ABSOLVE. ABSORB. ABSOLUTE, in Metaphysics, refers to a being which ABSOLUTE EQUATION, in Astronomy, the sum of ABSOLUTE NUMBER, in Algebra, any pure number standing in an equation without the conjunction of literal characters. ABSOLUTE ABLATIVE. See GRAMMAR, Div. i. ABSOLUTION, in Civil Law, a sentence by which the party accused is declared innocent of the alleged crime. Among the Romans, the ordinary method of pronouncing judgment was this: after the cause had been pleaded on both sides, the prætor used the word dixerunt, q. d. they have said what they had to say; then three ballots were distributed to each judge, and as the majority was found, the accused was absolved or condemned, &c. If he were absolved, the prætor dismissed him with videtur non fecisse, or jure videtur fecisse. ABSOLUTION, in Canon Law, a juridical act, by which the priest, or minister, remits the sins of such as are penitent. This is supposed to be done by the Roman Catholic priests more directly and immediately, by virtue of their holy office; and by the clergy of the established church of England, by " a power and authority given to Christ's ministers to declare and pronounce forgiveness" to the truly penitent. In the Greek church absolution' is deprecatory, as she lays no claim to the infallible powers of the Roman hierarchy. The form that Tetzel used in vending the indulgencies which first awoke the indignation and resistance of LUTHER, has been often quoted, but is said by Catholics to be unauthentic. They have thus stated their opinions upon this subject:-"Every catholic is obliged to believe that when a sinner repenteth him of his sins from the bottom of his heart, and acknowledgeth his transgression to God and his ministers, the dispensers of the mysteries of Christ, resolving to turn from his evil ways and bring forth fruits worthy of penance; then is (then and no otherwise) an authority left by Christ to absolve such a penitent sinner from his sins which authority Christ gave to his apostles and their successors, the bishops and priests of the catholic church, in these words, when he said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost; whose sins ye shall forgive, they are forgiven unto them, &c." ABSOLUTION is chiefly used among Protestants for a sentence, by which a person who stands excommunicated, is released from that punishment. ABSORB', t. Ab: sorbeo to sup or suck up. To swallow, imbibe. To be wholly occupied by, or engaged in, devoted ABSORPTION. to, immersed, plunged, or lost in the contemplation of. For no thyng as Luther sayeth can damne a Christen man, saue Sir Tho. More's Works, p. 267. This abolition of their name happened about the end of the ABSORB Circe in vain invites the feast to share; The learned tell you, that they [colours] are nothing but a certain Those twinkling tiny lustres of the land, Couper's Poems. ABSORBENT MEDICINES, are all those testaceous powders, or substances into which calcareous earth enters, and which are taken internally for drying up or absorbing any acid or redundant humours in the stomach or intestines. They are applied externally to ulcers or sores with the same intention. ABSORBENTS, OF ABSORBING VESSELS, in Anatomy, a minute kind of vessels found in animal bodies, which imbibe fluids that come in contact with them. ABSORBENT EARTHS, in Chemistry, those substances which are capable of imbibing large quantities of water by capillary attraction. ABSORPTION of the EARTH. Kircher, and other geologists, use this phrase to denote the swallowing up of great portions of land by earthquakes, and other subterraneous convulsions or accidents. Several instances of these alarming commotions have occurred in various countries. The mountain of Cymbotus, and the town of Curites, seated on its declivity; the city of Tantalis, in Magnesia; the mountain Sypilus; Galanis, and Garnates, two Phoenician towns; the promontory of Phegium, in Ethiopia; the mountain Picus, and several others are mentioned as having sunk into the earth, at different times. Later instances have occurred in China, France, and Switzerland. A mountain belonging to the chain of the Cevennes, in the south of France, was precipitated, with an awful crash, into the valley below, on the 23d of June 1727; one block of stone, ninety feet long, and twenty-six in diameter, sunk vertically, and the village of Pradines, situated on the declivity, being overwhelmed by the rocky fragments, its inhabitants were only saved from destruction in consequence of having gone to some distance to celebrate Midsummer-eve. To these, and other instances of absorption which might be mentioned, may be subjoined