Encyclopædia Britannica; Or, A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Miscellaneous Literature; Constructed on a Plan, by which the Different Sciences and Arts Are digested into the Form of Distinct Treatises or Systems, comprehending The History, Theory, and Practice, of each, according to the Latest Discoveries and Improvements; and full Explanations given of the Various Detached Parts of Knowledge, whether relating to Natural and Artificial Objects, or to Matters Ecclesiastical, Civil, Military, Commercial, &c. Including Elucidations of the most important Topics relative to Religion, Morals, Manners, and the Oeconomy of Life: together with A Description of all the Countries, Cities, principal Mountains, Seas, Rivers, &c. throughout the World; A General History, Ancient and Modern, of the different Empires, Kingdoms, and States; and An Account of the Lives of the most Eminent Persons in every Nation, from the earliest ages down to the present times. Third Edition. Volume 1. Edinburgh: A. Bell and C. MacFarquhar. [Internet Archive]
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The utility of science, and the delight which it affords to the human mind, are acknowledged by every man who is not immersed in the grossest ignorance. It is to the philosopher that the husbandman, the architect, the carpenter, and the seaman, &c. are indebted for the principles of those arts, by which they furnish us with most of the accommodations, and with all the elegances, of civilized life; whilst the pleasure experienced in the very progress of philosophical research is such, as both reason and revelation intimate, not obscurely, will constitute part of our happiness in a future state. (EB I, 1797: v)
A very flowery beginning. Reason and revelation intimate knowledge, but not experience. What accommodations and elegances were there to "civilized life" in the 18th century?
With all the aid which can be furnished by one age or nation to another, the labours of the philosopher still present themselves as immense and difficult. His object comprehends universal nature, of which nothing can be known but by sensation and reflection; but the objects of sense are all individuals, almost infinite in number, and for ever changing: so that instead of a system of science, the first view of the corporeal world would lead us to imagine, that from our most diligent researches nothing could be obtained but a vast collection of particular truths. Such a collection, whilst it would burden the memory, could be of little advantage to the arts of life; for we are very seldom brought, on different occasions, into circumstances so perfectly similar, as to require, without the smallest variation, the same conduct. (EB I, 1797: v)
"A vast collection of particular truths" could just as well be the subtitle of this blog. The last sentence is weird. Usually the opposite is said, i.e. "Commonly experienced contexts of meaning" arise because everyday situations are so perfectly similar (La Barre 1954: 166). My bus-ride to work today is very little different from my bus-ride to work tomorrow.
But thought all the objects of sense, of memory, and of consciousness, are unquestionably individuals distinct from each other, the contemplative mind of man observes among them various resemblances and analogies. It observes, that the sensation communicated to the sight by snow is similar to that communicated by milk, paper, chalk, and a thousand other objects; that all external objects are solid, extended, divisible, and of some figure; that the path described by a planet round the sun resembles that described by a cannon ball over the surface of the earth; and that many of the actions of brutes are similar to those which we are impelled to perform by the internal feelings of desire and aversion. (EB I, 1797: vi)
Animals are like us. PC: "desire and aversion" = "preference and aversion".
In ancient Greece, where philosophy first assumed a systematic form, all the objects of human thought were ranged under ten categories or predicaments; and every thing which could be affirmed or denied of these categories was supposed to be comprehended under five lasses called predicables. Among the Greek philosophers, therefore, the use of induction was to ascertain the category to which any particular object belonged; after which, nothing more was to be done but, by a short process of syllogistic reasoning, to affirm or deny of that object whatever could be affirmed or denied of its category. (EB I, 1797: vi)
Aristotle's categories were called predicaments. Makes "predication" that much more a loaded word.
To this ancient arrangement of human knowledge many insuperable objections have been urged. But it must be confessed, that the arrangements which have been proposed in its stead, by the sages of modern times, have little claim to greater perfection. Locke classed all things under three categories; substances, modes and ideas. Hume reduced the number to two; impressions and ideas. The former of these philosophers admitted of only four predicables, all different from those of the ancients; the latter at first extended the number to seven, but afterwards reduced it to three; among which none of the ancient predicables are to be found, and only one of those which had been admitted by Locke. (EB I, 1797: vi)
Hot dang, did not expect the preface to Encyclopædia Britannica to illuminate such philosophical issues.
Locke says expressly, that as the objects of our knowledge are confined to substances, modes and ideas, so we can discover nothing of these, but, 1st, their identity or diversity; 2d, their relation; 3d, their co-existence or necessary connection; and, 4th, their real existence: while Hume declares, with some hesitation indeed, that we can know nothing but the resemblance, contiguity in time or place, and causation of our impressions and ideas. (EB I, 1797: vi)
Quite obviously Kant merely switched some places, put "real existence" down as a second, and expanded all into triads.
The truth of these observations will be controverted by no man who is not an absolute stranger to the various systems, ancient and modern, of what has been called the first philosophy. (EB I, 1797: vii)
What is metaphysics.
Its truth is indeed admitted by Chambers himself, the compiler of one of the first and most valuable of these dictionaries, who speaks of the works of his predecessors as containing nothing but a multitude of materials, or a confused heap of incoherent parts. (EB I, 1797: vii)
The unstructuced dictionary = a vague uncharted nebula.
(EB I, 1797: viii)
What stands out is that most of this structure follows philosophical distinctions (natural/artificial; internal/external; sensible/rational). What should catch special attention is the lowest distinction, Symbolical, which includes a considerable gamut of semiotic subjects (linguistics, badges, metaphors, poetics).
But on this topic it is needless to expatiate. The very favourable reception with which the former editions of the Encyclopædia Britannica were honoured by the Public; the still greater encouragement which has been given to the present; and the adoption of the plan by the editors of other repositories of arts and sciences - bear ample testimony to the excellence of the arrangement. On this subject we express ourselves with the greater ease and the greater confidence, that we cannot be accused of flattering our own vanity, or publishing our own praise; for the merit of forming the arrangement, as well as of introducing into the Work various branches of knowledge, from which, as they are not generally to be found in dictionaries, it derives a just claim to the favour of the Public, belongs not to the Compilers of the present Edition. (EB I, 1797: x)
I anticipate that much that I draw out of reading this encyclopaedia will have to do with phatic tropes. It is nearly unavoidable.
Of all the various species of narrative-writing, it is acknowledged that none is more worthy of cultivation than biography; since none can be more delightful or more useful, none can more certainly enchain the heart by irresistible interest, or more widely diffuse introduction to every diversity of condition. (EB I, 1797: x)
Südamete aheldamine.
This curiosity, so natural and so laudable, has been frequently felt by ourselves during the compilation of this Work; and to gratify it in others, we have subjoined to the name of every considerable place an account of its situation, its climate, its soil, its peculiarities, its inhabitants, with their manners, customs, and arts; its revolutions, laws, and government, with whatever else appeared necessary for the reader's information, and at the same time admissible into a Work of such variety and extent. (EB I, 1797: xi)
Information as a state of of being informed.
The knowledge of history is so important, not only to the statesman and the legislator, to whom indeed it is absolutely necessary, but likewise to every man who moves in a sphere above that of the lowest vulgar, that a Work professing to be a general repository of arts, sciences, and literature, would be exceedingly defective, if it did not contain some information of the transactions of those who have been in possession of the world before us; of the various revolutions of states and empires; and of all the other means which have contributed to bring every thing into the state in which we behold it. (EB I, 1797: xi)
Another verbal oddity of the same rank: "vulgar" as a noun instead of adjective. PC: the "uneducated classes".
In the English language A is the mark of three different sounds, termed, by our grammarians, the broad, the open, and the slender A. The first resembles that of the German A, is found in several monosyllables, as wall, salt, &c. and is pronounced as au in cause. It is probable that the Saxons expressed only this broad sound of the letter, as it is still commonly retained in the northern distnicts of England, and universally throughout Scotland; as, tauk for talk, wauk for walk or wake. - The open A resembles that of the Italians in adagio, and is the same with that of a in father, rather, &c. The slender sound is peculiar to the English language, and resembles the sound of the French dipthong ai in pais, or the a masculine, or perhaps it is a middle sound between them: it is exemplified in place, waste, &c. also in toleration, justification, and all other words ending with ation. (EB I, 1797: 1)
Estonian recognizes only the open A. From our point of sound, the broad A is just o, and the slender like ei.
A, among the ancients, was a numeral letter, and signified 500; and when a dash was added o the top, Ā, 5000. (EB I, 1797: 1)
Trivia.
A, among logicians, is used to denote an universal affirmative proposition; according to the verse,Afferat A, negat E, verúm generaliter ambæ.
Thus, in the first figure, a syllogism consisting of three universal affirmative propositions, is said to be Bār-bā-rā; the A thrice repeated, denoting so many of the propositions to be universal, &c. (EB I, 1797: 1)
Wolff spoke of this on Youtube. Medieval logicians had various such vocative shorthands for logican contradictions.
A, among the Romans, was used in the giving of votes or suffrages. - When a new law was proposed, each voter had two wooden ballots put in his hand; the one marked with a capital A signifying antiquo, q.d. antiquam volo; and the other with V.R. for uti rogas. Such as were against the law, cast the first into the urn; as who should say, I refuse it, I antiquate it; or, I like the ancient law, and desire no innovation. (EB I, 1797: 1)
A) Mulle meeldib vana seadus.
AARTGEN, or AERTGEN, a painter of merit, was the son of an woolcomber, and born at Leyden in 1498. He worked at his father's trade until he had attained the age of eighteen; and then, having discovered a genius for designing, he was placed with Cornelius Engelheihtz, under whom he made a considerable progress in painting. He became so distinguished, that the celebrated Francis Floris went to Leyden out of mere curiosity to see him. He found him inhabiting a poor half ruined hut, and in a very mean style of living: He solicited him to got Antwerp, promising him wealth and rank suitable to his merit; but Aartgen refused, declaring that he found more sweets in his poverty than others did in their riches. It was a custom with this painter never to work on Mondays, but to devote that day, with his disciples, to the bottle. He used to stroll about the streets in the night, playing on the german flute, and in one of these frolics was drowned in 1564. (EB I, 1797: 3)
Rather a jew among kings than a king of the jews, etc.
ABACINARE, or ABBACINARE, in writers of the middle age, a species of punishment, consisting in the blinding of the criminal, by holding a hot bason or bowl of metal before his eyes. (EB I, 1797: 3)
I've vaguely heard of this.
ABACTORS, or ABACTORES, a name given to those who drive away, or rather steal, cattle by herds, or great numbers at once; and are therefore very properly distinguished from fures, or thieves. (EB I, 1797: 4a)
What a thing to require a word.
ABAFT, a sea-term, signifying the hinder part of a ship, or all those parts both within and without which lie towards the stern, in opposition to AFORE; which see. - Abast, is also used as a preposition, and signifies further aft, or nearer the stern; as, the barricade stands abaft the main-mast, i.e. behind it, or nearer the stern. (EB I, 1797: 4)
E.g. "see above".
ABALIENATION, in law, the act of transferring one man's property to another. (EB I, 1797: 4)
Seizure of property.
The Hyperborean, in return, presented the Samian, as though he equalled Apollo himself in wisdom, with the sacred arrow, on which the Greeks have fabulously related that he sat astride, and flew upon it, through the air, over rivers and lakes, forests and mountains; in like manner as our vulgar still believe, particularly those of the Hebrides, that wizards and switches fly withersoever they please on their broomsticks. (EB I, 1797: 5)
You're a wizard, Abaris.
As to what relates to his abilities, Himerius informs us, that "he was affable and pleasant in conversation, in dispatching great affairs secret and industrious, quick-sighted in present exigencies, in preventing future dangers circumspect, a searcher after wisdom, desirous of friendship, trusting little to fortune, and having every thing trusted him for his prudence." (EB I, 1797: 5)
Mahaffian tropes, PC.
ABASCIA, or ABCAS, a country in Asia, tributary to the Turks, situated on the coast of the Black Sea. The people are poor, thievish, and treacherous, insomuch that there is no trading witht hem without the utmost caution. (EB I, 1797: 6)
Vargalik.
ABATAMENTUM, in law, is an entry to lands by interposition, i.e. when a person dies seized, and another who has no right enters before the heir. (EB I, 1797: 6)
Squatting.
ABBA, in the Syriac and Chaldee languages, literally signifies a father; and, figuratively, a superior, reputed as a father in respect of age, dignity, or affection. It is more particularly used in the Syriac, Coptic, and Ethiopic churches, as a title given to the bishops. The bishops themselves bestow the title Abba more eminently on the bishop of Alexandria; which occasioned the people to give him the title of Baba, or Papa, that is, Grandfather; a title which he bore beforet he bishop of Rome. It is a Jewish title of honour given to certain rabbins called Tanaites: and it is also particularly used, by some writers of the middle age, for the superior of a monastery, usually called ABBOT. (EB I, 1797: 7)
Somehow Papa has taken the place of Father.
He [ABBADIE (James)] published several works in French that were much esteemed; the principal of which are, A Treatise on the Truth of the Christian Religion; The art of Knowing one's Self; A Defence of the British Nation; The Deity of Jesus Christ essential to the Christian Religion; The History of the last Conspiracy in England, written in order of king William III.; and The Triumph of Providence and Religion, or the opening the Seven Seals by the Son of God. (EB I, 1797: 7)
Know thyself.
These abbés are very numerous, and no less useful. They are, in colleges, the instructors of youth; in private families, the tutors of young gentlemen; and many procure a decent livelihood by their literary and witty compositions of all kinds, from the profoundest philosophy to the most airy romances. They are, in short, a body of men who possess a fund of universal talents and learning, and are incessantly employed in the cultivation of every various branch of literature and ingenuity. No subject whatever escapes them; serious or gay, solid or ludicrous, sacred or profane, all pay tribute to their researches; and as they are conversant in the lowest as well as the highest topics, their fame is equally great in the leraned and in the scribbling world. - A distinguishing part of their character, too, though we shall but slightly touch it, is their devotion to the fair sex: whose favourites, in return, they have the honour of being in the most enviable degree; the wit and smartness for which they are usually remarkable, being just the very thing that suit the French ladies. - In fine, these abbés are sought after by most people, on various accounts; as they are equally men of business and pleasure, not less expert in them ost serious transactions, than fond of enjoying their share in whatever occupies the gay world. Hence they diligently frequent all public sepctacles, which are thought incomplete without them; as they compose the most intelligent part of the company, and are the most weighty approvers or condemners of what passes in almost all places. (EB I, 1797: 7)
High praise for a class that no longer appears to exist in a considerable degree.
But it retains its old name in the king's books, and is a discharged vicarage of 30 l. clear yearly value. (EB I, 1797: 11)
Vicarious vicarage.
ABBREVIATION, or ABBREVIATURE, a contraction of a word or passage; made by dropping some of the letters, or by substituting certain marks or characters in their place. - Lawyers, physicians, &c. use abundance of abbreviations, partly for the sake of expedition, and partly for that of mystery; but of all people the Rabbins are the most remarkable for this practice, so that their writings are unintelligible without the Hebrew abbreviatures. (EB I, 1797: 11)
Expedience?
ABCEDARY, or ABCEDARIAN, an epiteth given to compositions, the parts of which are disposed in the order of the letters of the alphabet: thus we say, Abcedarian psalms, lamentations, hymns, &c. (EB I, 1797: 11)
Along with "Abbreviator", this feels like self-descriptive of the encyclopaedist.
ABDALMOTHLEB, or ABDAL MATELEB, the son of Hastem, the father of Abdalla, and grandfather of Mahomet the prophet of the Mussulmans, was, it is said, of such wonderful comeliness and beauty, that all women who saw him became enamoured: which may have given occasion to that prophetic light, which, according to the Arabians, shone on the foreheads of him, his ancestors, and descendants; it being certain that they were very handsome and graceful men. (EB I, 1797: 12)
Typically these specimens appear in literature among the gentler sex, e.g. in 100 Years of Solitude and Infinitr Jest.
ABDALS, in the Eastern countries a kind of saints supposed to be inspired to a degree of madness. The word comes, perhaps, from the Arabic, Abdallah, the servant of God. The Persians call them devaneh khoda, similar to the Latins way of speaking of their prophets and sybils, q.d. furentess deo, raging with the god. They are often carried by excess of zeal, especially in the Indies, to run about the streets, and kill all they meet of a different religion; of which travellers furnish many instances. The English call this, running a muk, from the name of the instrument, a sort of poniard, which they employ on those desperate occasions. If they are killed, as it commonly happens, before they have done much mischief, they reckon it highly meritorious; and are esteemed, by the vulgar, martyrs for their faith. (EB I, 1797: 12)
Religion makes crazy. Frequently, violently so.
Several had a fever at their coming out of the theatre; and as their imaginations were full of the tragedy, the delirium which the fever raised represented perpetually Andromeda, Perseus, Medusa, &c. and the several dramatic incidents, and called up the ideas of those objects, and the pleasure of the representation, so strongly, that they could not forbear imitating Archelaus's action and declamation: And from these the fever spread to others by infection. (EB I, 1797: 12)
The author of this entry evidently a fan of the association of idess (Locke and/or Hume).
ABDUCTION, in logic, a kind of argumentation, by the Greeks called apagoge, wherein the greater extreme is evidently contained in the medium, but the medium not so evidently in their lesser extreme as not to require some farther medium or proof to make it appear. It is called abduction, because, from the conclusion, it draws us on to prove the proposition assumed. Thus, in the syllogism, "All whom God absolves are free from sin; but God absolves all who are in Christ; therefore all who are in Christ are free from sin," - the major evident; but the minor, or assumption, is not so evident without some other proposition to prove it, as, "God received full satisfaction for sin by the sufferings of Jesus Christ." (EB I, 1797: 13)
Whst Peirce is known for. The illustration might turn useful when I continue my introduction into logic.
ABELARD (Peter), one of the most famous doctors of teh twelfth century, was born at Palais near Nantz, in Britany: he was well learned in divinity, philosophy, and the languages; but was particularly distinguished by his skill in logic, and his fondness for disputations, which led him to travel in several provinces in order to give public proof of his acuteness in that science. (EB I, 1797: 13)
Another one to look out for im connection with Peirce. His private life (next paragraph, not quoted) is reflected in the main character in Kurbmäng Paabelis.
ABELIANS, ABEOLITES, or ABEOLIANS, in church-history, a sect of heretics mentioned by St Austin, which arose in the diocese of Hippo in Africa, and is supposed to have begun in the reign of Arcadius, and ended in that of Theodosius. Indeed it was not calculated for being of any long continuance. Those of this sect regulated marriage after the example of Abel; who, they pretended, was married, but died without ever having known his wife. They therefore allowed each man to marry one woman, but enjoined them to live in continence: and, to keep up the sect, when a man and woman entered into this society, they adopted a boy and a girl, who were to inherit their goods, and to marry upon the same terms of not begetting children, but of adopting two of different sexes. (EB I, 1797: 14)
Accidental role models for asexual lefties.
ABEN Melter, a leaned rabbin, who wrote a commentary on the Old Testament in Hebrew, intitled The Perfection of Beauty. This rabbin generally follows the grammatical sense and the opinions of Kimchi. The best edition is that of Holland. (EB I, 1797: 14)
Aftef Schiller I'm much better disposed towards such works. At least enough to record the title.
The yshipped their sacrilegious booty, with an intention of exposing it to sale in Holland: but the vessel had scarcely gone out of port, when it perished in a storm with all its ill-gained lading. (EB I, 1797: 15)
The adjective "laden" has a noun form.
He [ABERNETHY (John)] was distinguished by his candid, free and generous sentiments; and died of the gout in Dec. 1740, in the 60th year of his age. He published a volume of sermons on the Divine Attributes; after his death a second volume was published by his friends; and these were succeeded by four other volumes on different subjectS: all of which have been greatly admired. (EB I, 1797: 17)
Sentiments descriptive of character, as per Shand. Divine Attributes are transcendent - what could he have known of the unknowable?
ABESTA, the name of one of the sacred books of the Persian magi, which they ascribe to their great founder Zoroaster. The abesta is a commentary on two others of their religious books called Zend and Pazend; the three together including the whole system of the Ignicold, or worshippers of fire. (EB I, 1797: 17)
General knowledge that somehow has escaped me thus far.
ABETTOR, a law-term, implying one who encourages another to the performance of some criminal action, or who is art and part in the performance itself. (EB I, 1797: 17)
Part and parcel.
(EB I, 1797: 19)
The old long s that looks like an f without a crossbar takes some getting used to.
The hatred which these savages, whose manners, though rude and uncultivated, are in many respects pure and virtuous, bear to the Spaniards, is invincible. (EB I, 1797: 19)
Qualities of manners.
ABLECTI, in Roman antiquity, a select body of soldiers chosen from among those called EXTRAORDINARII. (EB I, 1797: 20)
Neat - "extraordinary" apparently a very old word.
ABO, a maritime town in Sweden: it is the capital of the province of Finland, and lies upon the point where the gulps of Bothnia and Finland unite. It is a good port; and is the see of a bishop, suffragan of Upsal. It has an university, founded by queen Christina in 1640, and endowed with the same privileges as that of Upsal. There is also a school here, which was founded by Gustavus Adolphus, for 300 scholars. (EB I, 1797: 21)
Lolol, the province of Finland.
ABOARD, the inside of a ship. Hence any person who enters a ship is said to go aboard: but when an enemy enters in the time of battle, he is said to board; a phrase which always implies hostility. (EB I, 1797: 21)
Still holds true with regard to "boarding" a plane, the TSA reportedly being responsible for the hostilities.
