WALL (WILLIAM), the able defender of infant-baptism, was born in 1646, but where educated, or any further particulars of his early life, are not upon record. He was vicar of Shoreham in Kent, where he died in 1728, at the age of eighty-two, and was considerably advanced when he stept forth as the champion of infant baptism, in opposition to Dr. John Gale, the ablest writer of his time on the baptist side. Mr. Wall published his "History of Infant Baptism" in 1707; and Dr. Gale, in 1711, published "Reflections" on it (See GALE.) In 1719, a friendly conference was held on the subject between him and Mr. Wall, which ended without any change of opinion on either side. Mr. Wall, in the same year, published his "Defence of the History of Infant Baptism," which was accounted a performance of such ability and so decisive on the question, that the university of Oxford, to mark their high opinion. of the book, and of the talents of the author, conferred on him the degree of D. D. in the following year. After his death were published "Critical Notes on the Old Testa- ́ ment, wherein the present Hebrew text is explained, and in many places amended, from the ancient versions, more particularly from that of the LXX. To which is prefixed, a large introduction, adjusting the authority of the Masoretic Bible, and vindicating it from the objections of Mr. Whiston, and the author of the Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion.' By the late learned William Wall, D. D. author of the "History of Infant Baptism," 1733, 2 vols. 8vo.

Dr. Wall stands confessedly at the head of those writers who have supported the practice of infant-baptism; and his antagonists Gale, Whiston, and the baptist historian. Crosby, all unite in praising his candour and piety. He was vicar of Shoreham for the long space of fifty-two years. He once had an offer of a living of 300l. a year, Chelsfield, three miles from Shoreham, which his conscience would not allow him to accept; but he afterwards consented to take one of about one fifth the value, at twelve miles distance, that of Milton, near Gravesend. By an only daughter, Mrs. Catherine Waring, of Rochester, he had sixteen grand-children. This lady communicated some anecdotes of her father, printed in Atterbury's Correspondence, by which it appears that he was a man of a facetious turn, and there are some of his letters to Atterbury in that correspondence. He was such a zealot for this pre

late, that he would have lighted up all Whittlebury-forest, in case of his recall, at his own expence.'

WALLACE (Sir WILLIAM), a celebrated warrior and pa triot, was born, according to the account of his poetical biographer Henry, or Blind Harry, in 1276. He was the younger son of sir Malcolm Wallace of Ellerslie, near Paisley, in the shire of Renfrew, Scotland, and in his sixteenth year was sent to school at Dundee. In 1295, he was insulted by the son of Selby, an Englishman, constable of the port and castle of Dundee, and killed him; on which he fled, and appears to have lived a roving and irregular life, often engaged in skirmishes with the English troops which then had invaded and kept Scotland under subjection. For his adventures, until he became the subject of history, we must refer to Henry. Most of them appear fictitious, or at least are totally unsupported by any other evidence. Wallace, however, is represented by the Scotch historians as being about this time the model of a perfect hero; superior to the rest of mankind in bodily stature, strength, and activity; in bearing cold and heat, thirst and hunger, watching and fatigue; and no less extraordinary in the qualities of his mind, being equally valiant and prudent, magnanimous and disinterested, undaunted in adversity, modest in prosperity, and animated by the most. ardent and inextinguishable love of his country. Having his resentment against the English sharpened by the personal affront abovementioned, and more by the losses his family had sustained, he determined to rise in defence of his country, and being joined by many of his countrymen, their first efforts were crowned with success; but the earl of Surrey, governor of Scotland, collecting an army of 40,000 men, and entering Annandale, and marching through the South-west of Scotland, obliged all the barons of those parts to submit, and renew the oaths of fealty. Wallace, with his followers, uuable to encounter so great a force, retired northward, and was pursued by the governor and his army.

When the English army reached Stirling they discovered the Scots encamped near the abbey of Cambuskeneth, on the opposite banks of the Forth. Cressingham, treasurer of Scotland, whose covetousness and tyranny had been one great cause of this revolt, earnestly pressed the earl of

Nichols's Atterbury-and Bowyer.-Crosby's Baptists.

Surrey to pass his army over the bridge of Stirling, and attack the enemy. Wallace, who observed all their motions, allowed as many of the English to pass as he thought he could defeat, when, rushing upon them with an irresistible impetuosity, they were all either killed, drowned, or taken prisoners. In the heat of the action, the bridge, which was only of wood, broke down, and many perished in the river; and the earl of Surrey, with the other part of his army, were melancholy spectators of the destruction of their countrymen, without being able to afford them any assistance: and this severe check, which the English received on Sept. 11, 1297, obliged them to evacuate Scotland. Wallace, who after this great victory was saJuted deliverer and guardian of the kingdom by his followers, pursuing the tide of success, entered England with his army, recovered the town of Berwick, plundered the counties of Cumberland and Northumberland, and returned into his own country loaded with spoils and glory.

