abridgments are formed by the simple omission of portions which are regarded as subordinate; some by a condensation of the style; but the substance of the original is, in an abridgment, supposed to be unaltered. It is the same thing shortened, and is itself a work. It will be seen by the following that abridgment may be regarded as a generic term including the others.

"An abridgment or abstract of anything is the whole in little; and if it be of a science or doctrine, the abridgment consists in the essential or necessary parts of it contracted into a narrower compass than where it was diffused in the ordinary way of delivery."Locke.

A COMPENDIUM, on the other hand (compendium, con and pendo, a sparing, or saving), is not of a work, but of a subject; purporting to give as much as need be known of some branch of science or knowledge in a concise form, and is also a work; as a compendium of universal history.

"All those excellent persons of whose acts and sufferings we have a compendium or abridgment in this chapter."-Bishop Hall. Like abridgment, and unlike compendium, summary and abstract bear reference to an antecedent form of which another and shorter form is reproduced; but, unlike abridgment, they may be a reproduction in which the form has been much altered by the reproducer, who may have assimilated the subject matter and have reexpressed it in a style of his own. Of these, SUMMARY (summa, a sum or total) professes to give the heads and general results, as in the headings prefixed to chapters; ABSTRACT (abstrahere) the general tenor and drift; these are not works.

"The Sermon on the Mount, which is a summary of a Christian's life."-Bp. Taylor.

DIGEST (digerere) has for its object arrangement or re-arrangement of given materials in a more orderly or convenient shape, as of the Roman laws by order of Justinian.

"If we had a complete digest of Hindu and Mahommedan laws, after the model of Justinian's celebrated Pandects, we should rarely be at a loss for principles and rules of law applicable to the cases before us."-Sir W. Jones.

A DRAUGHT commonly precedes the work, and is of the nature of a sketch or outline, intended for the guidance of another who is to fill it up and finish it.

"And thus poetry and the writer's art, as in many respects it resembles the statuary's and the painter's, so in this more particularly, that it has its original draughts and models for study and practice."-Shaftesbury.

EPITOME is a word formed from the Greek TITÉμvew (to cut into, or cut short), with the view of expressing that which gathers up the substance and essential points of a matter, and prunes and shapes them into a concise compass. We may observe, as regards present use, that as compendium is of science, so epitome is of history.

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This sentence (St. Matthew vii. 12) I read unto you is very fitly placed towards the close of our Saviour's admirable Sermon on the Mount, as being in great measure the epitome and sum of what the Divine Preacher had there expressed more at large."-Bishop Atterbury.

SYNOPSIS (a Greek word meaning a collective view) differs from the preceding in not aiming at any style or consecutiveness, and in giving nakedly and disjointedly a view of all needful matters of fact, as in a chart or table.

"Not to reckon up the infinite helps of interlinearies, breviaries, synopses, and other loitering gear."-Milton.

ABRUPT. RUGGED. ROUGH.

These terms may be taken in their order to express the same thing in gradually lessening degrees. That which on a large scale is precipitous, on a lesser is ABRUPT (abruptus, broken, or broken away). Abruptness on a smaller scale is RUGGEDNESS (Sax. hreoh and other forms); and this on a smaller again is ROUGHNESS. An abrupt style or manner is that which passes from one point to another by jerks, and without easy transitions. Such abruptness is shown in the combination of manner and words; as an abrupt salutation, an abrupt departure.

"Or if thou hast not broke from company Abruptly, as my passion now makes me, Thou hast not lov'd." Shakespeare.

Of rugged and rough in their secondary senses, we may observe that the former is an epithet of appearance, the latter of character and bearing, yet not exclusively so. Scott, in his "Christian Life," speaks of that unmanly sharpness and ruggedness of humour which renders us perverse and untractable in our conversation. In this sense it is less coarse and violent than roughness, which carries with it the idea of overbearing.

"To take a cause out of your hands into mine I do but mine office. You meddle further than your office will bear you, thus roughly to handle me for using of mine."Burnet.

VERTED. DISTRACTED. ABSORBED. ENGROSSED.