Aurelius Victor suggests another opinion, viz. that they were called Aborigines, q.d. Aberrigines, from ab "from," and errare "to wander;" as having been before a wandering people. (EB I, 1797: 21)
Errare humam est - mitte, et inimene eksib vaid, inimene eksleb.
The foundation on which the practice is said to have been allowed, was, that the fœtus, while in utero, was reputed as a part of the mother, ranked as one of her own viscera, over which she had the same power as over the rest: besides, that it was not reputed as a man, homo; nor to be alive, otherwise than as a vegetable: consequently, that the crime amounted to little moret han that of plucking unripe fruit from the tree. (EB I, 1797: 22)
Wow. Two thousand years has modified nothing in the discourse surrounding abortion.
Seneca represents it as a peculiar glory of Helvia, that she had never, like other women, whose chief study is their beoty and shape, destroy the fœtus in her womb. (EB I, 1797: 22)
Helvia was not like the othr girls.
We have a commentary of his [ABRABANEL, ABARBANEL, or AVRAVANEL, (Isaac)] on all the Old Testament, which is pretty scarce: he there principally adheres to the literal sense; and his style is clear, but a little diffuse. His other works are, A Treatise on the Creation of the World; in which he refused Aristotle, who imagined that the world was eternal: A Treatise on the explication of the prophecies relating to the Messiah, against the Christians: A book concerning articles of Faith; and some others less sought after. (EB I, 1797: 22)
Anogher one of those older writers against whom Kant must have been arguing.
ABRACADABRA, a magical word, recommended by Serenus Samonicus as an antidote against agues and several other diseases. It was to be written upon a piece of paper as many times as the word contains letters, omitting the last letter of the former every time, as in the margin [IMG], and repeated in the same order; and then suspended about the neck by a linen thread. Abracadabra was the name of a god worshipped by the Syrians; so wearing his name was a sort of invocation of his aid; a practice which, though not more useful, yet was less irrational, than is the equally heathenish practice among those who call themselves Christians, of wearing various things, in expectation of their operating by a Sympathy, whose parents were Ignorance and Superstition. (EB I, 1797: 22)
Idea for a minimalist halloween costume.
ABRASAX, or ABRAXAS, the supreme god of the Basilidian heretics. It is a mystical word, composed of the Greek numerals, α, β, ρ, α, ξ, α, ς, which together make up the number CCCLKV. For Basilides taught, that there were 365 heavens between the earth and the empyrean; each of which heavens had its angel or intelligence, which created it; each of which angels likewise [|] was created by the angel next above it; thus ascending by a scale to the supreme Being, or first Creator. The Basilidians used the word Abraxas by way of charm or amulet. (EB I, 1797: 23-24)
Nice little piece of symbolism.
ABRIDGEMENT, in literature, a term signifying the reduction of a book into a smaller compass. The art of conveying much sentiment in few words, is the happiest talent an author can be possessed of. This talent is peculiarly necessary in the present state of literature; for many writers have acquired the dexterity of spreading a few tritical thoughts over several hundred pages. When an author hits upon a thought that pleases him, he is apt to dwell upon it, to view it in different lights, to force it in improperly, or upon the slightest relations. Though this may be pleasnat to the writers, it tires and vexes the reader. There is another great source of diffusion in composition. It is a capital object with an author, whatever be the subject, to give vent to all his best thoughts. When he finds a proper place for any of them, he is peculiarly happy. But, rather than sacrifice a thought he is fond of, he forces it in by way of digression, or superfluous illustration. If none of these expedients answer his purpose, he has recourse to the margin, a very convenient apartment for all manner of pedantry and impertinence. There is not an author, however correct, but is more or less faulty in this respect. An abridger, however, is not subject to these temptations. The thoughts are not his own; he views them in a cooler and less affectionate manner; he discovers an impropriety in some, a vanity in others, and a want of utility in many. His business, therefore, is to retretch superfluities, digressions, quotations, pedantry, &c. and to lay before the public only what is really useful. This is by no means an easy employment: To abridge some books, requires talents equal, if not superior, to those of the author. The facts, manner, spirit, and reasoning, must be preserved; nothing essential, either in argument or illustration, ought to be omitted. The difficulty of the task is the principal reason why we have so few good abridgements: Wynne's abridgement of Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding, is, perhaps, the only unexceptionable one in our language. (EB I, 1797: 24)
Several good ideas in one paragraph.
Abridging is peculiarly useful in taking the substance of what is delivered by Professors, &c. It is impossible, even with the assistance of short-hand, to take down, verbatim, what is said by a public speaker. Besides, although it were practicable, such a talent would be of little use. Every public speaker has circumlocutions, redundancies, lumber, which deserve not to be copied. All that is really useful may be comprehended in a short compass. If the plan of the discourse, and arguments employed in support of the different branches, be taken down, you have the whole. These you may afterwards extend in the form of a discourse dressed in your own language. (EB I, 1797: 25)
This is very true. Natural speech is very redundant. A straight transcription of any lecture reads like a bunch of nonsense.
Abrogation stands opposed to rogation: it is distinguished from derogation, which implies the taking away only some part of a law; from subrogation, which denotes the adding a clause to it; from obrogation, which implies the limiting or restraining it; from dispensation, which only sets it aside in a particular instance; and from antiquation, which is the refusing to pass a law. (EB I, 1797: 25)
Thus "derogatory" implies taking away, diminishing.
ABSOLUTE, in a general sense, something that stands free or independent. ABSOLUTE is more particularly understood of a being or thing which does not proceed from any cause, or does not subsist by virtue of any other being, considered as its cause; in which sense, God alone is absolute. Absolute, in this sense, is synonymous with independent, and stands opposed to dependent. (EB I, 1797: 27)
Knew about independence but not causelessness.
(EB I, 1797: 27)
The archaic long s really takes some getting used to.
The Roman ladies, in the first ages of the republic, were all enjoined to be abstemious; and that it might appear, by their breath, whether or no they kept up to the injunction, it was one of the laws of the Roman civility, that they should kiss their friends and relations whenever they accosted them. (EB I, 1797: 28)
So that's why people from Latin cultures kiss so frequently?
Though it is no improbable opinion, that the air itself may furnish something for nutrients. It is certain, there are substances of all kinds, animal, vegetable, &c. floating in the atmosphere, which must be continually taken in by respiration. (EB I, 1797: 29)
"Elsb õhust ja armastusest" apparently a literal meaning. That the air does not provide nutrients, if oxygen is not considered a nutrient, must now be a certainty.
ABSTRACT, in a general sense, any thing separated from something else. ABSTRACt Idea, in metaphysics, is a partial idea of a complex object, limited to one or more of the component parts or properties, laying aside or abstracting from the rest. Thus, in viewing an object with the eye, or recollecting it in the mind, we can easily abstract from some of its parts or properties, and attach ourselves to others: we can attend to the redness of a cherry, without regard to its figure, taste, or consistence. (EB I, 1797: 29)
So not simply partial (vs concrete, whole) but partialled or partialized (unwellformedness on my part).
ABSTRACt Numbers, are assemblages of units, considered in themselves without denoting any particular and determined particulars. Thus 6 is an abstract number, when not applied to any thing; but, if we say 6 feet, 6 becomes a concrete number. (EB I, 1797: 29)
Good example.
ABSTRACTION, in metaphysics, the operation of the mind when occupied by abstract ideas. A large oak fixes our attention, and abstracts us from the shrubs that surround it. In the same manner, a beautiful woman in a crowd, abstract our thoughts, and engrosses our attention solely to herself. These are examples of real abstraction: when these, or any others of a similar kind, are recalled to the mind after the objects themselves are removed from our fight, they form what is called abstract ideas, or the mind is said to be employed in abstract ideas. (EB I, 1797: 29)
A natural connection with "meelelahutus" (entertainment), literally, the division or separation of mind.
ABSTRUSE, something deep, hidden, concealed, or far removed from common apprehensions, and therefore not easily understood; in opposition to what is obvious and palpable. Thus metaphysics is an abstruse science; and the doctrine of fluxions, and the method de maximis et minimis, are abstruse points of knowledge. (EB I, 1797: 29)
One of my favorite words, along with obnubilation or making abstruse.
ABUNDANT NUMBER, in arithmetic, is a number, the sum of whose aliquot parts is greater than the number itself. Thus the aliquot parts of 12, being 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6, they make, when added together, 16. An abundant number is opposed to a deficient number, or that which is greater than all its aliquot parts taken together; as 14, whose aliquot parts are, 1, 2, and 7, which make no more than ten: and to a perfect number, or one to which its aliquot parts are equal, as 6, whose aliquot parts are 1, 2, and 3. (EB I, 1797: 30)
Define:aliquot - a portion of a larger whole, especially a sample taken for chemical analysis or other treatment.
ABUNDANTIA, a heather divinity, represented in ancient monuments under the figure of a woman with a pleasing aspect, crowned with garlands of flowers, pouring all sorts of fruit out of a horn which she holds in her right hand, and scattering grain with her left, taken promiscuously from a sheaf of corn. On a medal of Trajan, she is represented with two cornucopiæ. (EB I, 1797: 30)
A familiar figure from art history. A pre-Madonna.
ABUSE, an irregular use of a thing, or the introducing something contrary to the true intention thereof. In grammar, to apply a word abusively, or in an abusive sense, is to misapply or pervert its meaning. - A permutation of benefices, without the consent of the bishop, is termed abusive, and consequently null. (EB I, 1797: 30)
Väärkohtlemine, väärkasutus.
Their [Abyssinian] males marry about ten years old, and their females younger. Their marriage tie is so loose, that they part whenever they find that they cannot live agreeably together. (EB I, 1797: 32)
Phraseology: agreeableness.
In most of the towns the houses are separated by hedges, which are always green, and mixed with flowers and fruit-trees at a certain distance from each other, which affords an agreeable prospect. (EB I, 1797: 32)
Same.
The habit of persons of quality is a fine silken vest, or fine cotton, with a kind of scarf. The citizens have the same habit, only coarser. The common people have nothing but a pair of cotton drawers, and a scarf which covers the rest of their body. (EB I, 1797: 32)
The clothes of larger people (quality denoting size, quantity amount), the assumption being that the richer or more prosperous people are also the more sizeable or taller than the poor.
Vanity and precipitanceare the great sources of scepticism: hurried on by these, instead of attending to the cool and deliberate principles recommended by the academy, several of our modern philosophers have plunged themselves into an absurd and ridiculous kind of scepticism. They pretend to discredit subjects that are plain, simple, and easily comprehended; but give preremptory and decisive judgments upon things that evidently exceed the limits of our capacity. (EB I, 1797: 38)
Phraseology: vanity.
Mr Hume has gone a step further, and questioned even the existence of ideas; but at the same time has not hesitated to give determined opinions with regard to eternity, providence, and a future state, miraculous interpositions of the Deity, &c. subjects far above the reach of our faculties. (EB I, 1797: 38)
Pretty much Kant's critique of Hume.
ACADEMY, among the moderns, is most commonly used to signify a SOCIETY of leraned men, established for the improvement of any art or science, and generally under the protection of a prince. (EB I, 1797: 39)
So approximately what Jakobson called a "circle", now that I think about it, probably with reference to the Pythagorean half-circle.
COSMOGRAPHICAL ACADEMIES; as that at Venice, called the Argonauts. This was instituted at the solicitation of F. Coronelli, for the improvement of geographical knowledge. (EB I, 1797: 39)
What does this word even mean?
Accordingly Mr Colbert, having conferred with those who were at that time most celebrated for their learning, resolved to form a society of such persons as were conversant in natural philosophy and mathematics, to join to them other persons skilled in history and other branches of erudition, along with those who were entirely engaged in what are called the Belles Lettres, grammar, eloquence, and poetry. (EB I, 1797: 40)
In some sense a precursor to semiotics, then.
Besides most of the politer wits of both sexes in Italy, this academy comprehends many princes, cardinals, and other ecclesiastics; and, to avoid disputes about pre-eminence, all appear masked after the manner of Arcadian shepherds. (EB I, 1797: 45)
Eyes Wide Shut?
ACATALEPSY, signifies the impossibility of comprehending something. - The distinguishing tenet of the Pyrrhonists was their asserting an absolute acatalepsy in regard to every thing. (EB I, 1797: 49)
Arusaamatu.
ACCA (St), bishop of Hagustaldt, or Hexam, in Northumberland, succeeded Wilfried in that see in 709. He ornamented his cathedral in a most magnificent manner: he furnished it also with plate and holy vestments; and erected a noble library, consisting chiefly of ecclesiastical learning, and a large collection of the lives of the saints, which he was at great pains to procure. (EB I, 1797: 50)
As opposed to very rude libraries.
ACCELERATION, in mechanics, the increase of velocity in a moving body. Accelerated motion is that which continually receives fresh accessions of velocity. Acceleration stands directly opposed to retardation, which denotes a diminution of velocity. (EB I, 1797: 50)
I wonder if the etymology comes from the suddenly blooded shovel or the horseback guard regiment.
ACCENT, in reading or speaking, is inflection of the voice, which gives to each syllable of a word its due pitch in respect of height or lowness. The word is originally Latin, accentus: a compound of ad, to; and cano, to sing. Accentus, quase adcantus, or juxta cantum. In this sense, accent is synonymous with the Greek τονος; the Latin tenor, or tonor; and the Hebrew טעם, gustus, taste. (EB I, 1797: 51)
Nowadays it implies foreign affectation.
Where the principal is pardoned without attainder, the accessory cannot be arraigned; it being a maxim in law, Ubi non est principalis, non protest esse accessorius: but if the principal be pardoned, or have his clergy after attainer, the accessory shall be arraigned; [...] (EB I, 1797: 53)
Haven't seen either of these words before.
ACCIAIOLI (Donata), a man famous for his learning and the honourable employments he possesed in Florence his native country, in the 15th century. He wrote, A Latin translation of some of Plutarch's Lives; Commentaries on Aristotle's Ethics and Politics; and the Life of Charlemagne. (EB I, 1797: 53)
Noting this because my desire to read Aristotle has been on the rise.
ACCIDENT, among logicians, is used in a threefold sense. 1. Whatever does not assentially belong to a thing; as the clothes a man wears, or the money in his pocket. 2. Such properties in any subject as are not essential to it; thus whiteness in paper is an accidental quality. 3. In opposition to substance, all qualities whatever are called accidents; as sweetness, softness, &c. (EB I, 1797: 53)
A serviceable illustration.
ACCIDENT, in grammar, implies a property attached to a word, without entering into its essential definition; for every word, notwithstanding its signification, will be either primitive, derivative, simple, or compound, which are the accidents of words. A word is said to be primitive, when it is taken from no other word in the language in which it is used: thus heaven, king, good, are primitive words. It is said to be derivative, when it is taken from some other word: thus heavenly, kingdom, goodness, &c. are derivatives. A simple word is easily distinguished from a compound: thus just, justice, are simple words; unjust, injustice, are compound: res is a simple word, as well as publica; but respublica is a compound. Besides these accidents, which are common to all sorts of words, each particular species has its accidents: thus the accidents of the noun substantive are the gender, declension, and number; and the adjective has another accident, namely, the comparison. (EB I, 1797: 53)
Could turn useful in delineating the etymologies of "phatic".
ACCISMUS, denotes a feigned refusal of something which a person earnestly desires. The word is Latin; or rather Greek, αχχισμος; supposed to be formed from Acco, the name fo a foolish old woman noted in antiquity for an affectation of this kind. (EB I, 1797: 54)
I recall instances when I was guilty of this.
We do not know the name of this piece of Accius's, but the titles of several of his tragedies are mentioned by various authors. He wrote on the most celebrated stories which had been represented on the Athenian stage; as Andromache, Andromeda, Atreus, Clytemnestra, Medea, Meleager, Philocletes, [|] the civil wars of Thebes, Tereus, the Troades, &c. (EB I, 1797: 54-55)
A list to have around just in case.
ACCLAMATION, a confused noise or shout of joy, by which the public express their applause, esteem, or approbation. ACCLAMATION, in a more proper sense, denotes a certain form of words, uttered with extraordinary vehemence, and in a peculiar tone somewhat resembling a song, frequent in the ancient assemblies. Acclamations were usually accompanied with applauses, with which they are sometimes confounded: though they ought to be distinguished; as acclamation was given by the voice, applause by the hands; add, that acclamation was also bestowed on persons absent, applause only on those present. Acclamation was also given by women, whereas applause seems to have been confined to men. (EB I, 1797: 55)
Some additional details for ancient public gestures and acclamations.
We meet with loud acclamations, musical, and rythmical acclamations; acclamations of joy and respect, and even of reproach and contumely. (EB I, 1797: 55)
Define:contumely - insolent or insulting language or treatment, "the Church should not be exposed to gossip and contumely".
The former, wherein words of happy omen were used, were also called, Laudationes, et bona vota, or good wishes; the latter, Execrationes et convicia. Suetonius furnishes an instance of this last kind in the Roman senate, on occasion of teh decree for demolishing the statues of Domitian, when the fathers, as the historian represents it, could not refrain from contumelious acclamations of the deceased. (EB I, 1797: 55)
Oh, so like Trump and McCain. As a rule of thumb, don't speak ill of the recently deceased.
The acclamations wherewith the spectators honoured the victories of the athletæ, were a natural consequence of the impetuous motions which attended the gymnastic games. The cries and acclamations of the people sometimes expressing their compassion and joy, sometimes their horror and disgust, are strongly painted by different poets and orators. (EB I, 1797: 56)
Sympathy and antipathy.
ACCORD, in painting, is the harmony that reigns among the lights and shades of a picture. (EB I, 1797: 57)
I've lately made frequent use of this word so a definition is in order.
ACCORDS (Staphen Tabourot, seigneur des), advocate in the parliament of Dijon in France, and king's advocate in the bailiwic and chancery of that city, born in the year 1549. He was a man of genius and learning; but too much addicted to tristes, as appears from his piece, intitled, "Les Bigarrures," printed at Paris in 1582. (EB I, 1797: 57)
The same could be said of Malinowski.
The lordship of Accords is an imaginary fief or title from the device of his ancestors, which was a drum, with the motto, à tous accords, "chiming with all." (EB I, 1797: 57)
Accord - chiming in harmony.
ACCOUTREMENT, an old term, applied to the furniture of a soldier, knight, or gentleman. (EB I, 1797: 58)
Vaguely still in use, though with a broader meaning, I imagine.
ACCUBATION, a posture of the body, between sitting and lying. The word comes from the Latin accubare, compounded of ad, to, and cubo, I lie down. Accubation, or Accubitus, was the table-posture of the Greeks and Romans; whence we find the words particularly used for the lying, or rather (as we call it) sitting, down to meat. The Greeks introduced this posture. The Romans, during the frugal ages of the republic, were strangers to it: but as luxury got footing, this posture came to be adopted, at least by the men; for as to women, it was reputed an indecency in them to lie down among the men: though, afterwards, this too was got over. But children did not lie down, nor servants, nor soldiers, nor persons of meaner condition; [...] (EB I, 1797: 58)
They say this is most accommodating posture for the spine.
ACCUBITOR, an ancient officer of the emperors of Constantinople, whose business was to lie near the emperor. He was the head of the youth of the bedchamber, and had the cubicularius and procubitor under him. (EB I, 1797: 58)
The imperial pimp. An ancient Epstein.
Writers on politics treat of the benefit and the inconvenience of public accusations. Various arguments are alleged, both for the encouragement and discouragement of accusations against great men. Nothing, according to Machiavel, tends more to the preservation of a state, than frequent accusations of persons trusted with the administration of public affairs. (EB I, 1797: 58)
Machiavelli would, of course, hold such a view.
Ovid, speaking of the palace of the sun, says, Materiem superabat opus, The work surpassed the materials. Here materiem has the accusative termination; because it determines the action of the verb superabat. (EB I, 1797: 59)
Good expression, something along the lines of the whole being greater than its parts.
ACEPHALI, or ACEPHALITÆ, a term applied to several sects who refused to follow some noted leader. Thus the persons who refused to follow either John of Antioch, or St Cyril, in a dispute that happened in the council of Ephesus, were termed Acephali, without a head or leader. Such bishops, also, as were exempt from the jurisdiction and discipline of their patriarch, were styled Acephali. (EB I, 1797: 59)
An ecclesiastic variety of anarchism, in the strict sense of the term.
In spring the plants will appear, and make a shoot of about a foot and a half by the autumn following, if the ground of the seminary be tolerably good, and they are kept free from weeds. (EB I, 1797: 61)
Seminar on kasvulava.
These discouragements to vice might seem to bespeak a moral and virtuous people: yet all travellers agree in representing the Achenese as one of the most dishonest and flagitious nations of the East. (EB I, 1797: 65)
Define:flagitious - (of a person or their actions) criminal; villainous.
It was formerly used in medicine; but though it may still have a place in some dispensatories, no physician of any note expects any virtue from it, or ever prescribes it. (EB I, 1797: 66)
Doctors and herbal medicines. Achillea millefolium.
ACHILLEID, ACHILLEIS, a celebrated poem of Statius, in which that author proposed to deliver the whole life and exploits of Achilles; but being prevented by death, he has only treated of the infancy and education of his hero. (EB I, 1797: 67)
That pesky bugger, death.
Jovius, who knew Achillini, and heard his lectures, says, that he was a man of such exceeding simplicity, and so unacquainted with address and flattery, that he was a laughing-stock to the pert and saucy young scholars, although esteemed on account of his learning. (EB I, 1797: 67)
Kiidusõnapuudulikkus.
