BROWN, JOHN, of Haddington, author of the Self-interpreting Bible, was born in 1722 at Carpow, near Abernethy, Perthshire. A poor weaver's child, at the age of eleven he lost both father and mother, and himself shortly afterwards all but died of four fevers. His schooling was scanty; but, as a herd-boy on the Tayside hills, he studied Greek, Latin, and Hebrew with such success that the neighbours declared he had dealings with the evil one. Once, after folding his flock, he set off for St Andrews, 24 miles away, and stood the next morning in a bookseller's shop, inquiring the price of a Greek Testament. The man laughed at him; but a professor, who was in, said he would give him one if he could read a verse. Ay, could he; and so the Testament was his. Then he turned pedlar, a pedlar like him in Wordsworth's Excursion; and during the '45 served in the Fife militia; and from 1747 to 1750 was a schoolmaster at Gairney Bridge, near Kinross, and at the Spittal, near Penicuik. The vacations were devoted to theological study in connection with the Associate Burgher Synod; and in 1751, having the year before been licensed to preach, he was called to the congregation at Haddington. He was a man of great learning, knowing Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Persic, and Ethiopic, French, Spanish, Dutch, German, and Italian; open-handed, on a stipend of from £40 to £50 a year; not narrow-minded, the age and his station considered; a kindly humorist, though harrowing self-doubts tormented him all his life through; and a powerful preacher, witness David Hume's well-known remark: 'That's the man for me, he means what he says; he speaks as if Jesus Christ was at his elbow.' In 1768 he accepted the unsalaried Burgher chair of Divinity; in 1784 he refused the pastorate of the Dutch Church at New York; and on 19th June 1787 he died at Haddington. Of his twenty-seven ponderous works, published between 1758 and 1804, and dealing with the Scriptures, church history, &c., the most widely known are the Dictionary of the Bible (1768) and the Self-interpreting Bible (2 vols. 1778), whose object was 'to condense within a reasonable space all the information which the ordinary reader may find necessary for attaining an intelligent and practical knowledge of the sacred oracles.' See his Memoirs and Select Remains, edited by the Rev. W. Brown (Edin. 1856).
JOHN BROWN, D.D., his grandson, was son of the Rev. John Brown of Whitburn (1754-1832), and nephew to the Rev. Ebenezer Brown of Inverkeithing, whose eloquence amazed Brougham and Jeffrey. Born in 1784, he studied at Edinburgh University from 1797 to 1800, and then, not yet sixteen years old, left home with his father's blessing and a guinea, to keep school for three years at Elie, meantime attending, during the summer vacations, the Burgher Theological Hall at Selkirk. In 1806 he was ordained to a pastorate at Biggar; in 1822 accepted a call to Rose Street Church, Edinburgh; and thence in 1829 was translated to Broughton Place. Created a D.D. of Jefferson College, Pennsylvania, in 1830, he was elected professor of Exegetical Theology in 1834; during 1840-45 was engaged in the vexatious atonement controversy; and died 13th October 1858. He published close upon twenty religious works; but for us the interest is in the man himself, strong, saintly, learned, yet with a passion for riding, and 'a steady liking, nay hunger, for a good novel.' See Dr Cairns's Memoir of him (1860), and especially the letter, appended thereto, by his son.
