FIG, N. S. FIG'APPLE, FIG'GNAT, FIG LEAF, FIG'MARIGOLD, FIG'WORT. Sax. Fic; Fr. figue; Ital. and Span. figo; Teut. feig; Lat. ficus; Heb. 15. See FICUS. The tree which bears figs; the fruit of the ficus. The fig-apple Mortimer defines in the extract. The fig-gnat is a species of culex. Fig-leaf, the leaf of the ficus, and metaphorically any flimsy, imperfect covering. Fig-marigold, a plant-see the extract. Figwort, a plant also called SCROPHULARIA, which Will not wounding the branch of a pear-tree, which is too vigorous, prevent the blossoms from falling off; as from some fig-trees the fruit is said to fall off unless they are wounded by caprification? Darwin. FIG, or FIG-TREE. See FICUS. Figs are a considerable article in the materia medica, chiefly employed in emollient cataplasms and pectoral decoctions. The best are those which come from Turkey. Many are also brought from the south of France, where they prepare them in the following manner:-The fruit is first dipped in scalding hot lie made of the ashes of the figtree, and then dried in the sun. Hence these figs stick to the hands, and scour them like lixivial salts and for the the same reason they excite to stool, without griping. They are moderately nutrimental, grateful to the stomach, and easier to digest than any other of the sweet-fruits They have been said to produce lice, when eaten as a common food; but this is entirely without foundation. FIGHIG, a town and district of Africa, in the country of Sigilmessa, to the south of the greater Atlas and included within the dominions of the emperor of Morocco. A fine woollen cloth is manufactured here; and the place is a considerable rendezvous for the Mecca and Tombuctoo caravans. 240 miles E. S. E. of Mequinez. FIGHT, v. n., v. a. & n. s. Sax. FeohFIGHT'ER, tan; Gothic, FIGHTING, part. adj., & n. s. vigan, figta; Swed. fecta, fegd (war); Teut. fechten; all, as Mr. Thomson thinks, from the Goth. eiga, to contend. To combat in battle; to war; make war; contend in arms; contend generally; taking both with and against before the party opposed as an active verb, to war against: as substantives, fight and fighting are battle or combat of any kind; contention: fight is particularly used for a screen of the combatants in ships. The stars in their courses fought against Sisera. Judges. An host of fighting men went out to war by bands. 2 Chron. Ye fight with the Chaldeans. Jer At mortal battails had he ben fiftene, The most diminutive of birds, will fight, I will return again into the house, and desire some conduct of the lady: I am no fighter. Id. Philips. Greatly unfortunate, he fights the cause Of honour, virtue, liberty, and Rome. Addison. In fighting fields as far the spear I throw, As flies the arrow from the well-drawn bow. Pope. The common question is, if we must now surrender Spain, what have we been fighting for all this while ? The answer is ready: we have been fighting for the ruin of the publick interest, and the advancement of a private. Swift. While chairs and slavery were the certain lot of the conquered, battles were fought, and towns de fended with a rage and obstinacy, which nothing but flinger are both names of the contemptible race horror at such a fate could have inspired. of astrologers. Robertson's Sermon. And when they smiled because he deemed it near, His heart more truly knew that peal too well Which stretched his father on a bloody bier, And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell: He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell. Byron. FIG'MENT, Lat. figmentum. A fiction; invention; feigned notion. Upon the like grounds was raised the figment of Briareus, who, dwelling in a city called Hecatonchiria, the fancies of those times assigned him an hundred hands. Browne. Those assertions are in truth the figments of those idle brains that brought romances into church history. Bishop Lloyd. It carried rather an appearance of figment and invention, in those that handed down the memory of it, than of truth and reality. Woodward. FIGUERAS, a town of Catalonia, situated in the middle of a plain near the French frontier. It has a spacious square, with a piazza and wide ill-built streets. In the vicinity is a strong castle erected on an eminence, at an immense cost, in the middle of the eighteenth century. The approaches are all undermined, and every building is bomb proof. This important fortress was delivered over to the French in 1808, but surprised by the insurgent Spaniards in the night of 10th April 1811. The French garrison were made prisoners without firing a shot; but the place being besieged anew was compelled to surrender on 19th August, for want of provisions. Population 4600. Twenty miles north of Gerona, and twenty-five south of Perpignan. FIGURE, n. s., v. a. & v. n.