LESLIE
379
LESS-(IUS)
of Ross. While in this position he took a prominent part in the civil as well as ecclesiastical affairs of his coun- try, and secured to the Scots what are commonly called '•the black acts of Parliament" (ISGO). During the flight of queen INIary to England he defended her cause against the Covenanters. In 1579 he was made suffra- gan bishop and vicar general of Kouen, in Normandy, and, after persecution and imprisonment, died in 159(5. His writings are not of particidar interest to theological students. See AUibone, Diet, of BritisK and A merican A ut/iors, vol. ii, s. v. ; Collier, Eccl. Hist, of Enrjland (see Index, vol. viii).
Leslie, Charle.s, a prominent writer in the politi- cal and theological controversies of the 17th century, was the son of bishop John Leslie, of the Irish sees of Kaphoe and Clogher, and was born in Ireland about 1650, and educated at Trinity College, Dublin. His course in life was very eccentric. In 1671 he went to England to study law, but in a few years turned him- self to divinity, was admitted into orders, and, settling in Ireland, became chancellor of Connor. He was living in Ireland at the time of the lievolution, and distin- guished himself in some disputations with the IJoman Catholics on the side of the Protestant Church. Though a zealous Protestant, he scrupled to renounce his alle- giance to king James, and to acknowledge king William as his rightful sovereign. There was thus an end to his prospects in the Church, and, leaving Ireland, he went to luigland, and there employed himself in writing many of his controversial works, especially those on the political state of the country. When James II was dead, Leslie transferred his allegiance to his son, the Pretender; and, as he made frequent visits to the courts of the exiled princes, he so far fell under suspicion at home that he thought proper to leave England, and join himself openly to the court of the Pretender, then at Bar-le-Duc. He was still a zealous Protestant, and had in that court a private chapel, in which he was ac- customed to officiate as a minister of the Protestant Church of England. When the Pretender removed to Italy, Leslie accompanied him ; but, becoming at length sensible of the strangeness of his position, a Protestant clergyman in the court of a zealous Roman Catholic, and age coming on, and with it the natural desire of dying in the land which had given liim birth, he sought and obtained from the government of king George I, in 1721, permission to return. He died at Glaslough, in the county of llonaghan, in 1722. Leslie's writings in the political controversies of the time were all in sup- port of high monarchical principles. His theological writings were controversial; they have been distributed into the six following classes: those against, 1, the Quakers; 2, the Presbyterians; 3, the Deists; 4, the Jews; 5, the Socinians; and, G, the Papists. Some of them, especially the book entitled A short and easy Method with the Deists, are still read and held in esteem. Towanls the close of his life he collected his theological writings, and published them in two folio volumes (1721). They were reprinted at Oxford (1832, 7 vols. 8vo). His other numerous works have not been published uniform- ly. Among them we notice A View of the Times, their J'rincipks and Practices, etc. (2d ed. Lond. 1750, 6 vols. 12mo): — The Massacre of Glencoe (Anon., Lond. 1703, 4t()); — The Axe laid to the Root of Christianity, etc. (Lond. 1706, 4to) : — Querela temporum, or the Danger of the Church of England (Lond. 1695, 4to) : — A Letter, etc., against the sacramental Test (Lond. 1708, 4to) : — Answer to the Remarks on his first iJialogue against the Socin- ians. Bayle styles him a man of great merit and learn- ing, and adds that he was the lirst who wrote in Great Britain against the fanaticism of Madame Bourignon : his books, he further says, are much esteemed, and es- pecially his treatise The Snake in the Crass. Salmon observes that his works must transmit him to posterity as a man thoroughly learned and truly pious. Dr. Hickes says that he made more converts to a sound faith and iioly life than any man of the age in which he
lived; that his consummate learning, attended by the lowest humility, the strictest piety without tlie least tincture of narrowness, a conversation to the last degree lively and spirited, yet to the last degree innocent, made him the delight of mankind. See Biog. Brit. ; Enci/c. Brit. ; Jones, Christ. Biog. ; Engl. Cyclop, s. v. ; Darling, Cyclop. Bibliog. ii, 1825 ; Allibone, Bictioiun-y of British and A mei-ican A uthors^ vol. ii, s. v.
Leslie, John, D.D., a noted prelate of the Irish Church, father of the celebrated Charles Leslie, was de- scended from an ancient family, and born in the north of Scotland about the beginning of the 17th century, and was educated at Aberdeen and at Oxford. Af- terwards he travelled in Spain, Italy, Germany, and France. He spoke French, Spanish, and Italian with the same propriety and fluency as the natives; and wa;; so great a master of the Latin that it was said of him when in Spain, " Solus Lesleius Latine loquitur." He continued t^venty-two years abroad, and during that time was at the siege of Rochelle, and in the expedition to the isle of Rlie with the duke of Buckingham. He was all along conversant in courts, and at home was happy in that of Charles I, who admitted him into his privy council both in Scotland and Ireland, in which stations he was continued by Charles II after the Resto- ration. His chief preferment in the Church of Scotland was the bishopric of the Orknej's, whence he was trans- lated to Raphoe, in Ireland, In 1633, and the same year sworn a privy councillor in that kingdom. During the Rebellion he openly and valiantly espoused the cause of his royal master, and after the Restoration was trans- lated to the see of Clogher. He died in 1671. See Cham- bers, Biog. of Eminent Scotsmen, s. v.