FABER, Cecilia Bohl von (1797-1877), the great woman-novelist of Spain, better known by her masculine pseudonym of Fernati Caballero, was born at Morges, Canton de Vaud, in 1797, her parents being then on a tour through Switzerland. Her father, Johann Nikolas Bohl von Faber, the son of a Hamburg merchant, had removed early in life to Cadiz, prospered in business, professed the Catholic faith, and married Dona Francisca de Larrea, a member of the Spanish aristocracy. Cecilia received a con siderable part of her education in Germany at Gbrslow near Schwerin, where her father had an estate; and here, besides other accomplishments, including a complete mastery of German and Spanish, she acquired a competent knowledge of Latin, English, French, and Italian. In 1813 she returned to Cadiz, and in the following year became the wife of Captain Planells, whom she accompanied to America, where she seems to have spent some years of married life. Not long after the death of her first husband, she was married to the Marques de Arco Hermoso, and in virtue of her exalted station frequently attended the court of Madrid, where she was much admired for her beauty, vivacity, and wit. Tn 1837, having, by the death of the marquis (1835), been again left a widow, she gave her hand to Seiior de Arrom, a member of the bar. This union appears to have been productive of little happiness, and when her husband accepted an appointment as Spanish consul abroad, she decided to remain alone in Seville. It is to the trials and disappointments that came upon her in the later years of her life that the world is indebted for the fascinating works of this distinguished writer, who seems to have been driven to authorship less by any imperious literary instinct than by the necessity she felt for some anodyne against sorrow. Rarely does it happen that literary genius such as she possessed lies dormant for so long a time, unguessed by the world, hardly suspected even by its owner. As early as 1828, indeed, if not earlier, she had committed to writing, in the form of a novel, a tale of peasant life, which she had heard prosaically told under the olive trees at the village of Dos Hermanas, in the neighbourhood of Seville, but singularly enough, she had preferred to make use of the German language, and does not appear to have contemplated publication. Although Washington Irving, in the course of one of his visits to Spain, had seen and praised the manuscript, and had encouraged the writer to cultivate literature, and especially Spanish literature, as a serious pursuit, it was not till many years afterwards that this first effort, La Familia de Alvareda, was presented to the public; nor was it till after her fiftieth year had been passed that she appeared as an author at all, and even then only under an assumed name. Her first, and in some respects her best, publication. La Gaviota (The Sea-Gull), was originally printed in short daily instalments in the pages of a Madrid newspaper in 1849. It met with high appreciation in the capital, and was accordingly followed at brief intervals by Elia, Clemenda, La Familia de Alvareda, Una en Otra, Simon Verde, and other Cuadros de costumbres populares (pictures of popular life). Slowly but surely the works of the new writer found their way all over the peninsula, and gradually were translated into French and German, until within ten years she had achieved a European reputation. A collected edition of her works in 13 volumes was issued from the royal printing press at Madrid in 1859, and about the same time she received an appointment as governess to the royal children. From 1863 to 1868 she occupied rooms in the palace of the Alcazar,—

the Hampton Court of Seville. At the revolution of 1868 she removed to private apartments in the Calle de Burgos; and though with advancing years her pen became less busy, she continued with unimpaired faculties to take a keen and kindly, if somewhat needlessly anxious, interest in the important events that were revolutionizing the institutions of her country. Among the numerous schemes of beneficence that busied her, especially in later life, was the promotion of a society for the prevention of cruelty to animals. She was engaged in correcting for the press the last sheets of a compilation of stories, nursery-rhymes, &c., for the use of children (Cuentos, Oraciones, Adivinas, y Refranes populares e infantiles') when she died in her eightieth year, on April 7, 1877.