Of these the simplest is ABSENT (absum, abesse, to be absent), which denotes either the occasional or the habitual state of one whose mind is inattentive to what is going on immediately before him. It may be the result of habits of abstract thought, or the opposite, namely, an impatience of pure reflection, or casual inattention.

"What is commonly called an absent man is commonly either a very weak or a very affected man."-Chesterfield.

ABSTRACTED, on the other hand (abstrahere, abstractus, to draw away), implies the influence of something sufficiently strong to draw off the mind from present things, and fix it in a state of wrapt contemplation of others. It differs from DISTRACTED in being a single influence, while distraction (distrahere) may be manifold, and it has not the uneasiness and disturbance belonging to distraction. Morcover, distraction implies an influence in contradiction to some proposed matter of thought, for which the mind is accordingly incapacitated, while in abstraction it is wholly given

to it.

"Whether dark presages of the night proceed from any latent power of the soul during her abstraction, or from the operation of subordinate spirits, has been a dispute."Addison.

"As for me, during my confinement to this

ABSOLUTE.

melancholy solitude, I often dirert myself at leisure moments in trying such experiments as the unfurnishedness of the place and the present distructedness of my mind will permit me."-Boyle.

DIVERTED is a term of lighter meaning, and is applicable to cases of mental recreation or amusement, in which the mind is turned aside (diver. tere) from studious thought to matters less serious. ABSORBED (absorbere) and ENGROSSED (gross, the main body, Fr. gros, from the Latin crussus, and so literally absorbed into the main body of a thing) differ from the preceding as denoting not a drawing off from present matters, but an intense or excessive contemplation of them. Absorption excludes distraction and diversion of the mind, which is swallowed up with present employ. ment. Engrossment of mind is relative absorption; that is, absorption to the disregard of other matters which may possibly have more or less of claim upon the attention. So it may be well to be absorbed, but it is not altogether well to be engrossed.

"Circe in vain invites the feast to share, Absent I wander and absorpt in care.'

Of these ABSOLUTE (absolutus, absolvere, loosed, or free from restraint) denotes simply the possession of unlimited and irresponsible power, without implying anything as to the way in which it may be exercised.

"An honest private man often grows cruel and abandoned when converted into an absolute prince."-Addison.

DESPOTIC may be used either in the abstract of the power, or relatively of the way in which it is exercised. Despotic power may have been acquired with the consent or through the instrumentality of others, as in the case of the Greek δεσπότης οι τύραννος, who commonly owed his elevation to some party in the state. When employed in a moral sense of

character and proceedings, the despotic character is he who expects implicit obedience to his commands.

"Whatever the will commands the whole man must do, the empire of the will over all the faculties being absolutely overruling and despotic."-South.

The ARBITRARY character (arbitrium, the will or pleasure) expects submission where nothing but his own will constitutes the principle of government; hence, as imperiousness belongs to the despotic, fickleness is associated with arbitrariness.

"By an arbitrary proceeding I mean one conducted by the private opinions or feelings of the man who attempts to regulate."Burke.

TYRANNICAL, in modern parlance, relates not only to the disposition and proceedings of the governing party, but to the result upon the governed. It associates the suffering or oppression of the latter with the domination and caprice of the former.

"These poor prisoners eat nothing but rice and drink water, and are tyrannically insulted over by their rigid creditors till the debt is paid."-Dampier's Voyages.

"Every wanton and causeless restraint of the will of the subject," says Blackstone, "whether practised by a monarch, a nobility, or a popular assembly, is a degree of tyranny."

ABSOLVE. ACQUIT. EXONERATE. CLEAR. EXCULPATE.

TO ABSOLVE (Lat. absolvere, to loose) had originally a religious force, which it has not yet entirely lost. It refers to the loosing of solemn obligations, and the setting free from the consequences of sin and guilt, or from such ties as it would be sin and guilt to violate, as oaths, promises, and the like.

ABSTAIN.

perhaps to a fault in quoting the authors of several passages which I might have made my own."-Addison.

To EXONERATE is less formal than acquit, and is used of cases in which blame is imputed without any public indictment; it indicates, however, some superiority, real or assumed, in the person who exonerates. So the magistrate acquits, but it is only as a man that he exonerates (ex and onus, a burden). It is used of obligations.

