MORAY, JAMES STUART, EARL OF, illegitimate son of James V. of Scotland, and so half-brother of Mary, Queen of Scots; was from 1556 the leader of the Reformation party, and on Mary’s arrival in her kingdom in 1561 became her chief adviser; on her marriage with Darnley he made an unsuccessful attempt to raise a Protestant rebellion, and had to escape to England 1565, and after a visit to Edinburgh, when he connived at Rizzio’s murder, to France in 1567; he was almost immediately recalled by the nobles, who had imprisoned Mary in Lochleven, and appointed regent; next year he defeated at Langside the forces which, on her escape, had rallied round her, and in the subsequent management of the kingdom secured both civil and ecclesiastical peace, and earned the title of “the Good Regent”; he was shot by a partisan of the queen’s, James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, when riding through Linlithgow (1531-1570).
MORE, HANNAH, English authoress, born near Bristol; wrote dramas, a novel entitled “Coelebs in Search of a Wife,” and a tract “The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain” (1745-1833).
MORE, HENRY, a Platonist, born at Grantham, a Fellow of Christ College, Cambridge, and author of a poem “Song of the Soul”; he was a mystic who exercised a great influence among the young men of Cambridge (1614-1687).
MORE, SIR THOMAS, Chancellor of England, born in London; was the lifelong friend of Erasmus, and the author of “Utopia,” an imaginary commonwealth; succeeded Wolsey as Chancellor, but resigned the seals of office because he could not sanction the king’s action in the matter of the divorce, and was committed to the Tower for refusing to take the oath of supremacy, whence after 12 months he was brought to trial and sentenced to be beheaded; he ascended the scaffold, and laid his head on the block in the spirit of a philosopher; was one of the wisest and best of men (1478-1535).
MOREA is the modern name of the ancient Peloponnesus, that remarkable peninsula, larger than Wales, which constitutes the southern half of Greece, and is joined to the mainland by the Isthmus of Corinth, less than 4 m. broad.
MOREAU, JEAN VICTOR, French general, born at Morlaix; served with distinction under the Republic and the Empire; was suspected of plotting against the latter with George Cadoudal, and banished on conviction; went to America, but returning to Europe, joined the ranks of the Russians against his country, and was mortally wounded by a cannon ball at Dresden (1763-1813).
MORGANATIC MARRIAGE, is a union permitted to German princes who, forbidden to marry except with one of equal rank, may ally themselves with a woman of inferior status, their children being legitimate but not eligible for the succession; the marriages of British princes contracted before the age of 25 without consent of the sovereign, or after that age without consent of Parliament, are of a morganatic nature.
MORGARTEN, a mountain slope in the canton of Zug, Switzerland, where 1400 Swiss, on Nov. 15, 1315, in assertion of their independence, defeated an Austrian army of 15,000.