` FIG'URABLE, adj. FIGURABILITY, n. s. FIG'URAL, adj. FIG'URATE, FIGURATION, n. S. FIGURATIVE, adj. Fr. figure; It. Span. Port. and Lat. figura à fingo, to make. Form; shape; outline; appearance: FIGURATIVELY, adv. applied intenFIG'URE-CASTER, n. s. sively to reFIG'URE-FLINger. markable appearance; eminence; numerical characters; representations of the human form; statues; also to the combination of figures in an astrological horoscope; to theological types and representations; and in rhetoric to various modes of speaking which depart from the literal and primitive sense of words. See FIGURE, in rhetoric, below. To figure is to mould; form into shape; represent in any way; to cover, adorn, or diversify with figures; to form figuratively; to express in numerical or other characters: as a verb neuter to make a figure. Figurable is capable of receiving and retaining forms: figurability, the corresponding substantive: figural, represented by figure or delineation: figurate, of a determinate form, or resembling a determinate form: figuration, determination to, or the act of giving, a particular form: figurative, not literal; meaning something else under the literal terms or representations used; changed by rhetorical figures from the primitive meaning: figuratively is the corresponding adverb. Figure-caster and figure Who was the figure of him that is to come. Romans. Men find green clay that is soft as long as it is in the water, so that one may print on it all kinds of figures, and give it what shape one pleases. Boyle. Here is a strange figure invented against the plain and natural sense of the words; for by praying to bestow, must be understood only praying to pray. Stillingfleet. How often have we been railed at for understanding words in a figurative sense, which cannot be literally understood without overthrowing the plainest evidence of sense and reason. The blue German shall the Tigris drink, Ere I, forsaking gratitude and truth, d. orget the figure of that godlike youth. Dryden. While fortune favoured while his arms support The cause, and ruled the counsels of the court, I made some figure there; nor was my name Obscure, nor I without my share of fame. Id. In the principal figures of a picture the painter is to employ the sinews of his art; for in them consists the principal beauty of his work. Id. Each thought was visible that rolled within, As thro' a crystal glass the figured hours are seen. Id. Sublime subjects ought to be adorned with the sublimest and with the most figurative expressions. Id. Juvenal, Preface. Satyr is a kind of poetry in which human vices are reprehended, partly dramatically, partly simply; but, for the most part, figuratively and occultly. Id. Dedication. Figure-flingers and star-gazers pretend to foretell the fortunes of kingdoms, and have no foresight in what concerns themselves. L'Estrange. Figures are properly modifications of bodies; for pure space is not any where terminated, nor can be: whether there be or be not body in it, it is uniformly continued. Locke. Quacks, figure-flingers, pettifoggers, and republican plotters cannot well live without it. Collier. This is a figurative expression, where the words are used in a different sense from what they signify in their first ordinary intention. Rogers. The custom of the apostle is figuratively to transfer to himself, in the first person, what belongs to others. Hammond. Now marks the course of rolling orbs on high, O'er figured world now travels with his eye. Pope. The figure of a syllogism is the proper disposition of the middle term with the parts of the question. Watts's Logick. If it be his chief end in it to grow rich, that he may live in figure and indulgence, and be able to retire from business to idleness and hurry, his trade, as to him, loses all its innocency. Law. I grant you the periods are very well turned: so, a fresh egg is a very good thing; but when thrown at a man in a pillory it does not at all improve his figure, not to mention the irreparable loss of the egg. FIGURE, in logic, denotes a certain order and disposition of the middle term in any syllogism. Figures are fourfold. 1. When the middle term is the subject of the major proposition, and the predicate of the minor, we have what is called the first figure. 