testing against his flatteries. He wrote "Manuale Controversarium," and "Summa Theologiæ."—J. S., G.
BECART, John, a Flemish monk, who, under the name of Richard Brumæus, published in 1624 "S. Thomæ Cantu. et Henrici II. monomachia de libert. eccles." He died in 1635.
BECCADELLI or BECCATELLI, Antonio, a native of Palermo, whence his Latin designation of Panormus, was born in 1394. At the age of twenty-five he was sent to the university of Bologna, being designed for the profession of the law. He afterwards attached himself to Filippo Maria Visconti, duke of Milan, and obtained the chair of belles-lettres at Pavia; still, however, remaining at Milan, and enjoying a pension. Thence he went to the court of Alfonso, king of Naples, with whom he passed the rest of his life, receiving many favours, being ennobled by that prince, and treated with equal kindness by his successor Ferdinand; and, after a long and prosperous life, he died in 1471. Beccadelli wrote a considerable number of works in history, poetry, and the drama. He was remarkable for purity and elegance of style; but, in some of his writings, no less so for licentiousness and indecency. Indeed, these latter qualities drew down upon him not only the censure of the critics, but the sermons of the monks, who publicly preached against him, burning one of his offensive works, and himself in effigy, at Ferrara and Milan. The charity of one of his enemies even counselled a similar fate for the author.—J. F. W.
BECCADELLI, Lodovico, one of the most eminent literary men of Italy in his own times, was born on January 27, 1502, at Bologna, where his family held a high position. He studied jurisprudence under Carlo Ruini; but forming a friendship with a fellow-student, the celebrated Giovanni della Casa, they both gave themselves up to the fascination of the belles-lettres, and especially of poetry; and when the plague broke out in 1527, they abandoned Bologna and their law-books, and retired to pursue their favourite studies at the villa of the latter at Mugello. Thence they went to the university of Padua in 1528, where Beccadelli enjoyed the friendship of Pietro Bembo, Cardinal Pole, and many other distinguished scholars; and in 1535 he took the degree of doctor of laws. Pole, in particular, took him into his councils and companionship, and in 1539 brought him to several of the courts of Europe. Subsequently he attached himself to Gasparo Contarini, with whom, when legate a latere, he was present at the diet of Ratisbon. Pope Paul III. committed to him the education of his nephew, Ranuzio Farnese, whom he accompanied to Padua. His pupil was afterwards made a cardinal, and Beccadelli became private secretary to the cardinal-legates Monte Santacroce and Pole. After receiving some substantial appointments, he was made bishop of Ravelle in 1549; but Ranuzio was unwilling that he should leave him, so that he never took possession of the bishopric. On the death of Paul, his successor, Giulio III., sent Beccadelli in 1550 as nuncio to Venice, where he remained five years, till he was elected in 1555 to the vicar-generalship of Rome; and in September of the same year he was elevated to the archbishopric of Ragusa, in which office he conducted himself with great prudence. Pius IV. availed himself of Beccadelli's abilities, and sent him in 1651 to the council then being assembled at Trent, where he acquitted himself with great prudence. Cosmo I., grand-duke of Tuscany, induced Beccadelli in 1563 to give up the see of Ragusa, and undertake the education of his son Ferdinand, promising him instead the archbishopric of Pisa. To the performance of this promise, however, obstacles were interposed at Rome; and after waiting in vain for two years, he accepted in 1565 the provostship of the cathedral of Prato. He died in that city on the 17th October, 1572. He was distinguished not less by the superior endowments of mind than by his great learning and judgment. He enjoyed throughout his life the friendship and respect of his most distinguished contemporaries, with whom he maintained extensive correspondence. His literary works are numerous; and amongst them are biographies of his friends Bembo, Pole, and Contarini, and also of Petrarch.—J. F. W.