ACHILLINI (Claudius), grandson of the former, read lectures at Bologna, Ferrara, and Parma; where he was reputed a great philosopher, a learned divine, an excellent lawyer, an eloquent orator, a good mathematician, and an elegant poet. (EB I, 1797: 67)
And an accomplished violinist, an excellent troubadour, a prized lensmaker and a valued customer.
It was adorned with a very large forum, with beautiful porticos, a most elegant prytaneum, a spacious senate-house, and a superb temple of Jupiter Olympius. (EB I, 1797: 68)
Further furnished by a large screen TV, an excellent porterpotty and a fridge full of name brand beverages.
A little piece, printed in 1595, under the title of Mulieres non esse homines, "That women were not of the human species," was falsely ascribed to him. But the fact was, that Acidalius happening to meet with the manuscript, and thinking it very whimsical, transcribed it, and gave it to the bookseller, who printed it. (EB I, 1797: 69)
Whimsical.
The late discoveries concerning air of different kinds have suggested a new theory, first published by M. Lavoisier, and strenuous maintained by the French chemists, viz. That the acid principle is contained in the air; and, according as it combines itself with different substances, forms acids of different denominations. (EB I, 1797: 70)
Luls, the paradigm that simply dropped away soon after Newton. // Not so funny some hundred pages later when the "scientific" portions of the encyclopedia go on and on about phlogisticated and dephlogisticated air.
These cannot here be detailed; but his conclusions from the whole are, That "dephlogisticated air enters as a constituent part into the composition of several acids, particularly the phosphoric, vitriolic, and nitrous; that this pure and highly respirable air is the constitutive principle of acidity common to all acids; and that the difference by which they are distinguished from each other is produced by the union of one or more principles besides this air, so as to constitute the particular form under which each acid appears." (EB I, 1797: 70)
"Constitutive principle" older than I thought.
To obviate an objection that the quantity of fixed air thus obtained is too small to deserve to be ranked among the constituent parts of the nitrous acid. (EB I, 1797: 71)
Define:obviate - avoid or prevent (something undesirable).
The animal acids are, the microsmic or acid of urine, and that of bones, both of which are also called the phosphoric, though this might be accounted a vegetable acid, as it is procured by distilling mustard and some other vegetables by a violent fire. Besides these, there are the acids of ants, wasps, bees, silk-worms, milk, &c. (EB I, 1797: 75)
Those are some funny acids.
ACIDUM pingue, an imaginary acid, which some German chemists supposed to be contained in fire, and by combining with alkalis, lime, &c. to give them their caustic properties; an effect which is found certainly to depend on the loss of their fixed air. (EB I, 1797: 75)
Why is everything chemical acidic in this era?
ACIS, in fabulous history, the son of Faunus and Simetheis, was a beautiful shepherd of Sicily, who being beloved by Galatea, Polyphemus the giant was so enraged, that he dashed out his brains against a rock; after which Galatea turned him into a river, which was called by his name. (EB I, 1797: 75)
Gurl yasss history.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT, in a general sense, is a person's owning or confessing a thing; but, more particularly, is the expression of gratitude for a favour. (EB I, 1797: 76)
Acknowledgment is a response.
ACOEMETÆ, or ACOEMETI, in church-history; or, Men who lived without sleep: A set of monks who chanted the divine service night and day in their places of worship. They divided themselves into three bodies, who alternately succeeded one another, so that their churches were never silent. This practice they founded upon the precept, Pray without ceasing. They flourished in the east about the middle of the 5th century. There are a kind of acoemeti still subsisting in the Roman church, viz. the religious of the holy sacrament, who keep up a perpetual adoration, some one or other fo them praying before the holy sacrament day and night. (EB I, 1797: 76)
What a life.
ACONTIUS (James), a philosopher, civilian, and divine, born at Trent in the 16th century: he embraced the reformed religion; and, coming into England in the reign of queen Elisabeth, was much honoured by her, which he acknowledges in a book dedicated to that queen. This work is his celebrated Collection of the Strategems of Satan, which has been so often translated, and borne so many editions. (EB I, 1797: 78)
Sounds naughty.
ACOUSTIC Vessels, in the ancient theatres, were a kind of vessels, made a brass, shaped in the bell fashion, which being of all tones within the pitch of the voice or even of instruments, rendered the sounds more audible, so that the actors could be heard through all parts of theatres, which were even 400 feet in diameter. (EB I, 1797: 78)
Lacking loudspeakers, they played human speech on brass instruments?
The Science of ACOUSTICS INSTRUCTS us in the nature of sound. It is divided by some writers into Dacoustics, which explains the properties of those sounds that come directly from the sonorous body to the ear; and Catacoustics, which treats of reflected sounds: but such distinction does not appear to be of any real utility. (EB I, 1797: 78-79)
Katakombide katakustika.
To explain their progress therefore through water, a second theory must be formed: so that two theories must be made to explain a similar effect; which is contrary to the simplicity of true philosophy, for it is contrary to the simplicity of nature. (EB I, 1797: 80)
Before the theory of evolution, nature was thought simple and elegant, rather than complex and wasteful.
ACQUEST, or ACQUISt, in law, signifies goods got by purchase or donation. (EB I, 1797: 92)
So the opposite of a conquest?
ACRASIA, among physicians, implies the predominancy of one quality above another, either with regard to artificial mixtures, or the humours of the human body. The word is Greek, and compounded of α, priv. and χεροννυμι, to mix; q.d. not mixed in a just proportion. (EB I, 1797: 93)
A term that could serve hierarchical functionalism, implying the predominance of a single function over all the rest.
ACRE, the universal measure of land in Britain. The word (formed from the Saxon acher, or the German aker, a field), did not originally signify a determined quantity of land, but any open ground, especially a wide champaign; and in this antique sense it seems to be preserved in the names of places, as Castle-acre, West-acre, &c. (EB I, 1797: 94)
A wild what?
ACROAMATIC, or ACROATIC, in general, denotes a thing sublime, profound, or abstruse.
ACROAMATICI, a denomination given the disciples or followers of Aristotle, &c. who were admitted into the secrets of the inner or acroamatic philosophy.
ACROATIC. Aristotle's lectures to his disciples were of two kinds, exoteric and acroatic. The acroatic were those to which only his own disciples and intimate frinds were admitted; whereas the exoteric were public, and open to all. But there are other differences. The acroatic were set apart for the higher and more abstruse subjects; the exoteric were employed in rhetorical and civil speculations. Again, the acroatics were more subtile and exact, evidence and demonstration being here aimed ta; the exoteric chiefly aimed at the probable and plausible. The former were the subject of the mornings exercises in the Lyceum, the latter of the evenings. Add, that the exoterics were published: whereas the acroatics were kept secret; being either entirely concealed; or, if they were published, it was in such obscure terms, that few but his own disciples could be the wiser for them. Hence, when Alexander complained of his preceptor for publishing his acroatics, and thus revealing what should have been reserved to his disciples, Aristotle answered, that they were made public and not public; for that none who had not heard them explained by the author viva voce, would understand them. (EB I, 1797: 95)
Reminiscent of the Pythagorean distiontion between mathemati and acusmati.
ACROSTIC, in poetcy, a kind of poetical composition, disposed in such a manner, that the initial letters of the verses form the name of some person, kingdom, place, motto &c. The word is compounded of the Greek αχρο, extremity, and αλιχο, verse. The acrostic is considered by the critics as a species of false wit, and is therefore very little regarded by the moderns. (EB I, 1797: 96)
The stuff of many 4chan greentexts.
Among ancient physicians, it signified the larger extremities of the body, as the head, hands, and feet. It has also been used for the tips of the fingers, and sometimes for the eminences or processes of bones. (EB I, 1797: 97)
What is a process?
ACT, in logic, is particularly understood of an operation of the human mind. Thus to discern an examine, are acts of the understanding; to judge and affirm, are acts of the will. There are voluntary and spontaneous acts; the former are produced by the operation of the soul, the latter without its privity or participation. (EB I, 1797: 97)
Evidently Clay's "discernment" is volitional.
The prisoners being thus in the hands of the civil magistrate, are presently loaded with chains, are carried first to the secular goal, and from thence in an hour or two brought before the civil judge; who, after asking in what religion they intend to die, pronounces sentence, on such as declare they die in the communion of the church of Rome, that they shall be first strangled, and then burnt to ashes; on such as die in any other faith, that they burnt alive. (EB I, 1797: 97)
This treatment of heretics is clearly all very Christlike. Jesus surelt wanted those who believed in him differently than the church required to be strangled before burning, and those who did not believe in him to be burnt alive.
ACT, in dramatic poetry, signifies a certain division, or part, of a play, designed to give some respite both to the actors and spectators. The Romans were the first who divided their theatrical pieces into acts; for no such divisions appear in the works of the first dramatic poets. Their pieces indeed consisted of several parts or divisions, which they called protasis, epitasis, catastasis, and catastrophe; but these divisions were not marked by any real interruptions on the theatre. Nor does Aristotle mention any thing of acts in his Art of Poetry. But, in the time of Horace, all regular and finished pieces were divided into five acts. (EB I, 1797: 97)
Could these terms apply to modern three-act model films?
Under Marcus Antonius, this was carried further: persons were obliged to notify the births of their children, with their names and surnames, the day, consul, and whether legitimate or spurious, to the præfects of the Ærarium Saturni, to be entered in the public acts; though before this time the births of persons of quality appear thus to have been registered. (EB I, 1797: 98)
Spurious = illegitimate.
F. Germon will have the greater part of the acts of former ages to be spurious. (EB I, 1797: 98)
Spurious = forgery, falsification.
There were several Spurious ACTS OF THE APOSTLES; particularly, I. Acts, supposed to be written by Abdias, the pretended bishop of Babylon, who gave out that he was ordained bishop by the apostles themselves who they were upon their journey into Persia. II. The Acts of St Peter: this book came originally from the school of the Ebionites. III. The Acts of St Paul, which is entirely lost. Eusebius, who has seen it, pronounces it of no authority. IV. The Acts of St John the Evangelist; a book made use of by the Encratites, Manichæans, the Priscillianists. V. The Acts of St Andrew; received by the Manichæans, Encratites, and Apotactics. VI. The Acts of St Thomas the Apostle; received particularly by the Manichæans. VII. The Acts of St Philip. This book the Gnostics made use of. VIII. The Acts of St Matthias. (EB I, 1797: 99)
Non-canonical testaments.
Act of Parliament is a positive law, consisting of two parts, the words of the act, and its true sense and meaning; which being joined, make the law. The words of acts of parliament should be taken in a lawful sense. (EB I, 1797: 99)
Cf. Austin, "sense and reference". Surprised to see such a formulation so early.
Upon the non-appearance of either party, the defaulter lost his cause; - if they both appeared, they were said se stetisse; and then the plaintiff proceeded litem sive actionem intendere, i.e. to prefer his suit, which was done in a set form of words, varying according to the difference of the actions. (EB I, 1797: 100)
Set phrases!
ACTION, in a general sense, implies nearly the same thing with ACT. - Grammarians, however, observe some distinction between action and act; the former being generally restricted to the common or ordinary transactions, whereas the latter is used to express those which are remarkable. Thus, we say it is a good action to comfort the unhappy; it is a generous act to deprive ourselves of what is necessary, for their sake. The wise man proposes to himself an honest end in all his actions; a prince ought to mark every day of his life with some act of greatness. The abbé Girard makes a further distinction between the words action and act. The former, according to him, has more relation to the power that acts than the latter; whereas the latter has more relation to the effect produced than the former: and hence the one is properly the attribute of the other. Thus we may properly say, "Be sure to preserve a presence of mind in all your actions; and take care that they be all acts of equity." (EB I, 1797: 101)
Something I'm intuitively conscious of. Now what's the exact difference between, say, behaviour and conduct?
Quantity of Action, a name given by M. de Maupertuis, in the Memoirs of the Parisian Academy of Sciences for 1744, and those of Berlin for 1746, to the product of the mass of the body by the space which it runs through, and by its celerity. (EB I, 1797: 101)
Always lovely to meet this word in the wild.
ACTION, in ethics, denotes the external signs or expressions of the sentiments of a moral agent. (EB I, 1797: 101)
Loaded.
The vital functions, or actions, are those which are absolutely necessary to life, and without which there is no life, as the action of the heart, lungs, and arteries. On the action and reaction of the solids and fluids on each other, depend the vital functions. The pulse and respiration aret he external signs of life. Vital diseases are all those which hinder the influx of the venous blood into the cavities of the heart, and the expulsion of the arterial blood from the same. - The natural functions are those which are instrumental in repairing the several losses which the body sustains; for life is destructive of itself, its very offices occasioning a perpetual waste. The manducation of food, the deglutition and digestion thereof, also the separation and distribution of the chyle and extrementitious parts, &c. are under the head of natural functions, as by these our aliment is converted into our nature. They are necessary to the continuance of our bodies. - The animal functions are those which we perform at will, as muscular motion, and all the voluntary actions of the body: they are those which constitute the senses of touch, taste, smell, fight, hearing; perception, reasoning, imagination, memory, judgment, affections of the mind. Without any, or all of them, a man may live, but not so comfortably as with them. (EB I, 1797: 101)
An archaic system of needs/motivation, in a sense. Interesting that reason etc are animal functions.
ACTIVITY, in general, denotes the power of acting; or the active faculty.
Sphere of ACTIVITY, the whole space in which the virtue, power, or influence, of any object, is exerted. (EB I, 1797: 102)
Hence semiosphere, the space of sign-activity.
ACTUAL, something that is real and effective, or that exists truly and absolutely. Thus philosophers use the terms actual heat, actual cold, &c. in opposition to virtual or potential. (EB I, 1797: 103)
Odd seeing this word used in thr 18th century.
ACTUS Intervicenalis, a space of ground four feet in breadth, left between the lands as a path or way. (EB I, 1797: 103)
The absence of which has annoyed me to no end in Age of Empires.
ADAGE, a proverb, or short sentence, containing some wise observation or popular saying. Erasmus has made a very large and valuable collection of the Greek and Roman adages; and Mr Ray has done the same with regard to the English. We have also Kelly's collection of Scots Proverbs. (EB I, 1797: 104)
Erasmus oli üks esimesi vanasõnade kogujaid?
Nor has the imagination been less indulged concerning the formation of the human species male and female. - It would be endless to recount all the whimsies that have been wrote on this subject; but as Mad. Bourignon has made a considerable figure in the religious, or rather superstitious world, we cannot help inserting some of her opinions concerning the first man, which are peculiarly marvellous. According to the revelations of this lady, Adam before his fall possessed in himself the principles of both sexes, and the virtue or power of producing his like, without the concurrent assistance of woman. The division into two sexes, she imagined, was a consequence of man's sin; and now, she observes, mankind are become so many monsters in nature, being much less perfect in this respect than plants or trees, who are capable of producing their like alone, and without pain or misery. She even imagined, that, being in an ecstasy, she saw the figure of Adam before he fell, with the manner how, by himself, he was capable of procreating other men. (EB I, 1797: 105)
Phraseology with an oddity ("wrote") and the plot of an Ancient Greek play.
ADAMUS, the philosopher's stone is so called by alchemists; they say it is an animal, and that it has carried its invisible Eve in its body, since the moment they were united by the Creator. (EB I, 1797: 107)
Incomprehensible.
In the year 1582, being attacked with a grievous disease, in which the physicians could give him no relief, he happened to take a simple medicine from an old woman, which did him service. The woman, whose name was Alison Pearson, was thereupon charged with witchcraft, and committed to prison, but escaped out of her confinement; however, about four years afterwards, she was again found and burnt for a witch. (EB I, 1797: 107)
No good deed goes unpunished.
A provincial synod was held at St Andrew's in April 1586: the archbishop was here accused and excommunicated: he appealed to the king and the states, but this availed him little; for the mob being excited against him, he durst scarce appear in public. (EB I, 1797: 107)
Küsimärk.
His life was exemplary; his conversation pleasing, and greatly instructive; and his behaviour as a gentleman, a clergyman, and a neighbour, did honour to the place of his residence. (EB I, 1797: 110)
Both agreeable and instructive. Mahaffy would be pleased.
Lord Halifax replied, somewhat hastily, that he did know such a person, but would not mention him; adding, that long had he seen, with indignation, men of no merit maintained in luxury at the public expense, whilst those of real worth and modesty were suffered to languish in obscurity. (EB I, 1797: 110)
A timeless complaint.
Another death-bed interview, of a more solemn nature, is recorded: Lord Warwick was a young man of very irregular life, and perhaps of loose opinion. (EB I, 1797: 112)
Hey, that's me.
Addison and Mr Temple Stanyan were very intimate. In the familiar conversations which passed between them, they were accustomed freely to dispute each other's opinions. (EB I, 1797: 113)
Phatic trope of familiarity.
ADDITAMENT, something added to another. Thus physicians cal the ingredients added to a medicine already compounded, additaments. (EB I, 1797: 113)
Additives.
ADDITIONS of Mystery, are such as scrivener, painter, mason, and the like. (EB I, 1797: 113)
Semiotician.
ADEPTS, a term among alchemists for those who pretended to have found the panacea or philosophers-stone. (EB I, 1797: 115)
Seems to have lost its ironic connotation, today meaning just "very skilled or proficient at something".
ADFILIATION, a Gothic custom, whereby the children of a former marriage are put upon the same footing with those of the second. This is also called unio prolium, and still retained in some parts of Germany. (EB I, 1797: 115)
Modern norm apparently something that used to require a special term.
ADMINISTRATOR, in Scots law, a person legally impowered to act for another whom the law presumes incapable of acting for himself. Thus tutors or curators, are sometimes styled administrators in law to pupils, minors, or fatuous persons. (EB I, 1797: 117)
This is starting to look like a shifting pattern: intitled → entitled; impowered → empowered.
The Persian manner of Adoration, introduced by Cyrus, was by bending the knee, and falling on the face at the prince's feet, striking the earth with the forehead, and kissing the ground. This ceremony, which the Greeks called πδοσχυνειν, Conon refused to perform to Artaxerxes, and Calisthenes to Alexander the Great, as reputing it impious and unlawful. (EB I, 1797: 122)
Wouldn't have thought it to have this specific of an origin.
He was not immediately allowed to make the habit; but passed some time, by way of trial, in recommending himself to the monks by a strict attention to all their commands. This behaviour, together with the beauty of his person, and prudent conversation, rendered him so acceptable to those religious, that after some time they intreated him to take the habit of the canonical order. (EB I, 1797: 125)
Ilusate silmade eest saab paavstikski.
The primitive Christians practised great austerity during this season. (EB I, 1797: 127)
They didn't go out Christmas shopping?
ADVENTREM INSPICIENDUM, in law, a writ by which a woman is to be searched whether she be with child by a former husband, on her with-holding of lands from the next, failing issue of her own body. (EB I, 1797: 127)
Last part of thr sentence incomprehensible.
The inhabitants seemed mild and cheerful, with little of that wild appearance that savages in general have. They are amost totally devoid of personal activity or genius, and are nearly upon a par with the wretched natives of Terra del Fuego. (EB I, 1797: 128)
Sild and inactive savages. Common tropes of early anthropology.
Their indifference for presents, their general inattention, and want of curiosity, were very remarkable, and testified no acuteness of understanding. (EB I, 1797: 127)
Same. All these characteristics make an appearance in Malinowski's writings.
ADVERSARIA, among the ancients, a book of accounts, not unlike our journals or day-books. It is more particularly used for a kind of common-placebook. See COMMON-PLACE-BOOK. (EB I, 1797: 128)
Heal lapsel mitu nime.
ADVERSATIVE, in grammar, a word expressing some difference between what goes before and what follows it. Thus, in the phrase, he is an honest man, but a great enthusiast, the word bt is an adversative conjunction. (EB I, 1797: 128)
Good to know.
According to the former, a woman is an adulteress who, either being herself married, converses carnally with another man; or being single herself, converses with a man that is married. According to the latter, she is not an adulteress, if she be not herself in the married state, though she converses with a man that is. (EB I, 1797: 128)
A bodily conversation.
Under Justinian, a further mitigation was granted, at least in favour of the wife, who was only to be scourged, lose her dower, and be shut up in a monastery: after two years, the husband was at liberty to take her back again; if he refused, she was shaven, and made a nun for life: But it still remained death in the husband. The reason alleged for this difference is, that the woman is the weaker vessel. (EB I, 1797: 129)
Gentler sex, weaker vessel, what's the diff.
Under Theodosius, women convicted of this crime were punished after a very singular manner, viz. by a public constupration; being locked up in an arrow cell, and forced to admit to their embraces all the men that would offer themselves. To this end, the gallants were to dress themselves on purpose, having several little bells fastened to their clothes, the tinkling of which gave notice to those without of every motion. This custom was again abolished by the same prince. (EB I, 1797: 129)
Brutal.
Among the Mingrelians, according to Chardin, adultery is punished with the forfeiture of a hog, which is usually eaten in good friendship between the gallant, the adulteress, and the cuckold. (EB I, 1797: 129)
Nice expression, dubious content.
In Poland, before Christianity was established, they punished adultery and fornication in a very particular manner: the criminal they carried to the market-place, and there fastened him by the testicles with a nail; laying a razor within his reach, and leaving him under a necessity, either of doing justice upon himself or of perishing in that condition. (EB I, 1797: 130)
Saw: Poland before Christianity.
In Britain, adultery is reckoned a spiritual offence, that is, cognizable by the spiritual courts, where it is punished by fine and penance. (EB I, 1797: 130)
Damaging to the conscience?
