Bale, John (Batons), bishop of Ossory, an English historian and theologian, was born rt Cove Hithe, in Suffolk, Nov. 21, 1495, and was educated at Jesus Col- lege, Cambridge, where he early gained a reputation for letters and opposed the Reformation. He attributes his conversion to Lord Wentworth, and soon beijan to write against Romanism ; and although protected for a time by the Earl of Essex, he was, after the death of Cromwell, obliged to retire into Flanders. He returned under Edward VI, and received the living of Bishop- stoke, in Hampshire. On Feb. 2, 1553, he was made 1 >isk- op of Ossory. When Edward died he took refuge at Ba- sle, where he remained till 1559, when ho returned into England, and, refusing to resume his bishopric (which he at the first was earnestly desirous not to accept), he was made prebend of the Church of Canterbury. His chief work is his Ilhistrium majoris Britannia- Scrijito- rum Summarium, first printed at Ipswich in 1549. This edition contained only five centuries of writers ; but an enlarged edition was published at Basle in 1557, etc., containing nine centuries, under the following title : Scriptorum Illustrium, M. Britannia, quain nunc Angli- can et Scotiam meant, Catalogue, a Japketoper 3618 an- nos usque ad annum hunc Domini 1557, ex Beroso, Gen-
nadio, Beda, etc collectus ; and in 1559 a third
edition appeared., containing five more centuries. Ho was a very voluminous writer ; a long list of his print- ed works is given by Fuller, and also in the Engl. < '//- clopadia (s. v. Bale). His works were placed on the prohibitory Index, printed at Madrid in 1667, as those of a heretic of the first class. No character has been more variously represented than Bale's. Gesner, in his Bibliotheca, calls him a writer of the greatest dili- gence, and Bishop Godwin gives him the character of a laborious inquirer into British antiquities. Similar praise is also bestowed upon him by Vogler (Introd. Universal, in Notit. Scriptor.). Anthony a Wood, how- ever, styles him "the foul-mouthed Bale." Hearne (Pre/, to Ileminrf.) calls him " Baljcus in multis men- dax." And even Fuller {Worthies, last edit, ii, 332) says " Biliosus Balauis passeth for his true character."
BALFOUR
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BALLDIATHLE
He inveighed with much asperity against the pope I and papists, and his intemperate zeal, it must be ac- knowledged, often carried him beyond the bounds of and candor. Fuller, in his Church History (cent. ix. p. 68), pleads for Hale's railing against the! papists. "Old age and ill usage," he says, "will make any man angry. When young, he had seen tin ;r superstition ; when old, he felt their oppression." The greatest fault of Hale's book on the British writers i- its multiplication of their works by frequently giv- ing the heads of chapters or sections of a book as the titles of distinct treatises. A selection from his works was published by the Parker Society (Cambridge, 1849, 8vo). See Sfrype, Memorials qfCranmer, p. 206, 3C0; Collier, Eccl. Hist, v, 500 ; Penny Cyclop, s. v.
Balfour, Walter, was born at St. Ninian's, Scot- land, 1776, and educated in the Scotch Church at the expense of Mr. Robert Ilaldane. After some years' preaching he came to America, and became a Baptist about 1806. In 1823 he avowed himself a Universal- ist, and labored, both as preacher and writer, in behalf ofTJniversalism until his death at Charlestown, Mass., Jan. 3, 1852. He published Essays en the intermediate Stat of the Dead (Charlestown, 1828, 12mo). See Whit- temore, M< moir of Rev. W. BaJfjur (Bost. 1830).
Balguy, John, an English divine, was born at Sheffield in 1686, and educated at Cambridge, where he passed M.A. in 1720. In the Bangorian controver- sy (q. v.) he maintained the views of Bishop Hoadley, and wrote, in 1718, 1719, several tracts on the dispute. In 1726, in view of the infidel principles of Lord Shaftes- bury, he published A Letter to a Deist, and The Foun- dati m of Moral Virtue. These, with others, are given in .1 Collection of Tracts, by the Rev. J. Balguy (Lond. 1734, 8vo). His Sermons (2 vols. 8vo) had reached a third edition in 1790. Balguy was a " latitudinarian" (q. v.) in theology. He died in 1748. — Allibone, s. v.
Balguy, Thomas, D.D., son of John, was born in Yorkshire in 1716, and educated at St. John's College, Cambridge, where in 1741 he became M.A., and in 1758 D.D. In 1757, under the patronage of Hoadley, he was made prebendary of Winchester, and afterward archdeacon of Salisbury and Winchester. He aban- don d Hoadley's " latitudinarianism," and brought his sound scholarship to the "defence of the Christian re- ligion and of the English Church." He wrote a num- ber of excellent sermons and charges, which may be found in his I)isrniir.,es on various Subjects, edited by Drake, with a .Memoir of Balguy (Cambridge, 1822, 2 vols. 8vo). lb' wrote, also. Divine Hiwvilence vindi- catedfrom th> Reflections of Sceptics (Lond. 2d ed. 1803, 12mo). lie died unmarried, Jan. 19, 1795. See Hook, / . Bioff. i, 177 ; Hose, BlOff. Diet. s. v.
Ball (in, dur), well known as being used in vari- rl and games from the earliest times, several kind- of which are depicted on the Egyptian monu- ments (Wilkinson, i, 198 sq. abridg.). The word oc- cura in tlii- sense in Isa. xxii, 18, but in a subsequent K3UX, 3) it is employed of a ring or circle, and translated '-round about" in the prophecy of the siege of Jerusalem. In Ezek. xxiv, 5, in the symbol of the same event, it i. translated "burn," but probably 'r. as in the margin.