Her works, though numbering about fifty in all, are none of them very large, and she cannot be called a voluminous writer. They all belong to one comparatively brief period of her long and chequered life; and, if classified at all, can be so only by the application of some comparatively artificial criterion. Some deal principally with the features of Andalusian life as it exists among the labourers and peasants; some delineate the higher phases of society; and in others “the interest lies, not in the characters of the persons and the description of scenery and manners, but in the selection of incidents which are intended to point a moral or adorn a proverb.” While all are marked by deep and tender sympathy with nature, by subtle and unerring delineation of character, by a quaint humour that is never far removed from pathos, and by an exquisite‘power of expression, it may safely be said that, as “George Sand” is most delightful when she lovingly depicts the quiet scenes of Berri, the home of her youth, so Fernan Caballero excels in her descriptions of the peasant life of Andalucia. Foreign critics complain not unnaturally of the bitter ultramontane prejudice and the exaggerated Espanolismo which are so needlessly paraded in almost all her works; yet even this peculiarity, as imparting to these productions of undoubted genius a unique couleur locale, may fairly enough be held to enhance rather than diminish their value in the eyes of the dispassionate student of the infinitely varied phases of human thought and feeling.

Besides those already noted, the following stories may be mentioned:— Cuentos y Pocstas populares Andaluces, Un Verano en Pornos, Cosa cumplida solo en la otrd vida, La Estrella de Vandalia, Pobre Dolores, &c. Her principal works may be found in the Colecaion de Autcrcs Espauoles, published by Brockhaus, Leipsic. Most of them have been translated into French. La Gaviota and Elia have been translated into English,—the former by the Honourable Augusta Bethell (1867); La Familia de Alvarcda, under the title of The Castle and the Cottage in Spain, by Lady Wallace, appeared in 1861, and a second translation, by the Viscount Pollington, was published in 1872. An appreciative and able estimate or Fernan Caballero, with a full analysis of several of her best known works, appeared in the Edinburgh Review, July 1861.

FABER, Frederick William (1814-1863), a famous hymn writer and theologian, the son of Thomas Henry Faber, secretary to Dr Barrington, bishop of Durham, was born on the 28th of June 1814, at Calverley, Yorkshire, of which place his grandfather, Thomas Faber, was vicar. He attended the grammar school of Bishop Auckland for a short time, but a large portion of his boyhood was spent in Westmoreland; and the lake scenery left an indelible impression on his imagination. He afterwards went to Harrow, where he remained until he became a student of Balliol College, Oxford, in 1833. About the beginning of 1835 he begau to reside at University College, in consequence of obtaining a scholarship there; and in 1836 he gained the Newdigate prize for a poem on the “The Knights of St John,” which elicited special praise from Keble. . Among his college friends were Dean Stanley and Sir Roundell Palmer. In January 1837 he was elected fellow of University College. Meanwhile he had given up the Calvinistic views of his youth, and had become an enthusiastic admirer and follower of John Henry Newman. In 1841 a travelling tutorship took him to the Continent; and, on his return, a book appeared called Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and among Foreign Peoples, which he dedicated to his dear friend the poet Wordsworth. The journal of his travels is beautifully written, and reveals an intense love of nature, and an almost southern susceptibility to her charms. There is none of the interjectional piety which so often disfigures books of travel written by religious men. He accepted the rectory of Elton in Huntingdonshire, but soon after proceeded again to the Continent, with the intention of studying the methods followed by the Roman Catholic Church. Returning to Elton, he devoted himself, with great earnestness, to the work of his parish, although the two years he spent there were marked by severe mental struggles, which issued in his conversion to the Roman faith in November 1845. On leaving Elton his parishioners sobbed out—“God bless you, Mr Faber, wherever you go” (Life, p. 238). He founded a religious community at Birmingham, called Wilfridians, after the name Wilfred, which Faber assumed. The community was ultimately merged in the oratory of St Philip Neri, of which Father Newman was the head; and in 1849 a branch of the oratory—subsequently considered independent—was established in London, first in King William Street, and afterwards at Brompton over which Father Faber presided till his death on the 26th of September 1863. In spite of his weak health, an almost incredible amount of work was crowded into those years. He published a number of theological works, and edited the Oratorian Lives of the Saints. He was an eloquent preacher, a brilliant talker, and had an unsurpassed power of gaining the love of all with whom he came in contact. It is mainly as a hymn writer, however, that he will be known in the future. There is a sweet saintliness, and at the same time a grandeur of thought and a simplicity of poetical expression in Faber’s hymns, which we fail to find in much of the Protestant hymnoiogy. Among the finest are—“The Greatness of God,” “The Will of God,” “The Eternal Father,” “The God of my Childhood,” “Jesus is God,” “The Pilgrims of the Night,” “The Land beyond the Sea,” “Sweet Saviour I bless us ere we go,” “I was wandering and weary,” and “The Shadow of the Rock.” The hymns are largely used in Protestant collections.