That son, DR JOHN BROWN, the essayist, was born at Biggar, 22d September 1810. Till 1822 his education was undertaken by his father, who had lost his first wife in 1816; then, when the family removed to Edinburgh, the boy had four years at a classical academy and the High School. In 1826 he entered on the arts course at the university, and in 1828 on the medical, at the same time becoming pupil and apprentice to Syme, the eminent surgeon. In 1833, after a year spent at Chatham —the great cholera year—as a surgeon's assistant, he graduated M.D., and at once established a practice in Edinburgh. It never was large, for he was something besides a doctor, and nothing at all of a money-getter. His life was quiet and uneventful, save that its latter years, all but the last one, were clouded by fits of the darkest depression. The end came somewhat suddenly, but sweetly, on 11th May 1882. He is buried beside his father in the New Calton Cemetery. Almost all Dr John Brown's writings are comprised within three volumes—the two Hore Subseciva ('leisure hours,' 1858-61), and John Leech and other Papers (1882). Editors and publishers had to 'pester' him to write, for he was distrustful, as few men, of his powers, believing that none should venture to publish aught 'unless he has something to say, and has done his best to say it aright.' Herein lay the secret of his writing so little, and of that little's hyper-excellence. Dogs, children, old-world folk, friends gone before, and lowland landscapes—these are the subjects which he wrote on best; his essays on art and medical topics are good, but it is not by them that he will be remembered. Humour is the chief feature of his genius—humour with its twin-sister pathos; we find them both at their highest perfection in his sketches of 'Rab' and 'Marjorie'—the uncouth mastiff and the dear dead child. Then, silent Minchmoor, the Enterkin's wild pass, and peaceful Inchmahome—he is to them what Wordsworth is to Yarrow; himself to Yarrow he applied that most exquisite epithet, 'fabulosus as ever Hydaspes.' Writing of nothing that he did not know, he wrote, too, of nothing that he did not love, or at least did not greatly care for. Hence both the lucidity and the tenderness of his essays. They rank with Lamb's, and with Lamb's alone in the language. See Swinburne's Sonnet, John Brown and his Sister Isabella (2d ed. 1890), and Peddie's Recollections of Dr John Brown (1893).
SAMUEL BROWN, M.D., chemist, was a grandson of John Brown of Haddington, and son of Samuel Brown, provost of that burgh (1779-1839), who in 1817 established the East Lothian itinerating libraries. Born in 1817 at Haddington, he was educated there till 1830, when he entered the Edinburgh High School. Thence in 1832 he passed on as a medical student to the university, and, after a visit to St Petersburg (1837-38), graduated M.D. in 1839, but immediately surrendered himself to the fascination of chemistry. The dream of his life was the possibility of reconstructing the whole science of atomics, and to its experimental realisation he devoted his nights and days with all the self-forgetful ardour of the medieval alchemist. In 1843 he delivered in Edinburgh four memorable lectures on the atomic theory, but in the same year was unsuccessful in his candidature for the chair of Chemistry. His noble sincerity of nature, his subtlety and versatility of intellect, and his brilliant conversational powers endeared him to a group of friends that included such figures as Edward Forbes, De Quincey, Jeffrey, Carlyle, Harriet Martineau, and Emerson. For some years his health was uncertain, and he died at Edinburgh, 20th September 1856. He was author of the Tragedy of Galileo (1850), a monograph on his father (1856), and two admirable volumes of Essays, Scientific and Literary (1858), on Chemistry, Nature and Man, Christianity, George Herbert, David Scott, Physical Puritanism, Magnetism, Ghosts, &c. See North British Review, Feb. 1857.