a circumstance which occurred on the 3d of September 1806, at Schweitz, a canton in Switzerland. Between the lakes of Zug and Lowertz, and the mountains of Rosenberg and Rossi, lay a beautiful valley, overspread with several About five o'clock in the evening pleasant villages. of the 3d September, the Spitzberg, or north-east projection of the mountain Rosenberg, fell into the valley, from the height of 2000 feet, and overwhelmed the villages of Goldau, Busingen, and Rathlen, and a part of Lowertz, and of Oberart. The earth and stones rushed like lava into the valley, and covered more than three square miles of a fertile vicinity; filling up, at the same time, nearly a fifth of the lake Lowertz. And O thou, Cesare, now formest in the preis, Douglas, book vi. p. 195. Ayenst glotonie the remedie is abstinence, as sayth Galien: but that I holde not meritorie, if he do it only for the hele of his body. Seint Augustine wol that abstinence be don for vertue, and with patience. Abstinence (sayth he) is litel worth, but if a man have good will therto, and but it be enforced by patience and charitee, and that men don it for Goddes sake, and in hope to have the blisse in heven. Chaucer. The Personnes Tale, vol. ii. p. 360. After this dangerous businesse finished, and for a time ended, by meane of frendes, and desire of princies, a truce or abstinence of warre for a certaine tyme, was moued betwene the kyng [Henry the Sixth] of Englande, and the duke of Burgoyne. Hall, p. 184. I haue deliuerd to Lord Angelo, Id. Love's L. Lost, p. 135. act iv. sc. 3. PAC. Be abstinent, shew not the corruption of thy generation; he that feeds shall die, therefore he that feeds not shall live. Beaumont and Fletcher's Love's Cure, act ii. sc. 1. A little wisdom, and an easie observation were enough to make all men that love themselves, wisely to abstain from such diet which does not nourish. Taylor's Dissuasive from Popery. He that can apprehend and consider vice, with all her baits and seeming pleasures, and yet abstain, and yet distinguish, and yet prefer that which is truly better, he is the true way-faring Christian. Milton on the Liberty of Unlicensed Preaching. As for fasting and abstinence, which is many times very helpful and subservient to the ends of religion, there no such extraordinary trouble in it, if it be discreetly managed, as is worth the speaking of. Tillotson's Sermons. If moderate fare and abstinence I prize Congreve's Eleventh Satire of Juvenal. After some time of separation from the other pure Christians in worship, and an abstention from the sacrament, they [the penitents] Call'd to the temple of impure delight, He that abstains, and he alone, does right. If a wish wander that way, call it home; He cannot long be safe whose wishes roam. Cowper's Truth. ABSTEINACH, a district in the duchy of Hesse, formerly subject to the elector of Mentz. Also a town of Germany. 7 m. N. E. of Heidelberg. ABSTE'MIOUS, a. ABSTE'MIOUSLY. Ab: temetum (quasi, to μedu, Vossius,) from wine. An abstemious man refrains from wine; ab abstinentia temeti dictus. But the word is now applied generally to that which is temperate, moderate, restrained or withheld from excess. A man so much divine, Drayton's Poly Olbion, 24th song. Gillius reckons up 155 publicke baths in Constantinople, of faire building; they are still frequented in that citie by the Turkes of all sorts, men and women, and all over Greece and those hot countries; to absterge, belike, that fulsomeness of sweat to which they are then subject. Burton's Anat. Melancholy. Nor will we affirm that iron indigested, receiveth in the stomach of the Oestridge no alteration at all; but if any such there be, we suspect this effect rather from some way of corrosion, than any of digestion ; but rather some attrition from an acide and vitriolous humidity in the stomach, which may absterse and shave the scorious parts thereof. Brown's Vulgar Errours. A tablet stood of that abstersive tree, The seats with purple clothe in order due; And let th' abstersive sponge the board renew: Let some refresh the vase's sullied mould, Some bid the goblets boast their native gold. Pope's Homer's Odyssey, b. xx. ABSTERGENT MEDICINES, those employed for resolving obstructions, concretions, &c. such as soap, &c. The more common term is detergent. They are supposed to operate by loosening the cohesion of the substances removed. ABSTINENCE, is the act or habit of refraining from something to which there is a strong propensity. ABSTINENCE. ABSTI- Various kinds of abstinence were ordained by the Jewish NENCE. law. The Pythagoreans were enjoined to abstain from animal food, with