Mortimer. The land was sooted before. Pope. Soor is a volatile matter arising from wood and other fuel along with the smoke; or rather it is the smoke itself condensed and gathered to the sides of the chimney. Though once volatile, however, soot cannot be again resolved into vapor; but, if distilled by a strong fire, yields a volatile alkali and empyreumatic oil, a consider able quantity of fixed matter remaining at the bottom of the distilling vessel. If burnt, in an open fire, it flames with a thick smoke, whence other soot is produced. It is used as a material for making sal ammoniac, and as a manure. See CHEMISTRY, Index. Mr. Donaldson observes that this useful manure can be obtained in considerable quantities only from great cities, or large manufacturing towns. The price in London, whence great quantities are carried to the adjacent districts, is 8d. the bushel. The ordinary allowance is from twenty-five to thirty-five bushels an acre. Soot is used in many parts of England, as Middlesex, Buckingham, Gloucester, Wilts, Lancashire, Yorkshire, &c. The mode of application is chiefly as top-dressings for young clover, sainfoin, and old worn-out meadows. The best season for laying it on is in February or March. It is carefully spread over the field with the hand, and always succeeds best, if rain immediately ensues. Mr. Marshall recommends its being sown before rain, when a shower washes it in, and will be of obvious service; but that if it lie on the surface long, without rain, there will be no benefit derived from it. A rich soil wants no scot, but a soil much out of heart wants forty or fifty bushels. In his Rural Economy of Norfolk, he says, that the time of sowing it over the land is considered as very material. If it be sown early, and the frost catch it, its strength is thereby lowered; if late, and no rain falls to wash it in, it is thought to be rather injurious than beneficial to the crop of wheat. And it is not, in any case, found of much, if any, service to the succeeding crop of barley. The method of sowing it is extremely simple; and, in the only instance he saw, the sowing of soot practised there was very complete. A favorable opportunity being embraced, when the wind blew gently, and in the direction, or nearly in the same direction, as the lands or ridges lie; the same waggon which brought it from Norwich, and which, until the opportunity offered, had stood safe under cover, was drawn in a furrow against the wind; while a man, standing on the outside of the waggon, spread the soot, with a shovel, several yards wide on either side of him; the height of his situation at once enabling him to spread it wide and even. As he reached the windward end of the lands, the team wheeled round under the hedges, and took a fresh width. The quantity set on was forty bushels an acre in this case. Mr. Young remarks that, in general, thirty bushels are used for a complete dressing; that is, when dung or some other manure has not been previously applied to the same crop, which is very frequently the practice, and the quantity of top-dressing is then diminished to about one-half of a complete dressing. Of soot & complete dressing, as above, costs from 30s. to 36s. per acre. Soot is found to answer best on wheat in April. It likewise succeeds on pease or clover in the same month, and has a good effect sown with barley, in the beginning of April, and harrowed in. A slight dressing of soot is used at any time in the spring, when grubs or worms appear to injure the young corn. The worms frequently make great havoc, by drawing the blades of young corn after them into their holes: this soot prevents best: soot thinly distributed on newly sown turnips, just before they come up prevents the fly, or grub from injuring them, provided no rain falls to wash it into the soil. Soot answers best on light, dry, chalky soils, and in moderately wet seasons. It does little good on strong or wet land, or in very dry seasons, unless sown earlier than usual. The London soot from coals is rarely bought unmixed with cork-dust, coal-ashes, or sweepings of the streets; yet, even in this adulterated state, it is found to answer much better than real country soot from wood. It is remarked, in the Agricultural Survey of Hertfordshire, that about Stevenage they spread from twenty to forty bushels an acre, bringing it from London; it costs 8d., and the carriage 3d., in all 11d. per bushel. And Mr. Clarke, of Sandridgebury, spreads from thirty-five to forty bushels an acre on wheat. But about Beachwood they sow from thirty to forty bushels on wheat, in February or March, bought at 1s. a bushel at London, and bring 160 bushels in a waggon with four horses. Around Hitchin, forty bushels are sown on wheat. And a good deal is used at Watford, at the rate of forty bushels an acre. Also about Barkway they have a very high opinion of it; fifty bushels an acre, brought thirty miles from London, are seen on wheat to an inch. And it is stated, in addition, that the practice is universal through this country; insomuch