Niethammer, Friederich-Ejimanuel, a German philosopher, was born in 1766, at Beilstein in Wiirtem- berg. Nominated in 1793 professor of philosophy and theology in Jena, he received in 1803 a chair in the high school at WUrzburg; in 1807 became a member of the Superior Council of Public Instruction in Munich ; was afterwards elected member of the Academy of Sci- ences of that city, and obtained in 1829 the position of first counsellor of the Superior Consistory. He dis- tinguished himself bj' his struggle against the intro- duction of principles exclusivel,v utilitarian on the sub- ject of education. He died in 1846. We have of his works, Versuch einer Ableitung des moralischen Gesetzes aus den Formen der reinen Vernunft (Jena, 1793):— Ueber Religion als Wissenschaft (Neustrelitz, 1795) : — Versuch einer Begriindiing des venmnj'imdssigen Offen- barungsglaubens (Leipsic, 1798) : — Der Streit des Phi- lanthropismus und Ilumanismus (Jena, 1808) : — Philo- sophisches Journal (Jena, 1795-1800, 10 vols.) ; from the fifth volume, conjointly with Fichte. — Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Geneixdc, xxxviii, 01.
NietO, David ben-Pinciias (or, as his full name is, Signor Hachacham R. David Netto Rab del Kehilla Ke- dosha de Londres), a Jewish savant, noted as a philos- opher, physician, poet, mathematician, astronomer, his- torian, and theologian of extraordinary ability, « as oT Spanish descent, and was born at V"enice, Italy, in 1654. He practiced medicine at Leghorn, occasionally preach- ing in the synagogue. While there he wrote in Italian a woi-k entitled Pascalogia, a disquisition on the pas- chal festival of the Christian Church, in which he I tiointcd out the causes of the differences between the
(ireek and Latin churches on the time of Easter, and l)etwcen them and the synagogue on that of the Pass- over. This book he dedicated to the " Altezza Kever-
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endissima di Francesco IMaria Cardinale de Jledici." The fame of his talents led the congregation of London to invite him to be their head in the place of Jacob Abendana (q. v.). Nieto accepted the call, and arrived at London in 170L In 1704 he published a theological treatise on Divine Providence, or Dialogues on the Uni- versal Law of Nature, In 1718 he published a Jewish Calendar, entitled d'^Pl^b il3'^3. In Hebrew he pub- lished his i"t 1ST2 rrn ^N, i.e. The Fire of the Law, impugning the doctrine of K. Nehemiah Chajun: — The Rod of Judgment ("|1 Ti'i^'O), or second part of the Ku- sari, to prove the divine authority of the oral law (Engl, transl. by Laz. Low [London, 1842]) : — a contribution to the history of the Inquisition, Noticias reconditas y posthumas del -procedimiento de las Inquisicione de Espiana y Portugal, etc. : — and, besides some pulpit dis- courses, and A Reply to the Sermon of the A rchbishop of Cranganor at the auto-da-fe at Lisbon in 1705, he wrote among other polemical pieces one against the doctrines of Sabbathai Zewi, who at that time, as one of a succession of impostors of the same class, had been making a sensation among the Jews as a pretender to the Messiahship. Nieto died in 1728. That he was a very learned man may be seen from a passage of one of the funeral sermons which were delivered at his grave, wherein he is spoken of as a " theologo sublime, sabio profundo, medico insigne, astronomo francoso, po- eta dolce, pregador facundo, logico arguto, physico en- genhoso, rhetorico fluente, author jucundo, nas lenguas prompto, historias notorioso, posto que tanto em ponco, a guy se encerra, que e muito, e pauco, em morte ha pouca terra." See Furst, Bibl. Jud. iii, 33 sq. ; De Rossi, Dizionario (Ger. transl.), p. 246 sq. ; Lindo, Hist, of the Jews in SjKiin, p. 372 sq. ; Etheridge, Infrod. to Hebrew Literature, p. 472 sq. ; Gratz, Gesch. d. Juden, x, 322, 333, 361; Jost, Gesch. d. Judenth. u. s. Sekten, iii, 235; Steinschueider, Jewish Literat. p. 213; Kayserling, Ge- schichte d. Juden in Portugal, p. 325 sq. ; Sephardim, p. 299, 307 ; Bibliotheh jud. Kanzelredner, vol. i (1870), BeUage, p. 9, 17. (B. P.)
NieUTwentyt, Beunakd, a learned Dutch mathe- matician and philosophical writer, was born at West- graafdyk, in Holland, Aug. 10, 1654. He was at first intended for the Church by his parents, but afterwards devoted himself to mathematics. He was one of the early opponents of infinitesimal calculus, and became involved in discussions with Leibnitz, Bernouilli, and Hermann. He died at Purraerend May 30, 1718. Among his works, those having a bearing on theology are, A Refutation of Spinoza (Amst. 1720, 4to), and Het regt Gebruik der Werelt-beschouwingen (ibid. 1715, 1720, 1727, 4to). This work, very well conceived, but written in a tedious, diffuse style, was translated into ^English bj' Mr. Chamberlayne, a member of the Royal Society of London, under the title of The Christian Philosopher (Lond. 1719, 3 vols. 8vo) ; a French trans- lation was afterwards published under the title oi U Ex- istence de Dieu demonstree par les merveilles de la nature (Paris, 1725, and Amst. 1760, 4to, with numerous plates), and also into German by J. A. Segner, Rechter Gebrauch d. IVellbetrachtung, etc. (Jena, 1747, 4to). This work has led to a charge of plagiarism against Dr. Paley (q. v.), who stands accused of having embodied the principal argument of the Christian Philosopher in his Natural Theology without any acknowledgment. See U Europe Savante, viii, 394 ; Bibl. Bremensis, ii, 356 ; Niceron, Mhnoires, vol. xiii and xx; Iloefer, Nouv. Biog. Genirale, xxxviii, 68; Meth. Quar. Rev. Jan. 1849. (J. N. P.)