the exception of the remains of sacrifices; and to drink nothing but water, excepting in the evening, when they might take a small portion of wine. Some of the primitive Christians denied themselves the use of particular meats; others regarded this abstinence with contempt. See Romans, xiv. 1-3. The council of Jerusalem, which was held by the apostles, enjoined the Christian converts to abstain from meats strangled, and from blood. Acts xv. Though these could have no moral evil in them, they were forbidden to the Gentile converts, because the Jews were so averse to them that they could not converse with any who used them. This reason having now ceased, the obligation to this abstinence has been supposed to cease with it. Ritual abstinence. stinence. The abstinence which may be called ritual, consists The ancient Athletæ abstained from all kinds of Abstinence Among animals, the serpent kind can endure an extraof animals. ordinary degree of abstinence. Rattle-snakes have lived many months without any food, still retaining their vigour and fierceness. Dr. Shaw speaks of a couple of cerastes (a sort of Egyptian serpents), which bad been kept five years in a bottle closely corked, without any food, unless a small quantity of sand in which they coiled themselves up may be reckoned as such. When he saw them, they were as brisk and lively as if just taken. Many species pass four, five, or six months every year, without either eating or drinking, as the tortoise, bear, dormouse, serpent, &c. ABSTÍ. Pliny says, a person may live seven days without any Ancient - To these testimonies it may afford some amusement to the reader, and at the same time, furnish some ABSTI curious data for the study of physiology, if we subjoin NENCE. a few facts of more detail. "In a former visit to this place (Barmouth), July Mary Tho- 18th, 1770, my curiosity," says Pennant," was excited to examine into the truth of a surprizing relation of a woman, in the parish of Cylynin, who had fasted a most supernatural length of time. I took boat, had a most pleasant passage up the harbour, charmed with the beauty of the shores, intermixed with woods, verdant pastures, and corn fields. I landed, and after a short walk, found in a farm, called Tydden Bach, the object of my excursion, Mary Thomas, who was boarded here, and kept with great humanity and neatness. She was of the age of forty-seven, of a good countenance, very pale, thin, but not so much emaciated as might be expected from the strangeness of the circumstances I am going to relate. Her eyes weak, her voice low, deprived of the use of her lower extremities, and quite bed-ridden; her pulse rather strong; her intellects clear and sensible. "On examining her, she informed me, that at the age of seven she had some eruptions like the measles, which grew confluent and universal; and she became so sore, that she could not bear the least touch: she received some ease by the application of a sheep's skin, just taken from the animal. After this, she was seized, at spring and fall, with swellings and inflammations, during which time she was confined to her bed; but in the intervals could walk about, and once went to Holy well in hopes of cure. "When she was about twenty-seven years of age, she was attacked with the same complaint, but in a more violent manner; and during two years and a half remain ed insensible, and took no manner of nourishment, notwithstanding her friends forced open her mouth with a spoon, to get something down; but the moment the spoon was taken away, her teeth met, and closed with snapping and violence: during that time she flung up vast quantities of blood. "She well remembers the return of her senses, and her knowledge of every body about her. She thought she had slept but a night, and asked her mother whether she had given her any thing the day before, for she found herself very hungry. Meat was brought to her, but so far from being able to take any thing solid, she could scarcely swallow a spoonful of thin whey. From this she continued seven years and a half without any food or liquid, excepting sufficient of the latter to moisten her lips: At the end of this period, she again fancied herself hungry, and desired an egg; of which she got down the quantity of a nut kernel. About this time she requested to receive the sacrament; which she did, by having a crumb of bread steeped in the wine. She at this time, for her daily subsistence, eats a bit of bread, weighing about two penny-weights seven grains, and drinks a wine glass of water: sometimes a spoonful of wine; but frequently abstains whole days from food and liquids. She sleeps very