As to the moral turpitude of this offence, some have vainly endeavoured to deny or explain it away by various arguments, and even by an appeal to scripture. On the part of the man who solicits the chastity of a married woman, it certainly includes the crime of SEDUCTION, and is attended with mischief still more complicated and extensive: It creates a new sufferer, the injured husband, upon whose simplicity and affection is inflicted a wound the most painful and incurable that human nature knows. The infidelity of the woman is aggravated by cruelty to her children, who are generally involved in their parents shame, and always made unhappy by their quarrel. (EB I, 1797: 130)
Very well put. But I notice that it is gendered, quietly affirming the modern notion that men are jealous of their partner's sexuality and women threatened by their partner's affections finding a new object.
'When they continued asking him,' when they teazed him to speak, he dismissed them with a rebuke, which the impertinent malice of their errand, as well as the secret character of many of them, deserved: 'he that is without sin (that is, this sin) among you, let him first cast a stone at her.' (EB I, 1797: 131)
Rude ill will.
A candidate for the office of an advocate undergoes three several trials: The first is in Latin, upon the civil law and Greek and Roman antiquities; the second, in English, upon the minicipal law of Scotland; and, in the third, he is obliged to defend a Latin thesis, which is impugned by three members of the faculty. Immediately before putting on the gown, the candidate makes a short Latin speech to the lords, and then takes the oaths to the government and de fideli. (EB I, 1797: 132)
Imagine if our universities required trials in both English and Estonian, instead of one of these only.
ADYNAMIA, in medicine, debility, or weakness, from sickness. (EB I, 1797: 134)
Unmoving.
ÆGINA, is fabulous history, the daughter of Æsopus, king of Bæotia, was beloved by Jupiter, who debouched her in the similitude of a lambent flame, and then carried her from Epidaurus to a desart island called Oenope, which afterwards obtained her own name. (EB I, 1797: 136)
Define:lambent - "(of light or fire) glowing, gleaming, or flickering with a soft radiance".
Many authors have overlooked these distinctions for want of going to the sources. (EB I, 1797: 137)
Phraseology.
ÆGYPTILLA, in natural history, the name of a stone described by the ancients, and said, by some authors, to have the remarkable quality of giving water the colour and taste of wine. This seems a very imaginary virtue, as are indeed too many of those in former ages attributed to stones. (EB I, 1797: 139)
Jesus, what is that in your pocket?
He was likewise honoured with the title of Sophist, an appellation in his days given only to men of learning and wisdom. He loved retirement, and devoted himself to study. He greatly admired and studied Plato, Aristotle, Isocrates, Plutarch, Homer, Anacreon, Archilochus, &c. and, though a Roman, gives the preference to the writers of the Greek nation. (EB I, 1797: 139)
Life goals on point. Retire and study.
ÆLURUS, in Egyptian mythology, the deity or god of cats; represented sometimes like a cat, and sometimes like a man with a cat's head. The Egyptians had so superstitious a regard for this animal, that the killing it, whether by accident or design, was punished with death: and Diodorus relates, that, in the time of extreme famine, they chose rather to eat one another than touch these sacred animals. (EB I, 1797: 139)
Don't **** With Cats.
The principal excellency of Virgil is tenderness. His soul was full of sensibility. He must have felt himself all the affecting circumstances in the scenes he describes; and he knew how to touch the heart by a single stroke. (EB I, 1797: 140)
Emotive terminology.
ÆNIGMA, denotes any dark saying, wherein some well-known thing is concealed under obscure language. The word is Greek, αινιγμα, formed of αινιτεσθαι [?], obscure innuere, to hint a thing darkly, and of αινος, an obscure speech or discourse. The popular name is riddle; from the Belgic raeden, or the Saxon araethan, to interpret. Fa. Bouhours, in the memoirs of Trevoux, defines an ænigma, A discourse, or painting, including some hidden meaning, which is proposed to be guessed. (EB I, 1797: 140)
Using difficult language to convry something simple.
It is essential to ænigmas, that the history or fable, under which they are presented, be known to every body; otherwise it will be two ænigmas instead ofone; the first of the history or fable, the second of the sense in which it is to be taken. (EB I, 1797: 141)
Like memes - they don't work witbout knowledge of the source material.
As to the solution of ænigmas, it may be observed, that those expressed by figures are more difficult to explain than those consisting of words, by reason images may signify more things than words can; so that to fix them to a particular sense, we must apply every situation, symbol, &c. and without omitting a circumstance. (EB I, 1797: 141)
1000 words.
Æon, among the followers of Plato, was used to signify any virtue, attribute, or perfection: hence they represented the deity as an assemblage of all possible æons; and call him pleroma, a Greek term signifying fullness. (EB I, 1797: 142)
I recall when I read miscellaneous semiotics papers and this word suddenly started cropping up in successive readings.
ÆQUIMELIUM, in antiquity, a place in Rome, where stood the house of Spurious Melius, who, by largess corrupting the people, affected the supreme power: refusing to appear beforet he dictator Cincinnatus, he was slain by Servilius Ahala, master of the horse; his house was razed to the ground; and the spot on which it stood was called Area Equimelii (Livy). (EB I, 1797: 143)
Is there a connection between the name Spurius and the word spurious?
He gave it the name of gas sylvestre, from the Dutch word ghoast, signifying spirit; and observes, that some bodies resolve themselves almost entirely into it. (EB I, 1797: 148)
Huh. Cars run on ghosts.
He asserts, that it is to the corruption of the aliment, and the gas discharged from it, that we are to attribute wind, and the discharge of it from the bowels. (EB I, 1797: 148)
As a collector of polite phrases about flatulence, I am pleased. Winds discharged from the bowels indeed.
[...] that it is possessed of a strong antiseptic quality, and may be introduced with safety into the intestinal canal, and other parts of the animal œconomy, where common air would have fatal effects; but is mortal if breath into the lungs, &c. (EB I, 1797: 149)
The same Priestly associated with Kant?
It was reserved, however, for Dr Priestly to make the great discovery concerning the nature of our atmosphere; and to inform the world, that it is composed of two fluids; the one absolutely obnoxious, and incapable of supporting animal life for a moment; the other extremely salutary, and capable of preserving animals alive and healthy for a much longer time than the purest air we can meet with. (EB I, 1797: 149)
The same Priestly associated with Kant?
After the publication of Dr Ingenhousz's experiments, it became generally delieved, that the atmosphere was meliorated by the common process of vegetation, and that plants absorbed the phlogistic part as their food, discharging the pure dephlogisticated air as an excrement; which is just the reverse of what happens to animals, who absorb the pure part in respiration, and reject the phlogistic. (EB I, 1797: 152)
The proximate discovery of photosynthesis.
With a view to ascertain this, the large globe being made perfectly clean, and filled with spring-water, he introduced into it a quantity of the fine thread of glass commonly called spun-glass, such as is used for making a brush for cleaning jewels, and an artificial feather sold by Jew pedlars. (EB I, 1797: 155)
Important details of a scientific experiment, the religion, nationality or race of persons furnishing the experimental materials.
Mr Cavallo, however, informs us, that "when an animal is confined in quantity of dephlogisticated air, and is kept therein till it dies, that air is not rendered so bad but that it will still be capable of considerable diminution by nitrous air. (EB I, 1797: 157)
Ladies and gentlemen, natural philosophy.
[...] and I presently found, that the dephlogisticated air had actually been imbibed by the melted iron, in the same manner as inflammable air had been imbibed by the melted calces of metals in my former experiments, however improbable such an absorption might have appeared à priori. (EB I, 1797: 159)
"Before experience" in the wild.
The inner vessel communicated with the copper pipe, and the air was forced out of it by pouring water into the outer vessel; [...] (EB I, 1797: 160)
A superb example of the use of "communication" for the passage of fluids (e.g. channels).
That in the calcination of mercury, this metallic substance absorbs the salubrious part, leaving only the mephitic portion of the air. (EB I, 1797: 164)
Define:salubrious - health-giving; healthy.
To determine the effects of respiration upon air, a live sparrow was placed under a glass receiver, filled with common air and inverted in mercury, containing 31 cubic inches. In a quarter of an hour it became agitated, and in 55 minutes died convulsed. (EB I, 1797: 164)
God damn natural philosophers.
ÆS UXORIUM, in antiquity, a sum paid by bachelors, as a penalty for living single to old age. This tax for not marrying seems to have been first imposed in the year of Rome 350, under the censorship of M. Furius Camillus and M. Posthumus. At the census, or review of the people, each person was asked, Et tu ex anima sententia uxorem habes liberum quærendorum causa? He who had no wife was hereupon fined after a certain rate, called æs uxorium. (EB I, 1797: 212)
Hot diggity, such a thing existed?
In this last action, according to Diodorus Siculus, Aminias, the younger of the three brothers, commanded a squadron of ships, and behaved with so much conduct and bravery, that he sunk the admiral of the Persian fleet, and signalized himself above all the Athenians. (EB I, 1797: 212)
What the hell is conduct as an adjective?
Some affirm, that Æschylus never sat down to compose but when he had drunk liberally. He wrote a great number of tragedies, of which there are but seven remaining: and notwithstanding the sharp censures of some critics, he must be allowed to have been the father of the tragic art. (EB I, 1797: 212)
Oof.
M. Le Fevre has observed, that Æschylus never represented women in love in his tragedies; which, he says, was not suited to his genius; but, in representing a woman transported with fury, he was incomparable. (EB I, 1797: 212)
Understandable, considering the famous scorn that hath the object.
The horse-chesnut, like most other trees, delights most in good fat land; but it will grow exceedingly well on clayey and marley grounds. (EB I, 1797: 214)
I don't think I've ever seen clay as an adjective.
ÆSTIVAL, in a general sense, denotes something connected with, or belonging to, summer. Hence æstival sign, æstival solstice, &c. (EB I, 1797: 215)
Summer festivals.
In effect, æther, being no object of our sense, but the mere work of imagination, brought only upon the stage for the sake of hypothesis, or to solve some phenomenon, real or imaginary; authors take the liberty to modify it how they please. (EB I, 1797: 216)
Do with fictions what you will.
Heat, Sir Isaac Newton observes, is communicated through a vacuum almost as readily as through air: but such communication cannot be without some interjacent body, to act as a medium. (EB I, 1797: 216)
As odd as "inter-contact".
On the summit of mount Ætna, Mr Hamilton observes, that he was sensible of a difficulty in respiration from the too great subtilty of the air, independent of what arose from the sulphureous smoke of the mountain. (EB I, 1797: 219)
Sense and sensibility were evidently once synonymous.
While this lava was issuing in such prodigious quantity, the merchants, whose account is recorded in the Philosophical Transactions, attempted to go up to the mouth itself; but durst not come nearer than a furlong, lest they should have been overwhelmed by a vast pillar of ashes, which to their apprehension exceeded twice the bigness of St Paul's steeple in London, and went up into the air to a far greater height; [...] (EB I, 1797: 222)
Ei julenud (sic) minna lähemale.
AFFECTION, in a general sense, implies an attribute inseparable from its subject. Thus magnitude, figure, weight, &c. are affections of all bodies; and love, fear, hatred, &c. are affections of the mind. (EB I, 1797: 223)
Wow. Affection in an "essential attribute".
AFFECTION, signifying a settled bent of mind toward a particular being or thing, occupies a middle space between disposition on the one hand, and passion on the other. It is distinguishable from Disposition, which being a branch of one's nature, originally, must exist before there can be an opportunity to exert it upon any particular object; whereas Affection can never be original, because, having a special relations to a particular object, it cannot exist till the object have once at least been presented. It is also distinguishable from Passion, which, depending on the real or ideal presence of its object, vanishes with its object: whereas Affection is a lasting connection; and, like other connections, subsists even when we do not think of the person. A familiar example will illustrate this. There may be in one person's mind a disposition to gratitude, which, through want of an object, happens never to be exerted; and which therefore is never discovered even by the person himself. Another, who has the same disposition, meets with a kindly office that makes him grateful to his benefactor: An intimate connection is formed between them, termed affection: which, like other connections, has a permanent existence, though not always in view. The [|] affection, for the most part, lies dormant, till an opportunity offer for exerting it: in that circumstance, it is converted into passion of gratitude; and the opportunity is eagerly seized of testifying gratitude in the warmest manner. (EB I, 1797: 223-224)
Somewhat closer to the modern sense of the word.
AFFINITY, among civilians, implies a relation contracted by marriage; in contradistinction to consanguinity, or relation by blood. - Affinity does not sound any real kinship; it is no more than a kind of fiction, introduced on account of the close relation between husband and wife. It is even said to cease when the cause of it ceases: hence a woman who is not capable of being a witness for her husband's brother during his lifetime, is allowed for a witness when a widow, by reason the affinity is dissolved. Yet with regard to the contracting marriage, affinity is not dissolved by death, though it be in every thing else. (EB I, 1797: 224)
Again, wow. Would not have thought of these terms in this connection.
AFFINITY is also used to denote conformity or agreement: Thus we say, the affinity of languages, the affinity of words, the affinity of sounds, &c. (EB I, 1797: 224)
More familiar usage.
AFFIRMATIVE, in grammar. Authors distinguish affirmative particles; such is, yes. - The term affirmative is sometimes also used substantively. Thus we say, the affirmative is the more probable side of the question: there were so many votes, or voices, for the affirmative. (EB I, 1797: 224)
PC: affirmatio and consent, "Yes, Socrates, certainly."
AFFRAY, or AFFRAYMENT, in law, formerly signified the crime of affrighting other persons, by appearing in unusual armour, brandishing a weapon, &c. but, at present, affray denotes a skirmish or fight between two or more. (EB I, 1797: 225)
Frightening. Scearing.
AFRICA (according to Bochart, from a Punic word, signifying Ears of Corn); one of the four great divisions, by the moderns called quarters, of the world, and one of the three called by the Greeks Ηπειροι, or continents. By them it was also called Libya. (EB I, 1797: 225)
What do modern etymologies say?
Those called by the ancients the mountains of God, on account of their being subject to perpetual thunder and lightning. Of all these, however, little more is known than their names. (EB I, 1797: 225)
Natural eternal lamps.
AFRICAN COMPANY, a society of merchants, established by King Charles II. for trading to Africa; which trade is now laid open to all his Majesty's subjects, paying 10 per cent. for maintaining the forts. (EB I, 1797: 228)
A tither.
AFTERMATH, in husbandry, signifies the grass which springs or grows up after mowing. (EB I, 1797: 228)
Fresh like the spring morning.
The aga of the Janissaries is an officer of great importance. He is the only person who is allowed to appear before the Grand Signior without his arms across his breast in the posture of a slave. (EB I, 1797: 228)
Huh?
AGAPE, in ecclesiastical history, the love-feast, or feast of charity, in use among the primitive Christians; [|] when a liberal contribution was made by the rich to feed the poor. The word is Greek, and signifies love. St Chrysostom gives the following account of this feast, which he derives from the apostolical practice. He says, "the first Christians had all things in common, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles; but when that equality of possessions ceased, as it did even in the Apostles time, the agape, or love-feast, was substituted in the room of it. Upon certain days, after partaking of the Lord's supper, they met at a common feast; the rich bringing provisions, and the poor who had nothing being invited." It was always attended with receiving the holy sacrament; but there is some difference between the ancient and modern interpreters as to the circumstance of time, viz. Whether this feast was held before or after the communion. (EB I, 1797: 228-229)
So, a half-measure in place of original communism.
This plant has but little smell; is rather dry; and yet, when broiled or stewed, it communicates a good flavour. (EB I, 1797: 229)
Odd use of "communication".
This is the moucho-more of the Russians, Kamtschadales, and Koriacs, who use it as an instrument of intoxication. They sometimes eat it dry, sometimes immersed in a fermented liquor made with the epilobium, which they drink notwithstanding the dreadful effects. They are first seized with convulsions in all their limbs, then with a raving such as attends a burning fever. A thousand phantoms, gay or gloomy (according to their constitutions), present themselves to their imaginations: some dance, others are seized with unspeakable horrors. They personify this mushroom; and, if its effects urge them to suicide, or any dreadful crime, they say they obey its commands. To fit themselves for premeditated assassinations, they take the moucho-more. Such is the fascination of drunkenness among these people, that nothing can induce them to forbear this dreadful potion! (EB I, 1797: 230)
The shamans tipping on fly agaric.
Among the ancient poets, this word was used for the space of thirty years; in which sense, age amounts to much the same with generation. Thus, Nestor is said to have lived three ages when he was 90 years old. (EB I, 1797: 234)
I have soon have lived one age.
AGENDA, among philosophers and divines, signifies the duties which a man lies under an obligation to perform: thus, we meet with the agenda of a Christian, or the duties he ought to perform; in opposition to the credenda, or things he is to believe. (EB I, 1797: 235)
Do and believe. Hence "creed" is an imposition of belief.
AGENT, in a general sense, denotes any active power or cause. Agents are either natural or moral Natural agents are such inanimate bodies as have a [|] power to act upon other bodies in a certain and determinate manner; as, gravity, fire, &c. Moral agents, on the contrary, are rational creatures, capable of regulating their actions by a certain rule. (EB I, 1797: 235-236)
Another parallel with physical and semiotic realities.
The people are called Picentes (Cicero, Livy), distinct from the Picentini on the Tuscan sea, though called by Greek writers Πιχεντινοι. This name is said to be from the bird Picus, under whose conduct they removed from the Sabines, of whom they were a colony. (EB I, 1797: 236)
Something analogous to what the "conductor" of an orchestra does?
Agesilaus would never suffer any picture or sculpture to be made of him, and prohibited it also by his will: this he is supposed to have done from a consciousness of his own deformity; for he was of a short stature, and lame of one foot, so that strangers used to despise him at the first sight. His fame went before him into Egypt, and there they had formed the highest idea of Agesilaus. When he landed in that country, the people ran in crowds to see him: but great was their surprise when they saw an ill-dressed, slovenly, mean-looking little fellow lying upon the grass; they could not forbear laughing, and applied to him the fable of the mountain in labour. He was, however, the first to jest upon his own person; and such was the gaiety of his temper, and the strength with which he bore the roughest exercises, that these quantities made amends for his corporal defects. He was extremely remarkable for plainness and frugality in his dress and way of living. (EB I, 1797: 236)
An epic figure.
AGMEN, in antiquity, properly denotes a Roman army in march: in which sense, it stands contradistinguished from acies, which denoted the army in battle array; though, on some occasions, we find the two words used indifferently for each other. (EB I, 1797: 240)
Indifference much more colourful than interchangeability.
The Greeks call it χγνοσ, chaste; to which has since been added the reduplicative castus, q.d. chaste chaste. (EB I, 1797: 241)
Phatic speech is "reduplicative".
It was famous among the ancients as a specific for the preservation of chastity. The Athenian ladies, who made profession of chastity, lay upon leaves of agnus castus during the feats of Ceres. - Being reputed a cooler, and particularly of the genital parts, it was anciently used in physic to allay those inordinate motions arising from seminal turgescences: but it is out of the present practice. (EB I, 1797: 241)
Probably intentionally difficult, this part of the sentence.
AGORÆUS, in heathen antiquity, an appellation given to such deities as had statues in the market-places; particularly Mercury, whose statue was to be seen in almost every public place. (EB I, 1797: 242)
Forerunners of the market-cross.
The British nobles had at length their sons educated in learning; and they who before had the utmost aversion to the Roman language, now began to study it with great assiduity: they wore likewise the Roman habit; and, as Tacitus observes, they were brought to consider those things as marks of politeness, which were only so many badges of slavery. (EB I, 1797: 243)
Confirmed: habit means clothing not only in an ecclesiastical context.
The Chaldeans, who inhabited the country where agriculture had its birth, carried that valuable art to a degree of excellence unknown in former times. They cultivated their lands with great assiduity, and seem to have found out some means of restoring fertility to an exhausted soil, by having plentiful harvests in succession; on which account they were not obliged, as their predecessors have been, to change their situations, in order to obtain a sufficiency for themselves and their numerous flocks and herds. (EB I, 1797: 244)
Invented the horoscope AND proper farming.
The Athenians, who were the first people that acquired any tincture of politeness, taught the use of corn to the rest of the Greeks. (EB I, 1797: 245)
Nice phrase. What is implied by "tincture", though? A smidgin?
This will be evident to those who read his account of the compost and covered dung-hills, and his judicious observations on the fertilization qualities lodged in salt, street-dirt, and the sullage of streets in great cities, clay, fuller's earth, moorish earths, dung-hills made in layers, fern, hair, calcination of all vegetables, malt-dust, willow-tree earth, soaper's ashes, urine, marle, and broken pilchards. (EB I, 1797: 248)
A pheonomenon of which remain some designated streets in India (it's an old meme but it checks out).
From all this we cannot indeed infer, that putrid air is sweetened by mere earth; but we discover what is perhaps more important, namely, that though earth is the common receptacle of all putrid matters both animal and vegetable, there is a change made on them when in it, which cannot be made either by air or water. Thus, if the carcase of a small animal is left to putrefy in the air, it becomes exceedingly offensive, and continues so from first to last. The same thing happens if it is left to putrefy in water. But, in earth, the case is quite different. After the carcase is consumed, the earth which has imbibed all the putrid steams, instead of exhaling an offensive odour, diffuses an agreeable one; and thus we may see that it is endued with a power no less remarkable than that of attraction [|] or repulsion, and which we may distinguish by the name of transmutation. (EB I, 1797: 251-252)
Sounds like magic, and not at all as if bactria in the soil are having an avid go at the carcass. God I hope they didn't bury spoiled meat and then eat it after having earth "transmute" it with a more agreeable smell.
If we look back 30 years, ploughs of different constructions did not enter even into a dream. (EB I, 1797: 272)
Ei näinud uneski.
When ground is ploughed from the state of nature, and after a competent time is cross-ploughed, the brake is applied with great success, immediately after the cross-ploughing, to roduce the whole to proper tilth. (EB I, 1797: 276)
Ploughing transforms the ground into a social state.
