"in the presbyterian principles but ... a man of great piety and
virtue, learned in the law, in mathematics and in languages." He married a
sister of Sir Archibald Johnston, Lord Warriston, and left a son, George,
who took refuge in Holland, afterwards returning with William III. and
being restored to his estates.

BAILLY, JEAN SYLVAIN (1736-1793), French astronomer and orator, was born at
Paris on the 15th of September 1736. Originally intended for the profession
of a painter, he preferred writing tragedies until attracted to science by
the influence of Nicolas de Lacaille. He calculated an orbit for the comet
of 1759 (Halley's), reduced Lacaille's observations of 515 zodiacal stars,
and was, in 1763, elected a member of the Academy of Sciences. His _Essai
sur la theorie des satellites de Jupiter_ (1766), an expansion of a memoir
presented to the Academy in 1763, showed much original power; and it was
followed up in 1771 by a noteworthy dissertation _Sur les inegalites de la
lumiere des satellites de Jupiter_. Meantime, he had gained a high literary
reputation by his _Eloges_ of Charles V., Lacaille, Moliere, Corneille and
Leibnitz, which were issued in a collected form in 1770 and 1790; he was
admitted to the French Academy (February 26, 1784), and to the Academie des
Inscriptions in 1785, when Fontenelle's simultaneous membership of all
three Academies was renewed in him. Thenceforth, he devoted himself to the
history of science, publishing successively:--_Histoire de l'astronomie
ancienne_ (1775); _Histoire de l'astronomie moderne_ (3 vols. 1779-1782);
_Lettres sur l'origine des sciences_ (1777); _Lettres sur l'Atlantide de
Platon_ (1779); and _Traite de l'astronomie indienne et orientale_ (1787).
Their erudition was, however, marred by speculative extravagances.

The cataclysm of the French Revolution interrupted his studies. Elected
deputy from Paris to the states-general, he was chosen president of the
Third Estate (May 5, 1789), led the famous proceedings in the Tennis Court
(June 20), and acted as mayor of Paris (July 15, 1789, to November 16,
1791). The dispersal by the National Guard, under his orders, of the
riotous assembly in the Champ de Mars (July 17, 1791) rendered him
obnoxious to the infuriated populace, and he retired to Nantes, where he
composed his _Memoires d'un temoin_ (published in 3 vols. by MM. Berville
and Barriere, 1821-1822), an incomplete narrative of the extraordinary
events of his public