2. When the middle term is the predicate of both the premises, the syllogism is said to be in the second figure. If the middle term is the subject of the two premises, the syllogism is in the third figure. And lastly, by making it the predicate of the major, and subject of the minor, we obtain syllogisms in the fourth figure. Each of these figures has a determinate number of moods, including all the possible ways in which propositions differing in quantity or quality can be combined, according to any disposition of the middle term, in order to arrive at a just conclusion. See LOGIC. FILACER, FILAZER OF FILIZER. Filizarius. I was charmed with the gracefulness of his figure Fr. file, filace; from Lat. filum, a thread. An and delivery, as well as with his discourses. Addison. officer of the court of common pleas, so called because he files those writs whereon he makes in their several divisions and counties, and they out process. There are fourteen of those filazers make forth all writs and processes upon original writs, issuing out of chancery, as well real, as personal and mixed, returnable in that court; and in actions merely personal, where the defendants are returned summoned, they make out pones or attachments; which being returned and executed, if the defendant appears not, they make forth a distringas, and so ad infinitum, or until he doth appear; if he be returned nihil, then process of capias infinite, &c. They enter all appearances and special bails, upon any pro- They make cables of the bark of lime trees; it is the stalk that maketh the filaceous matter commonly, and sometimes the down that groweth above. Bacon's Natural History. The lungs of consumptives have been consumed, nothing remaining but the ambient membrane, and a number of withered veins and filaments. Harvey. Men that look no further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabric hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and, considering the thousand doors that lead to death, to thank my God that we can die but once. Sir T. Browne. The dung of horses is nothing but the filaments of the hay, and as such combustible. Arbuthnot. FILANDERS, in entomology and falconry, are worms as small as thread, and about an inch long, that lie wrapt up in a thin skin or net, near the reins of a hawk, apart from either gut or gorge. The malady is known by the hawk's poverty; by her ruffling her tail; by straining the fist, or perch, with her pounces; and, lastly, by croaking in the night, when the filanders prick her. The disease proceeds from bad food; and must be remedied early, to prevent its spreading over the whole body, and destroying the bird. These worms must not be killed as others are, for fear of imposthumes from their corruption, being incapable of passing away with the hawk's feces. They must only be stupified, to prevent their being offensive, by giving the hawk a clove of garlic; after which she will feel nothing of them for forty days. The falconer, when he observes the hawk poor and low, should give her a clove of garlic once a month by way of prevention. FILANDERS, in falconry, are also the name of another disease in hawks, &c., consisting of filaments or strings of blood coagulated; and occasioned by a violent rupture of some vein, by which the blood extravasating, hardens into these figures, and incommodes the reins, hips &c. FILANGIERI (Gætan), one of the few modern Neapolitan writers of eminence, was born in 1752, and destined, as the younger son of a noble family, to the army. He however applied himself in 1774 to the study of the law, and produced a tract, in which he defended a new enactment against the arbitrary decision of a judge. He soon after withdrew from public life, but in 1777 at the advice of his uncle, the archbishop of Naples, entered into the service of the court, and was appointed gentleman of the bed-chamber and an officer in the royal corps of marine volunteers. In 1780 he published the first part of his great work on The Science of Legislation, the whole of which was to be completed in seven books. In the first he proposed to expound the general rules of legislation; in the second, civil and economical laws; in the third, criminal laws; in the fourth, legislation as applied to education and morals; in the fifth, ecclesiastical laws; in the sixth, laws respecting property; and in the seventh, laws relative to paternal authority and domestic economy. Of this work the first four books only appeared during the life of the author. In 1783, having married a lady from Hungary who was governess to one of the princesses, he resigned his employments and resided for some time in the country; but in March, 1787, was appointed to a place in the royal college of finance. He died suddenly while engaged in some extensive plans of improvement in the rethe fifth book of his Science of Legislation was sources of the state, in July 1788. A part of published in 1791, and attracted great public attention, from the bold and original views, and the liberality of sentiment by which it is characterised. Several editions appeared in Italy, and it was translated into the French, German, English, and Spanish languages. FILBERT', n. s. A hazel