Page images
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

A charger, yearly filled with fruits, was offered to the gods at their festivals, as the premices or first ga-, therings. Dryden. PREMIER, adj. & n. s. Fr. premier. First; chief: a chief minister of state.

The Spaniard challengeth the premier place, in regard of his dominions. Camden's Remains.

Thus families, like realms, with equal fate, Are sunk by premier ministers of state. Swift. PREMISE', v. a. Lat. præmissus. To exPREMISES, n. s. plain previously; lay PREM ISS. Sdown premises: which are propositions antecedently supposed or proved: premiss is the singular, and rarely used; premises or premisses, in law, properly signifies the land, &c., mentioned in the beginning of a deed; hence it came to mean in law language,

house and lands.

[blocks in formation]

PREMNA, in botany, a genus of the angiospermia order, and didynamia class of plants: CAL. bilobed: :COR. quadrifid:berry quadrilocular: VOL. XVIII.

[blocks in formation]

PREMON'ISH, v. a. warn or admonish beforehand.

What friendly premonitions have been spent On your forbearance, and their vain event.

To

Chapman. After these premonishments, I will come to the compartition itself. Wotton's Architecture.

How great the force of such an erroneous persuasion is, we may collect from our Saviour's premonition to his disciples, when he tells them that those who killed them should think they did God service. Decay of Piety.

It is no small mercy of God, that he gives us so gracious a premonition, if we make not a meet We shall make an ill use of warning of our end. preparation for our passage. Bp. Hall.

PREMONSTRANTS, or PRÆMONSTRATENSES, a religious order of regular canons, instituted in 1120, by St. Norbert; and thence also called Norbertines. The first monastery of this order was built by Norbert in the Isle of France, which he called Premonstre, Præmonstratum; and hence the order derived its name; though, as to the occasion of that name, the writers of that order are divided. At first the religious of this order were so very poor that they had only a single ass, which served to carry the wood they cut down every morning, and sent to Laon in order to purchase bread. But they soon received so many donations, and built so many monasteries, that in thirty years after the foundation of the order they had above 100 abbeys in France and Germany; and, in process of time, the order so increased that it had monasteries in all parts of Christendom, amounting to 1000 abbeys, 300 provostships, a vast number of priories, and 500 nunneries. The rule they followed was that of St. Augustine, with some slight alterations, and an addition of certain severe laws, whose authority did not long survive their founder. The order was approved by Honorius II. in 1126, and afterwards by several succeeding popes. At first the abstinence from flesh was rigidly observed. In 1245 Innocent IV. complained to a general chapter of its being neglected. In 1288 their general, William, procured leave of pope Nicholas IV. for those of the order to eat flesh on journeys. In 1460 Pius II. granted them a general permission to eat meat, excepting from Septuagesima to Easter. The dress of the religious of this order is white, with a scapulary before the cassock. Out of doors. they wear a white cloak and white hat; within, a little camail; and at church a surplice, &c. In the first monasteries built by Norbert there was one for men and another for women, only separated by a wall. In 1137, by a decree of a general chapter, this practice was prohibited, and the nuns removed out of those already built to a greater distance from those of the monks. The Præ

monstratenses, or monks of Premontre, vulgarly called white canons, came first into England A. D. 1146. Their first monastery, called New House, was erected in Lincolnshire by Peter de Saulia, and dedicated to St. Martial. In the reign of Edward I. this order had twenty-seven monasteries in England.

E

PREMONTVAL (Peter Le Guay de), an eminent French writer, born at Charenton in 1716. He became a member of the academy of Berlin. He wrote several works, of which the most noted is his Antidote to the Corruption of the French Language, written in German. He died at Berlin in 1767, aged fifty-one.

PREMUNI'RE, n. s. Lat. premunire. A writ in common law, whereby a penalty is incurrable, as infringing some statute. See below. Premunire is now grown a good word in our English laws, by tract of time; and yet at first it was merely mistaken for premonire.

Bramhall against Hobbes. Wolsey incurred a premunire, forfeited his honour, estate, and life, which he ended in great calamity.

South.

PREMUNIRE. See PRÆMUNIRE. PRENANTHES, in botany, wild lettuce, a genus of the polygamia æqualis order, and syngenesia class of plants; natural order forty-ninth, compositæ receptacle naked: CAL. calyculated: pappus simple, and almost sessile: the florets are placed in a single series. Species thirty-three; one, P. mutalis, common to our own groves. PRENOM'INATE, v. a. Latin prænomino. To forename.