The shares are to penetrate the ground two or three inches, to raise the quicks till the rake I, I, fetches them into the cart H, where a man must be ready with a muck-hook to clear them backward when gathered. (EB I, 1797: 278)
Is that what they "run a muck" with?
Let the manure laid upon it, whether lime or dung, be intimately mixed with the soil by repeated harrowings. This will make a fine bed for turnip-seed if sown broad-cast. (EB I, 1797: 283)
Broadcasting seeds.
That one very prevalent motive with him in prosecuting this plan, is, that he is of opinion it may enable Government to devise means of uspoorting the vagrant poor, both old and young, who are now to be met with every where, both in towns and in the country, and who are at present a burden on the community: but if such employment could be struck out for them, a comfortable subsistence might be provided for them by means of their own labour and industry; and not only save the public or private charitable contributions, but may also render that class of people useful and profitable subject; instead of their remaining in a useless, wretched, and perhaps a profligate and vicious course of life. (EB I, 1797: 291)
Did Michael Bloomberg write this?
When the ground is thus cleared by the plough, raise the potatoes with a fork having three broad toes or claws; which is better than a spade, as it does not cut the potatoes. (EB I, 1797: 301)
Vigla.
The roots grow very large; and the larger they are, they penetrate to the greater depth; and hence it may be concluded, that this grass, when it thrives well, receives ag reat part of its nourishment from below the staple of the soil: of course, a deep dry soil is best for the culture of sainfoin (EB I, 1797: 305)
A surprising use of "staple".
Pasture-grass, while young, maintains many animals; and the field is greatly recruited by what they drop; it is even recruited by hay crops, provided the grass be cut before feeding. (EB I, 1797: 310)
Maa "värbab" loomade pudemeid.
Fig. 13. a rake with iron teeth, to be applied to the under side of the rails of the machine, with staples and screw nuts at n n, by which many useful purposes are answered, viz. in accumulating cuitch or hay into rows, and as a scarificator for young crops of wheat in the spring, or to be used upon a fallow; in which case, the seed-box, the ladle cylinder, the coulters, the funnels, and harrows, are all taken away. (EB I, 1797: 318)
Define:cuitch - "to grasp or hold with or as if with the hand or claws usually strongly, tightly, or suddenly"; define:scarificator - "an instrument for making superficial cuts in the skin especially: one containing several lancets moved by a spring".
On the opposite bank are two tapering columns without their capitals, most happily placed in a tuft of carob trees. (EB I, 1797: 327)
? // Found out from the entry on architecture that capitals are the top parts of a column.
It is eat by sheep and goats, but refused by horses and swine. (EB I, 1797: 327)
EN.
AGRIOPHAGI, in antiquity, a name given to those who fed on wild beasts. The word is Greek, compounded of αγδος, "wild," "savage," and φαγω "I eat." (EB I, 1797: 327)
Agriculture, thus, is growing or developing the wild.
AGRIPPA (Herod), the son of Aristobulus and Marimne, and grandson to Herod the Great, was born in the year of the world 3997, three years before the birth of our Saviour, and seven years before the vulgar æra. (EB I, 1797: 327)
What the heck. They really believed that the world became six thousan years old in 2000 A.D.?
But in this affair Agrippa acted a part wherein he showed more cunning and address than sincerity and honesty; for while he made a show of being in the interest of the senate, he secretly advised Claudius to be resolute, and not to abandon his good fortune. (EB I, 1797: 328)
What does "address" mean in this context?
When therefore the king spoke to the Tyrians and Sidonians, the parasites around him began to say, that it was the voice of a god, and not that of a man. (EB I, 1797: 328)
As Turovski is always ready to point out, the parasite is one who sits at the table and eats without contributing to the feast.
AGRIPPA (Cornelius), born at Cologne in 1486, a man of considerable learning, and by common report a great magician; for the monks at that time suspected every thing of heresy or sorcery which they did not understand. He composed his Treatise of the Excellence of Women, to insinuate himself into the favour of Margaret of Austria, governess of the Low-Countries. He accepted of the charge of historiographer to the emperor, [|] which that princess gave him. The treatise of the Vanity of the Sciences, which he published in 1530, enraged his enemies extremely; as did that of Occult Philosophy, which he printed soon after at Antwerp. He was imprisoned in France for something he had written against Francis I.'s mother; but was enlarged, and went to Grenoble, where he died in 1534. His works are printed in two volumes octavo. (EB I, 1797: 328-329)
Sounds like a playa.
AGRYPNIA, among physicians, implies an inaptitude to sleep; a troublesome symptom of feverish and other disorders. (EB I, 1797: 329)
A cousin of insomnia?
AGUIRRA (Joseph Sænz de), a Benedictine, and one of the most learned men of the 17th century, was born March 24. 1630. He was censor and secretary of the supreme council of the inquisition in Spain, and interpreter of the scriptures in the university of Salamanca. He printed three volumes in folio upon Philosophy, a commentary upon Aristotle's ten books of Ethics, and other pieces. He died at Rome August 19. 1699. (EB I, 1797: 330)
Never heard or read of him.
AGYNIANI, in church-history, a sect who condemned all use of flesh, and marriage, as not instituted by God, but introduced at the instigation of the devil. The word is compounded of the privative α and γυνη woman. They are sometimes also called Agynnenses, and Agynii; and ares aid to have appeared about the year 694. It is no wonder they were of no long continuance. Their tenets coincide in a great measure with those of the Abelians, Gnostics, Cerdonians, and other preachers of chastity and abstinence. (EB I, 1797: 330)
Use of flesh? Is that what the k... clerics were calling it in those days?
AGYRTÆ, in antiquity, a kind of strolling impostors running about the country, to pick up money by telling fortunes at rich mens doors, pretending to cure diseases by charms, sacrifices, and other religious mysteries; also to expiate the crimes of their deceased ancestors, by virtue of certain odours and fumigations; to torment their enemies, by the use of magical verses and the like. The word is Greek Αγυδλαι, formed of the verb αγυδω, I congregate; alluding to the practice of Charletans, who gather a crowd about them. (EB I, 1797: 330)
Neat. Could become handy for discussing public gatherings, or at least one type.
[...] from this, our author concludes, that the whole colours were used on the occasion; for in the Asiatic style, which is very near the poetic, the part is oftentimes to be taken for the whole. (EB I, 1797: 333)
What is metonymy?
AIR, in natural philosophy, a thin, fluid, elastic, transparent, ponderous, compressible, and dilatable body, surrounding the terraqueous globe to a considerable height. (EB I, 1797: 335)
Thorough.
It evidently appears how expeditious a method this is of charging and discharging a gun; and were the force of condensed air equal to that of gun-powder, such an air-gun would answer the end of several guns. (EB I, 1797: 338)
Elsewhere frequently "answers the purpose".
It is well known, that, under every such copper or boiler, there are placed two holes, separated by a grate; the first of which is for the fire, and the other for the ashes falling from the same; and that there is also a flue from the fire-place upward, by which the smoke of the fire is discharged at some convenient place of the ship. (EB I, 1797: 339)
Hence flue powder in Harry Potter books.
AIR-Threads, in natural history, a name given to the long filaments, so frequently seen in autumn flotaing about in the air.
These threads are the work of spiders, especially of that species called the long-legged field-spider; which, having mounted to the summit of a bush or tree, darts from its tail several of these threads, till one is produced capable of supporting the creature in the air: on this it mounts in quest of prey, and frequently rises to a very considerable height. (EB I, 1797: 340)
Creepy. Reminds me of a childhood memory near Pärnu circa 03, of trees covered with white nets and little maggot-like creatures crawling everywhere.
The augurs also drew presages from the coluds, thunder, lightning, &c. (EB I, 1797: 340)
Sounds like Defari lyrics.
AIR, in painting, &c. denotes the manner and very life of action; or it is that which expresses the disposition of the agent. - It is sometimes also used in a synonymous sense with gesture or attitude. (EB I, 1797: 340)
The metaphorical sense in which there can be "an atmosphere of sociability".
We need not follow Rousseau, and the other philologists, in their endeavours to investigate the etymon of the word air. Its derivation, though found and ascertained, would contribute little to illustrate its meaning in that remote sense, to which, through a long continuance of time, and the various vicissitudes of language, it has now passed. (EB I, 1797: 340)
Define:etymon - "an earlier form of a word in the same language or an ancestral language".
The airs of our operas, are, if we may be permitted [|] the expression, the canvass or substratum upon which are painted all the pictures of imitative music; melody is the design, and harmony the colouring; every picturesque object selected from the most beautiful parts of nature, every reflected sentiment of the human heart, are the models which the artist imitates; whatever gains attention, whatever interests the soul, whatever charms the ear, or causes emotion in the heart, these are the objects of his imitation. (EB I, 1797: 340-341)
Sentiments located in the heart.
The real enthusiast in music never forgets the beautiful airs which he has heard; when he chooses, he causes the opera to recommence. (EB I, 1797: 341)
Not very fun when a catchy song you haven't listened for a decade starts haunting you all day long or for a whole week.
It is, however, a well-built city; and most like Paris of any place in the kingdom, as well for the largeness of the buildings, as in respect of the politeness of the inhabitants. (EB I, 1797: 342)
I'm getting a sense that "politeness" might have meant something slighly different at that time.
They may all be raised in this country on hot-beds; but as they are not remarkable either for beauty or any other property, it appears unnecessary to take further notice of them. (EB I, 1797: 344)
Take notice only of utility.
At these meetings, which, as they were not select, must be supposed to have consisted of such persons as usually meet for the purpose of gossiping, men of wealth, but of ordinary endowments, and able to talk of little else than news, and the occurrences of the day. Akenside was for displaying those talents which had acquired him the reputation he enjoyed in other companies: but here they were of little use to him; on the contrary, they tended to engage him in disputes that betrayed him into a contempt of those that differed in opinion from him. (EB I, 1797: 344)
Phatic communion in high society.
The value of that precept which exhorts us to live peacably with all men, or, in other words, to avoid creating enemies, can only be estimated by the reflection of those many amiable qualities against which the neglect of it will preponderate. (EB I, 1797: 344)
Can you be more ambiguous?
AL, an Arabic particle prefixed to words, and signifying much the same with the English particle the: Thus they say, alkermes, alkoran, &c. i.e. the kermes, the koran, &c. (EB I, 1797: 345)
Drinking the "cohol".
The country is rough, ragged, and mountainous; yet there are good pastures, and plenty of horses and camels. (EB I, 1797: 347)
Raw.
ALAMODALITY, in a general sense, is the accommodating a person's behaviour, dress, and actions, to the prevailing taste of the country or times in which he lives.
ALAMODALITY of writing, is defined the accommodation of mental productions, both as to the choice of subject and the manner of treating it, to the genius or taste of the times, in order to render them more acceptable to the readers. (EB I, 1797: 347)
The opposite of cultural appropriation?
The whole country formerly called Albania, now goes under the names of Shirwan and East-Georgia, and is extremely fruitful and pleasant. (EB I, 1797: 352)
This name gives away the nationality of a certain geopolitical analysis channel on youtube (Caspian Reports).
It must be acknowledged, however, that there are, in his Comment upon the Master of Sentences, some questions concerning the practice of conjugal duty, in which he has used some words rather too gross for chaste and delicate ears: but they allege what he himself used to say in his own vindication, that he came to the knowledge of so many mounstrous things at confession, that it was impossible to avoid touching upon such questions. (EB I, 1797: 354)
Let's talk about conjugal duty baby, let's talk about you and me, let's talk about all the things we have a duty to do.
The other, who is two years younger, is rather a more agreeable figure: he is gay and sprightly, and seems not to want wit. (EB I, 1797: 356)
Odd syntax.
ALBUM is also used, in later times, to denote a kind of table, or pocket-book, wherein the men of letters with whom a person has conversed, inscribe their names with some sentence or motto. (EB I, 1797: 359)
Good idea in itself.
He was present at an engagement, wherein the Athenians gained a victory over the Lesbians; and here, as he himself is said to have confessed in one of his pieces, he threw down his arms, and saved himself by flight. (EB I, 1797: 361)
What a string of words.
It is 25 miles north of the confines of Andalusia, 108 south of Cuenza, and 138 south-by-east of Madrid. (EB I, 1797: 363)
"South-east" used to be "south by-east"?
[...] even the women signalizing themselves bravely in its defence. (EB I, 1797: 368)
Odd use of signals. Probably in the sense that they made themselves significant.
It requires not the eye of a philosopher to discover in every soil and country a principle of national pride: and if we look back for many ages on the history of the Arabians, we shall easily perceive that pride among them invariably to have consisted in the knowledge and improvement of their native language. (EB I, 1797: 371)
A sentence as if from Herbert's Dune.
The modern nations of Europe all possess some original author, who, rising from the darkness of former ages, has begun the career of composition, and tinctured with the character of his own imagination the stream which has slowed through his posterity. (EB I, 1797: 372)
The avalanche figure of intertextual influences.
The first praise of all the productions of genius, is invention; that quality of the mind, which, by the extent and quicknes of its views, is capable of the largest conceptions, and of forming new combinations of objects the most distant and unusual. But the Koran bears little impression of this transcendent character.s (EB I, 1797: 372)
Transcendent theory of creative, literary invention.
Paulus Manutius, in his commentary upon these words of Cicero, Librum tibi celeriter mittam de gloria, "I will speedily send you my treatise on glory;" has the following passage relating to this affair: "He means (says he) his two boks On Glory, which were handed down to the age of our fathers; for Bernard Justinian, in the index of his books, mentions Cicero de Gloria. (EB I, 1797: 374)
Plagisrism at its worst.
The number of these magistrates is not limited, but is more or less according to the magnitude of the place. In London they are 26; each having one of the wards of the city committed to his care. This office is for life; so that when one of them dies, or resigns, a ward-mote is called, who return two persons, one of whom the lord-mayor and aldermen choose to supply the vacancy. (EB I, 1797: 374)
Hence wizardga-mote in Harry Potter.
In these different seminaries he acquired a very uncommon stock of knowledge; and became famous for his learning, not only in England, but in foreign countries: whence several learned men sent him their writings for his perusal and correction; [...] (EB I, 1797: 375)
Reminiscent of Mahaffy on common and special knowledge.
When he was abbot of Malmsbury, having a fine voice, and great skill in music as well as poetry, and observing the backwardness of his barbarous countrymen to listen to grave instructions, he composed a number of little poems, which he sung to them after mass in the sweetest manner; by which they were gradually instructed and civilized. (EB I, 1797: 375)
It is important to keep the record player on at night so that they can learn the words.
Though the Doctor chiefly applied himself to the cultivation of sacred music, yet, being a man of humour, he could divert himself by producing pieces of a lighter kind. There are two catches of his; the other, "Hark the bonny Christ-church Bells," the other intitled, "a Smoking Catch," to be sung by four men smoking their pipes, which is not more difficult to sing than diverting to hear. (EB I, 1797: 377)
Something something, the bells of St. Clemens.
Indeed, he is always spoken of as having been a man of wit; and as one who, to his great talents and virtues, joined those amiable qualities, which rendered him the object of general affection, as well as of general esteem and respect. (EB I, 1797: 377)
Agreeable qualities.
Thus the natives of Spain, the inhabitants of France, and the aborigines of Britain, all used an infusion of barley for their ordinary liquor: and it was called by the various names of Cælia and Ceria in the first country, Cerevisiain the second, and Curmi in the last; all literally importing only the strong water. (EB I, 1797: 378)
And if I'm not mistaken, vodka and other "hard" liquors were literally "little water", or just a diminutive of water.
Gill ALE, is that in which the dried leaves of gill or ground-ivy have been infused. It is esteemed abfertive and vulnerary, and consequently good in disorders of the breast and obstructions of the viscera. (EB I, 1797: 379)
I know neither of these words.
His good nurse perceived his ardent activities; heard him mentioned as the writer of many books; but never took it into her head that he was a great man, and rather beheld him with a kind of compassion. "You will never," said she to him one day, "be any thing but a philosopher - and what is a philosopher? - a fool, who toils and plagues himself during his life, that people may talk of him when HE IS NO MORE." (EB I, 1797: 380)
Not wrong.
His cheerful conversation, his smart and lively sallies, a happy knack at telling a story, a singular mixture of malice of speech with goodness of heart, and of delicacy of wit with simplicity of manners, rendered him a pleasing and interesting companion, and his company consequently was much sought after in the fashionable circles. His reputation, at length, made its way to the throne, and rendered him the object of royal attention and beneficence. (EB I, 1797: 381)
A mess of phatic tropes.
He accordingly wrote to Omar, who was then khalif, acquainting him with the request of his friend: To which the ignorant tyrant replied, That if those books contained the same doctrine with the koran, they could be of no use, since the koran contained all necessary truths; but if they contained any thing contrary to that book, they ought not to be suffered; and therefore, whatever their contents were, he ordered them to be destroyed. Pursuant to this order, they were distributed among the public baths; where, for the space of six months, they served to supply the fires of those places, of which there was an incredible number in Alexandria. (EB I, 1797: 391)
This I've heard of. The O.G. book-burners.
If it be asked in Europe, Why do they not repair the New Port? the answer is, That in Turkey they destroy every thing, and repair nothing. The old harbour will be destroyed likewise, as the ballast of vessels has been continually thrown into it for the last 200 years. The spirit of the Turkish government is to ruin the labours of past ages, and destroy the hopes of future times, because the barbarity of ignorant despotism never considers to-morrow. (EB I, 1797: 392)
This still appears to hold true. Turkey, as much as I've seen from social media videos, is still waiting to be properly paved, and despotism's disregard for the future is amply demonstrated by the Trump cabinet (Who'd ever need a pandemic response team? You're fired!).
Each shire was under the government of an earl, under whom was the reive, his deputy; since, from his office, called shire-reive, or sheriff. (EB I, 1797: 397)
The U.S. still has sheriffs but no shires.
A general method of computation, wherein signs and symbols, commonly the letters of the alphabet, are made use of to represent numbers, or any other quantities. (EB I, 1797: 398)
Mathematics is quite semiotic, as we know from Peirce.
However, the Arabs, it is to be observed, never use the word algebra alone, to express what we mean by it; but always add to it the word macabelah, which signifies opposition and comparison: thus algebra-almacabelah, is what we properly call algebra. (EB I, 1797: 399)
Sounds like abracadabra.
A quantity which can be measured, and is the object of mathematics, is of two kinds, Number and Extension. The former is treated of in Arithmetic; the latter in Geometry. (EB I, 1797: 400)
Did Kant equate extension with quality, as Meiklejohn suggests in a footnote, that quality corresponds with size?
The juxtaposition of letters as in the same word, expresses the product of the quantities denoted by these letters. Thus ab expresses the product of a and b; bcd expresses the continued product of b, b, and d. The sign × also expresses the product of any two quantities between which it is placed. (EB I, 1797: 400)
Korrutamine on tootmine.
A quantity is said to be simple, which consists of one part or Term, as +a, −abc; and a quantity is said to be compound, when it consists of moret han one term, connected by the signs + or −. Thus a&plusb, a−b+c, are compound quantities. If there are two terms, it is called a binomial; if three, a trinomial, &c. (EB I, 1797: 400)
Compound is probably better than "complex", and trinomial better than "triadic".
The Spaniards landed without opposition, and immediately built a fort, under the cannon of which they encamped, and diverted the course of a spring which supplied the city with water. Being now reduced to the utmost distress, Hassan received a summons to surrender at discretion, on pain of being put to the sword with all the garrison. The herald was ordered to extol the vast power of the emperor by sea and land, and to exhort him to return to the Christian religion. But to this Hassan only replied, that he must be a madman who would pretend to advise an enemy, and that the advised must still act more madly who would take counsel of such an adviser. He was, however, on the point of surrendering the city, when advice was brought him that the forces belonging to the western government were in full march towards the place; upon which it was resolved to defend it to the utmost. Charles, in the mean time, resolving upon a general assault, kept a constant firing upon the town; which, from the weak defence mady by the garrison, he looked upon as already in his hands. But while the douwan, or Algerine senate, were deliberating on the most proper means of obtaining an honourable capitulation, a mad prophet, attended by a multitude of people, entered the assembly, and foretold the speedy destruction of the Spaniards before the end of the moon, exhorting the inhabitants to hold out till that time. This prediction was soon accomplished in a very surprising and unexpected manner: for, on the 28th of October 1541, a dreadful storm of wind, rain, and hail, arose from the north, accompanied with violent shocks of earthquakes, and a dismal and universal darkness both by sea and land; so that the sun, moon, and elements, seemed to combine together for the destruction of the Spaniards. In that one night, some say in less than half an hour, 86 ships and 15 galleys were destroyed, with all their crews and military stores; by which the army on shore was deprived of all means of subsisting in these parts. Their camp also, which spread itself alond the plain under the fort, was laid quite under water by the torrents which descended from the neighbouring hills. Many of the troops, by trying to remove into some better situation, were cut in pieces by the Moors and Arabs; while several galleys, and other vessels, endeavouring to gain some neighbouring creeks along the coasts, were immediately plundered, and their crews massacred by the inhabitants. (EB I, 1797: 446)
This part of the story has that Dune quality, very reminiscent of the final battle in the first book.
The number of prisoners was so great, that the Algerines sold some of them, by way of contempt, for an onion per head. (EB I, 1797: 446)
Dang. Human life with the price of a vegetable.