"I intreat your lordships to consider whether there ever was a witness brought before a court of justice who had stronger motives to give testimony hostile to a defendant for the purpose of exonerating himself." -State Trials.

Exonerate implies a purely moral, acquittal a magisterial, decision.

To EXCULPATE (ex and culpa, a fault) denotes a process of evidence and argument of which the result is to prove unworthy of blame. A man may be exculpated, or he may exculpate himself; he may also be exonerated by himself or by another.

"In Scotland the law allows of an exculpation, by which the prisoner is suffered before his trial to prove the thing to be impossible." -Burnet.

Exculpation is a riddance of the guilt, exoneration from the charge and liabilities, of an offence or obligation.

To CLEAR is to prove absolutely innocent, and, like acquit, exonerate, and exculpate, denotes the antecedent blamelessness of the party; whereas absolve, except where it is used in the simple sense of to free from an obligation, denotes an antecedent offence. The innocent are cleared, the guilty are absolved.

"Although innocency needs no defence as to itself, yet it is necessary for all the advantages it hath of doing good to mankind that it appear to be what it really is; which cannot be done unless its reputation be cleared from the malicious aspersions which are cast upon it."-Stillingfleet.

ABSORB. See ABSENT and Iм

ABSTINENCE.

from anything (abstinere), which may be with a great struggle, or with almost no effort. Some degree of enticement, however, it is necessary to suppose, otherwise the case is one of mere avoidance.

"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 wayfaring Christian."-Milton.

FORBEAR (literally, to bear or keep, and for (with the sense of negation)— to withhold) and REFRAIN (re, back, and frænum, a rein or bridle) differ in the degree of the impulse, in the nature of it, and so, to some extent, in the object affected. We for the most part refrain from doing that which primarily affects ourselves; we forbear from doing that which primarily affects others. A more essential distinction is, that refrain expresses an effort of the will, by which we leave an act undone. Forbear expresses an antecedent reflection or judgment on its consequences, which induces us to abstain from doing it.

"In pretence of forbearance they resolve to torment him with a lingering death."Bishop Hall.

The force of refrain appears more plainly in the reflective use of it.

"Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him.”—Bible. ABSTINENCE. FAST.

These terms are technically distinguished. ABSTINENCE (abstinere) is a refraining from certain sorts of food.

"The temperance which adorned the severe manners of the soldier and the philosopher was connected with some strict and frivolous rules of religious abstinence; and it was in honour of Pan or Mercury, of Hecate or Iris, that Julian on particular days denied himself the use of some particular food."—Gibbon.

FASTING (allied to fast, meaning firm) is to refrain from food altogether.

"From hence may an account be given why the inhabitants of hot countries may endure longer fasting and hunger than those of colder; and those seemingly prodigious, and to us scarce credible, stories of the fastings and abstinence of the Egyptian monks be rendered probable."-Ray on Creation.

) ABSTINENT.

ABSTINENT. SOBER. ABSTEMIOUS. TEMPERATE. MODERATE.

ABSTINENT (see ABSTAIN) expresses the power and the habit of abstaining from indulgence of appetite.

"Be abstinent, show not the corruption of thy generation. He that feeds shall die, therefore he that feeds not shall live."Beaumont and Fletcher.

Abstinence is the power of refraining altogether; temperance, the power of enjoying with moderation. We are temperate in what is good, we abstain from what is not good. It supposes a state of self-discipline, so that some are abstinent from feeling their inability to be TEMPERATE (Lat. temperare, to moderate). When abstinence is employed on matters of food and drink, it is called ABSTEMIOUSNESS, a word most probably of kindred origin.

"Promis'd by heavenly message twice descending,

Under His special eye

Abstemious I grew up, and thriv'd amain."

Milton.

SOBER (Lat. sobrius, opposite to ebrius) denotes the character which by its natural gravity is constitutionally untempted to excesses of any kind.

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Sobriety is sometimes opposed in Scripture to pride, and sometimes to sensuality." -Gilpin.

