAS, a king of Galatia, who fought on the side of Antony and Octavianus at Philippi, 42 b.c., and at Actium, 31 b.c., adhered to the latter. On the death of Amyntas, Galatia became a Roman province.
AMYNTIA´NUS (Ἀμυντιανός), a Greek author, who, in the time of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius (a.d. 161-180), produced a life of Alexander the Great, and a number of other biographies, which he called Βίοι Παράλληλοι, as he seems to have been fond of writing them in pairs. None of these works have come down to us. (See Photius in his Myriobiblion seu Bibliotheca.)—A. M.
AMYOT, Jacques, a celebrated French translator, was born at Melun, of poor parents, in 1513, and died at Auxerre in 1593. When he came to Paris to attend the college of France, then recently founded by Francis I., Amyot's circumstances were so needy that he was obliged to act as servant to more wealthy students, in order to support himself in the prosecution of his own studies. Surmounting all his difficulties, he attained the degree of master of arts at Paris, and subsequently that of doctor of civil law at Bourges, where he secured the friendship of Jacques Colure, abbé of St. Ambroise, through whose influence with Madame Marguerite, sister of the king, he obtained a chair of Latin and Greek in the university of the last-mentioned town. He taught in Bourges for ten years, but the influence of Amyot was destined to be exerted not so much in extending the knowledge of the ancient tongues, as in forming and developing his native language. He devoted himself to translating from the Greek, and his translations, more particularly his "Vies de Plutarque," were found to be executed in a French style so idiomatic, easy, and elegant, that they became standard and popular works. His first book was a French version of the Greek romance of Heliodorus, called "Ethiopica," treating of "the royal and chaste amours of Theagenes, a Thessalian, and Chariclea, an Ethiopian," published at Paris in 1545 in folio, and in 1549 in octavo. He next translated some of the Lives of Plutarch, dedicating them to Francis I., who rewarded him with the abbey of Bellozane. Amyot, however, did not now give himself up to a life of ease. Finding such texts of Plutarch as he could procure in France unsatisfactory, he proceeded to Rome in the suite of the cardinal of Tournou, in order to enjoy the advantages of the library of the Vatican. The cardinal also gave him a commission to the council of Trent, which he executed with a skill that added greatly to his reputation. On his return to Paris he was made tutor to the sons of Henry II.; and, while holding this office, he completed his translation of Plutarch's Lives, dedicating this second part of his work to the reigning king. The "Morals" of the same author he dedicated to his pupil Charles IX., a prince, unfortunately, too intimately connected with the massacre of St. Bartholomew, for the credit of his master's name. Amyot was, perhaps, more a student and man of taste and cultivation than an educator. Charles IX. appears, at any rate, to have esteemed him, for he made him grand almoner, and presented him with the abbeys of Roches and St. Corneille de Compiègne, while Pope Pius V., to oblige the French sovereign, conferred on this fortunate "poor scholar" the bishopric of Auxerre.
When Henry III., also a pupil of Amyot's, acceded to the throne, he continued him in the office of grand almoner, and made him commander of the order of the Holy Spirit, inserting in the statutes of the order the following regulation, expressly on Amyot's account: "Quiconque seroit grand aumônier de France seroit aussi commandeur du Saint-Esprit, sans estre tenu de faire les preuves de noblesse."
Amyot spent the remainder of his life at Auxerre, but not quite happily or peacefully. Those unquiet times did not leave even the scholar and the priest at rest, and Amyot was involved in the troubles of the League, while at home his diocesans refused to submit to his authority. According to the "Nouv. Biog. Universelle," he died "accablè de tristesse et de chagrin." Though he had expended considerable sums on the restoration of the cathedral of Auxerre, he left great wealth, bestowing on the hospital of Orleans a legacy of twelve hundred crowns in return for the alms of a few pence which he had there received, when, "poor and naked, he was going to Paris."
Amyot's principal works not mentioned above are "Sept livres des Histoires de Diodore Sicilien," translated from the Greek, Paris, Vascosan, 1554, folio; and "Amours pastorales de Daphnis et Chloë," from the Greek of Longus, Paris, 1559, 8vo. Both these books have been frequently reprinted.—A. M.
AMYRAUT or AMYRALDUS, Moïse, one of the most celebrated divines of the reformed church of France during the seventeenth century, was born at Bourqueil in Touraine, in September, 1596. His father, who was a protestant, destined him for the profession of the law, and he was for some time engaged in legal studies; but the reading of Calvin's Institutes awakened in him such a taste for theological subjects, that he resolved to devote himself to the ministry of the reformed church. He studied in the college of Saumur, under the famous Scottish professor, John Cameron; and his subsequent career evinced how deeply he had been imbued with the peculiar doctrinal spirit and tendencies of the master. Having been admitted to the ministry, his first charge was at St. Aignan, in the province of Maine. On the removal of Daillé in 1626 from the church of Saumur to Charenton, Amyraut had the honour of succeeding him at Saumur, and here his talents and learning became so conspicuous that he was appointed in 1633 to one of the theological chairs of the university. His colleagues were Lewis Cappel (Capellus) and Joshua de la Place (Placæus), who entered upon office at the same time, and with whom he united in publishing the "Theses Salmurienses." Amyraut was selected as early as 1631, by the synod of Charenton, to present a complaint to King Louis XIII. on the subject of some infractions of the edicts under which the rights of the protestant church were secured. This delicate and weighty business he managed with great address, and left a highly favourable impression of his abilities upon Cardinal Richelieu and other eminent men, whom he met on this occasion at the court of France. The cardinal was then meditating a project for the reunion of the two churches, which he soon after secretly communicated to Amyraut through the jesuit Father Audebert; but on finding from Audebert that no accommodation was proposed, or would be allowed, on the subject of the eucharist, Amyraut broke off the interview by assuring him that there was no hope of a reconciliation upon such conditions. His attachment to the reformed church was strong and sincere; and he not only warmly defended it against the attacks of the Romanists, but longed to see its divisions healed by a reconciliation of its Lutheran and Calvinistic branches. It was with these views that he published his treatise, "De Secessione ab Ecclesia Romana, deque ratione pacis inter evangelicos in negotio religionis constituendæ." But he was no latitudinarian, as was shown by his "Traité des Religions, contre ceux qui les estiment indifférentes;" and that he was no rationalist, is proved by his "Traité de l'elevation de la foi et de l'abaissement de la raison." Amyraut, however, had the boldness to stand forward as an innovator in the established doctrine, or at least in the established mode of exhibiting the doctrine of his own church; and with his name stands connected the modified system of Calvinism called Amyraldism, which excited so much agitation and alarm in the Calvinistic branches of the continental protestant church during the seventeenth century; and which the Swiss divines judged it necessary to oppose, by adopting in 1675 the "Formula Consensus," the latest of the dogmatic standards adopted by any of the great branches of the Calvinistic church. Amyraldism differed from Arminianism in retaining the Calvinistic doctrine of the absolute and unconditional election of grace; but it sought to combine with this the idea of a grace which is universal and conditional, which is offered to all upon condition of faith, although in fact accepted by none, on account of the corruption of our nature, until the grace of unconditional election takes effect in the case of some, though not of others. Amyraut hoped, by bringing forward this view, to repel the objections to Calvinism which were continually insisted upon by the Romish divines; and he was repeatedly absolved from the charge of heresy by the general synod of his own church, several of whose most eminent ministers, including Daillé and Blondel, regarded his peculiarities as harmless, and perfectly reconcilable with the Calvinistic system as usually held and taught. But his views were strongly condemned by Molinæus, A. Rivetus, F. Spanheim, F. Turretin.