He you would sound, Having ever seen, in the prenominate crimes, The youth, you breathe of, guilty. Shakspeare. The watery productions should have the prenomination; and they of the land rather derive their names, than nominate those of the sea. Browne.

PRENOTION, n. s. Fr. prenotion; Lat. pra and nosco. Foreknowledge; prescience.

The hedgehog's presension of winds is so exact, that it stoppeth the north or southern hole of its nest, according unto prenotion of these winds ensuing. Browne.

PRENTICE, n. s. Į PRENTICESHIP.

Contracted from APS PRENTICE. One bound

to a master, in order to instruction in a trade: state or servitude of an apprentice.

My accuser is my prentice, and, when I did correct him for his fault, he did vow upon his knees he would be even with me. Shakspeare.

He served a prenticeship, who sets up shop, Ward tried on puppies, and the poor, his drop.

Pope.

PRENZLOW, the chief town of the district of Brandenburgh, called the Ucker Mark, Prussia. It is situated in a plain on the lake and river Ucker, and is divided into the Old and New Town; both of which are tolerably built. Here are four Lutheran, two Calvinist, and one Catholic church; a pleasant square, a beautiful public walk, several schools and hospitals, and 8000 inhabitants. The town has also several breweries, and a considerable trade in corn. The woollen manufactures, and still more those of tobacco, occupy a large portion of the inhabitants, many of whom are descended from French Protestant refugees. It was near this place, on 24th October 1806, that the remains of the Prussian army, about 20,000, defeated at Jena on the 14th, were obliged to surrender to the French. Seventy-three miles N. N. W. of Frankfort on the Oder, and fifty-six N. N. E. of Berlin.

PREOCCUPATE, v. a.
PREOCCUPATION, n. s.
PREOCCUPY, v. a.

Lat.

Fr. preoccuper ; preoccupo. To Santicipate; prepos

sess; fill with prejudice: preoccupation corresponds with these senses: to preoccupy is the more modern synonyme of preoccupate.

Honour aspireth to death; grief flieth to it; and fear preoccupieth it. Bacon.

That the model be plain without colours, lest the eye preoccupate the judgment. Wotton.

As if, by way of preoccupation, he should have said; well, here you see your commission, this is your duty, these are your discouragements; never seek for evasions from worldly afflictions; this is your reward, if you perform it; this is your doom,

you decline it.

if South. I think it more respectful to the reader to leave something to reflections, than preoccupy his judgArbuthnot.

ment.

[blocks in formation]

for any purpose; make ready before

hand; form; adjust; compound: as a verb neuter, to take previous or preparatory measures; make every thing ready: Shakspeare uses prepare for preparation; which signifies the act of preparing or previously fitting or ordering things; previous measures; introduction; composition; and, in an obsolete sense, accomplishments; qualification: preparative is, having the power or quality of preparing: and, as a noun substantive, that which has this power; that which is done as introductory to something else; the adverb corresponding with the adjective: preparatory is, introductory; antecedent; necessary; previous: preparedly is, advisedly; orderly; by proper precedent measures: the noun substantive corresponding: preparer, he or that which fits or prepares.

There he maketh the hungry to dwell, that they may prepare a city for habitation. Psalm cviii. 36.

[blocks in formation]

Wotton.

The bishop of Ely, the fittest preparer of her mind to receive such a doleful accident, came to visit her. Efficacy is a power of speech, which represents to our minds the lively ideas of things so truly, as if we saw them with our eyes; as Dido preparing to kill herself. Peacham.

The miseries, which have ensued, may be yet, through thy mercy, preparatives to us of future blessings. King Charles. Resolvedness in sin can, with no reason, be imagined a preparative to remission. Decay of Piety. Prepare men's hearts by giving them the grace of humility, repentance, and probity of heart.

Hammond.

[blocks in formation]

next.

Tillotson. What avails it to make all the necessary preparatives for our voyage, if we do not actually begin the journey? Dryden.

Confound the peace established, and prepare Their souls to hatred, and their hands to war. Id. Codded grains are an improver of land, and preparer of it for other crops. Mortimer's Husbandry. I will shew what preparations there were in nature for this dissolution, and after what manner it came to pass. Burnet. Rains were but preparatory, the violence of the

[blocks in formation]

The beams of light had been in vain displayed, Had not the eye been fit for vision made; In vain the author had the eye prepared With so much skill, had not the light appeared. Blackmore.