nut. A corruption, as Junius and Skinner think, of 'full beard', from the long beard or husk of this fruit. Dr. Johnson conjectures it may have been originally called after some proper name, like Filbert or Filibert. Mr. Horne Tooke reminds us of the following curious passage in Gower's Amantis on the subject of its etymology: Upon a grene bough 'Thou hast a brain, such as it is indeed! On what else should thy worm of fancy feed? Yet in a filbert I have often known Maggots survive, when all the kernel's gone. Dorset. There is also another kind, called the filbert of Constantinople; the leaves and fruit of which are bigger than either of the former; the best are those of thin shell. Mortimer. FILCH, v.a. Fr. filouter; Goth. fela, FILCH'ER, n.s.filgia; Swed. filska: probably, FILCH'ING. as Minsheu suggests, from the Latin fallar, fallacis. To steal; thieve; particularly in a secret and paltry manner. The champion robbeth by night, Tusser's Husbandman. He shall find his wealth wonderfully enlarged by keeping his cattle in inclosures, where they shall always have safe being, that none are continually filched and stolen. Spenser. Who steals my purse, steals trash; 'tis something, nothing; 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands; Dryden. drew up in good order, and filed off. All ran down without order or ceremony, 'till we Tatler. Did all the grosser atoms at the call Of chance file off to form the pondrous ball, And undetermined into order fall? Blackmore. From the day his first bill was filed he began to collect reports. Arbuthnot and Pope's Martin Scriblerius. Now at the camp arrived, with stern review Thro' groves of spears from file to file he darts His sharp experienced eye. Somervile. Then broader leaves in shadowy files advance, Spread o'er the crystal flood their green expanse; And, as in air the adherent dew exhales, Court the warm sun, and breathe ethereal gales. FILE, n. s. & v. a. FI'LE-CUTTER, n. s. FI'LINGS. Darwin. Sax. Feol; Goth. thil; Swed. fil; Belgic, vyle: Teut, and Dan. fiel (q.?) every bee did nought else but sting; some like hornets, of the same origin as the preceding word, the resome like filching wasps, others as drones. Burton on Melancholy. FILE, n. s., v. a. & v.n. Fr. file; Lat. filum (à pilus, Gr. milos, hair). A thread; a line on which papers are strung; a muster-roll; line of soldiers: to place papers or documents on a file; to march in file. Our present musters grow upon the file To five and twenty thousand men of choice. Shakspeare. Those goodly eyes, That o'er the files and musters of the war Have glowed like plated Mars, now bend, now turn Upon a tawny front. Shakspeare. Antony and Cleopatra. All records, wherein there was any memory of the king's attainder, should be cancelled and taken off the file. Bacon. But let me resume the file of my narration, which this object of books, best agreeable to my course of life, bath a little interrupted. Wotton. VOL. IX. gular teeth lying like threads or hairs on the instrument. A rubbing or cutting instrument to smooth prominences, sharpen other instruments, &c. To file is to apply this instrument: hence to smooth or polish in any way. A file-cutter is a maker of files: filings, the fragments worn or cut off by a file. A file for the mattocks and for the coulters. 1 Sam. xiii. 21. They which would file away most from the largeness of that offer, do in more sparing terms acknowHooker. ledge little less. His humour is lofty, his discourse peremptory, his eye ambitious. Shakspeare. tongue filed, and his decoction of galls, make good ink, without any copThe filings of iron infused in vinegar, will, with a perose. Brownt. The smiths and armourers on palfreys ride, Files in their hands and hammers at their side. Dryden. Let men be careful how they attempt to cure a blemish by filing or cutting off the head of such an overRay. grown tooth. The rough or coarse-toothed file, if it be large, is called a rubber, and is to take off the unevenness of your work which the hammer made in the forging: the bastard-toothed file is to take out of your work the deep cuts, or file-strokes, the rough file made: the finetoothed file is to take out the cuts or file-strokes, the bastard file made; and the smooth file is to take out those cuts, or file-strokes, that the fine file made, Moxon. Gad-steel is a tough sort of steel: filecutters use it to make their chissels, with which they cut their files. Id. The chippings and filings of these jewels are of more value than the whole mass of ordinary authors. Felton on the Classics. FILE v. a. Sax. apylan, to foul; defile; sully: Isaid to be still in use in this sense in Scotland. For Banquo's issue have I filed my mind, For them the gracious Duncan have I murdered. Shakspeare. P |