indifferently: the ordinary functions of nature are very small, and very seldom performed. Her attendant told me, that her disposition of mind was mild; her temper even; that she was very religious, and very fervent in prayer: the natural effect of the state of her body, long unembarassed with the grossness of food, and a constant alienation of thought from all worldly affairs." Journey to Snowden, vol. ii. p. 105-107. VOL. XVII. NENCE. Gilbert "Gilbert Jackson, or Carse-Grange, Scotland, about ABSTI fifteen years of age, in February 1716, was seized with a violent fever, which returned in April for three weeks, and again on the 10th of June; he then lost his speech, Jackson. his stomach, and the use of his limbs, and could not be persuaded to eat or drink any thing. May 26th, 1717, his fever left him, but he was still deprived of speech, and the use of his limbs, and took no food whatever. June 30th, he was seized with a fever again, and the next day recovered his speech, but without eating or drinking, or the use of his limbs. On the 11th of October, he recovered his health, with the use of one of his legs, but neither eat nor drank, only sometimes washed his mouth with water. On the 18th of June 1718, the fever returned and lasted till September: he then recovered, and continued in pretty good health, and fresh coloured, but took no kind of meat or drink. On the 6th of June 1719, he was again seized with a severe fever; on the 10th at night, his father prevailed on him to take a spoonful of milk boiled with oatmeal: it stuck so long in his throat, that his friends feared he had been choaked; but ever since that time he took food, though so little, that a halfpenny loaf served him for eight days. All the time he fasted, he had no evacuation; and it was fourteen days after he began to eat, before he had any :~~he still continued in pretty good health.” "In the year 1724, John Ferguson, of Killmelfoord, John Ferin Argyleshire, overheated himself in the pursuit of guson. cattle on the mountains, then drank largely of cold water and fell asleep. He slept for four and twenty hours, and waked in a high fever ever since, his stomach loathed and could retain no kind of aliment but water. A neighbouring gentleman (Mr. Campbell) to whom his father was tenant, locked him up for twenty days, supplying him daily with water, and taking care that he should have no other food; but it made difference either in his look or strength; at the age of thirty-six (when the account was sent to the Philosophical Society) he was of a fresh complexion and as strong as any common man." Phil. Trans. 1742, vol. xlii. page 240. no "A very curious instance of a nearly two years abstinence from all food and drink, is related in two numbers of Hufeland's Practical Journal, Vol. VIII and IX, No. 2; and a pamphlet has since been published respecting this fact, by Dr. Schmidtmann of Melle, in the bishoprick of Osnabruck. "A country girl, sixteen years old, in a village near A girl, near Osnabruck, had enjoyed a good state of health during Osnabruck. her childhood; but at about ten years of age she was seized with epileptic fits, against which a number of remedies were employed in vain. Since that time she was mostly confined to her bed, particularly in winter: but in summer she found herself a little better. From February 1798, the alvine and urinary excretions began to cease, though she took now and then a little nourishment. But from the beginning of April of the same year, she abstained entirely from all food and drink, falling into an uninterrupted slumber, almost senseless, from which she only awoke from time to time for a few hours. Her sensibility was during this time so great, that the slightest touch on any part of the body, brought on partial, convulsive motions. In this state she had continued for nearly ten months, when Dr. Schmidtmann saw her first in March 1799. F ABSTI- Though she had not taken the least nourishment during NENCE. all this time, Dr. S. found her, to his utmost astonishment, fresh and blooming. For the last two months only, the intervals of sleep began to be longer; her senses of sight and hearing were in perfect order; but her feeling she seemed to have quite lost, as she could suffer pinching of the arms and legs without pain; her gums bled frequently, and the pulse was scarcely perceptible in the arms, but beat strong and full in the carotids, about 120 in a minute. Dr. S. attempted to make her drink a little milk, but she protested she could not swallow it. The alvine and urinary excretions had quite ceased. References to other cases. French officer. Although there could hardly be