BROWN, JOHN, M.D., founder of the Brunonian system of medicine, born in 1736, of poor parents, in Bunkle parish, Berwickshire, was educated at the grammar-school of Duns. At school he was looked upon as a prodigy, his physical powers were great, he possessed strong intelligence, and an extraordinary memory. After acting as teacher and tutor in Duns and Edinburgh, he obtained leave from Monro, professor of Anatomy, and the other professors, to attend their lectures free; meanwhile he was tutor to the children of the celebrated Dr Cullen, and became his assistant in his university lectures. Conceiving himself slighted by Cullen, he commenced giving lectures himself upon a new system of medicine, according to which all diseases are divided into the sthenic, or those depending on an excess of excitement, and the asthenic, those resulting from a deficiency of it; the former to be removed by debilitating medicines, as opium, and the latter by stimulants, such as wine and brandy. His system, in which he freely exposed the errors of former systems, and those of Dr Cullen, gave rise to much opposition, but his partisans were numerous; for a time his opinions had some influence, and what was true in his lectures has been gradually adopted in ordinary medical treatment. In 1779 he took the degree of M.D. at the university of St Andrews, and in 1780 published his Elementa Medieina. He was noted for the freedom with which he wrote and spoke Latin. A Life by Dr Beddoes of Bristol was prefixed to the second edition (2 vols. 1795) of Brown's own English translation. The book was reprinted on the Continent and in America, and translated into French, Italian, and German. He also wrote On the Present System of Spasm as Taught in the University of Edinburgh (1787), and a Short Account of the Old Method of Cure. Being overwhelmed with debt, for which he was at one time thrown into prison, in 1786 he removed to London, where he was again in difficulties. Just as his prospects had begun to brighten, and as he had arranged with a publisher to produce a work on gout for £500, with literary work mapped out for ten years to come, he was struck down by apoplexy, of which he died, 17th October 1788. His works were edited, with a memoir by his son, Dr William Cullen Brown (3 vols. 1804). The merits and demerits of the Brunonian system continued to be matter of controversy both in Europe and the colonies long after the death of its founder. Vol. ii. of Thomson's Life of Cullen (1859) is largely occupied with a discussion of the system; and Hirschel published, in German, a History of the Brunonian System (1846).
BROWN, JOHN, of Ossawatomie, abolitionist, was born in Torrington, Connecticut, May 9, 1800. Descended in the sixth generation from Peter Brown, a Mayflower pilgrim, he preserved the stern religious enthusiasm of his ancestors. In 1805 his father, Owen, removed to Hindson, Ohio, and in 1812 had a contract to supply Hull's army with beef. John, already a vigorous lad, accompanied his father to Detroit, and acquired a hatred of both war and slavery. He became a tanner and land-surveyor, and from 1825 to 1835 lived at Richmond, Pennsylvania, where he was made postmaster. Returning to Ohio he engaged in land speculations, which proved disastrous, and then turned shepherd. In 1846 he removed to Massachusetts, but in 1848 purchased a farm at North Elba, New York. He wandered much through the country in prosecution of anti-slavery enterprises, in which he was assisted by his family. He was twice married and had twenty children. In 1854 five of his sons removed from Ohio to Kansas, and he joined them in the next year after the border conflict had begun. Brown became a leader in the strife, and two of his sons were arrested by United States cavalry. Soon after the town of Lawrence was sacked by border ruffians, he ordered five pro-slavery men at Pottawatomie to be slain as dangerous. Ossawatomie,
Copyright 1888 in U.S.
by J. B. Lippincott
Company.
Brown's home, was burned August 30, 1856, and his son killed. When the war in Kansas ceased, Brown began to drill men in Iowa, using rifles which had been sent to him from Massachusetts. His scheme then was to establish a stronghold in the mountains of Virginia as a refuge for runaway slaves. This plan was disapproved by the few to whom he mentioned it, and he resumed anti-slavery work in Southern Kansas. In June 1859 he hired a farm near Harper's Ferry, and here gathered twenty-two men, of whom six were coloured. Boxes of rifles, pistols, and pikes were also received. On Sunday night, October 16, with eighteen men, he broke into the United States armoury in the town and took several citizens prisoners. On Monday some fighting took place, and Colonel Robert E. Lee, with a company of marines, arrived from Washington. Lieutenant J. E. B. Stuart, who accompanied them, recognised Brown, whom he had met in Kansas. Brown, with six men, now driven into the engine-house, refused to surrender, and continued to fight until his two sons were killed and himself severely wounded. Brown was tried by a Virginia court for conspiracy to produce insurrection, for treason, and for murder. He was convicted and hanged at Charlestown, Virginia, December 2, 1859, having shown the utmost firmness throughout his imprisonment. Four of his men were executed with him, and two others later; six escaped. The raid was investigated by a committee of the United States senate. Its full effects were not seen until the civil war was over. Brown's Life has been written by James Redpath (1860) and by F. B. Sanborn (1885).