ADVERTISEMENT. EFORE entring on the perufal of the following Work, have fome account of the authors of it. Of the learned and pious LESSER few particulars are known. He was of Nordhaufen in Germany, and published in 1736, a LITHO-THEOLOGY. Of the author of the NOTES, we are enabled to give the following account, which was published in the Gentleman's Magazine for September 1789: MR PETER LYONET, fecretary of the Cyphers, translator and patent-master to their High Mightineffes, was born at Maeftricht in 1706, and was defcended from a very refpectable and ancient family in Lorrain. His ancestors were frequently obliged by the wars and troubles occafioned by the Reformation, to abandon their habitations, and their native country, on account of their zeal for the reformed religion. His great grandfather, after having feen his eftates and poffeffions deftroyed and burnt to ashes, and his wife and all his children murdered, was at last reduced to the neceffity of flying. He took refuge in Switzerland, where he was afterwards re-married, and had by his fecond wife a fon, of whom was born Benjamin Lyonet, French minifter at Houfdon, the father of our author. Mr Peter Lyonet had fcarcely attained his feventh year before he displayed an uncommon ftrength and agility in all bodily exercifes; but he was not lefs diligent in the improvement of his mind. Being placed at the Latin fchool, he learned chronology, and exercised himself in Latin, Greek, and French poetry, as alfo in Hebrew, Logic, and the Cartefian Physics. He was particularly fond of the study of languages, and understood no less than nine,living and dead; viz. of the former, befides the Dutch and French, the Italian (which he had acquired without the aid of a master,) the Spanish, German, and English. Having entered the University of Leyden, he studied the Newtonian Philosophy, Geometry, Algebra, &c. but his father defiring he should attach himself to divinity, he reluctantly abandoned the former studies, as his paffion for them was not easily to be overcome. He at the fame time applied himfelf toanatomy, and alfo to mufic and drawing. He began afterwards to practise fculpture, and performed feveral pieces in wood, one of which in particular, which is preferved, is uncommonly admired by the artifts. It is a baffo relievo, cut in palm-wood, representing Apollo, with the Nine Muses; a moft gloririous master-piece, and which the painter Van Gool, in the lecond volume of his "Review of the Dutch painters, &c. under the article Lyonet, ftyles a wonder-piece.' It excited alfo the admiration of the painter le Chevalier de Moor. After this, he betook himfelf to drawing portraits of his friends from life, wherein, after three or four months practice, he became a great proficient. Having attained the de⚫gree of candidate in divinity, he refolved to ftudy law, to which he applied himfelf with fo much zeal, that he was promoted at the end of the first year. On this occafion he delivered an academical treatise on the proper use of the torture, which was published, and gained him the cfteem of the learned. Arrived at the Hague, he undertook the study of decyphering, and became fecretary of the cyphers, translator of the Latin and French languages, and patent mafter mafter to their High Mightineffes. Meanwhile, having taken a strong liking to the ftudy of infects, he undertook an hiftorical description of fuch as are found about the Hague, and to that end collected materials for feveral volumes; and having invented a method of drawing adapted thereto, he enriched this work with a great number of plates, univerfally admired by all the connoiffeurs who had feen them. In the year 1742 was printed at the Hague a French tranf lation of the following work. The love of truth engaged Mr Lyonet to defer the publication of his above-mentioned defcription, and to write the Notes now translated. This performance caufed his merit to be univerfally known and admired. The celebrated M. de Reaumur had the French: translation reprinted at Paris, not more on account of the work itself, than of Mr Lyonet's obfervations; and bestowed on it, as did alfo many other authors, the highest encomiums. He afterwards executed drawings of the fresh water Polypus for Mr Trembley's beautiful work published in 1744. The ingenious Wandelaar had engraved the first five plates, when Mr Lyonet, who had never witnessed this operation, concerned at the difficulties he experienced in getting the remaining eight finished in the fuperior style he required, resolved to perform the task himself. He accordingly took a lesson of one hour of Mr Wandelaar, engraved three or four small plates, and immediately began upon the work itself, which he performed in fuch a manner as drew on him the higheft degree of praife, both from Mr Trembley and from many other artists, particularly the celebrated Van Gool already named, who declared that the performance aftonished not only the amateurs, but alfo the most experienced artists. The authors of the "Bibliotheque Raifonnée," 1744, have likewife certified their admiration of him; for after a long panegyric, they exprefs themfelves thus; "We may justly apply to him, what Fontenelle fomewhere fays of the famous Leibnitz: "Of many Herculeffes antiquity made only one, but of a single Lyonet, we may make many learned men.” In 1748 he was chofen member of the Royal Society of London. In 1749 he began, by mere chance, his amazing collection of horns and fhells, which according to the univerfal opinion of all travellers and amateurs who have visited it, is at present the most beautiful, and certainly one of the most valuable in Europe. In 1753 he became member of the newly established Dutch Society of Sciences at Haerlem ; and in 1757, after the celebrated M. le Cat profeffor of Anatomy and surgery, and member of almost all the principal focieties of fciences in Europe, had feen Mr Lyonet's incomparable "Traité Anatomique de la Chenille qui ronge le Bois de Saule," with the drawings belonging to it (which work was afterwards publifhed,) he was elected member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Rome, whereof M. le Cat was perpetual fecretary. Mr Lyonet's design in the compiling of that work was, among other things, to publish an anatomical defcription of an infect, as extensive and complete as any exifting of the human body, which had hitherto never been effected, although feveral ingenious men have attempted fomething of this kind, but have however produced nothing more than weak and even faulty effays. Of the praise and admiration expreffed of our author in many respects (but particularly on account of the last mentioned work) by many celebrated writers, and in almost all countries of Europe, we shall state thefe extracts. "Mr 1. From the Bibliotheque des Sciences, 1760; "Lyonet has longheld a distinguished place among the great "Naturalifts of Europe. His translation of the Theologie des 66 Infectes," (this is however a mistake, for Lyonet did not translate the work) "the excellent notes he has added "to it, the magnificent cabinet of fhells which he has "conftructed with fo much tafte and judgement, in which he "has fpared neither trouble nor expence, and which the cu"rious come to admire as one of the finest and most compleat "that can be seen,' (now much improved and increased) have pro |