The forefathers of this celebrated person whose name justly occupies so conspicuous a place in the political annals of continental Europe, are stated to have been Irish Protestants, at a time when there was particularly little personal safety to those holding the doctrines of the reformed faith. At a troublous period they fled from persecution, and sought refuge in Prussia, whence another generation found their way into Switzerland. Thus it happened that Necker was born in Geneva, on the 3d of September, 1732, where his parents were in respectable circumstances, and where his father held the Professorship of Public Law. The boy was doubtless educated with care in his native city, whose beautiful situation on the Rhône and at the end of Lake Leman, with its fine walks and pleasant prospects, furnished a fitting scene wherein to indulge his youthful and ambitious aspirations after fame and fortune. But at the same time the manners and customs of the place conveyed to him impressions still more salutary, and predisposed him in favor of those habits of rigid virtue on which he subsequently built his high power and enviable reputation, as also those sound religious principles which, in after life, distinguished him and his house from those among whom his lot was cast. The opinion that the true genius is a mind of large general powers, determined by accident to some particular direction, is rather confirmed than otherwise by the instance of Necker. His natural bent was toward political and philosophical studies, and had they been encouraged and pursued, he might have become a fanciful and brilliant thinker; but his parents did not regard his prepossessions with satisfaction. On the contrary, they deemed it better that his time should be devoted to the lucrative labor which fortune supplies to a votary of activity, energy, and intellect. While commerce fills the purse it clogs the brain; and, though highly favored in his efforts, Necker was not luckier than others in this respect. In earlier years he is said to have written two comedies; but the extraordinary struggle which must have been required to metamorphose a friendless clerk into one of the richest men of his time would naturally tend to crush and destroy any of the more precious particles of talent and enthusiasm with which he had been endowed by nature. His uncompromising virtue, rare amiability, common sense, amazing industry, and well-proved philanthropy, are the claims which his name possesses to the respect and gratitude of posterity.