In the preparations of cookery, the most volatile parts of vegetables are destroyed. Arbuthnot. Nothing hath proved more fatal to that due preparation for another life, than our unhappy mistake of the nature and end of this. Wake.

PREPARATION OF DISSONANCES, in music. See

MUSIC.

PREPARATIONS, in anatomy, the parts of animal bodies prepared and preserved for anatomical uses. Though several parts prepared dry are useful, yet others must be so managed as to be always flexible, and nearer a natural state. According to Dr. Monro, the best liquor for this wine, to which is added a small quantity of purpose is a well rectified colorless spirit of nitric or sulphuric acids. When these are properly mixed, they neither change the color nor the consistence of their parts, except where there are serous or mucous liquors contained in them. The brain, even of a young child, in this mixture grows so firm as to admit of gentle handling, as do also the vitreous and crystalline humors of the eye. The liquor of the sebaceous glands is coagulated by this spirituous mixture; and it heightens the red color of the injection of the blood-vessels, so that, after the part has been in it a little time, several vessels appear which were before invisible. The glasses which contain the preparations should be of the finest sort, and pretty thick; for through such the parts may be seen very distinctly, and of a true color, and the object will be so magnified as to show vessels in the glass which out of it were not to be seen. As the glass when filled with the liquor has a certain focus, it is necessary to keep the preparation at a proper distance from the sides of it, which is easily done by little sticks suitably placed, or by suspending it by a thread in a proper situation. Mr. Sheldon describes a simple method of stopping the mouths of the preparation glasses, by which means the stopper is rendered nearly as durable as the glass itself. 'To execute it, let the anatomist take care to have the upper surface of his bottles made plane, by desiring the workmen at the glass-house to flatten them in the making. This they will easily do in forming the round ones, but the flat bottles are attended with considerable difficulty. The right way to make them, would be to blow them in moulds of various sizes; the workmen should likewise form the bottoms of the bottles

perfectly flat, that they may stand upright and steady. Bottles of this form being provided for the larger preparations, we grind the upper surface of them on a plain plate of lead, about a quarter of an inch thick, and two feet in diame

ter; first with Ane emery and water, then with powdered rotten stone, or putty first wet with water and at last dry; so that the surface may be reduced to an exact horizontal plane, and of as fine a polish as plate glass. The manœuvre requires but little dexterity; and the anatomist should be provided with a considerable number of these glasses thus prepared. To the top of each bottle a piece of plate glass, cut by a diamond, is to be adapted so as completely to cover, but not project over, the edge of the bottle. When these two smooth surfaces are put upon each other, with a drop of solution of gum between, the attraction of cohesion is so considerable that it requires great force to separate them. A piece of wet ox bladder, freed from fat, and soaked in water till it becomes mucilaginous, is then to be placed over the top, the air pressed out from between it and the glass; after which it must be tied with a pack-thread dipped in the solution of gum arabic. The bladder, being cut off neatly under the last turn of the thread, is then to be dried, the string taken cautiously off, and the top and neck painted with a composition of lamp-black mixed with japanner's gold size: this soon dries, and leaves a fine smooth glossy surface, from which the dirt can at any time be as readily wiped off as from a mirror. By this method large bottles are as easily and effectually secured as small ones; and it is found to answer as well as the hermetical sealing of glasses, which in large vessels is altogether impracticable. With respect to the stopper bottles, which are very convenient for holding small preparations, Mr. S. advises the stoppers to be perfectly well ground; that they pass rather lower down than the neck of the bottle, for the convenience of drilling two holes obliquely through the inferior edge of the substance of the stopper, opposite to each other, for the convenience of fixing threads to hold the subject; for, if the threads pass between the neck and stopper, a space will be left; or, if the stopper be well ground, the neck of the bottle will be broken in endeavouring to press it down. On the other hand, if any space be left, the thread, by its capillary attraction, will act from capillary attraction, raise the spirits from the bottle, and cause evaporation, which will likewise take place from the chink between the stopper and neck. Mr. W. Cooke has found that all preparations of animal bodies may be preserved by a solution of common salt. He finds that if used a little below saturation, it will preserve animal substances for an indefinite period, at all the temperatures of our atmosphere.-Transactions of the Society of Arts, vol. xxxvii. p. 43.