a suspicion of any kind of imposition, the parents being honest people; yet to remove all doubt, six sworn men were appointed from different places in the neighbourhood to watch her day and night, and instructions given to them accordingly. This being continued for a fortnight, the men were dismissed, having given evidence upon oath, that the patient had never taken any food or drink whatever during that time, nor had any excretion alvine or urinary. She had been once very ill and nearly dying, seized with convulsions, feverish, and sometimes in a great sweat, which had the extraordinary property of turning water black. When Dr. S. saw her again, he found her quite recovered, not in the least emaciated, but rather looking lustier; her gums, however, still frequently bled, and her feeling was not yet returned; but her memory was not impaired, and she amused herself sometimes with reading and writing. No alvine and urinary excretion had taken place. Sometimes she was attacked by a sudden weakness, particularly after having bled from the mouth. During the last severe winter, she could not endure the heat of the stove, because she felt then faint and oppressed. "Dr. Schmidtmann then enters into an enquiry by what means the patient, in this case, was nourished and maintained in that state in which she was found; and having discussed the matter at large, he is of opinion, that she drew, by resorption, such elementary particles from the atmosphere, as were sufficient for the nutrition of the body, and that the excretions were likewise replaced by the skin. "However incredible and miraculous this fact may seem, yet we find similar instances recorded by several authors, viz. by Haller, in his Elementa Physiologiæ, Tom. 6. Sec. 2. ||. 6.-Conf. Memoires de l'Academie de Sciences de Toulouse, T. 1, 1783; and in Prichter's Library devoted to Surgery, (in German), Vol. 12. p. 184. Swieten Comment. in Boerhaav. Aph. T. 3. p. 508, Histoire de l'Academie Royale de Sciences, l'an 1769; and in Hufeland's Art of Prolonging Life, first edition, p. 67, Halpart van der Wiel Observat. rar. Centur. Poster. In the London Magazine for August, 1769, there is likewise an account of a young woman, twenty-four years of age, who had fasted for two years, and whose excretions were also entirely suppressed."- London Medical and Physical Journal. vol. iv. p. 87. A French officer of infantry, who had retired from service, and become deranged, took it in his head to refuse food, and continued in that determination, from the 25th of December till the 9th of February, drinking only about a pint and a half of water daily, with a few drops of aniseed-liquori n each glass, till the thirty AB ninth day: from which time, till the forty-seventh day, ABSTI he took nothing whatever. Till the 38th day, too, he NENCE, remained out of bed; but weakness at length obliged him to lie down. The return to food was followed by a STRACT. temporary cure of his insanity. Hist. de l'Academie des Sciences, 1769, p. 45. In the Philosophical Transactions we have an account of four Colliers, who were confined twenty-four days in a coal-pit, at Herstol, near Leige, with nothing to support them but water: and in the medical commentaries (Dec. vol. iv. p. 360) there is a history of a girl, who had lost her way, and remained eighteen days on a barren moor, in the island of Lewis, where she could not possibly have had any other kind of sustenance. Mr. Miller, who relates the case, saw her two hours after she was found, and describes her as much emaciated. In fact, proofs abound as to the possibility of maintaining life, for a considerable time, and under the most unfavourable circumstances, on small quantities of water, or other liquids. Jejuni magis sitiunt, quam esuriunt.-The feeling of hunger, if not appeased by food, often ceases all together. But the feeling of thirst becomes constantly more urgent; and if the body be at the same time under the influence of heat, it produces the most aggravated distress: "Torrentur viscera flamma, Oraque sicca rigent squamosis aspera linguis. Jam marcent vena, nulloque humore rigatus Aeris alternos angustat pulmo meatus ; Rescissoque nocent suspiria dura palato. Pandunt ora tamen, nocturnumque æra captant." LUCAN, IV. 324. ABSTINENCE is sometimes used medically, in the senses of suppression and of compression. ABSTINENTS, or ABSTINENTES, a sect of heretics, of the third century, who originated in France and Spain. They opposed marriage, and hence have been called Continentes; and condemned the use of flesh meat and wine. In what doctrinal errors their heresy consisted, it is difficult to ascertain. |