Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Tooke, Andrew

by Thompson Cooper

TOOKE, ANDREW (1673–1732), master of the Charterhouse, second son of Benjamin Tooke, citizen and stationer of London, was born in 1673, and received his education in the Charterhouse school. He was admitted a scholar of Clare Hall, Cambridge, in 1690, took the degree of B.A. in 1693, and commenced M.A. in 1697. In 1695 he had become usher in the Charterhouse school, and on 5 July 1704 he was elected professor of geometry in Gresham College in succession to Dr. Robert Hooke [q. v.] On 30 Nov. 1704 he was chosen a fellow of the Royal Society, whose members held their meetings in his chambers until they left the college in 1710 (Thomson, List of Fellows of the Royal Society, p. xxxi). He was chosen master of the Charterhouse on 17 July 1728 in the room of Dr. Thomas Walker. He had taken deacon's orders and sometimes preached, but devoted himself principally to the instruction of youth. On 26 June 1729 following he resigned his professorship in Gresham College. He died on 20 Jan. 1731-2, and was buried in the chapel of the Charterhouse, where a monument was erected to his memory (Gent. Mag. 1732, p. 586; Publications of the Harleian Soc., Registers, xviii. 85). In May 1729 he married the widow of Henry Levett [q. v.], physician to the Charterhouse.

His works are:

1. 'The Pantheon, representing the Fabulous Histories of the Heathen Gods and most Illustrious Heroes,' translated from the 'Pantheum Mithicum' of the Jesuit father François Antoine Pomey and illustrated with copperplates, London 1698, 8vo; 7th edit., 'in which the whole translation is revised,' London, 1717, 8vo, 35th edit. London, 1824, 8vo.
2. 'Synopsis Graecae Linguae,' London, 1711, 4to.
3. 'The Whole Duty of Man, according to the Law of Nature,' translated from the Latin of Baron Samuel von Pufendorf, 4th edit. London, 1716, 8vo.
4. 'Institutions Christianae,' London, 1718, 8vo, being a translation of the 'Christian Institutes,' by Francis Gastrell [q. v.], bishop of Chester.
5. An edition of Ovid's 'Fasti,' London, 1720, 8vo.
6. An edition of William Walker's 'Treatise of English Particles,' London, 1720, 8vo.
7. 'Copy of the last Will and Testament of Sir Thomas Gresham … with some Accounts concerning Gresham College, taken from the last Edition of Stow's "Survey of London"' (anon.), London, 1724 (some of these accounts were originally written by him).
8. Some epistles distinguished by the letters A. Z. in the English edition of Pliny's 'Epistles,' 11 vols. London, 1724, 8vo.

[Addit, MS. 5882, f. 52; Biogr. Brit., Suppl. p. 173; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. iii. 627, v. 242, ix. 167; Ward's Gresham Professors, p. 193.]

T. C.