In the mean time, Gascon took it ino his head, by way of bravado, to go to the mole-gate, and give three loud knocks at it with the pommel of his dagger, and to leave it fixed in the gate by its point, that the Algerines might have cause to remember him. (EB I, 1797: 447)
See Berger and Luckmann's Social Construction of Reality for a similar anecdote.
It was not long, however, before they had the satisfaction to see one of their corsairs land, with a fresh supply of 600 slaves, whom he had brought from the coast of Iceland, whither he had been directed by a miscreant native taken on board a Danish ship. (EB I, 1797: 450)
Vihavald.
The aga, or general of the janizaries, or the president pro tempore, first proposes the question; which is immediately repeated with a voice by the chia-bashaws, and from them echoed again by four officers called bashaldalas, from these the question is repeated from one member of the douwan to another, with strange contortions, and the most hideous growlings, if it is not to their liking. From the loudness of this growling noise, the aga is left to guess as well as he can whether the majority of the assembly are pleased or displeased with the question; and from such a preposterous method, it is not surprising that these assemblies should seldom end without some tumult or disorder. (EB I, 1797: 452)
Trotter, "first sign of a growl".
They soon forget their private quarrels; and after the first paroxysm of resentment is over, it is infamy for a Turk to keep in remembrance the injuries he has received. In this respect certainly they are less barbarous than other nations that boast of their civilization. (EB I, 1797: 454)
Quite opposed to how the Greeks saw the Turks, similar to the above quote about despotism.
Alien-Duty, an impost laid on all goods imported by aliens, over and abovet he customs paid for such imported by British, and on British bottoms. (EB I, 1797: 458)
(Meresõidu)alused.
Both the vegetable and fossil alkali applied externally in a caustic state, first irritate and inflame the skin, and afterwards act as fire in mortifying and destroying it; and therefore have been much used by surgeons for opening buboes and other abscesses, and for eating away proud or fungous flesh that sprouts out from sores. (EB I, 1797: 463)
Eighteenth century medicine was rough.
It has been proved that alkaline salts preserve animal substances from putrefaction; on which account some practitioners have concluded that they act as strong antiseptic remedies when swallowed as medicines, and are taken up by the lacteal vessels, and by them carried to the subclavian vein to be mixed with the blood. Experience, however, has shown that they have effects directly opposite, and that by stimulating the vessels and quickening the circulation, the contribute towards the dissolution of the vital fluid; of which Dr Monro says he has seen several instances. (EB I, 1797: 463)
There is a Trump who thinks of drinking bleach in every age of human history.
The diuretic powers of these medicines are sometimes increased by opium, and they have been successfully joined with essential oils and balsams. (EB I, 1797: 463)
That's great, doc!
Dr Priestley informs us, that by the union of nitrous air with iron, a volatile alkali is generated; and Mr Cavendish, that by the action of the electric fluid, or pure elementary fire, upon phlogisticated air, the nitrous acid is produced: the volatile alkali, therefore, must be supposed to consist ultimately of phlogisticated air united to a great quantity of elementary fire. (EB I, 1797: 465)
Hence why firebenders can bend lightning in Avatar TLA.
All-Saints, in the calendar, denotes a festival celebrated on the first of November, in commemoration of all the saints in general; which is otherwise called All-hallows. (EB I, 1797: 465)
Hallowed are the Ori.
The term alla is Arabic, derived from teh verb alah, to adore. It is the same with the Hebrew Eloah, which signifies the Adorable Being. (EB I, 1797: 466)
Jumal on jumaldatav.
ALLEGIEANCE, in law, is the tie, or ligamen, which bins the subject to the king, in return for that protection which the king affords the subject. The thing itself, or substantial part of it, is founded in reason and the nature of government; the name and the form are derived to us from our Gothic ancestors. Under the feodal system, every owner of lands held them in subjection to some superior or lord, from whom or frmo whose ancestors the tenant or vassal had received them: and there was a mutual trust or confidence subsisting between the lord and vassal, that the lord should protect the vassal in the enjoyment of the territory he had granted him; and, on the other hand, that the vassal should be faithful to the lord, and defend him against all his enemies. This obligation on the part of the vassal was called his fidelitas or fealty: and an oath of fealty was required by the feodal law to be taken by all tenants to their landlord, which is couched in almost the same terms as our ancient oath of allegiance; except that, in the usual oath of fealty, there was frequently a saving or exception of the faith due to a superior lord by name, under whom the landlord himself was perhaps only a tenant or vassal. But when the acknowledgment was made to the absolute superior himself, who was vassal to no man, it was no longer called the oath of fealty, but the oath of allegiance; and therein the tenant swore to bear faith to his sovereign lord, in opposition to all men, without any saving or exception. Land held by this exalted species of fealty, was called feudum ligium, a liege see; the vassals homines ligii, or liege men; and the sovereign, their dominus ligius, or liege lord. And when sovereign princes did homage to each other for lands held under their respective sovereignties, a distinction was always made between simple homage, which was only an acknowledgement of tenure; and liege homage, which included the fealty before-mentioned, and the services consequent upon it. (EB I, 1797: 466)
Some interesting tidbits about feudalism.
Natural allegiance is, therefore, a debt of gratitude; which cannot be forfeited, cancelled, or altered, by any change of time, place, or circumsltance, nor by any thing but the united concurrence of the legislature. A Briton who removes to France, or to China, owes the same allegiance to the king of Britain there as at home, and twenty years hence as well as now. For it is a principle of universal law, That the natural-born subject of one prince cannot by any act of his own, no, not by swearing allegiance to another, put off or discharge his natural allegiance to the former: for this natural allegiance was intrinsic, and primitive, and antecedent to the other; and cannot be divested without the concurrent act of that prince to whom it was first due. (EB I, 1797: 467)
Just recently read about this somewhere.
That allegiance is a debt due from the subject, upon an implied contract with the prince; that so long as the one affords protection, so long the other will demean himself faithfully. (EB I, 1797: 467)
Social Contract Theory.
Nothing gives greater pleasure than an allegory, when the representative subject bears a strong analogy, in all its circumstances, to that which is represented. But most writers are unlucky in their choice, the analogy being generally so faint and obscure, as rather to puzzle than to please. (EB I, 1797: 468)
Iconicity.
In a letter to his cousin Louis, he expressed with great warmth the impression which was made on him by the first sight of Corregio's paintings: "Every thing which I see here (says he) astonishes me; particularly the colouring and the beauty of the children. They live - they breathe - They smile with so much grace and so much reality, that it is impossible to restraing from smiling and partaking of their enjoyment. (EB I, 1797: 468)
The other pole of representation and iconicity: life stimulated by art.
There is a great variety of character in the different persons present, yet that uniformity common to all herdsman and peasants. (EB I, 1797: 469)
Oh those conformist peasants.
The fourth council of Toledo has prohibited the use of it in times of Lent, or other days of fasting, and in the ceremonies of mourning: and, according to the present practice of the Romish church, this word is never repeated in Lent, nor in the obsequies of the dead; notwithstanding which, it is used in the mass for the dead, according to the mosarabic ritual, at the introit, when they sing, Tu es portio mea, Domine, Alleluia, in terra viventium, Alleluia, Alleluia. The singing alleluiah was oftentimes an invitatory or call to each other to praise the Lord. (EB I, 1797: 469)
Call and response?
ALLERION, or ALERION, in heraldry, a sort of eagle without beak or feet, having nothing perfect but the wings. They differ from martlets by having their wings expanded, whereas those of the martlet are close; and denote imperialists vanquished and disarmed; for which reason they are more common in French than in German coats of arms. (EB I, 1797: 470)
The heraldic pracyice of removing elements for embarassments was more steadfast than I could have known.
ALLEVEURE, a small brass Swedish coin, worth about 1/2d. English money. (EB I, 1797: 470)
Probably passed through these parts in the 17th century.
"Shakespeare did not take this talke in good sorte; but Johnson put an end to the strife with wittylye remarkinge, This affaire needeth no Contentione; you stole it from Ned, no doubte; do not marvel: Have you not seen him act tymes out of number? - Believe me most syncerilie, yours, G. Peele." (EB I, 1797: 472)
Accusation of plagiarism.
The forms or ceremonies of alliances have been various in different ages and countries. Among us, signifying and swearing, sometimes at the altar, are the chief; anciently eating and drinking together, chiefly offering sacrifices together, were the customary rite of ratifying an alliance. Among the Jews and Chaldeans, heifers or calves; among the Greeks, bulls or geats; and among the Romans, hogs were sacrificed on this occasion. (EB I, 1797: 472)
The communion of food, eranos.
ALLIANCE, in a figurative sense, is applied to any kind of union or connection; thus we say, there is an alliance between the church and state. (EB I, 1797: 472)
Perhaps a better term than communion.
We apprehend the principal operation of this ornament to be quite mechanical. It is easier for the organs of speech to resume, at short intervals, one certain conformation, than to throw themselves into a number of different ones, unconnected and discordant. For example, a succession of labials, interspersed at regular distances with dentals and gutturals, will be more easily pronounced than the succession of all the three at random. (EB I, 1797: 475)
The mechanism of poetry.
We choose Grey for another reason, in proof of what we mentioned before, taht alliteration contributes not only to the sweetness, but also to the energy, of versification; for he uses it chiefly when he aims at strength and boldness. In the Sister Odes (as Dr Johnson styles them), almost every strophe commences and concludes with an alliterative line. The poet, we suppose, wished to begin with force, and end with dignity."Ruin seize thee, ruthless king."
"To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Lewellyn's lay."
"Weave the warp, and weave the woof."
(EB I, 1797: 475)
Must be where the expression ("warp and whoof") comes from, though I still don't know what it means.
ALLOBROGES (Inscriptions, Livy, Velleius, Flarus); from Allobrox (Horace): a people of Gallia Narbonensis, situated between the rivers Isara and Rhodanus, and the Lacus Lemanus; commended by Cicero for their fidelity, discommended by Horace on account of their fondness for novelty. (EB I, 1797: 478)
Modern native speakers in my experience find "commending" startling and "disommending" I think I'm meeting for the first time.
ALLOCUTIO, an oration or speech of a general addressed to his soldiers, to animate them to fight, to appease sedition, or to keep them to their duty. A mount of earth was raised upon the occasion, as it were a kind of tribunal of turf. From this the general pronounced his harangue to the army, which was ranged in several squadrons round him, with their captains at their head. When the time and circumstances would not admit of a formal harangue, the general went through the ranks, and called each by his name, putting them in mind of their courage upon former occasions, mentioning the victories they had won, and making promises of plunder. (EB I, 1797: 478)
Kihutuskõne. Souds like a term in Austin's speech act theory.
ALMAGEST, in matters of literature, is particularly used for a collection or book composed by Ptolemy, containing various problems of the ancients both in geometry and astronomy.
ALMAGEST is also the title of other collections of this kind. Thus Riccioli has published a book of astronomy, which he calls the New Almagest; and Pluckenet, a book which he calls Almagestrum Botanicum. (EB I, 1797: 479)
Is ther an Almagestrum Semiotica, an account of ancient semiotics?
HERESY OF ALMARIC, a tenet broached in France by one Almaric, in the year 1209. It consisted in affirming, that every Christian was actually a member of Christ; and that without this faith no one could be saved. His followers went farther, and affirmed, that the power of the Father lasted only during the continuance of the Mosaic law; that the coming of Christ introduced a new law; that at the end of this began the reign of the Holy Ghost; and that now confession and the sacraments were at an end, and that every one is to be saved by the internal operations of the Holy Spirit alone, without any external act of religion. (EB I, 1797: 480)
The age of reason.
ALME, or ALMA, singing and dancing girls in Egypt, who, like the Italian Improvisatori, can occasionally pour forth "unpremeditated verse." They are called Almé, from having received a better education than other women. They form a celebrated society in this country. To be received into it, according to Mr Savary, it is necessary to have a good voice, to understand the language well, to know the rules of poetry, and be able to compose and sing couplets on the spot, adapted to the circumstances. The Almé know by heart all the new songs. Their memory is furnished with the most beautiful tales. There is no festival without them; no entertainment of which they do not constitute the ornament. They are placed in a rostrum, from whence they sing during the repast. They then descend into the saloon, and form dances which have no resemblance to ours. They are pantomime ballets, in which the represent the usual occurrences of life. The mysteries of love too, generally furnish them with scenes. The suppleness of their bodies is inconceivable. One is astonished at the mobility of their features, to which they give at pleasure the impression suited to the characters they play. The indecency of their attitudes is often carried to excess. Their looks, their gestures, every thing speaks, but in so expressive a manner, that it is impossible to mistake them. At the beginning of the dance, they lay aside with their veils the modesty of their sex. A long robe of very thin silk goes down to their heels, which is slightly fastened wit ha rich girdle. Long black hair, plaited and perfumed, is flowing on their shoulders. A shift, transparent as gauze, scarcely hides their bosom. As they put themselves in motion, the shapes, the contours of their bodies, seem to develop themselves successively. Their steps areregulated by the sound of the flute, of castanets, the tambour de basque, and cymbals, which accelerates or retards the measure. They are still further animated by words adapted to such scenes. They appear in a state of intoxication. They are the Bacchants in a delirium. It is when they are at this point, that throwing off all reserve, they abandon themselves totally to the disorder of their senses; it is then that a people far from delicate, and whom like nothing hidden, redouble their applauses. These Almé are sent for into all the harams. They teach the women the new airs; they amuse them with amorous tales, and recite in their presence poems, which are so much the more interesting, as they furnish a lively picture of their manners. They initiate them into the mysteries of their art, and teach them to contrive lascivious dances. These girls, who have a cultivated understanding, are very agreeable in conversation. They speak their language with purity. The habit of dedicating themselves to poetry renders the softest and most sonorous expressions familiar to them. They repeat with a great deal of grace. In singing, nature is their only guide. Sometimes two of them sing together, but always with the same voice. It is the same with an orchestra, where all the instruments playing in unison execute the same part. (EB I, 1797: 481)
Sounds like a certain female order in a certain sci-fi universe: The Bene Gesserit.
Hence that saying of one of their khalifs: "Player carries us half-way to God, fasting brings us to the door of his palace, and alms introduces us into the presence-chamber." (EB I, 1797: 482)
A drawing-room?
ALMUCIUM, denotes a kind of cover for the head, worn chiefly by monks and ecclesiastics: It was of a [|] square form, and seems to have given rise to the bonnets of the same shape still retained in universities and cathedrals. (EB I, 1797: 482-483)
The things thrown into the air by U.S. graduates, a bunch of them hanging on Edward's wall.
In small doses, repeated from time to time, it not only cleanses the prima viæ, but likewise tends to promote the menstrual discharge in women; and therefore it is frequently employed in chlorosis, or where the menstrua are obstructed. (EB I, 1797: 486)
Main roads?
ALPHA, the name of the first letter of the Greek alphabet, answering to our A. - As a numeral, it stands for one, or the first of any thing. It is particularly used, among ancient writers, to denote the chief or first man of his class or rank. In this sense, the word stands contradistinguished from beta, which denotes the second person. Plato was called the Alpha of the wits: Eratosthenes, keeper of the Alexandrian library, whom some called a Second Plato, is frequently named Beta. (EB I, 1797: 487)
So the folk-psychological (or pseudo-zoological) conception of alpha-males had a historical precedent.
Again, setting aside the evidence to be derived from Scripture on this subject, the simplicity of manners predominant in the early ages, the small extent of the intellectual powers of mankind, and the little intercourse which nations had with one another, which would seem more particularly to render writing necessary, can scarce allow us to suppose that such a complex and curious contrivance as alphabetical writing could be invented by a race of men whose wants were so few, their advantages so circumscribed, and their ideas so limited. (EB I, 1797: 488)
Thr exact logic of the Ancient Aliens show: people in the past and on other continents couldn't have invented or created something because our knowledge of them is insubstantial, hence they must have been helped, by god, aliens, or European visitors. People who haven't read a 200yo book are surprised that this encyclopedia is legible.
This symbol-writing in its advanced state would become more refined, but enigmatical and mysterious in proportion to its refinement. Hence it would become less fit for common use, and therefore more particularly appropriated to the mysteries of philosophy and religion. Thus, two feet standing upon water served to express an impossibility; a serpent denoted the oblique trajectories of the heavenly bodies; and the beetle, on account of some supposed properties of that insect, served to represent the sun. (EB I, 1797: 489)
What a curio.
The common language is the German: however, the better sort of people speak French in the towns; and even in the country, they seak French well enough to be understood. (EB I, 1797: 503)
Des raycest.
ALSIRAT, in the Mahometan theology, denotes a bridge laid over the middle of hell, finer than a hair, and sharper than the edge of a sword, over which people are to pass, after their trial, on the day of judgment. (EB I, 1797: 503)
Now I kniw what it's called.
Altars differed in figure as well as in materials. Some were round, others square, and others triangular. All of them were turned towards the east, and stood lower than the statues of the gods; and were generally adorned with sculpture, representing either the gods to whom they were erected, or their symbols. (EB I, 1797: 505)
Did not know that when I made my own for a laugh. It probaboy pointed west.
According to Servius, those altars set apart for the honour of the celestial gods, and gods of the higher class, were placed on some pretty tall pile of building; and for that reason were called altaria, from the word alta and ara "a high elevated altar." Those appointed for the terrestial gods were laid on the surface of the earth and called aræ. And, on the contrary, they dug into the earth and opened a pit for those of the infernal gods, which they called βοθροι λαχχοι, "scrobiculi." But this distinction is not every where observed: the best authors frequently use ara as a general word, under which are included the altars of the celestial and infernal, as well as those of the terrestial, gods. (EB I, 1797: 505)
Level symbolism.
ALTERCATION, a debate or contest between two friends or acquaintance. The word comes from altercari, which anciently signified to converse or hold discourse together. - Thus, we say, They never come to an open quarrel, but there is continually some little altercation or other. (EB I, 1797: 507)
An outright phatic word.
He was natural son of Don Alvaro de Luna, lord of Canete in Arragon, and of a woman infamous for unbounded lust. (EB I, 1797: 509)
Imagine this being the description of your mother in the encyclopedia.
AMABYR, a barbarous custom which formerly prevailed in several parts of England and Wales, being a sum of money paid to the lord when a maid was married within his lordship. The word is old British, and signifies "teh price of virginity." (EB I, 1797: 511)
Winston should have been asking about this rather than the prima nocta.
AMARGAM, mercury united with some metal.
AMALGAMATION, the operation of making an amalgam, or mixing mercury with any metal. (EB I, 1797: 514)
Not how I've found it used and have used it myself, much like "adept".
AMALTHÆA, the name of the Cumæan Sibyl, who offered to Tarquinius Superbus nine books, containing the Roman destinies, and demanded 300 pieces of gold for them. He derided her; whereupon she threw three of them into the fire; and returning, asked the same price for the other six; which being denied, she burnt three more; and returning, still demanding the same price. Upon which Tarquin consulting the pontiffs, was advised to buy them. These books were in such esteem, that two magistrates were created to consult them upon extraordinary occasions. (EB I, 1797: 514)
What an extraordinary case of extortion!
Though there are many blemishes in his poems, yet he had the talent of reading them in so agreeable a manner, that every one was charmed with them. (EB I, 1797: 515)
Made me realize that agreeableness is also a trait in personality psychology.
According to Ovid, it was a place rich in copper-ore, and where the inhabitants became Cerastæ, or horned. Now called Limisso. (EB I, 1797: 517)
Why.
The women, in consequence of the prevailing passion, were now seen in the middle of camps and of armies. They quitted the soft and tender inclinations, and the delicate offices of their own sex, for the toils and the toilsome occupation of ours. (EB I, 1797: 522)
The crusades were "passionate".
We seldom consider, that human knowledge is very narrow; that national manners are formed by chance; that uncommon conjunctures of causes produce rare effects; or that what is impossible at one time or place may yet happen in another. It is always easier to deny than to enquire. To refuse credit confers for a moment an appearance of superiority which every little mind is tempted to assume, when it may be gained so cheaply as by withdrawing attention from evidence, and declining the fatique of comparing probabilities. (EB I, 1797: 522)
Culture is accidental, and a "burn" of nay-sayers.
Many relations of travellers have been slighted as fabulous, till more frequent voyages have confirmed their veracity; and it may reasonably be imagined, that many ancient historians are unjustly suspected of falsehood, because our own times afford nothing that resembles what they tell. (EB I, 1797: 522)
"Teated" kui "suhted".
AMBIENT, a term used for such bodies, especially fluids, as encompass others on all sides: thus, the air is frequently called an ambient fluid, because it is diffused round the earth. (EB I, 1797: 529)
Good to know. Ambient awareness.
AMBIGUOUS, a term applied to a word or expression which may be taken in different senses. - An anonymous writer has published a ditionary of ambiguous words: Lexicon Philosophicum de Ambiguitate Vocabulorum, Francof. 1597. 4to. - The responses of the ancient oracles were always ambiguous. (EB I, 1797: 529)
Perhaps enlightning when it comes to legalese definitions of ambiguity.
AMBITION (ambitio), is generally used in a bad sense, for an immoderate or illegal pursuit of power.
In the strict meaning, however, of the word, it signifies the same with the ambitus of the Romans. See the next article.
Ambition, in the former and more usual sense, is one of those passions that is never to be satisfied. It swells gradually with success, and every acquisition serves but as a spur to further attempts.
"If a man (it has been well observed), could at once accomplish all his desires, he would be a miserable creature; for the chief pleasure of this life is to wish and desire. Upon this account, every prince who aspires to be despotic aspires to die of weariness. Searching every kingdom for the man who has the least comfort in life, Where is he to be found? - In the royal palace. - What! his majesty? Yes; especially if he be despotic." (EB I, 1797: 529)
Thus, Malinowski's ambition for power is redundant. It being an unquenching and pleasurable desire links with aspects of Fourierism.