The only complete edition of Faber’s Hymns is the one published l>v Richardson and Son in 1861, of which a second issue appeared in 1871. In addition to hymns, pamphlets, letters, and translations, he published the following works:— Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and among Foreign Peoples, All for Jesus, The Precious Blood, Bethlehem, The Blessed Sacrament, The Creator and the Creature, Growth in Holiness, Spiritual Conferences, The Foot of the Cross, Ethel's Book, Sir Lancelot, Poems, An Essay on Canonization aiid Beatification, Characteristics of the Lives cf the Saints, and Catholic Home Missions. Notes on Doctrinal and Spiritual Subjects were edited by Father Bowden, and issued after Faber’s death. See his Life and Letters, by Father Bowden, and A Brief Sketch of the Early Life of the late F. W. Faber, D.D., by his only surviving brother.

FABER, George Stanley (1773-1854), an English clergyman, son of Thomas Faber, vicar of Calverley, Yorkshire, was born October 25, 1773. He entered University College, Oxford, in 1789, graduated B.A. in 1792, and in 1794 was elected fellow and tutor of Lincoln College. He received his M.A. degree in 1796, and his B.D. degree in 1803. In 1801 he was appointed to the office of proctor, and the same year he delivered the Bampton lecture, which he afterwards published under the title of Horce Mosaicce. He was at this time one of the foremost preachers of the university, and his earnestness and eloquence secured for his discourses an interested and eager audience In his preaching he gave considerable prominence to the doctrines usually known as evangelical, but he endeavoured to avoid as much as possible the technicalities of a system, and to give all that he spoke a directly practical bearing. Marrying in 1803, he lost his fellowship, and for two years he acted as curate to his father. In 1805 he became vicar of Stockton-on-Tees, and three years later of Redmarshall, both in the county of Durham. In 1811 he obtained the rectory of Long Newton, in 1831 was made a prebendary of Salisbury Cathedral, and the following year received the mastership of Sherborn Hospital, where he died in the master’s residence on 27th January 1854. Faber wrote over forty volumes treating more or less directly of theological subjects, and chiefly of those which are of a polemical nature. They manifest great and varied erudition, and considerable acuteness within a certain limited sphere; but his abilities are frequently misapplied in vain endeavours to establish baseless theories, and in minute discussions regarding subjects of no general or lasting importance.

Among his principal works are Mysteries of theCabiri, or the Great Gods of Phoenicia, 2 vols., 1803; Origin of Pagan Idolatry, 3 vols., 1816; Difficulties of Romanism, 1826; Apostolicity of Trinitarianism, 2 vols., 1832; Election, 1842; Papal Infallibility, 1851; and the Sacred Calendar of Prophecy, 3 vols., 1828. The last is his most popular work, and has passed through several editions.

