Quotes4study

The right to relief was dependent on the right of citizenship. Hence it became hereditary and passed from father to son. It was thus in the nature of a continuous endowed charity, like the well-known family charity of Smith, for instance, in which a large property was left to the testator's descendants, of whom it was said that as a result no Smith of that family could fail to be poor. But the _annona civica_ was an endowed charity, affecting not a single family, but the whole population. Later, when Constantinople was founded, the right to relief was attached to new houses as a premium on building operations. Thus it belonged not to persons only, but also to houses, and became a species of "immovable" property, passing to the purchaser of the house or property, as would the adscript slaves. The bread followed the house (_aedes sequantur annonae_). If, on the transfer of a house, bread claims were lost owing to the absence of claimants, they were transferred to the treasury (_fisci viribus vindicentur_). But the savage law of Valentinian, referred to above, shows to what lengths such a system was pushed. Early in its history the _annona civica_ attracted many to Rome in the hope of living there without working. For the 400 years since the _lex Clodia_ was enacted constant injury had been done by it, and now (A.D. 364) people had to be kept off the civic bounty as if they were birds of prey, and the very poor man (_pauperrimus_), who had no civic title to the food, if he obtained it by fraud, was enslaved. Thus, in spite of the abundant state relief, there had grown up a class of the very poor, the Gentiles of the state, who were outside the sphere of its ministrations. The _annona civica_ was introduced not only into Constantinople, but also into Alexandria, with baleful results, and into Antioch. When Constantinople was founded the corn-ships of Africa sailed there instead of to Rome. On charitable relief, as we shall see, the _annona_ has had a long-continued and fatal influence. Entry: PART

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 8 "Chariot" to "Chatelaine"     1910-1911

Another celebrated hymn, which belongs to the first medieval period, is the "Veni Creator Spiritus" ("Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire"). The earliest recorded occasion of its use is that of a translation (898) of the relics of St Marcellus, mentioned in the _Annals_ of the Benedictine order. It has since been constantly sung throughout Western Christendom (as versions of it still are in the Church of England), as part of the appointed offices for the coronation of kings, the consecration and ordination of bishops and priests, the assembling of synods and other great ecclesiastical solemnities. It has been attributed--probably in consequence of certain corruptions in the text of Ekkehard's _Life of Notker_ (a work of the 13th century)--to Charlemagne. Ekkehard wrote in the Benedictine monastery of St Gall, to which Notker belonged, with full access to its records; and an ignorant interpolator, regardless of chronology, added, at some later date, the word "Great" to the name of "the emperor Charles," wherever it was mentioned in that work. The biographer relates that Notker--a man of a gentle, contemplative nature, observant of all around him, and accustomed to find spiritual and poetical suggestions in common sights and sounds--was moved by the sound of a mill-wheel to compose his "sequence" on the Holy Spirit, "Sancti Spiritus adsit nobis gratia" ("Present with us ever be the Holy Spirit's grace"); and that, when finished, he sent it as a present to "the emperor Charles," who in return sent him back, "by the same messenger," the hymn "Veni Creator," which (says Ekkehard) the same "Spirit had inspired him to write" ("Sibi idem Spiritus inspiraverat"). If this story is to be credited--and, from its circumstantial and almost dramatic character, it has an air of truth--the author of "Veni Creator" was not Charlemagne, but his grandson the emperor Charles the Bald. Notker himself long survived that emperor, and died in 912. Entry: 4

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 14, Slice 2 "Hydromechanics" to "Ichnography"     1910-1911