BECCAFUMI, Domenico, surnamed Mecherino, was born at Siena in 1484. Like the great Giotto, he was originally a shepherd, and in this contemplative life practised drawing, &c. He was placed under Capanna, and finally, as it is supposed, under Perugino, the careful master of Raphael. In the prime of life he went to Rome to study the works of Michel Angelo and Raphael, and spent two years in copying them, and in studying the antique statues and temples. He learned to draw well in distemper and fresco, engraved on copper and wood, and even executed a work in mosaic and some sculptures for the cathedral of his native town. The fifteenth-century men were accustomed, like Beccafumi, to run through the whole cycle of the arts. Domenico worked with Razzi, who studied under Da Vinci in the oratory of San Bernardino. He approaches the great master of the Sienese school in noble, simple grace, in clear lasting colour, and good design. In the Sienese academy, there is a grand altar-piece by him; and in the public palace, several agreeable pictures. His later works are mechanical. His mosaic pavement in the choir of the Duomo is formed of bright and dark marble, with hues of shading like niello. He died in 1549. His later figures are coarse and plump, and his heads harsh. He excelled in perspective and foreshortenings, but is sometimes too red in colour.—W. T.
BECCARI, Agostino, a poet whose fame rests upon being the father of pastoral comedy, was born at Ferrara about the year 1510. He was a man of considerable learning, well versed in the graver studies of philosophy and law, both civil and canon, of which he was a doctor, and, if we are to credit one of his Italian biographers, equally master of the humanities, rhetoric, and polite literature. In 1554 he produced his pastoral comedy, entitled "Il Sacrifizio," which is said by Ginguene to be the most ancient model of that style in existence. Its success was remarkable, and it had the advantage of having the choral parts set to music by Alfonso della Viola. The piece was brought out with great splendour, and twice performed in the palace of Francesco D'Este, before Duke Hercolo II. and his court, as well as on other occasions. Notwithstanding the praise which Mazzuchelli bestows upon this performance, we are disposed to consider its principal merit is due to its being the first of its kind in point of time. Beccari wrote another piece in the same style, called "Dafne," and died in 1590.—J. F. W.
BECCARI, J. Barthelemy, an Italian physician and philosopher, born at Bologna in 1682, and died in 1766. Early in life he devoted himself to the study of the natural sciences and experimental philosophy, of which he became professor. Those who attended his lectures founded an association in which they agreed to shake off the yoke of the ancient scholastic philosophy. Amongst them were numbered Morgagni, Eustathius, and Manfred. This association formed the nucleus of the academy of the Inquieti, which was the cradle of the institute of sciences and arts, founded at Bologna in 1711 by the Count Maisigli, and in which Beccari was named professor of physics. He succeeded Valsalva in the presidency of the institute. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1728. He published several works on medical subjects, and left numerous manuscripts, which are in the library of the institute of Bologna.—E. L.
BECCARIA, Marchese Cesare Beccaria Bonesana. The science of penal legislation owes to this great man the first decisive steps towards its deliverance from the trammels of mediæval barbarism. Beccaria was born at Milan on the 15th of March, 1738, of an ancient and noble family. The habits and prejudices of feudal rank presided over his early education, and the jesuits in the college of Parma were the first instructors of the future author. From his earliest youth his proficiency in mathematics and in natural sciences was so great, that his teachers were wont to call him il Newtoncino, the little Newton. The power of observation and stringent reasoning, which he acquired by such training, was afterwards most efficiently applied by him to the subject through which his reputation has become universal, namely, that of penal reform. The circumstances under which he was induced to turn his attention to this subject were the following:—On his return from college he fell in at Milan with a select society of young noblemen who had risen above the pompous dulness of their class, through the intellectual revolution which was then working upon and urging men's minds throughout Europe, to their emancipation from the tutelage of obsolete custom, and to the assertion of the rights of reason in social, as well as in natural and speculative sciences. The most prominent among those youths were Pietro Verri and his brother Alessandro. Surrounded by such friends, he soon took a deep interest in their studies, and the perusal of the Lettres Persanes by Montesquieu, opened to his mind a new field of inquiry. The strong contrast between the true principles of social welfare, and the existing state of things in Lombardy, prompted those men with an ardent desire to rekindle in their fatherland the