FABER, or Lefevre, Jacobus (c. 1450-1536), surnamed Stapulensis, an eminent pioneer of the Protestant movement in France, was born of humble parentage at Staples in Picardy about 1450, and received his higher education at the university of Paris. After having graduated, and for some time made use of the privilege of teaching which the degree of magister at that time actually conferred, he went to Italy for the prosecution of his favourite classical studies. On his return to Paris he became professor in the college of Cardinal Lemoine, and at the same time he began the publication, with introductions, commentaries, or translations, of various famous works, including the Physics, Metaphysics, and Ethics of Aristotle. In 1507 he commenced residence within the Benedictine Abbey of St Germain des Pr&s near Paris, of which hi3 friend Bri^onnet had become superior; and here he began to give himself to biblical studies. The first fruit of his labours was the Quinluplex Psalterium; Gallicum, Romanum, Hebraicum, Vetus, Conciliatum (Parisiis, Hen. Stephani, 1509). This was followed in 1512 by 8. Pauli Epistoloe XIV. ex vulgatci Editione, adjecta intelligentia ex Grceco cum commentariis, a work characterized by great intelligence and independence of judgment. His De Maria Magdalena et triduo Christi disceptatio, published in 1517, provoked a violent controversy, and was ultimately condemned by the Sorbonne in 1521. In 1523 he removed to Meaux as vicar to his friend Brigonnet, who had recently been advanced to that bishopric; and in the same year he published his new French translation of the New Testament, also Les Epistres et Evangiles pour les LII. dimanches de Van cl Vusage du diocese de Meaux. In his prefaces and notes to both these works he had expressly declared his conviction that the Bible is the only rule by which doctrines are to be tried, and also that justification is by faith alone. These utterances excited much hostility, but the powerful protection of the king (Francis I.) and of the Princess Margaret shielded him from any serious consequences. After the battle of Pavia (25th February 1525), Francis being at the time in captivity, Faber was formally condemned, and his works were vigorously suppressed by a commission of the parliament; these proceedings, however, were at once quashed on the return of the king some months afterwards. In 1526 Faber became librarian in the royal palace at Blois; and two years afterwards his translation of the Pentateuch appeared. In 1530 he completed his translation of the Bible, which at once took a high place, has often been reprinted, and has indeed been the basis of all subsequent French versions, both Roman Catholic and Protestant. In 1531 he was induced by Margaret (who had become queen of Navarre) to taka refuge at Ndrac from the storm of persecution which had broken out with fresh violence; and here he spent the closing years of his life in comparative quietude. His death took place in 1536.

See Graf in Zeitschr. f. histor. Theol., 1852, and in Herzog’s Real-Encyclopadie. A full list of Faber’s very numerous writings is given in the Biographic G6n£rale{s. v. Lefevre d’^taples).

FABER, or Lefevre, Johann (1478-1541), surnamed from the title of one of his works Malleus Haereticorum, was the son of a smith named Heigerlin, and was born at Leutkirch in Swabia in 1478. At an early age he joined the Dominicans, and he afterwards studied theology at Freiburg in Breisgau, where he received the degrees of M.A. and doctor of canon law. His reputation for ability and learning soon led to his being appointed vicar of Lindau and Leutkirch, and shortly afterwards canon in the cathedral church of Basel. In 1518 the bishop of Constance named him one of his vicar generals, and Pope Leo X. appointed him to be papal protonotary. At this time Faber was on a friendly footing with the principal German Reformers, and sympathized generally with their opinions. Of the many evil customs with which the church had become infected he was well aware, and he was so energetic in opposing the practice of indulgences in his diocese that he was looked upon with suspicion at Rome. He also defended Luther against the attacks of his opponent Eck, although he admitted that many of Luther’s views were too far in advance of the times. In 1521, however, Faber made a journey to Rome, which seems to have wrought almost an immediate and complete change in his manner of regarding the efforts of the Reformers, for as soon as he returned he began strenuously to oppose them both by speech and writing. In 1523 he appeared as an opponent of Zwingli in a disputation at Zurich, and the same year he published his tractate against Luther entitled Malleus Haereticorum. From this time his chief efforts were devoted either to win back the Reformers to the church of Rome, or to get that church to adopt such measures as would best tend to nullify their influence with the people. Among other means employed by him was the establishment of a boarding-house for poor theologians, in order to train a class of preachers fitted by their peculiar qualifications to rival the Reformed preachers in popular esteem. In 1526 Faber became court preacher to the emperor Ferdinand, and in 1527 and 1528 was sent by him as ambassador to Spain and England. He was chosen bishop of Vienna in 1531, and died there 12th June 1541. Most of his works were directed against the doctrines of Protestantism. They were collected and published in 3 vols., Cologne, 1537, 1539, and 1541,