HAMILTON, SIR WILLIAM (1788-1856). —Metaphysician, b. in Glasgow, in the Univ. of which his f. and grandfather successively filled the Chair of Anatomy and Botany, ed. there and at Balliol Coll., Oxf., was called to the Scottish Bar, at which he attained little practice, but was appointed Solicitor of Teinds. In 1816 he established his claim to the baronetcy of H. of Preston. On the death of Dr. Thomas Brown in 1820, he was an unsuccessful candidate for the Chair of Moral Philosophy in Edin., but in the following year he was appointed Prof. of History. It was not until 1829 that he gave full proof of his remarkable powers and attainments as a philosopher in a famous article in the Edinburgh Review, a critique of Victor Cousin's doctrine of the Infinite. This paper carried his name over Europe, and won for him the homage of continental philosophers, including Cousin himself. After this H. continued to contribute to the Review, many of his papers being translated into French, German, and Italian. In 1852 they were coll. with notes and additions, and pub. as Discussions in Philosophy and Literature, etc. In 1836 H. was elected Professor of Logic and Metaphysics at Edinburgh, which office he held with great reputation until his death, after which the lectures he had delivered were edited and pub. by Prof. Mansel and Veitch. His magnum opus was his edition of the Works of Dr. Thomas Reid, left unfinished, and completed by Mansel. H. was the last, and certainly the most learned and accomplished, of the Scottish school of philosophy, which he considered it his mission to develop and correlate to the systems of other times and countries. He also made various important contributions to the science of logic. During his later years he suffered from paralysis of one side, which, though it left his mind unaffected, impaired his powers of work. A Memoir of H. by Prof. Veitch appeared in 1869.
HANNA, WILLIAM (1808-1882). —Divine and biographer, s. of Samuel H., Prof. of Divinity in the Presbyterian Coll., Belfast, was b. there, became a distinguished minister of the Free Church of Scotland, and colleague of [Dr. T. Guthrie] (q.v.). He wrote an admirable Life of Dr. Chalmers, whose son-in-law he was, and ed. his works. He also ed. the Letters of [Thomas Erskine] of Linlathen (q.v.), and wrote various theological works.
HANNAY, JAMES (1827-1873). —Novelist and journalist, was b. at Dumfries, and after serving for some years in the navy took to literature, and became ed. of the Edinburgh Courant. He wrote two novels, Singleton Fontenoy (1850), and Eustace Conyers (1855); also Lectures on Satire and Satirists, and Studies on Thackeray. For the last five years of his life he was British Consul at Barcelona.
HARE, AUGUSTUS JOHN CUTHBERT (1834-1903). —Youngest s. of Francis H., and nephew of Aug. and [Julius H.] (q.v.), b. at Rome, practically adopted by his aunt, the widow of Aug. H., and ed. at Harrow. He was the author of a large number of books, which fall into two classes: biographies of members and connections of his family, and descriptive and historical accounts of various countries and cities. To the first belong Memorials of a Quiet Life (his adoptive mother's), Story of Two Noble Lives (Lady Canning and Lady Waterford), The Gurneys of Earlham, and an inordinately extended autobiography; to the second, Walks in Rome, Walks in London, Wanderings in Spain, Cities of Northern, Southern, and Central Italy (separate works), and many others. His writings are all interesting and informing, but in general suffer from his tendency to diffuseness.
HARE, AUGUSTUS WILLIAM (1792-1834). —Was the s. of Francis Hare-Naylor, who m. a cousin of the famous Duchess of Devonshire, and was the author of a history of Germany. He was sent by the widow of Sir W. Jones, whose godson he was, to Winchester, and New Coll., Oxf., in the latter of which he was for some time a tutor. Entering the Church he became incumbent of the rural parish of Alton Barnes where, leading an absolutely unselfish life, he was the father and friend of his parishioners. In addition to writing in conjunction with his brother [Julius] (q.v.), Guesses at Truth, a work containing short essays on multifarious subjects, which attracted much attention, he left two vols. of sermons.