ABRAHAMITES, or ABRAHAMIANS, an order of religious, who derived their appellation from one Abraham, a native of Antioch, or, as the Arabs called him, Ibrahim. The emperor Theophilus, who united in his own character, the apparent zeal of a Christian with the fury of a persecutor, exterminated the Abrahamites, on a vague charge of idolatry, in the ninth century.

ABRANTES, a large and populous town of Portugal, in the province of Estramadura, occupying a delightful eminence, which commands a pleasing and picturesque prospect, surrounded by luxuriant gardens and plantations. It is near the mouth of the Tajo; and is now celebrated for a famous battle, in which the English and French forces greatly signalized themselves. The French general, Junot, was afterwards created duke of Abrantes. The town suffered much during the late war. The castle, in particular, was greatly injured. At the time here alluded to, Abrantes contained nearly 40,000 inhabitants, and several convents, alms-houses, and hospitals. W. lon. 70°, 18'. N. lat. 39°, 13'.

ABRASAX, or ABRAXAS, a cabalistic word composed of the following letters a, ß, p, a, ¿, a, s, making, according to the Grecian numeration, the number 365. This word was used as an amulet, or charm, by the disciples of Basil, father of the monks of Pontus.

In antiquities, the name is appropriated to a stone, on which the word is engraven, and sometimes the names of saints, angels, gods, and even Jehovah himself. Specimens, supposed to be as old as the third century, are still extant. If the Abraxas originally came from Egypt, as is believed, it may be regarded not as a curiosity fit only for the cabinet, but as one of those rich spoils of time which may illustrate the history of that country.

ABREAST', adv. See BREAST.

ABREAST, a maritime phrase, signifying side by side, or even opposite to; and used to denote ships lying, or sailing, with their sides parallel to each other. The term, however, has a more particular reference to the line of battle at sea. When the line is formed abreast, the whole squadron advances uniformly and evenly; the commander-in-chief being always stationed in the centre, and the ships equidistant from each other. Abreast of any place, signifies being opposite to it. In the interior of the ship, abreast means to be on the starboard or larboard side of the main hatchway, in opposition to afore or abaft the hatchway.

ABREOLHOS, or ABREOGOS, a dangerous point of land stretching out from the coast of Brazil, in W. lon. 39°, 18′. S. lat. 17°, 18', terminated by some hidden rocks and sands, on which frequent shipwrecks have occurred. It requires great skill and knowledge of the coast to avoid this point.

ABRETENE, or ABRETTINE, an ancient district of Mysia, in Asia. The people were called Abretteni, inhabiting the country between Ancyra of Phrygia, and the river Rhyndacus.

VOL. XVII.

Largesse it is, whose priuilege There maie no auarice abrege.

Gower, Con. A. book vii.

anoieth.

Chaucer. The Tale of Melibeus, vol. ii. p. 78.
And nere it that I wilne as now abredge
Diffusion of speache, I could almoste
A thousand olde stories thee aledge,

Of women loste, through false & fooles boste.

Id. Third booke of Troilus, fol. 168, col. iii.

Of Theophylactes authoritie wee never made any great aecoumpte. He is but a very late writer in comparison of the Ancient Fathers. For the most parte of that he writeth, he is but an abbridger of Chrysostome. Jewel's Defence of the Apologie.

Wherefore to abbridge his power, and to minishe his aucthoritie they determined to bryng hym into the hatred of the people, and into the disdain of the nobilite. Hall, repr. 1809, p. 223.

Sackville.

But as our parts abridge, or length our age,
So passe we all, while other fill the stage.
[The emperoure] specially chargynge the sayde bysshop that he
wold shewe vnto his sayde sone ye great dauger that he was in
agaynste God for the displeasurys doon to hym, & specyally that
he was a cause of the abrygement, or shortynge, of his dayes.
Fabyan, repr. 1811, p. 154.
Time is the nurse and breeder of all good;
Here if thou stay, thou canst not see thy loue;
Besides, thy staying will abridge thy life---
Hope is a louer's staffe, walke hence with that
And manage it against despairing thoughts.
Shakespeare's Two Gent. of Ver. p. 30, act iii. sc. 1.
THE. Say, what abridgement haue you for this euening?
What maske? What musicke? How shall we beguile
The lazie time, if not with some delight?

