LOWTH, ROBERT, was born at Boriton, or, as some vvill have it, in the Close of Winchester, No vember 27, 171o. He was educated on the foun dation of Winchester College, where he displayed his poetical talent at a very early age, and from whence he was elected to a scholarship at New College in 1730, and took his degree of M.A. in 1737. He became professor of poetry in 1741, was presented to the rectory of Ovington in Hampshire in 1744, was appointed to the arch deaconry of Winchester in 175o, and to the rectory East-Woodhay in Hampshire in 1753. It was in this year that Lowth published his famous Pra, lee/lanes Acadenzicce de Sacra Poen* Hebroorum, Oxon. 1753, comprising thirty-four lectures, which he had previously read to the students at Oxford when poetical professor. In these masterly and classical dissertations he not only evinces a deep knowledge of the Hebrew language, but philoso phically exhibits the true spirit and characteristics of that poetry in which the prophets of the O. T. clothed the lively oracles of God. It does not at all detract from Lowth's merits that both Abravanel and Azariah de Rossi had pointed out, two centu ries before him, the same features of Hebrew poetry [Rossi] upon which he expatiate, inasmuch as the enlarged views and the invincible arguments displayed in his handling of the subject are pecu liarly his own ; and his work is therefore justly regarded as marking a new epoch in the treatment of the Hebrew poetry. The greatest testimony to the extraordinary merits of these lectures is the thorough analysis which the celebrated philosopher Mendelssohn, to whom the Hebrew was almost vernacular, gives of them in the Bibliothek der schonen Wissenschafien und der frtyen A-zinste, vol. i., 1756. A second edition, enlarged with annotations by Michaelis, appeared in Gottingen, i758. Other editions were published in Oxford 1763, Gottingen 1768, Oxford 1775, 1810 ; with notes by Rosenmidler, Leipzig 1815, Ox ford 182i. An English translation of the first eighteen lectures, by Dr. Dodd, appeared in the Chrittiaa illagazine for 1766-67, and an excellent version of the whole by Dr. Gregory vvas pub lished in London 1787, 1816, 1835, 1839, 1847. So rapidly did the fame of this work spread over Europe, that it was translated into German by Schmidt, Danzig 1793 ; and into French by Sicard, Lyon 1812. Twelve months after the appear ance of the Pralectiones the University of Ox ford conferred upon their author the degree ot doctor of divinity. Lowth subjoined to the Pralec tiones A short Confutation of _Bishop Hare's System of Hebrew llfetre, which had appeared in a new edition of the Psalms by Bishop Hare 0736), and.
was afterwards translated into English in 1755. The Harian metre was, however, defended by Dr. Edwards, both in his Prolegomena in Libros Veteris Testamenti Poelicos, 1762, and in a Latin epistle, 1763. To this Lowth replied the following year in a pamphlet addressed to Dr. Edwards, entitled A ltzrger Confutation of Bishop Hare's System of Hebrew Metre, London 1766, reprinted in his Memoir and Remains, by the Rev. Peter Hall, London 1834, which is also a very important contribution to Biblical Literature. The same year (1766) he -was promoted in June to the see of St. David's ; was translated about four months after to that of Oxford, and thence to the see of London in 1777. He had hardly been twelve months in the metropolis when he published his last and greatest work, entitled ./saiah; a new Translation with a Preliminary Dissertation, ana' Notes, Criti cal, Philological, and _Explanatory, in v, hich he aimed not only to give an exact and faithful re presentation of the words and sense of the prophet by adhering closely to the letter of the text, and treading as nearly as may be in his footsteps ; but, moreover, to imitate the air and manner of the author, to express the form and fashion of the composition, and to g,ive the English reader some notion of the peculiar turn and cast of the original.' In the elaborate and valuable Preliminary Disser tation where Lowth states this, he enters more minutely than in his former production into the form and construction of the poetical compositions of the O. T., lays down principles of criticism for the improvement of all subsequent translations, and frankly alludes to De Rossi's view of Hebrew poetry, which is similar to his own [Rossi]. This masterly work soon obtained an European fame, and was not only rapidly reprinted in England, but was translated into German by Professor Koppe, who added some valuable notes to it, Gottingen 1779-8z, 4 vols. 8vo. But notwithstanding the great merit.: of his truly classical and erudite contri butions to '3iblical literature, it must be said that Lowth indulged too freely in conjectural emenda tions, that he often proceeded very rashly and un warrantably with the sacred text, and that if succeeding commentators had followed his example in this respect, and taken similar liberties with thc respective volumes of the O. T., we should now have had a different Bible. Lowth died Novem ber 3, 1787, in the seventy-seventh year of his age, full of years and full of honours. Comp. The In troductory Memoir to the Sermons and other Remains of Bishofi .Lowth, by the Rev. Peter Hall, M.A., London 1834.—C. D. G.