The date of inscriptions is determined partly by the internal evidence of the subject, persons, and events treated of, and the character of the dialect and language. But the most important evidence is the form of the letters and style of execution. For the Attic inscriptions the development from the earliest times to about A.D. 500 is elaborately treated by Larfeld, _Handbuch der att. Inschr._ (1902). bk. ii. Much of the evidence is of a kind difficult to appreciate from a mere description. Yet--besides the [Greek: boustrophêdon] writing of many early documents--we may mention the contrast between the stiff, angular characters which prevailed before 500 or 450 B.C. and the graceful yet simple forms of the Periclean age. This development was part of the general movement of the time. Inscriptions of this period are usually written [Greek: stotchêdon], i.e. the letters are in line vertically as well as horizontally. From the archonship of Eucleides (403 B.C.) onwards the Athenians officially adopted the fuller alphabet which had obtained in Ionia since the 6th century. Before 403 B.C. [zeta] and [psi] were expressed in Attic inscriptions by [Chi][Sigma] and [phi][Sigma], while [EPSILON] did duty for [eta], [epsilon], and sometimes [epsilon][iota], [Omicron] for [omicron], [omicron][upsilon], and [omega]--[Eta] being used only for the aspirate. There is, however, occasional use of the Ionic alphabet in Attica, even in official inscriptions, as early as the middle of the 5th century. The Macedonian period betrays a falling off in neatness and firmness of execution--the letters being usually small and scratchy, excepting in inscriptions relating to great personages, when the characters are often very large and handsome. In the 2nd century came in the regular use of _apices_ as an ornament of letters. These tendencies increased during the period of Roman dominion in Greece, and gradually, especially in Asia Minor, the _iota adscriptum_ was dropped. The Greek characters of the Augustan age indicate a period of restoration; they are uniformly clear, handsome, and adorned with _apices_. The lunate epsilon and sigma ([epsilon], C) establish themselves in this period; so does the square form [square C], and the cursive [omega] is also occasionally found. The inscriptions of Hadrian's time show a tendency to eclectic imitation of the classical lettering. But from the period of the Antonines (when we find a good many pretty inscriptions) the writing grows more coarse and clumsy until Byzantine times, when the forms appear barbarous indeed beside an inscription of the Augustan or even Antonine age. Entry: 3

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 14, Slice 6 "Inscriptions" to "Ireland, William Henry"     1910-1911

Erigena is the most interesting figure among the middle-age writers. The freedom of his speculation, and the boldness with which he works out his logical or dialectical system of the universe, altogether prevent us from classing him along with the scholastics properly so called. He marks, indeed, a stage of transition from the older Platonizing philosophy to the later and more rigid scholasticism. In no sense whatever can it be affirmed that with Erigena philosophy is in the service of theology. The above-quoted assertion as to the substantial identity between philosophy and religion is indeed repeated almost _totidem verbis_ by many of the later scholastic writers, but its significance altogether depends upon the selection of one or other term of the identity as fundamental or primary. Now there is no possibility of mistaking Erigena's position: to him philosophy or reason is first, is primitive; authority or religion is secondary, derived. "Auctoritas siquidem ex vera ratione processit, ratio vero nequaquam ex auctoritate. Omnis enim auctoritas, quae vera ratione non approbatur, infirma videtur esse. Vera autem ratio, quum virtutibus suis rata atque immutabilis munitur, nullius auctoritatis adstipulatione roborari indiget" (_De divisione naturae_, i. 71). F.D. Maurice, the only historian of note who declines to ascribe a rationalizing tendency to Erigena, obscures the question by the manner in which he states it. He asks his readers, after weighing the evidence advanced, to determine "whether he (Erigena) used his philosophy to explain away his theology, or to bring out what he conceived to be the fullest meaning of it." These alternatives seem to be wrongly put. "Explaining away theology" is something wholly foreign to the philosophy of that age; and even if we accept the alternative that Erigena endeavours speculatively to bring out the full meaning of theology, we are by no means driven to the conclusion that he was primarily or principally a theologian. He does not start with the datum of theology as the completed body of truth, requiring only elucidation and interpretation; his fundamental thought is that of the universe, nature, [Greek: to pan], or God, as the ultimate unity which works itself out into the rational system of the world. Man and all that concerns man are but parts of this system, and are to be explained by reference to it; for explanation or understanding of a thing is determination of its place in the universal or all. Religion or revelation is one element or factor in the divine process, a stage or phase of the ultimate rational life. The highest faculty of man, reason, _intellectus_, _intellectualis visio_, is that which is not content with the individual or partial, but grasps the whole and thereby comprehends the parts. In this highest effort of reason, which is indeed God thinking in man, thought and being are at one, the opposition of being and thought is overcome. When Erigena starts with such propositions, it is clearly impossible to understand his position and work if we insist on regarding him as a scholastic, accepting the dogmas of the church as ultimate data, and endeavouring only to present them in due order and defend them by argument. Entry: ERIGENA

