Lavater

Lavater, Johann (1741-1801), a Swiss theologian, was born at Zurich. He took Orders in 1769, and soon gained a reputation as an orator, a casuist, a woman's preacher, and a mystic. He was an acquaintance of Goethe, of whom he has given a description; but his chief claim to modern regard is as a phrenologist and physiognomist, and his Physioynomisohe Fragmenta owe much of their renown to their illustrations. Lavater died of a gunshot wound during the French occupation of Zurich.