TEMPERATE denotes the character which is well balanced in its appetites, and to which moderation, though it be the result of effort, is yet congenial. MODERATION (Lat. moderare, modus, a limit) and temperance are very nearly alike, but moderation is a somewhat wider term, referring both to the desires and to the gratification of them; so we might say a person of moderate desires, temperate habits, and sober disposition, character, or life.

"What goodness," says Bishop Hall, "can there be in the world without moderation, whether in the use of God's creatures or in our own disposition and carriage? Without this justice is no other than cruel rigour, mercy unjust remissness, pleasure brutish sensuality, love frenzy, anger fury, sorrow desperate mopishness, joy distempered wild

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ness, knowledge saucy curiosity, piety superstition, care wracking distraction, courage mad rashness."-Hall, Christian Moderation. Temperance," says Woolaston, in his "Religion of Nature," "permits us to take meat and drink not only as physic for hunger and thirst, but also as an innocent cordial, and fortifier against the evils of life, or even sometimes (reason not refusing that liberty) merely as matter of pleasure. It only confines us to such kinds, quantities, and seasons, as may best consist with our health, the use of our faculties, our fortune, and the like, and show that we do not think ourselves made only to eat and drink here."

ABSURD.

requisite in verbal criticism, no proficiency in the subtleties of the logician's art, no acquisitions of recondite learning."-Bishop Horsley.

ABSURD. FOOLISH. IRRATIONAL. PREPOSTEROUS,

ABSURD (ab and surdus, deaf, or dissonant) denotes that which jars against common sense and received notions of propriety and truth, as when an argument is reduced to an absurdity, on which every man's judgment is competent to determine; or men form absurd, that is, practically im

ESTRANGEMENT.

ABSTRUSE. CURIOUS.

DITE.

RECON

As applied to matters of knowledge or learning, that is ABSTRUSE (abstrusus, thrust away, and so hidden) which is removed from common or easy understanding, as abstruse ideas, abstruse learning, or abstruse reasoning. RECONDITE (reconditus, hidden) is that which lies out of the beaten path of inquiry, and so is known to few, without being of necessity perplexing to the understanding, like the abstruse. A matter is recondite in itself, but it may also be abstruse from the way in which it is put. The CURIOUS (cura, care in inquiry) denotes that which is the result of minute inquiry, and strikes us when discovered with a mingled feeling of unfamiliarity and use. Abstruse investigations in recondite branches of learning or science often bring to light curious results. Unlike the abstruse and the recondite, the curious is accompanied by a strange feeling of surprise and pleasure, the unfamiliar being brought into juxtaposition with the familiar. Unlike the others, curious is applicable to the strange in objects of nature and art.

"Let the Scriptures be hard, are they more hard, more crabbed, more abstruse than the Fathers?"-Milton.

"It is true our bodies are made of very coarse materials, of nothing but a little dust and earth. Yet they are so wisely contrived, so curiously composed."-Beveridge.

"To qualify the Christian to make a judicious application of these rules, no skill is

themselves in an absurd manner, that is, one in which even common persons would observe a palpable unfitness. Hence it follows that the ridiculous, or the ludicrous, are not of the essence of the absurd, though the absurd, when exhibited in matters of demeanour, dress, action, and the like externals, will be probably attended with such ludicrous effects.

"That we may proceed yet further with the atheist, and convince him that not only his principle is absurd, but his consequences also as absurdly deduced from it, we will allow him an uncertain extravagant chance against the natural laws of motion."Bentley.

IRRATIONAL (in, not, and ratio, reason) is employed to express sometimes the entire want of the faculty by nature, as in the phrase the "irrational animals," sometimes a deficiency in its exercise, and, like the rest of these synonyms, is applicable to persons, to principles, and to conduct. It is a more serious term than absurd, involving more serious results, as a dereliction of that reason which is the distinctive light and guide of men.

"These are all of them suggestions of internal sense, consciousness, or reflection, which we believe because we believe them to be true, and which if we were not to believe them, would bring upon us the charge of irrationality."-Beattie.

As irrational denotes the contradiction of reason, so FOOLISH denotes a deficient or heedless exercise of it, even on a small scale. So the conduct of children is never called irrational, though it is often foolish.

C