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 9, Slice 7 "Equation" to "Ethics"     1910-1911

Various other kinds of manna are known, but none of these has been found to contain mannite. Alhagi manna (Persian and Arabic _tar-angubin_, also known as terendschabin) is the produce of _Alhagi maurorum_, a small, spiny, leguminous plant, growing in Arabia, Asia Minor, Persia, Afghanistan, Baluchistan and northern India. This manna occurs in the form of small, roundish, hard, dry tears, varying from the size of a mustard seed to that of a coriander, of a light-brown colour, sweet taste, and senna-like odour. The spines and pods of the plant are often mixed with it. It is collected near Kandahar and Herat, and imported into India from Cabul and Kandahar. Tamarisk manna (Persian _gaz-angubin_, tamarisk honey) exudes in June and July from the slender branches of _Tamarix gallica_, var. _mannifera_, in the form of honey-like drops, which, in the cold temperature of the early morning, are found in the solid state. This secretion is caused by the puncture of an insect, _Coccus manniparus_. In the valleys of the peninsula of Sinai, especially in the Wady el-Sheikh, this manna (Arabic _man_) is collected by the Arabs and sold to the monks of St Catherine, who supply it to the pilgrims visiting the convent. It is found also in Persia and the Punjab, but does not appear to be collected in any quantity. This kind of manna seems to be alluded to by Herodotus (vii. 31). Under the same name of _gaz-angubin_ there are sold commonly in the Persian bazaars round cakes, of which a chief ingredient is a manna obtained to the south-west of Ispahan, in the month of August, by shaking the branches or scraping the stems of _Astragalus florulentus_ and _A. adscendens_.[1] _Shir Khist_, a manna known to writers on materia medica in the 16th century, is imported into India from Afghanistan and Turkestan to a limited extent; it is the produce of _Cotoneaster nummularia_ (_Rosaceae_), and to a less extent of _Atraphaxis spinosa_ (_Polygonaceae_); it is brought chiefly from Herat. Entry: MANNA

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 17, Slice 5 "Malta" to "Map, Walter"     1910-1911

The earliest unquestionable description of a pivoted compass is that contained in the remarkable _Epistola de magnete_ of Petrus Peregrinus de Maricourt, written at Lucera in 1269 to Sigerus de Foncaucourt. (First printed edition Augsburg, 1558. See also Bertelli in Boncompagni's _Bollettino di bibliografia_, t. i., or S. P. Thompson in _Proc. British Academy_, vol. ii.) Of this work twenty-eight MSS. exist; seven of them being at Oxford. The first part of the epistle deals generally with magnetic attractions and repulsions, with the polarity of the stone, and with the supposed influence of the poles of the heavens upon the poles of the stone. In the second part Peregrinus describes first an improved floating compass with fiducial line, a circle graduated with 90 degrees to each quadrant, and provided with movable sights for taking bearings. He then describes a new compass with a needle thrust through a pivoted axis, placed in a box with transparent cover, cross index of brass or silver, divided circle, and an external "rule" or alhidade provided with a pair of sights. In the Leiden MS. of this work, which for long was erroneously ascribed to one Peter Adsiger, is a spurious passage, long believed to mention the variation of the compass. Entry: A

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 7 "Columbus" to "Condottiere"     1910-1911