PREPARIS, the most northern of the Andainan Islands, in the eastern entrance of the Bay of Bengal, about a degree south of the Pegue shore, is four miles long, by one and a half broad. It rises gradually towards the middle, and is covered entirely with wood. In clear weather it may seen at the distance of twentyfive miles, but can only be approached on the east side, on account of rocks; on that side, within half a mile of the shore, there is seven fathoms water. It is only inhabited by birds, squirrels, and monkies. Long. 93° 40′ E., lat. 14° 50' N.

[blocks in formation]

Though pillars by channelling be seemingly ingrossed to our sight, yet they are truly weakened; and therefore ought not to be the more slender, but the more corpulent unless appearances preponder truths. Wotton's Architecture.

ponderate light falsehood in a thousand. Bp. Hall. A solid verity in one month, is worthy to prewill not preponderate. That is no just balance, wherein the heaviest side Wilkins.

An inconsiderable weight, by distance from the centre of the balance, will preponderate greater magnitudes. Glanville.

As to addition of ponderosity in dead bodies, comparing them unto blocks, this occasional preponderancy is rather an appearance than reality.

Browne's Vulgar Errours.

He that would make the lighter scale preponderate, will not so soon do it, by adding new weight to the emptier, as if he took out of the heavier, what he adds to the lighter.

Locke.

The mind should examine all the grounds of probability, and, upon a due balancing the whole, reject or receive proportionably to the preponderancy of the greater grounds of probability.

Id.

Little light boats were the ships which people used, to the sides whereof this fish remora fastening, might make it swag, as the least preponderance on either side will do, and so retard its course.

Grew.

[blocks in formation]

which ought to be last: hence, absurdly wrong; perverted; the adverb and noun-substantive corresponding.

Preposterous ass! that never read so far To know the cause why musick was ordained. Shakspeare. Those things do best please me, That befal preposterously.

Id. Midsummer Night's Dream. Put a case of a land of Amazons, where the whole government, public and private, is in the hands of women: is not such a preposterous government against the first order of nature, for women to rule over men, and in itself void? Bacon.

Death from a father's hand, from whom I first
Received a being! 'tis a preposterous gift,
An act at which inverted nature starts,
And blushes to behold herself so cruel.

Denham.

[blocks in formation]

PRE PUCE, n. s. Fr. prepuce; Lat. præputium. That which covers the glans; foreskin. The prepuce was much inflamed and swelled.

PREPUCE. See ANATOMY.

Wiseman.

PRERAU, a circle comprising the north-east portion of Moravia, bordering on Austrian Silesia. Its area is 1210 square miles. The smaller part lying on the rivers March and Hanna, is fertile; the rest is mountainous and containing only here and there fruitful spots. The pastures are good, and the number of sheep considerable. The chief rivers are the March, Hanna, Becswa, and Oder, which has here the commencement of its course. Population 215,000. The chief town of the same name is situated thirteen miles southeast of Almutz and contains 2300 inhabitants. PREREQUIRE', v. a. Į PREREQUISITE, adj. viously: præ and requisite. viously necessary.

Pra and require.

To demand

preSomething pre

[blocks in formation]
[ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

I will not consider only the prerogatives of man above other animals, but the endowments which nature hath conferred on his body in common with them. Ray on the Creation.

PREROGATIVE COURT, an English court established for the trial of all testamentary causes, where the deceased has left bona notabilia within

two different dioceses. In which case the probate of wills belongs to the archbishop of the province, by way of special prerogative. And all causes relating to the wills, administrations, or legacies of such persons, are originally cognizable herein, before a judge appointed by the archbishop, called the judge of the prerogativecourt; from whom an appeal lies, by stat. 25 Hen. VIII. c. 19, to the king in chancery, instead of the pope as formerly.

PREROGATIVE, ROYAL, that special pre-eminence which the king hath over and above all other persons, and out of the ordinary course of the common law, in right of his regal dignity. It signifies in its etymology (from præ and rogo) something that is required or demanded before, or in preference to all others. And therefore Finch lays it down as a maxim, that the prerogative is that law in case of the king, which 18 law in no case of the subject. Prerogatives are either direct or incidental. The direct are such positive substantial parts of the royal character and authority, as are rooted in, and spring from,

« PreviousContinue »