AMBITUS, in Roman antiquity, the setting up for some magistracy or office, and formally going round the city to solicit the interest and votes of the people.
Ambitus differed from ambition, as the former lies in the act, the latter in the mind.
Ambitus was of two kinds; one lawful, the other infamous. The first, called also ambitus popularis, was when a person offered his service to the republic frankly, leaving it to every body to judge of his pretensions as they found reasonable. The means and instruments here made use of were various. 1. Amici, or friends, under different relations, including cognati, affines, necessarii, familiares, vicini, tribules, clientes, municipes, sodales, collegæ. 2. Nomenclatura, or the calling and saluting every person by his name; to which purpose, the candidates were attended with an officer, under the denomination of interpres, or nomenclator. 3. Blanditia; or obliging persons, by serving them, or their friends, patrons, or the like, with their vote and interest on other occasions. 4. Prensatio; the shaking every person by the hand, offering him his service, [|] friendship, &c - The second kind was that wherein force, cajoling, money, or other extraordinary influence, was made use of. This was held infamous, and severely punished, as a source of corruption and other mischiefs.
Ambitus was practised not only at Rome and in the forum, but in the meetings and assemblies of other towns in Italy, where numbers of citizens were usually found, on account of trade and business. - The practise ceased in the city from the time of the emperors, by reason posts were not then to be had by courting the people, but by favour from the prince. (EB I, 1797: 529-530)
Nearly a breakdown of what a modern democratic politician must do to get elected.
It is true that Cortes found bags of lice in the magazines of the palace of king Axajacatl. It is also true, that Montezuma imposed such a tribute, not on all his subjects however, but only on those who were beggars; not on account of the extraordinary multitude of those insects, as M. de Paw affirms, but because Montezuma, who could not suffer idleness in his subjects, resolved that that miserable set of people, who could not labour, should at least be occupied in lousing themselves. (EB I, 1797: 541)
Public works or pubic works.
The character of the Indians is altogether founded upon their circumstances and way of life. A people who are constantly employed in procuring the means of a precarious subsistence, who live by hunting the wild animals, and who are generally engaged in war with their neighbours, cannot be supposed to enjoy much gaiety of temper, or a high flow of spirits. The Indians therefore are in general grave even to sadness; they have nothing of that giddy vivacity peculiar to some nations of Europe, and they despise it. Their behaviour to those about them is regular, modest, and respectful. Ignorant of the arts of amusement, of which that of saying trifles agreeably is one of the most considerable, they never speak but when they have something important to observe; and all their actions, [|] words, and even looks, are attended with some meaning. This is extremely natural to men who are almost continually engaged in pursuits, which to them are of the highest importance. (EB I, 1797: 544)
Not the first indication, in literature, that thr American natives were not very "phatic".
The different tribes or nations are for the same reason extremely small, when compared with civilized societies, in which industry, arts, agriculture, and commerce, have united a vast number of individuals, whom a complicated luxury renders useful to one another. (EB I, 1797: 544)
A use of "luxury" strangely congruent with Fourier's.
The women, forgetting the human as well as the female nature, and transformed into something worse than furies, even outdo the men in this scene of horror; while the principal persons of the country fit round the stake, smoking and looking on without the least emotion. What is most extraordinary, the sufferer himself, in the little intervals of his torments, smokes too, appears unconcerned, and converses with his torturers about indifferent matters. Indeed, during the whole time of his execution, there seems a contest which shall exceed, they in inflicting the most horrid pains, or he is enduring them with a firmness and constancy almost above human: not a groan, not a sigh, not a distortion of countenance, escapes him; he possesses his mind entirely in the midst of his torments; he recounts his own exploits; he informs them what cruelties he has inflicted upon their countrymen, and threatens them with the revenge that will attend his death; and, though his reproach exasperate them to a perfect madness of rage and fury, he continues his insults even of their ignorance of the art of tormenting, pointing out himself more exquisite methods, and more sensible part of the body to be afflicted. (EB I, 1797: 547)
Whst the actual fuck. Phatic communion between torturers and tortured?
The secret is inviolably kept, the actors assemble at the precise hour apponted, and every individual is animated with the same sanguine purposes. (EB I, 1797: 550)
To paint the ground red.
Their imagination takes in only the present, and in that only what intimately concerns themselves. (EB I, 1797: 551)
Probably a universal slur against "savages".
Vanity and conceit are said to be blended with their ignorance and treachery. Notwithstanding all they suffer from Europeans, they still, it is said, consider themselves as a race of men far superior to their conquerors. This proud belief, arising from their perverted ideas of excellence, is universal over the whole known continent of America. They do not think it possible that any people can be so intelligent as themselves. (EB I, 1797: 551)
Only our ideas of excellence are correct.
Their natural eloquence has also been decried. The free tribes of savages who enter into conventions with the Europeans, it is observed, are accustomed to make long, pompous, and, according to their own notions, sublime harangues, but without any method or connection. The whole is a collection of disjointed metaphors and comparisons. The light, heat, and course of the sun, form the principal topic of their discourse; and these unintelligible reasonings are always accompanied with violent and ridiculous gestures. Numberless repetitions prolong the oration,w hich, if not interrupted, would last whole days: At the same time, they meditate very accurately before hand, in order to avoid mentioning any thing but what they are desirous to obtain. This pompous faculty of making speeches is also one of the grounds on which they conceive themselves to be superior to the nations of Europe: They imagine that it is their eloquence that procures them the favours they ask. The subjected Indians converse precisely in the same style. Prolix and tedious, they never know when to stop; so that, excepting the difference in language, it would be impossible, in this respect, to distinguish a civilized Peruvian from an inhabitant of the most savage districts to the northward. (EB I, 1797: 551)
At least the note on the margin is exact: "Their eloquence disparaged."
In the savage, the organs of generation are small and feeble. He has no hair, no beard, no ardour for the female. Though nimbler than the European, because more accustomed to running, his strength is not so great. His sensations are less acute; and yet he is more timid and cowardly. He has no vivacity, no activity of mind. The activity of his body is not so much an exercise or spontaneous motion, as a necessary action produced by want. Destroy his appetite for victuals and drink, and you will at once annihilate the active principle of all his movements: He remains in stupid repose, on his limbs or couch, for whole days. (EB I, 1797: 559)
The poor savage.
To the preceding anecdotes in favour of the American character, may be added the following by Dr Benjamin Franklin. - The Indian men, when young, are hunters and warriors: when old, counsellors; for all their government is by the counsel or advice of the sages. Hence they generally study oratory; the best speaker having the most influence. The Indian women till the ground, dress the food, nurse and bring up the children, and preserve and hand down to posterity the memory of public transactions. These employments of men and women are accounted natural and honourable. Having few artificial wants, they have abundance of leisure for improvement by conversation. (EB I, 1797: 561)
Very well put.
He that would speak rises. The rest observe a profound silence. When he has finished, and sits down, they leave him five or six minutes to recollect, that if he has omitted any thing he intended to say, or has any thing to add, he may rise again and deliver it. To interrupt another, even in common conversation, is reckoned highly indecent. (EB I, 1797: 561)
Isn't that so. I recently thought of starting to note down the "characters" I find difficult in conversation, the man who interrupts your every sentence with seversl of his own being foremost.
"Upon summing up the whole particulars mentioned above, would one hesitate a moment to adopt the following opinion, were there no counterbalancing evidence, viz. "That God created many pairs of the human race, differing from each other, both externally and internally; that he fitted those pairs for different plimate; that the peculiarities of the original pairs were preserved entire in their descendants; who, having no assistance but their natural talents, were left to gather knowledge from experience; and, in particular, were left (each tribe) to form a language for itself; that signs were sufficient for the original pairs, without any language but what nature suggests; and that a language was formed gradually, as a tribe increases in numbers, and in different occupations, to make speech necessary?" But this opinion, however plausible, we are not permitted to adopt; being taught a different lesson by Revelation, viz. That God created but a single pair of the human species. Though we cannot doubt the authority of Moses, yet his account of the creation of man is not a little puzzling, as it seems to contradict every one of the facts mentioned above." (EB I, 1797: 563)
If you cannot doubt then you cannot doubt. Too bad for you.
"[...] with a tower, whose top might reach unto hevaen; that the Lord, beholding the people to be one, and to have all one language, and that nothing would be restrained from them which they imagined to do, confounded their language that they might not understand one another, and scattered them abroad upon the face of all the earth." (EB I, 1797: 563)
Sounds like a loving god.
There are some kinds of colouring roots, which, if mixed with the food of certain animals, will tinge even their bones of a yellow colour. - It cannot be thought any great degree of credulity to infer from this, that if these roots were mixed with the food of a white man, they might, without a miracle, tinge his skin of a yellow colour. If a man and woman were both to use food of this kind for a length of time, till they became as it were radically dyed, it is impossible, without the intervention of divine power, or of some extraordinary natural cause, but their children must be of the same colour; and was the same kind of food to be continued for several generations, it is more than probable that this colour might resist the continued use of any kind of food whatever. (EB I, 1797: 564)
Then make the experiment, you dingus. The stuff of science fiction, this.
[...] at length, reaching the farthest limits of the Old World, found a new one, with ample space to occupy unmolested for ages; till Columbus cursed them by a discovery, which brought again new sins and new deaths to both worlds. (EB I, 1797: 567)
Apt.
They made impression at first upon the ignorant and timid, and extending by degrees to such as were bettereinformed or more resolute, the countagion spread at length from ship to ship. From secret whispers or murmurings, they proceeded to open cabals and public complaints. (EB I, 1797: 572)
"Cabal" in the wild.
The above was one of the Bahama islands; to which he gave the name of San Salvador, and took possession of it in the name of their Catholic majesties. In this first voyage he discovered several other of the Lucoya or Bahama islands, with those of Cuba nad Hispaniola. The natives considered the Spaniards as divinities, and the discharge of the artillery as their thunder: they fell prostrate at the sound. The women, however, offered their favours, and courted the embraces of their new guests as men. Their husbands were not jealous of them; and in the arms of those wantons the companions of Columbus are said to have caught that malady which directs its poison to the springs of life. (EB I, 1797: 573)
Gee I wonder why modern liberals aren't on board with idolizing Columbus.
The Spaniards, as they first discovered it, have the largest and richest portion, extending from New Mexico and Louisiana in North America, to the Straits of Magellan in the South Sea, excepting the large province of Brasil, which belongs to Portugal; for though the French and Dutch have some sorts upon Surinam and Guiana, they scarcely deserve to be considered as proprietors of any part of the southern continent. (EB I, 1797: 574)
The natural law of "I saw it first", applied to your neighbour's possessions.
A circumstance much to their praise is, that notwithstanding their peculiar addiction to those occupations of which lucre is the sole object, they were duly attentive to cultivate the field of learning; and they have ever their first foundation been particularl careful to provide for the education of teh rising progeny. (EB I, 1797: 574)
Lucrative lucre.
The elegancies of dress had already been renounced for manufactures of the American kind, though much inferior; and the bulk of the people, consisting of farmers, were such as could in no way be affected by the want of British commodities, as having every necessary within themselves. (EB I, 1797: 576)
Archaic necessity.
The Americans, however, continued stedfast in the ideas they had adopted. (EB I, 1797: 578)
Oh my goodness gracious, thank god the authors of this encyclopedia had the good taste of not exposing their readers to the substance of the ideas they are referring to. The expression, "handled with kid gloves" comes to mind. Actually these kinds of circumlocutions are really annoying in what should be an objective account.
"The legislature of Great Britain, however, stimulated by an inordinate passion for power, not only unjustifiable, but which they know to be peculiarly reprobated by the very constitution of that kingdom; [...]" (EB I, 1797: 584)
A rare Malinowskian phrase in the wild.
We fight not for glory or conquest; we exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies. (EB I, 1797: 585)
Probably how native Americans felt about Europeans.
They boast of their privileges and civilization, and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death. (EB I, 1797: 585)
More like how poor people in modern America feel today.
"Brothers and Friends, open a kind ear!" (EB I, 1797: 586)
A Shakespearean phaticism. Context, how the colonists addressed the natives, i.e. the Twelve United Colonies addressed the Six Nations.
After having failed in their attempts to leave the town, general Gage had consented to allow them to retire with their effects; but afterwards, for what reason does not well appear, he refused to fulfil his promise. (EB I, 1797: 589)
Cute phrase.
Lord Howe next sent a letter to General Washington; but as it was directed "To George Washington, Esq;" the General refused to accept of it, as not being directed in the style suitable to his station. To obviate this objection, Adjustant-general Paterson was sent with another letter, directed "To George Washington, &c. &c. &c." But though a very polite reception was given to the bearer, General Washington utterly refused the letter; nor could any explanation of the Adjutant induce him to accept of it. (EB I, 1797: 592)
Privilege, when you can refuse a letter because it doesn't address you by your proper title.
This brought on a general engagement on the 11th September, in which the Americans were worsted through the superior discipline of the British troops; and it was only through the approach of night that they were saved from being entirely destroyed. On this occasion the provincials lost about 1000 in killed and wounded, besides 400 taken prisoners. (EB I, 1797: 596)
An unlucky date for the Americans.
Here they destroyed a great number of privateers and merchantmen, magazines, with storehouses, &c.; whence proceeding to a fertile and populous island called Martha's Vineyard, they carried off 10,000 sheep and 300 black cattle. (EB I, 1797: 602)
Along with Sandy Hook, what this entry has taught me is that some famous places in America have a longevity I couldn't have guesses. Martha's Vineyard being the place where Kennedy drove from when he ran over and killed a woman.
On the 26th of June, about six miles from Williamsburgh, Liutenant-colonel Simcoe, and 350 of the queen's rangers, with 80 mounted yagers, were attacked by a much superior body of the Americans; but whom they repulsed with great gallantry and with equal success, making four officers and twenty private men prisoners. (EB I, 1797: 614)
Yager-meisters.
AMILICTI, in the Chaldaic theology, denote a kind of intellectual powers, or persons in the divine hierarchy. - The amilicti are represented as three in number; and constitute one of the tryads, in the third order of the hierarchy. (EB I, 1797: 620)
What. Where can I read more of this? Triadic aspects of "Chaldaick" philosophy are very much among my interests.
This learned man was born of Christian parents, and educated in their religion; the outward profession of which, it is said, he never entirely deserted. As his genius was vast and comprehensive, so were his projects bold and singular: For he attempted a general coalition of all sects, whether philosophical or religious, by framing a system of doctrines which he imagined calculated to unite them all, the Christians not excepted, in the most perfect harmony. In pursuance of this design, he maintained, that the great principles of all philosophical and religious truth were to be found equally in all sects; that they differed from each other only in their method of expressing them, and in some opinions of little or no importance; and that, by a proper interpretation of their respective sentiments, they might easily be united into one body. Accordingly, all the Gentile religions, and even the Christian, were to be illustrated and explained by the principles of this universal philosophy; and the fables of the priests were to be removed from Paganism, and the comments and interpretations of the disciples of Jesus from Christianity. In conformity to this plan, he insisted, that all the religious systems of all nations should be restored to their original purity, and reduced to their primitive standard, viz. the ancient philosophy of the East, preserved uncorrupted by Plato: and he affirmed, that this project was agreeable to the intentions of Jesus Christ; whose sole view in descending upon earth was to set bounds to the reigning superstition, to remove the errors that had blended themselves with the religions of all nations, but not abolish the ancient theology from which they were derived. He therefore adopted the doctrines which were received in Egypt concerning the universe and the Deity, considered as constituting one great whole; concerning the eternity of the world, the nature of souls, the empire of Providence, and the government of the world by dæmons. He also established a system of moral discipline; which allowed the people in general to live according to the laws of their country and the dictates of nature; but required the wife to exalt tehir minds by contemplation, and to mortify the body, so that they might be capable of enjoying the presence and assistance of the dæmons, and of ascending after death to the presence of the Supreme Parent. In order to reconcile the popular religions, and particularly the Christian, with this new system, he made the whole history of the Heathen gods an allegory; maintaining that they were only celestial ministers, intitled to an inferior kind of worship. And he acknowledged that Jesus Christ was an excellent man, and the friend of God; but alleged that it was not his design entirely to abolish the worship of dæmons, and that his only intention was to purify the ancient religion. This system, so plausible in its first rise, but so comprehensive and complying in its progress, has been the source of innumerable errors and corruptions in the Christian church. At its first establishment it is said to have had the approbation of Athenagoras, Pantænus, and Clemens the Alexandrian, and of all who had the care of the public school belonging to the Christians at Alexandria. It was afterwards adopted by Longinus the celebrated author of the treatise on the Sublime, Plotinus, Herennius, Origen, Porphyry, Jamblichus the disciple of Porphyry, Sopater, Edisius, Eustathius, Maximus of Ephesus, Priscus, Chrysanthius the master the Julian, Julian the Apostate, Hierocles, Proclus, and many others both Pagans and Christians. (EB I, 1797: 624)
Ammonius Saccus and his unified philosophy and religion.
The green roots, preserved as a sweet-meat, and preferable to every other kind. The Indians mix them with their rice, which is their common food, to correct its natural insipidity. (EB I, 1797: 625)
Rice by itself is fairly tasteless. Add ginger.
A second use of breathing is, that, in inspiration, the variety of particles, of different qualities, which float always in the air, might be drawn into the lungs, to be insinuated intot he mass of blood, being highly necessary to contemperate and cool the agitated mass, and to contribute refined pabulum to the finer parts of it, which, meeting with the daily supply of chyle, serves to assimilate and more intimately mix the mass, and render its constitution the fitter for supporting the life of the animal. (EB I, 1797: 628)
Neat word.
A Calabrian monk at Madrid laid claim to this amphibious capacity, making an offer to the king of Spain, to continue twice twenty-four hours under water, without ever coming up to take breath. Kircher gives an account of a Sicilian, named the fish Colas, who, by a long habitude from his youth, had so accustomed himself to live in water, that his nature seemed to be quite altered; so that he lived rather after the manner of a fish than a man. (EB I, 1797: 630)
I don't follow the physiology here (what channel?) but noting it in case it's going to haunt me.
On the top stand three statues in bronze, representing Justice, Strength, and Plenty. (EB I, 1797: 635)
A classic triad.
In this arsenal they build the ships belonging to the India chamber of Amsterdam; for which reason they have all sorts of workhouses here for the artificers that serve the company. (EB I, 1797: 636)
Artifice, artificial, artificers.
The Rasp-house, which was formerly a nunnery, is now a sort of a work-house for men that behave ill. They are commonly set to saw or rasp Brasil wood; and if they will not perform their task, they are put into a cellar which the water runs into, where if they do not almost constantly ply the pump, they run the risk of being drowned. (EB I, 1797: 636)
Jesus Christ, the dutch were mad.
Both men and women are of the common size of Europeans, and their colour is that of a lightish comper; tehy are well-shaped, have regular features, are active, brisk, and lively. They have fine eyes, and in general good teeth, even to an advanced age. The women are the merriest creatures imaginable, and incessant talkers. (EB I, 1797: 637)
Phatic.
The practice of tattowing, or puncturing the skin, likewise prevails. (EB I, 1797: 637)
Tattow.
According to Pliny and Solinus, the territory of Amyclæ was so infested with vipers and other serpents, that the inhabitants were obliged to abandon their dwellings and settle elsewhere. - Among the ancient poets, the Amycli, or inhabitants of this city, obtained the epithet of taciti or silent. The reason of this was, either because it was built by the Lacedæmonians, who, as they followed the doctrine of Pythagoras, were always inculcating the precept of silence, and thence called taciti: or because of a law which obtained in this place, forbidding any one, under severe penalties, to mention the approach of an enemy. Before this law was made, the city was daily alarmed by false reports, as the enemy had been already at the gates. From terrors of this kind the abovementioned law indeed delivered them; but in the end it proved the ruin of the city: for the Dorians appearing unexpectedly under the walls, no one ventured to transgress the law; so that the city was easily taken. (EB I, 1797: 639)
The boy who cried wolf an actual historical occurrence.
ANA, in matters of literature, a Latin termination, adopted into the titles of several books in other languages. - Anas, or books in ana, are collections of the memorable sayings of persons of learning and wit; much the same with what we otherwise call tabletalk. (EB I, 1797: 644)
Thus Lotmana preferable to Lotmania. E.g. Socratiana.
ANAGNOSTA, or ANAGNOSTES, in antiquity, a kind of literary servant, retained in the families of persons of distinction, whose chief business was to read to them during meals, or at any other time when they were at leisure. Cornelius Nepos relates of Atticus, that he had always an agnostes at his meals. He never supped without reading; so that the minds of his guests were no less agreeably entertained than their appetites. The same custom, Eginhard observes, was kept up by Charlemagne, who at table had the histories and acts of ancient kings read to him. This custom seems to have been a relic of that of the ancient Greeks, who had the praises of great men and heroes sung to them at table. The ancient monks and clergy kept up the like usage, as we are informed by St Augustin. (EB I, 1797: 649)
Also among the pythagoreans, as reported by Iamblichus, the young read to the old, who chose what was to be read.
ANALECTA, Analects, in a literary sense, is used to denote a collection of small pieces; as essays, remarks, &c. (EB I, 1797: 650)
Will keep in mind.
Analogy enters much into all our reasoning, and serves to explain and illustrate. A great part of our philosophy, indeed, has no other foundation than analogy.