Id. M. N. Dreame, p. 159. act v. sc. 1.
Fond women, and scarce speaking children mourn,
Bewail his [Hertford's] parting, wishing his return,
That I was forc'd to abridge his banish'd years,
When they bedew'd his footsteps with their tears.

Drayton's Richard II. to Queen Isabel, p. 101,
Beasts too were his command: what could he more?
Yes, man he could, the bond of all before;
In him he all things with strange order hurl'd;
In him, that full abridgment of the world.

Cowley's Davideis, book i.

And I haue thrust my selfe into this maze, Happily to wine and thriue as best I may: Crownes in my purse I haue, and goods at home, And so am come abroad to see the world.

Surrey.

Shakespeare, Tam. of the S. p. 213, act i. sc. 2.
The clouds

From many a horrid rift abortive pour'd
Fierce rain with lightning mix'd, water with fire,
In ruin reconcil'd: nor slept the winds
Within their stony caves, but rush'd abroad
From the four hinges of the world, and fell
On the vex'd wilderness.

Milton's Paradise Regained, book iv.
Hey, boys! she scuds away, and by my head I know,

We round the world are sailing now.

What dull men are those that tarry at home,
When abroad they might wantonly roam,

And gain such experience, and spy too
Such countries and wonders, as I do!

Cowley's Ode [sitting and drinking in the chair made out of the relics of Sir F. Drake's ship.]

God hath made care and sweat, prudence and diligence, experience and watchfulness, wisdom and labour at home, and good guides abroad, to be instruments and means to purchase virtue. Taylor's Sermons.

Qu. M. Speak then, for speech is morning to the mind,
It spreads the beauteous images abroad.

Dryden's Duke of Guise, act ii. sc. 1. It is not unknown to any that observes the state of things in the world, how many erroneous religions are scattered abroad in the world; and how industrious men of false persuasions are to make proselytes. Hale's Contemplations.

None [of the bees] range abroad when winds and storms are nigh,
Nor trust their bodies to a faithless sky,

But make small journeys, with a careful wing,
And fly to water at a neighbouring spring.

Addison's Translations. Virgil, Georg. iv.

Arouse your conqu'ring troops: let Angus guard
The convent with a chosen band. The soul
Of treason is abroad!

Smollett's Regicide, act v. sc. i. While the national honour is firmly maintained abroad, and while justice is impartially administered at home, the obedience of the subject will be voluntary, cheerful, and I might almost say, unlimited. Junius, Letter i.

AB'ROGATE, v.) Ab: rogo. Rogare legem, is to ask AB'ROGATE, the people for their votes upon. ABROGA'TION. a law proposed, to propose a law; and subsequently, to pass a law and abrogare legem, to repeal; to annul; abolish a law and in this application the word is usually found in English.

Beside this, all estatutes made by king Edward, were clerely reuoked, abrogated, and made frustrate. Hall, p. 286.

I do not abrogate the grace of God; for if righteousness be by the law, then Christ dyed without a cause.

Geneva Bible, 1561. Galatians, chap. ii. v. 21.

Which fulfyllinge the lawe concluded oure religion within the lymitis of fayth and lour, all the ceremonies of the temple, both sacred and camall abrogated.

The Exposicion of Daniel, by George Joye, fo. 169, 170.

NATH. Perge, good M. Holofernes, perge, so it shall please you to abrogate scurilitie.

Shakespeare, Love's L. L. p. 131, act iv. sc. 2.
That robe of Rome proud Beauford now doth wear
In every place such sway should never bear:
The crosier-staff in his imperious hand,

To be the scepter that controuls the land;
That home to England dispensations draws,
Which are of power to abrogate our laws.

Drayton's Duke Humphrey to Elenor Cobham, p. 110.

The negative precepts of men may cease by many instruments, by contrary customs, by public disrelish, by long omission: but the negative precepts of God never can cease, but when they are expressly abrogated by the same authority.