The news of these surprising events being carried to king Edward 1. who was then in Flanders, accelerated his return, and soon after he raised a vast army of 80,000 foot and 7000 horse, which the Scots were no v in no condition to resist. Their country, for several years, had been almost a continued scene of war, in which many of its inhabitants had perished. Some of their nobles were in the English interest, some of them in prison; and those few who had any power or inclination to defend the freedom of their country, were dispirited and divided. In particular, the ancient nobility began to view the power and popularity of William Wallace with a jealous eye which was productive of very fatal consequences, and contributed to the success of Edward in the battle of Falkirk, fought July 22, 1298, in which the Scots were defeated with great slaughter.

We hear little of Wallace after this until 1303-4, when king Edward had made a complete conquest of Scotland, and, appointing John de Segrave governor of that kingdom, returned to England about the end of August. But Wallace, even after this, and although he had been excluded by the jealousy of the nobles from commanding the armies or influencing the councils of his country, still continued to assert her independency. This, together with the remembrance of many mischiefs which he had done to his English subjects, and perhaps some apprehension that he might

again rekindle the flames of war, made Edward employ various means to get possession of his person; and at length he was betrayed into his hands by sir John Monteith, his friend, whom he had made acquainted with the place of his concealment. The king immediately ordered Wallace to be carried in chains to London: to be tried as a rebel and traitor, though he had never made submission, or sworn fealty to England, and to be executed on Towerhill, which was accordingly done, Aug. 23, 1305. This, says Hume, was the unworthy fate of a hero, who, through a course of many years, had, with signal conduct, intrepidity, and perseverance, defended, against a public and oppressive enemy, the liberties of his native country.1

WALLAEUS. See WALÆUS.

WALLER (EDMUND), an eminent English poet, was born March 3, at Colshill in Hertfordshire. His father was Robert Waller, esq. of Agmondesham, in Buckinghamshire, whose family was originally a branch of the Wallers of Spendhurst in Kent; and his mother was the daughter of John Hampden, of Hampden in the same county, and sister to the celebrated patriot Hampden. His father died while he was yet an infant, but left him a yearly income of three thousand five hundred pounds; which, rating together the value of money and the customs of life, we may reckon more than equivalent to ten thousand at the present time.

He was educated*, by the care of his mother, at Eton ; and removed afterwards to King's college in Cambridge. He was sent to parliament in his eighteenth, if not in his sixteenth year, and frequented the court of James the first. His political and poetical life began nearly together. In his eighteenth year he wrote a poem that appears first in his works, on the prince's escape at St. Andero; a piece which shewed that he attained, by a felicity like instinct, a style which perhaps will never be obsolete; and that, "were we to judge only by the wording, we could not know what was wrote at twenty, and what at fourscore."

"He had grammar learning from the information of Mr. Dobson, minister of Market Wickham, who taught a private schoole there, and was (he told me) a good schoolmaster, and had been bred at Eaton coll. sohoole. I have heard Mr. Tho.

Bigge, of Wickham, say (who was his schoolefellow, and of the same formc) that he little thought then he would have been so rare a poet: he was wont to make his exercise for him." Aubrey, in "Letters of Eminent Persons," 1813, 3 vols. 8vo.

1 Henry's and Hume's Histories of England.

His versification was, in his first essay, such as it appears in his last performance. He had already formed such a system of metrical harmony as he never afterwards much needed, or much endeavoured, to improve.

*

The next poem is supposed by Fenton to be the address "To the Queen" on her arrival; but this is doubtful, and we have no date of any other poetical production before that which the murder of the duke of Buckingham occasioned. Neither of these pieces that seem to carry their own dates could have been the sudden effusion of fancy. In the verses on the prince's escape, the prediction of his marriage with the princess of France must have been written after the event; in the other, the promises of the king's kindness to the descendants of Buckingham, which could not be properly praised till it had appeared by its effects, shew that time was taken for revision and improvement. It is not known that they were published till they appeared long afterwards with other poems.

Waller was not one of those idolaters of praise who cultivate their minds at the expence of their fortunes. Rich as he was by inheritance, he took care early to grow richer, by marrying Mrs. Banks, a great heiress in the city, whom the interest of the court was employed to obtain for Mr. Crofts. Having brought him a son, who died young, and a daughter, who was afterwards married to Mr. Dormer of Oxfordshire, she died in childbed, and left him a widower of about five and twenty, gay and wealthy, to please himself with another marriage.

Being too young to resist beauty, and probably too vain to think himself resistible, he fixed his heart, perhaps half fondly and half ambitiously, upon the lady Dorothea Sidney, eldest daughter of the earl of Leicester, whom he courted by all the poetry in which Sacharissa is celebrated; and describes her as a sublime predominating beauty, of lofty charms, and imperious influence; but she, it is said, rejected his addresses with disdain. She married, in 1639, the earl of Sunderland, who died at Newbury in the royal cause; and, in her old age, meeting somewhere with Waller, asked him, when he would again write such verses

* "When he was a briske young sparke, and first studyed poetry, 'Methought,' said he, I never sawe a good copie of English verses: they want smoothnesse: then I began to

essay.' I have severall times heard him say, that he cannot versify when he will; but when the fitt comes upon him, he does it easily." Aubrey, as before.