It is natural to mankind to judge of things less known, by some similitude, real or imaginary, between them and things more familiar or better known. And where the things compared have really a great similitude in their nature, when there is reason to think that they are subject to the same laws, there may be a considerable degree of probability in conclusions drawn from analogy. Thus we may observe a very great similitude between this earth which we inhabit, and the other planets, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury. They all revolve round the sun, as the earth does, although at different distances, and in different periods. They borrow all their light from the sun, as the earth does. Several of them are known to revolve round their axis like the earth, and, by that means, must have a like succession of day and night. Some of them have moons, that serve to give them light in the absence of the sun, as our moon does to us. They are all, in their motions, subject to the same law of gravitation, as the earth is. From all this similitude, it is not unreasonable to think, that thase planets may, like our earth, be the habitation of various orders of living creatures. There is some probability in their conclusion from analogy. (EB I, 1797: 650)
This is even sadder than that part where all the animals of South America had to travel from the middle East, from Noah's ark, through Siberia and re-adapt to climates several times to reach the places where Providence ordained them. Naturally man used to look up at the other planets and wonder whom God made to live there.
But all arguments drawn from analogy are still the weaker, the greater disparity there is between the things compared; and therefore must be weakest of all when we compare body with mind, because there are no two things in nature more unlike. (EB I, 1797: 651)
Complementarity between opposites. Human body and soul very different (but how?).
The derivation of the word Analogy indicates, as professor Castillon of Berlin observes, a resemblance discernible by reason. This is confirmed by the sense in which the term is used in geometry, where it signifies an equality of ratios. - In explaining this subject, it is observed, there may be a resemblance between sensations and a resemblance between perceptions: the former is called physical resemblance, because it acts upon the physical or sensitive faculty; the latter moral resemblance, because it affects the moral or rational faculty of man. (EB I, 1797: 651)
Very interesting stuff but not triadic, does not yet distinguish between moral and rational faculties.
Physical resemblance is to the senses what analogy is to the understanding. - The former, when perfect, becomes equality; but the latter, identity. (EB I, 1797: 652)
Just yesterday found Peirce writing the same. In both cases it's probably Hume at the back of it.
Analysis, under its present improvements, must be allowed the apex or height of all human learning: it is this method which furnishes us with the most perfect examples of the art of reasoning; gives the mind an uncommon readiness at deducing and discovering, from a few data, things unknown; and, by using signs for ideas, presents things to the imagination, which otherwise seemed out of its sphere: by this, geometrical demonstrations may be greatly abridged, and a long series of argumentations, wherein the mind cannot without the utmost effort and attention discover the connection of ideas, are hereby converted into sensible signs, and the several operations required therein effected by the combination of those signs. But, what is more extraordinary, by means of this art, a number of truths are frequently expressed by a single line, which in the common way of explaining and demonstrating things would fill whole volumes. (EB I, 1797: 652)
How very semiotic.
ANALYSIS is divided, with regard to its object, into that of finites, and infinites.
ANALYSIS of Finite Quantities, is what we otherwise call specious arithmetic or algebra. See ALGEBRA.
ANALYSIS of Infinites, called also the New Analysis, is particularly used for the method of fluxions, or the differential calculus. See FLUXIONS. (EB I, 1797: 652)
Has this anything to do with "influxual determination"?
Several authors, as Freigius and others, have given analyses of Cicero's Orations, wherein they reduce them to their grammatical and logical principles; strip them of all the ornaments and additions of rhetoric which toherwise disguised their true form, and conceal the connection between one part and another. The design of these authors is to have those admired harangues just such as the judgment disposed them, without the help of imagination; so that here we may coolly view the force of each proof, and admire the use Cicero made of rhetorical figures to conceal the weak part of a cause. (EB I, 1797: 652)
These pages sre full of coincidences. In his modt recent video, wchich I'm currently halfway through, Philosopy Tube did the same, also with one of Cicero's speeches.
ANALYSIS is also used for a kind of syllabus, or table of the principle heads or articles of a continued discourse, disposed in their natural order and dependency. Analyses are more scientifical than alphabetical indexes; but they are less used, as being more intricate. (EB I, 1797: 652)
Must be what the index of The Meaning of Meaning is called.
ANARCHY, the want of government in a nation, where no supreme authority is lodged, either in the prince or other rulers; but the people live at large, and all things are in confusion. The word is derived from the Greek privative α, and αρχη, command, principality. Anarchy is supposed to have reigned after the deluge, before the foundation of monarchies. We still find it obtain in several parts, particularly of Africa and America. (EB I, 1797: 654)
Finally reached it. This was the first item I looked up in this book.
It is from this species alone that the ancients have given the fable of the swan being endued with the [|] powers of melody. Embracing the Pythagorean doctrine, they made the body of this bird the mansion of the souls of departed poets; and after that, attributed to the birds the same faculty of harmony which their inmates possessed in a pre-existent state. The vulgar, not distinguishing between sweetness of numbers and melody of voice, thought that real which was only intended figuratively. (EB I, 1797: 655-656)
Everything seems to reach back to Pythagoras.
The natives kill them with darts, and use the following method to succeed: - A number of men in canoes falling in with a stock while swimming, on a sudden set up a shouting, making as much noise as they can; on which, the birds being too much frightened to fly away, dive under the water; but as the place at which they are to rise again is known by the bubbling of the water above, the hunters follow them up as close as may be; and after acting this three or four times over, the birds become so fatigued as to be easily killed. (EB I, 1797: 657)
The apex predators, these shouty men.
The female is a very artful bird; and does not always make the nest close to the water, but frequently at a good distance from it; in which case the duck will take the young in its beak or between its legs. It is known sometimes to lay the eggs in a high tree, in a deserted magpie's or crow's nest. (EB I, 1797: 663)
Väga kunstiline lind.
The drakes, howsoever they vary in colours, always retain the curled feathers of the tail, and both sexes the form of the bill, of the wild kind. Nature sports in the colours of all domestic animals; and for a wise and useful end, That mankind may the more readily distinguish and claim their respective property. (EB I, 1797: 663)
Yes, the colours of the feathers on these birds certainly has something whatsoever to do with the human species.
It is also customary there to wait for the flock passing over certain known places, and the sportsman, having a wicker cage, containing a quantity of tame birds, lets out one at a time, at a convenient season, which enticing the passengers within gunshot, five or six are often killed at once by an expert marksman. (EB I, 1797: 663)
There is certainly a lot of killing involved in the descriptions of these bird species, especially of knocking geese on the head.
Various other means of catching ducks and geese are peculiar to certain nations; of which one seems worth mentioning from its singularity: - The person wishing to take these, wades into the water up to the chin, and having his head covered with an empty calabash, approaches the place where the ducks are; when they, not regarding an object of this sort, suffer the man freely to mix with the flock; after which he has only to pull them by the legs under the water, one after another, till he is satisfied; returning as unsuspected by the remainder as when he first came among them. This method is frequently put in practice on the river Ganges, using the earthen vessels of the Gentoos instead of the calabashes: these vessels are what the Gentoos boil their rice in, and are called Kutcharee pots (they likewise make a dish for their tables in them, which goes by the same name): after these are once used they look upon them as defiled, and in course throw them into the river as useless; and the duck-takers find them convenient for their purpose, as the ducks, from constantly seeing the vessels float down the stream, look upon them as objects of full as little regard as a calabash. The above, or some such method, is also practised in China as well as in India. (EB I, 1797: 663)
Hey, where did Steve go? If there truly are alien abductions, it is not like the human species hasn't done the same to others.
ANASTASIS, a term among ancient physicians, for a rising up to go to stool. It also signifies the passage of any humour, when expelled from one part, and obliged to remove to another. (EB I, 1797: 664)
There really is a term for everything.
This was so much the more necessary, because these tumults were chiefly occasioned by a kind of doxology or short hymn which used to be sung at divine service. This doxology consisted only of the following words, αγιος ο Θεος, αγιος ιξ-υδος, αγιος αθανατος, that is, "Holy God, holy the powerful, holy the immortal;" for which reason it was called τρισαγιος, Trisagius, "tree times holy;" because the word holy was therein three times repeated. The orthodox used to sing that hymn without any addition, or by adding only to it, αγια τριας, ελεησον ημας, i.e. "Holy Trinity, have mercy upon us:" But Peter the Fuller, bishop of Antioch, pretended to add these words to it, viz. ο ςαυρωθεις διημας, i.e. "who hast been crucified for us;" and as it was supposed that the first holy related to the Father, the second to the Son, the third to the Holy Ghost, the adding these words, who hast been crucified for us, seemed to insinuate that the whole consubstantial Trinity had suffered; for which reason the orthodox were resolved not to admit this addition. (EB I, 1797: 665)
Divinity, free will, and immortality?
When the seeds of this plant are ripe, the branches will draw up and contract; so that the whole plant forms a kind of ball or globular body, which will expand on laying it a short time in warm water. This property it retains for many years, on which account it is preserved as a curiosity by some people. From this property the monks have given it the name Rosa Mariæ, pretending that the flowers open on the night in which our Saviour was born. (EB I, 1797: 665)
Anastatica hierochuntica
ANATHEMA, among ecclesiastical writers, imports whatever is set apart, separated, or divided; but is most usually meant to express the cutting off a person from the privileges of society and communion with the faithful.
The anathema differs from excommunication in the circumstances of being attended with curses and execrations. It was practised in the primitive church against notorious offenders; and the form of that pronounced by Synencius against one Andronicus, is as follows: "Let no church of God be open to Andronicus, but let every sanctuary be shut against him. I admonish both private men and magistrates, to receive him neither under their roof nor to their table; and priests more especially, that they neither converse with him living, nor attended his funeral when dead." (EB I, 1797: 666)
Moderns use it simply in the sense of "contrary to".
Civilization, and improvements of every kind, would naturally begin in fertile countries and healthful climates, where there would be leisure for reflection, and an appetite for amusement. Accordingly, writing, and many other useful and ornamental inventions and arts, appear to have been cultivated in the eastern parts of Asia long before the earliest times that are treated of by the Greek or other European writers; and that the arts and learning of those eastern people were in subsequent times gradually communicated to adjacent countries, especially by the medium of traffic. The customs, superstitions, and climate of eastern countries, however, appear to have been as unfavourable to practical anatomy as they were inviting to the study of astronomy, geometry, poetry, and all the foster arts of peace. (EB I, 1797: 667)
The humanities were "the softer arts of peace", as opposed to anatomy, the harsh art of war.
In the beginning of the 15th century, learning revived considerably in Europe, and particularly physic, by means of copies of the Greek authors brought from the sack of Constantinople; after which the number of anatomists and anatomical books increased to a prodigious degree. - The Europeans becoming thus possessed of the ancient Greek fathers of medicine, were for a long time so much occupied in correcting the copies they could obtain, studying the meaning, and commenting upon them, that they attempted nothing of their own, especially in anatomy. (EB I, 1797: 669)
This explains a lot, and the phrase is familiar.
Soon after this, we may say about the year 1540, the great Vesalius appeared. He was studious, laborious, and ambitious. (EB I, 1797: 669)
Triad: 3, 1, & 2
From one day to another there has been a constant succession of discoveries, relating either to the structure or functions of our body; and new anatomical processes, both of investigation and demonstration, have been daily invented. (EB I, 1797: 670)
Jakobson called his linguistics structural functionalis because these words were in fashion at the beginning of the 20th century. In anatomy and physiology they've been mainstays for much longer.
Soon after, Isbrandus Diembroeck, professor of anatomy at Utrecht, began to appear as an author. His work contained very little original; but he was at great pains to collect from others whatever was valuable in their writings, and his system was the common standard among anatomical students for many years. (EB I, 1797: 671)
But for age, subject, and effect, that is me.
The figures are delineated with accuracy and clearness; but the colouring is rather beautiful than correct. (EB I, 1797: 672)
Clear and distinct.
Lastly, The mind being formed for society and intercourse with being of her own kind, she must be endued with powers of expressing and communicating her thoughts by some sensible marks or signs; which shall be both easy to herself, and admit of great variety: and accordingly she is provided with the organs and faculty of speech, by which she can throw out signs with amazing facility, and vary them without end. (EB I, 1797: 675)
Even anatomy includes some semiotics.
In each tooth we find an inner cavity, into which enter an artery, vein, and nerve. This cavity begins by a small opening, and becoming larger, terminates in the body of the tooth. In advanced life this hole sometimes closes, and the tooth is of course rendered insensible. (EB I, 1797: 685)
There might be some merit in sensing your teeth during meditation.
Muscles that act in opposition to each other, are called antagonistæ; thus every extensor or muscle has a flexor for its antagonist, and vice versa. Muscles that concur in the same action are styled congeneres. (EB I, 1797: 702)
Thus "congeries" can he understood as groups that work together.
[...] for it is evident that the limbs were affected by the sympathy of the brain, and of the nervous system in general, with the nerves of the heart. (EB I, 1797: 703)
The co-suffering of the brain?
The middle part of the upper region is called epigastrium, and its two sides hypochondria. (EB I, 1797: 725)
Everyone has hypochondria.
The stomach is placed in the epigastrium, and under the stomach is the pancreas. The liver fills the right hypochondrium, and the spleen is situated in the left. The kidneys are seen about the middle of the lumbar region, and the urinary bladder and parts of generation are seated in the lower division of the belly. (EB I, 1797: 725)
Had hypochondria the psychological kind something to do with the liver? Were alcoholics the o.g. hypochondiacs?
The testes are two glandular bodies, serving to secrete the semen from the blood. (EB I, 1797: 736)
So there is semen in blood?
The labia pudendi being separated, we observe a sulcus called fossa magna; in the upper part of which is placed the clitoris, a small round spongy body, in some measure resembling the male penis, but impervious, composed of two corpora cavernosa, arising from the tuberosities of the ossa ischii; [...] (EB I, 1797: 740)
Not a superficial similarity, it's the same structure.
The breasts may be defined to be two large conglomerate glands, mixed with a good deal of adipose membrane. (EB I, 1797: 745)
Rasvkude ja näärmed.
The late M. Ferein communicated to the French Academy of Sciences a very ingenious theory on the formation of the voice. He considered the organ of the voice as a string, as well as a wind, instrument; so that what art has hithero been unable to construct, and what both the fathers Mersenne and Kircher so much wished to see, M. Ferein imagined he had at length discovered in the human body. (EB I, 1797: 749)
Geniaalne. Inimese kõneaparaat korraga keel- ja puhkpill.
To effect this, we begin by making a considerable inspiration; in consequence of which the diaphragm is carried downwards towards the lower belly; the abdominal muscles are at the same time contracted in obedience to the will; and the intestines being compressed on all sides, the resistance of the sphincter is overcome, and the feces pass out at the anus; which is afterwards drawn up by its longitudinal fibres, which are called revatores ani, and then by means of its sphincter is again contracted: [...] (EB I, 1797: 749)
Mul ei olnud aimugi, et sissehingamine on oluline aspekt selle operatsiooni juures.
Behind the thalami and commissura posterior, we observe a small, soft, greyish, and oval body, about the size of a pea. This is the glandula pinealis; it is described by Galen under the name of conarion, and has been rendered famous by Descartes, who supposed it to be the seat of the soul. Galen seems formerly to have entertained the same opinion. Some modern writers have, with as little reason, imagined that the soul is placed in the corpus callosum. (EB I, 1797: 758)
Lobotomy kills the soul. I wonder if the conarion has something to do with conation.
The pathetici, distributed to the superior oblique muscles of the eyes, the motion of which is expressive of certain passions of the soul. (EB I, 1797: 760)
Wow. How much more could this one greek root be connected to?
They have farther supposed, that this very subtile fluid, to which they have given the name of animal spirits, is secreted in the cortical substance of the brain and spinal marrow, from whence it passes through the medullary substance. This, like the other system, is founded altogether on hypothesis; but it seems to be an hypothesis derived from much more probable principles, and there are many ingenious arguments to be brought in its support. (EB I, 1797: 761)
Animal spirits a fluid.
ANBERTKEND, in the eastern language, a celebrated book of the Brachmans, wherein the Indian philosophy and religion are contained. The word in its literal sense denotes the cistern wherein is the water of life. The anbertkend is divided into 50 beths, or discourses, each of which consists of ten chapters. It has been translated from the original Indian into Arabic, under the title of Morat al Maani, q. d. the marrow of intelligence. (EB I, 1797: 770)
Never heard of it.
When the shank is, for instance, eight feet long, the two arms are to be seven feet long, measuring them according to their curvity. As to the degree of curvity given the arms, there is no rule for it; the workmen are here left to their own discretion. (EB I, 1797: 772)
The curvity of an anchor.
His merit in this way procured him a very favourable reception at court; and Lewis XIV. showed him many marks of his favour. His sprightly conversation and polite behaviour made his company agreeable to all the men of figure both at court and in the city, and the most considerable persons were extremely pleased to have him at their houses. (EB I, 1797: 775)
Phatic qualia. Florent-Cartond Ancourt.
ANCYLE, in antiquity, a kind of shield that fell, as was pretended, from heaven, in the reign of Numa Pompilius; at which time, likewise, a voice was heard declaring that Rome should be mistress of the world as long as she should preserve this holy buckler. It was kept with great care in the temple of Mars, under the direction with great care in the temple of Mars, under the direction of twelve priests; and left any should attempt to steal it, eleven others were made so like, as not to be distinguished from the sacred one. These ancylia were carried in procession every year round the city of Rome. (EB I, 1797: 775)
No wonder they doubt the authenticity of the Danish flag story.
Their hands were covered with chilblains; their lips swelled and chopped; so that every motion in speaking, or the like, drew blood; consequently they were obliged to strict taciturnity, and little disposed to laugh, as, by causing an extension of the lips, it produced such fissures as were very painful for two or three days after. (EB I, 1797: 778)
These details were supposed to be amusing.
ANDRAPODISMUS, in ancient writers, the selling of persons for slaves. Hence also andrapodistes, a dealer in slaves, more particularly a kidnapper, who steals men or children to sell them; a crime for which the Thessalians were noted. (EB I, 1797: 780)
Didn't know thst there was a word for that.
This very learned prelate, who was distinguished by his piety, charity, and integrity, may be justly ranked with the best preachers and completest scholars of his age; he appeared to much gretaer advantage in the pulpit than he does now in his works, which abound with Latin quotations and trivial witticisms. His sermons, though full of puns, were suited to the taste of the times in which he lived, and were consequently greatly admired. He was a man of polite manners and livery conversation; and could quote Greek and Latin authors, or even pun, with king James. (EB I, 1797: 784)
Wit is not lasting.
ANDRONA, in ancient writers, denotes a street, or public place, where people met and conversed together. In some writers, androna is more expressly used for the space between two houses; in which sense, the Greeks also use the term ανδρωνας, for the way or passage between two apartments. (EB I, 1797: 788)
Uulits.
ANECDOTE, ANECDOTA, a term used by some authors, for the titles of Secret Histories; but it more properly denotes a relation of detached and interesting particulars. The word is Greek, ανεχδοτα, q. d. things not yet known or hithero kept secret. Procopius gives this title to a book which he published against Justinian and his wife Theodora; and he seems to be the only person among the ancients who has represented princes such as they are in their domestic relations. - Varillas has published Anecdotes of the House of Medicis. (EB I, 1797: 790)
Most definitely not how it is used today, though a vestige of this meaning remains in the adjective "anecdotal".
ANGARI, or ANGARII, in antiquity, denote public couriers, appointed for the carrying of messages. The ancient Persians, Budæus observes, had their αγγαρειον δρομημα; which was a set of courier on horseback, posted at certain stages or distances, always in readiness to receive the dispatches from one, and forward them to another, with wonderful celerity, answering to what the modern call posts, q.d. positi, as being posted at certain places or stages. (EB I, 1797: 793)
Might come handy someday to know this.
"Time (says the judicious Charnock) began with the foundation of the world: before the beginning of the creation and the beginning of time, there could be nothing but eternity; nothing but what was uncreated, that is, nothing but what was without beginning." But if angels were in a pre-existent state, the historian's language is unaccountably strange and inaccurate: for if the phrase in the beginning, which is remarkably emphatical, refer to the creation of the heavens and the earth only, they are unhappily expressed; so expressed, indeed, as to convey no meaning to those who consider words as the vehicle of thought, and as intended to express clearly to others the meaning of the writer. For the natural obvious sense is as follows - "In the beginning of the creation of the heavens and the earth, God created the heavens and the earth;" which language is not only a departure from the perspicuity and precision which distinguish all his narrations, but entirely irrational and absurd. (EB I, 1797: 795)
A phatic accusation against a departure from scriptural nonsense.
That the angelican powers and abilities vastly excel those of man, cannot be denied, if we consider, that their faculties are not clogged or impeded, as ours are, by any of those imperfections which are inseparable from corporeal being: so that their understandings are always in perfect vigour; their inclinations regular; their motions strong and quick; their actions irresistible by material bodies, whose natural qualities they can controul, or manage to their purposes, and occasion either blessings or calamities, public or private, here below; instances of which are too numerous to mention. (EB I, 1797: 795)
John Locke discussed this at length for somr reason. Angels have perfect memory, for example.
Some have imagined it to have been after; and that carnality, or lusting to converse with women upon earth, was the sin which ruined them: an opinion (B) built on a mistaken interpretation of Scripture, as if angels were meant by the sons of God who are said to have begotten the mighty men of old on the daughters of men. (EB I, 1797: 796)
Angels in heaven: "Ayy where the human women at?"
ANGER, a violent passion of the mind, consisting in a propensity to take vengeance on the author of some real or supposed injury done the offended party.
Anger is either deliberative or instinctive; and the latter kind is rash and ungovernable, because it operates blindly, without affording time for deliberation or foresight. (EB I, 1797: 798)
It is due to bypassing deliberation that anger is said to be blind, searching for its object rather than proceeding from it.