Taylor's Rules and Exercises of Holy Living and Dying.

That which I demand is, what peace of mind a sinner can have in this world, who knows not how soon he may be dispatched to that place of torment? Can he bind the hands of the Almighty, that he shall not snatch him away till he doth repent? or can he reverse the decrees of heaven, or suspend the execution of them? Can he abrogate the force of his laws, and make his own terms with God?. Stillingflect's Sermons.

Nor is it well, nor can it come to good,
That, through profane and infidel contempt
Of holy writ, she [London] has presum'd t'annul
And abrogate, as roundly as she may,
The total ordinance and will of God.

Cowper's Task, book i.

ABROMA, formed of a and Bowμa, q. d. 'not fit for food;' used in opposition to Theobroma, as a genus of plants belonging to the natural order of Columniferæ, the Malvacea of Jussieu, and the 18th class of polyadelphia dodecandria,

ABRUG-BANYA, a rich and populous town of Transylvania, in the province of Weissenburg, abounding with mines of gold and silver. E. lon. 23°, 24'. N: lat. 46°, 50'.

ABRUPT', adj.) Ab: rumpo, ruptus. To break off, ABRUPTION, or away from. Broken off from. Generally used where the breach and separation is sudden, or

ABRUPTLY,

ABRUPT'NESS.

violent, or hasty, or unexpected.

TROY. O Cressida, how often haue I wisht me thus? CRES. Wisht my lord? The gods grant! O my lord. TROY. What should they grant? What makes this pretty abruption: what too curious dreg espies my sweete lady in the founShakespeare, Tr. & Cr. p. 90.

taine of our loue?

ABSCISSE.

ABRUPT. The effects of whose [the sun's] activity are not precipitously
abrupted, but gradually proceed to their cessations.
Brown's Vulgar Errours, book vi. chap. x.
It is a rudeness in manners to depart from the house of our
friend as soon as the tables are removed, and an act of irreligion
to rise from our common meals without prayer and thanksgiving.
How much more absurd and impious, then, were it for us to depart
abruptly from the Lord's table.

Comber's Companion to the Temple, part iii. sect. 19.
Abrupt, with eagle-speed she cut the sky;
Instant invisible to mortal eye.

Pope's Translation, Homer's Odyssey, book ì. Hence proceeds the surprizing warmth, and boldness of figure, the abrupt transitions, the sudden lofty flights of the eastern writers and speakers, utterly contrary to the cool and regular genius of the European languages.

Secker's Sermons.

ABRUS, in Botany, a name of the Glycine, or Knobbed-rooted Liquorice-vetch; a genus of plants belonging to the Diadelphia class; order, Papilionaccæ.

ABRUS, in the Materica Medica, the name of a seed produced by one of the phascola, or kidneybeans, commonly called Angola seeds.

ABRUZZO, a Neapolitan province, consisting of two grand divisions; Ulteriore, and Citeriore; Aquila, or Aquileia, and Chieti, are the respective capitals. These districts are divided by the river Pescara. The face of the country is diversified by the towering heights of the Appenines, the Monte Cavallo, and the snow-clad summits of Monte Majello; whilst their sides, and the vallies and plains beneath, are rich in vegetables, fruits, and animals of various kinds. The climate, however, is somewhat cold. The inhabitants carry on some trade in Turkey wheat, rice, oil, and wines; but a still greater article of their trade and commerce is wool, which is the staple commodity. The warlike nations. which formerly occupied this country have left a valuable residue of monumental memorials and inscriptions. It is probable, from their appearance, that the mountains contain veins of metallic ore; and the botanist might find an ample field of research in the incalculable variety of plants that adorn their surfaces, particularly Monte-corno and Majello.

ABSCESS, in Surgery, from ab: scedo, to separate; a cavity containing pus; or a collection of puriform matter in a part.

line terminated at some certain point, cut off by an ABSCISSE. ordinate to a curve. See MATHEMATICS, Div. i.

