BROWNE, Sir THOMAS (1605-82). An Eng lish philosopher and miscellaneous author. lie was born in London. studied at Winchester, grad uated in 1626 at Broadgate Hall (now Pembroke College), Oxford. and traveled through France to Italy, where be attended lectures in the universi ties of Padua and Montpellier. Returning thence through Holland. he was made doctor of medi cine by the University of Leyden in 1633. He set up as practitioner at Norwich in 1637, and soon attained to a very considerable professional repute. Though Royalist in sympathy, lie pur sued his researches in quiet indifference to the stirring events of the Civil War. His learning was both multiform and extensive. lie spoke six languages, knew thoroughly philosophies ancient and modern. and was versed in astron omy, ornithology, and botany, as those sciences then existed. In general literature he was obvi ously well read, his quotation from the Inferno, for example, showing him to have been of the few who were then familiar with Dante. Of the four works published during his lifetime, the most famous and best are the Rcligio Medici (first authorized and correct ed., 164:3), and the Hydriotaphia, or Urn-Burial (1658). The former was translated into Latin by John ( 1644). and in one year passed through two. Leyden and two Paris editions. It was subse quently rendered into French, German, and Dutch. Alike in England and on the Continent it aroused much controversy as to its orthodoxy. and was assailed and defended with an equal vehemence. The latter discusses the burial us ages of various times and places, and closes with a chapter which for lofty and sustained elo quence must stand almost unequaled in English literature. The Pseudodoxia Epidcmica, or En
quiries into . . . Vulgar and Common Er rors (1646). is a mixture of cleverness and credulity, science and superstition. quite worthy of Pliny the Elder. The Garden of Cyrus (1658) contains some entertaining fantasies. A style more individual than llrowne's was never writ ten. Latin in derivation, it coins with an ease permitted only while language is yet plastic, and its periods move with a majestic solem nity. Respecting his thought, Dr. Johnson says: "lie was always starting into collateral con siderations; but the spirit and vigor of his pursuit always give delight ; and the reader fol lows him, without reluctance, through his mazes, in themselves flowery and pleasing, and ending at the point originally in view." And Charles Lamb, who owed much of his own diction and viewpoint to Browne, has an acute phrase when he speaks of Sir Thomas's 'beautiful obliqui ties.' The best edition of Brown's works is that by Simon Wilkin (4 vols.. London, 1835 :36), which includes all the posthumous publica tions, together with correspondence and other new matter. The reprint of 1852 (London, 3 vols.) is abridged and otherwise inferior. There is also an edition ( ISSI ) by Dr. Greenhill of the Religio Medici. Consult further the fine essay on Browne in Pater, Appreciations (Lon don, 1889).