The law of the conservation of matter, an important element in the atomic theory, has been roughly verified by innumerable analyses, in which, a given weight of a substance having been taken, each ingredient in it is isolated and its weight separately determined; the total weight of the ingredients is always found to be very nearly equal to the weight of the original substance. But on account of experimental errors in weighing and measuring, and through loss of material in the transfer of substances from one vessel to another, such analyses are rarely trustworthy to more than one part in about 500; so that small changes in weight consequent on the chemical change could not with certainty be proved or disproved. A few experimenters have carried the verification much further. Stas, in his syntheses of silver iodide, weighed the silver and the iodine separately, and after converting them into the compound he weighed this also. In each of a number of experiments he found that the weight of the silver iodide did not differ by one twenty-thousandth of the whole from the sum of the weights of the silver and the iodine used. His analyses of another compound, silver iodate, confirm the law to one part in 78,000. In E.W. Morley's experiments on the synthesis of water the hydrogen, the oxygen and the water that had been formed were separately determined; taking the mean of his results, the sum of the weights of the ingredients is not found to differ from the weight of the product by one part in 10,000. It is evident that if our experiments are solely directed to the verification of this law, they should, if possible, be carried out in a hermetically closed vessel, the vessel and its contents being weighed before and after the chemical change. The extremely careful experiments of this kind, by H. Landolt and others, made it at first appear that the change in weight, if there is any, consequent on a chemical change can rarely exceed one-millionth of the weight of the reacting substances, and that it must often be much less. The small discrepancies found are so easily accounted for by attributing them to experimental errors that, until recently, every chemist would have regarded the law as sufficiently verified. Landolt's subsequent experiments showed, what was already noticed in the earlier ones, that these minute changes in weight are nearly always losses, the products weigh less than the components, while if they had been purely experimental errors, due to weighing, they might have been expected to be as frequently gains as losses. Landolt was disposed to attribute these losses in weight to the containing vessel, which was of glass or quartz, not being absolutely impervious, but in 1908 he showed that, by making allowance for the moisture adsorbed on the vessel, the errors were both positive and negative, and were less than one in ten million. He concluded that _no change of weight can be detected._ Modern researches (see RADIOACTIVITY) on the complex nature of the atom have a little shaken the belief in the absolute permanence of matter. But it seems pretty clear that if there is any change in weight consequent on chemical change, it is _too minute to be of importance to the chemist_, though the methods of modern physics may settle the question. (See ELEMENT.) Entry: ATOM

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Slice 8 "Atherstone" to "Austria"     1910-1911

After Chlodio a certain Meroveus (Merowech) was king of the Salian Franks. We do not know if he was the son of Chlodio; Gregory of Tours simply says that he belonged to Chlodio's stock--"de hujus stirpe quidam Merovechum regem fuisse adserunt,"--and then only gives the fact at second hand. Perhaps the remarks of the Byzantine historian Priscus may refer to Meroveus. A king of the Franks having died, his two sons disputed the power. The elder journeyed into Pannonia to obtain support from Attila; the younger betook himself to the imperial court at Rome. "I have seen him," writes Priscus; "he was still very young, and we all remarked his fair hair which fell upon his shoulders." Aetius welcomed him warmly and sent him back a friend and _foederatus_. In any case, eventually, Franks fought (451) in the Roman ranks at the great battle of Mauriac (the Catalaunian Fields), which arrested the progress of Attila into Gaul; and in the _Vita Lupi_, which, though undoubtedly of later date, is a recension of an earlier document, the name of Meroveus appears among the combatants. Towards 457 Meroveus was succeeded by his son Childeric. At first Childeric was a faithful _foederatus_ of the Romans, fighting for them against the Visigoths and the Saxons south of the Loire; but he soon sought to make himself independent and to extend his conquests. He died in 481 and was succeeded by his son Clovis, who conquered the whole of Gaul with the exception of the kingdom of Burgundy and Provence. Clovis made his authority recognized over the other Salian tribes (whose kings dwelt at Cambrai and other cities), and put an end to the domination of the Ripuarian Franks. Entry: FRANKS

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 11, Slice 1 "Franciscans" to "French Language"     1910-1911