ABSCISSION, a figure of speech; in which, after beginning a discourse, it is suddenly broken off, upon the supposition that enough has been already intimated: as, "Such a reception of a man so eminent, supported by such credentials, having so important a commission, at a moment so critical- -I need add no more."

ABSCISSION, in Surgery, signifies the act of removing a morbid or superfluous part by an edged instrument. It is used by medical writers to denote the termination of a disease in death before its decline. Astrologers speak of the abscission of the light of a planet, by another outstripping it.

ABSCOND', v. ab: condo, to hide from (Condo est a cum et do, quasi simul in interiorem locum do: ut Festus ait Vossius.) To hide from; to conceal; to secrete; to depart or go away for the purpose of concealment.

Ajax, to shun his [Pluto's] general power,
In vain abscondea in a flower;

An idle scene Tythonus acted,
When to a grasshopper contracted.

Prior's Turtle and Sparrow,

Wyth fyre infernale in myne absence also

I sall the follow, and fra the cald dede

Reyf from my membrys thys saul, in euery stede
My goist sall be present the to aggrise.

Douglas, bke iv. P. 113. Lo badde is nothing els, but absence or negatiue of good, as darkness is absence or negatiue of light

Chaucer, third booke of the Test of Love, fol. 309, col. 1.
With burial brandes I absent shall thee trace:
And when cold death from life these limes deuides,
My gost eche where shall still on thee awaite.

Surrey.

ABSENT.

ABSENT. He [Edward the Confessor] sent for home into England his nephew Edward the sonne of king Edmund his brother, who by ABSOLVE, reason of his long absence out of the country, was commonly called the Outlawe.

Stow's Chronicle, Howes's Ed. Call hither,

I say bid come before vs Angelo,
What figure of vs thinke you, he will beare.
For you must know we have with speciall soule
Elected him our absence to supply;
Lent him our terror, drest him with our loue.
Shakespeare, M. for M. p. 61, act i. sc. 1.

DUKE. Not see him since? Sir, sir, that cannot be:
But were I not the better part made mercie,
I should not seeke an absent argument
Of my reuenge, thou present.

Id. As You Like It, p. 194. act iii. sc. 2.
-Night with her will bring
Silence; and sleep, listening to thee, will watch,
Or we can bid his absence, till thy song
End, and dismiss thee ere the morning shine.
Milton's Paradise Lost, book vi.

POLIN. But when against his custom, they perceiv'd

The King absented, streight the rebels met,
And roar'd, they were undone.

Dryden's Duke of Guise, act iii. sc. 1.

It is observed, that in the sun's total eclipses, when there is no part of his body discernible, yet there does not always follow so great a darkness as might be expected from his total absence.

Bishop Wilkins's Discovery of a new World.

In every age, the absence of genuine inspiration is supplied by the strong illusions of enthusiasm, and the mimic arts of imposGibbon's Roman Empire.

ture.

What is commonly called an absent man, is commonly either a very weak, or a very affected man. Chesterfield, Letter xii.

Whether if there was no silver or gold in the kingdom, our trade might not nevertheless supply bills of exchange, sufficient to answer the demand of absentees in England, or elsewhere?

Bishop Berkeley's Querist. ABSENCE, in Scots Law, when a person cited before a court does not appear, and judgment is pronounced. No person can be tried criminally in absence. ABSIS, in Astronomy, the same with apsis. Ab: solvo, solutus. To loose, or ABSOLVE', T. free from. To loose or free from ; ABSOLV'ER, AB'SOLUTE, To clear from difficulty; from AB'SOLUTELY, guilt; or the consequences of AB'SOLUTENESS, guilt; to acquit, to pardon. The ABSOLUTION, adj. and nouns are applied to that ABSOLUTORY. which is free from bound, restriction, uncertainty, imperfection.

But let the sonne of perdicion perisshe, and absolue we the chapter, the aungel yet speking with Daniel.

The Exposicion of Daniel, by George Joye, p. 146.

For the nature ne tooke not her begynning, of thynges amenused and imparfite, but it proceedeth of thynges that been all hole absolute, and discendeth so down into the vttrest thynges, and into thynges empty and without fruit.