This whole type of prophecy reached the West above all through the _Pseudo-Methodius_, which was soon translated into Latin. Especially influential, too, in this respect was the letter which the monk Adso in 954 wrote to Queen Gerberga, _De ortu et tempere Antichristi_. The old Tiburtine Sibylla went through edition after edition, in each case being altered so as to apply to the government of the monarch who happened to be ruling at the time. Then in the West the period arrived in which eschatology, and above all the expectation of the coming of Antichrist, exercised a great influence on the world's history. This period, as is well known, was inaugurated, at the end of the 12th century, by the apocalyptic writings of the abbot Joachim of Floris. Soon the word Antichrist re-echoed from all sides in the embittered controversies of the West. The pope bestowed this title upon the emperor, the emperor upon the pope, the Guelphs on the Ghibellines and the Ghibellines on the Guelphs. In the contests between the rival powers and courts of the period, the prophecy of Antichrist played a political part. It gave motives to art, to lyrical, epic and dramatic poetry.[13] Among the visionary Franciscans, enthusiastic adherents of Joachim's prophecies, arose above all the conviction that the pope was Antichrist, or at least his precursor. From the Franciscans, influenced by Abbot Joachim, the lines of connexion are clearly traceable with Milic of Kremsier (_Libellus de Antichristo_) and Matthias of Janow. For Wycliffe and his adherent John Purvey (probably the author of the _Commentarius in Apocalypsin ante centum annos editus_, edited in 1528 by Luther), as on the other hand for Hus, the conviction that the papacy is essentially Antichrist is absolute. Finally, if Luther advanced in his contest with the papacy with greater and greater energy, he did so because he was borne on by the conviction that the pope in Rome was Antichrist. And if in the _Augustana_. the expression of this conviction was suppressed for political reasons, in the Articles of Schmalkalden, drawn up by him, Luther propounded it in the most uncompromising fashion. This sentence was for him an _articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae_. To write the history of the idea of Antichrist in the last centuries of the middle ages, would be almost to write that of the middle ages themselves. Entry: A

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Slice 2 "Anjar" to "Apollo"     1910-1911

ICHNEUMON-FLY, a general name applied to parasitic insects of the section _Ichneumonoidea_ (or _Entomophaga_), order _Hymenoptera_, from the typical genus _Ichneumon_, belonging to the chief family of that section--itself fancifully so called after the Egyptian mammal (_Herpestes_). The species of the families (_Ichneumonidae_, _Braconidae_, _Evaniidae_, _Proctotrypidae_, and _Chalcididae_) are often indiscriminately called "Ichneumons," but the "super-family" of the Ichneumonoidea in the classification of W. H. Ashmead contains only the _Evaniidae_, the _Stephanidae_, and the large assemblage of insects usually included in the two families of the _Ichneumonidae_ and the _Braconidae_, which are respectively equivalent to the _Ichneumones genuini_ and _I. adsciti_ of older naturalists, chiefly differing in the former having two recurrent nerves to the anterior wing, whilst the latter has only one such nerve. The _Ichneumonidae_ proper are one of the most extensive groups of insects. Gravenhorst described some 1650 European species, to which considerable subsequent additions have been made. There are 6 sub-families of the _Ichneumonidae_, viz. the _Ichneumoninae_, _Cryptinae_, _Agriotypinae_, _Ophioninae_, _Tryphoninae_ and _Pimplinae_, differing considerably in size and facies, but united in the common attribute of being, in their earlier stages, parasitic upon other insects. They have all long narrow bodies; a small free head with long filiform or setaceous antennae, which are never elbowed, and have always more than sixteen joints; the abdomen attached to the thorax at its hinder extremity between the base of the posterior coxae, and provided in the female with a straight ovipositor often exserted and very long; and the wings veined, with perfect cells on the disk of the front pair. Ashmead proposes to separate the _Agriotypidae_ (which are remarkable for their aquatic habit, being parasitic on caddis-worms) from the _Ichneumonidae_ on account of their firm ventral abdominal segments and spined scutellum. He also separates from the _Braconidae_ the _Alysiidae_ as a distinct family; they have peculiar mandibles with out-turned tips. Entry: ICHNEUMON

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 14, Slice 2 "Hydromechanics" to "Ichnography"     1910-1911