Chaucer. Third booke of Boecius, fol. 226, col. 2. Furthermore, if I myghte be bold with Rastel, I wolde aske him this question, whether God haue not an absolute iustice as wel as an absolute power? If God have also an absolute iustice, then can not his absolute power preuayle vntyll his absolute iustice be fullie countrepyased. A Boke made by Johan Fryth, printed 1548.

At þer wille salle þou be, Sir, we se it wele,
Calle ageyn thin oth, drede pou no manace,
Nouber of lefe ne loth, pi lordschip to purchace
bou may fulle lightly haf absolutioun,
For it was a gilery, pou knew not per tresoun.
R. Brunne, p. 215.

But father nowe ye haue all herde,

In this maner howe I haue ferde
Of cheste, and of dissencion,
Yeue me your absolucion.

ABSOLVE.

Gower, Con. A. book iii. He [Wiclife] denyed ye Bishop to have authoritie to excommunicate any person; and that any priest might absolve such a one as well as the pope. Stow's Chronicle, Howes's Ed. 1614, p. 272. Pray speake in English; heere are some will thanke you, If you speake truth, for their poore Mistris sake; Beleeue me, she has had much wrong. Lord Cardinall, The willing'st sinne I euer yet committed, May be absolu'd in English.

Shakespeare, H. VIII. p. 218, act i. sc. 1. DUKE. Be absolute for death: either death or life Shall thereby be the sweeter.

Ib. M. for M. p. 70, act iii. sc. 1.

Now if to salve this anomaly, we say the heat of the sun is more powerful in the southern tropick, because in the sign of capricorn falls out the perigeum, or lowest place of the sun in his eccentrick, whereby he becomes nearer unto them than unto the other in cancer, we shall not absolve the doubt.

Brown's Vulgar Errours, book vi. chap. x.

BAR. Finding in his conscience

A tender scruple of a fault long since
By him committed, thinks it not sufficient
To be absolv'd of 't by his confessor,
If that in open court he publish not
What was so long conceal'd.

Beaumont and Fletcher's Spanish Curate, act iii. sc. 3.

We are bounde to heare the Pope, and his Cardinalles, and other like Scribes, and Phariseis, not absolutely, or without exception, what so ever they liste to saie: but only so long, as they teache the lawe of God. Jewel's Defence of the Apologie.

We must know what is to be meant by absolute, or absolutenes; whereof I finde two main significations. First, absolute signifieth perfect and absolutenesse, perfection: hence we have in Latin this expression, Perfectum est omnibus, numeris absolutum. And in our vulgar language we say, a thing is absolutely good, when it is perfectly good. Next, absolute signifieth free from tye or bond.

Knox's History of the Reformation. Preface.

It is fatal goodness left to fitter times, Not to increase, but to absolve, our crimes. Dryden's Poem to the Lord Chancellor Hyde. The proper object of love, is not so much that which is absolutely good in itself, as that which is relatively so to us. Bp. Wilkins's Sermon on the Hope of Rewarde. Though an absolutory sentence should be pronounced in favour of the persons--yet if adultery shall afterwards be truly proved, he may again be proceeded against as an adulterer.

Ayliffe.

As the priests of the law were to pronounce a blessing upon the offerers, so those of the gospel are to dispense of the blessing of absolution unto the penitent.

Comber's Companion to the Temple, part i. sect. iv.
Reason pursued is faith; and unpursued
Where proof invites, 'tis reason, then, no more:
And such our proof, That, or our faith is right,
Or Reason lies, and Heaven designed it wrong:
Absolve we this?

Young's Complaint, Night IV.

ASPASIA. Since fear predominates in every thought,
And sways thy breast with absolute dominion.

Johnson's Irene, act ii. sc. 1.

Possibly one part of the office [for the sick] may seem to have ascribed so high a power to the minister, of absolving the sick from their sins, as may lead them into great mistakes.

Secker's Sermons..

Rocking sets children to sleep better than absolute rest; there is indeed scarce any thing at that age, which gives more pleasure than to be gently lifted up and down.

Burke on the Sublime and Beautiful,