that the question is, whether there is a parish in it in which some men are not in the habit of using this manure from London. Ou cabbage crops, that have been sown, it has been found that if, as soon as the plants appear distinctly above the ground, a surge of soot be drilled upon them, to the amount of from ten to twelve bushels the acre, it affords much security against the fly. And it has been suggested that this business may be cheaply and conveniently executed by a hopper and round of cups, similar to Cook's, but larger, fixed to a frame similar to that of the Northumberland drill. When employed for preventing the fly, in drilled turnips, it should be sprinkled along the rows, from a scuttle, by the hand, or some such mean, in the proportion of about twenty bushels the acre. But, in respect to the application of this sort of substance to land, it is remarked by Mr. Kiddle, in the fourth volume of Communications to the Board of Agriculture, that all manures that are laid on the surface of land cannot be laid on too early in the season. Soot, for instance, is always recommended to be sown on wheats or clovers, and grass-lands, in the month of February, from a notion that if sown sooner they would exhaust themselves too soon. This he thinks absurd reasoning. No manure can be of any service to the crop, which it is meant to advantage, until it reaches the roots: and what contributes more to save it than the winter rains, and the dissolving of the snow? He has, in consequence, always sown the soot for wheat and clover, when he has been able to procure it, in the month of November or December, and always with satisfaction to himself. He last year sowed with soot an enclosure of wheat of eight acres, part of which was sown in the beginning of December, before the frost set in, and a heavy rain succeeded the sowing; on the remaining parts, owing to his not being able to procure more soot at that time, the sowing was postponed until after the frost was gone, in the month of February. The quantity sown on an acre, in both instances, was equal; but the superiority of the crop of wheat, where it was sown early, might be discerned by the eye. He had the curiosity to have it thrashed separately, and found its increase beyond the other considerable. If he could procure soot at the time of sowing wheat, he should be under no apprehension of its answering then, if the land was worked for the wheat. Some years since, having bought a small quantity of soot immediately after harvest, he had the desire to try its effects on the crop at that early season, and having a pea stubble which had been ploughed twice, and was designed for wheat, after sowing as much of the land as he had soot for with wheat, he then had the soot sown, and ploughed both in together. He owns he was anxious to see the success of his experiment, as it was a novel one, as were his neighbours also who had seen it done. The remainder of the land was sown with soot, as he was able to procure it. The wheat, where the soot was soon with it, kept the lead during the first months this he did not wonder at, but expected it from its forcing quality; but he was very much pleased to see it continue to do so during the remainder of the season, and at harvest the superiority in favor of it was easily to be seen. Some have thought that twenty bushels of soot to the acre are nearly equal to fifty of the ashes of either coals, wood, or peat. And the writer of the Middlesex corrected Agricultural Report remarks that the smoke, consisting of the lightest particles of soot and coal, raised by the force of the ascending current of rarefied air arising from 300,000 fires in the metropolis and its vicinity, is daily deposited on the surrounding country; where the next rain washes it into the soil, and it promotes vegetation and the fertility of the land to a considerable degree. The dyers make a considerable use of soot, for a kind of duncolor. : SOO TERKIN, n. s. From soot. A kind of false birth, fabled to be produced by the Dutch women from sitting over their stoves. When Jove was, from his teeming head, For after-birth a sooterkin. Swift. SOOTH, n. s., adj., & Sax. roð, roodian, SOOTH'ER, [v. a. to flatter. Truth; reality, (obsolete); pleasing; delightful: SOOTH'SAY, V. n. SOOTH'SAYER, n. s. hence to please with flattery or blandishment › to console; calm: soother corresponding: from the above root is also derived to soothsay, i. e. to predict; foretel (supposed truth): and soothsayer he who predicts. A damsel, possessed with a spirit of divination, met us, which brought her masters much gain by soothsaying. Acts xvi. Scarce was Musidorus made partaker of this oftblinding light when there were found numbers of Soothsayers, who affirmed strange and incredible things should be performed by that child. Sidney. The youngest daughter, whom you hearken for, Sir, understand you this of me in sooth, Her father keeps from all access of suitors, Until the eldest sister first be wed. Shakspeare. He looks like sooth: he says he loves my daughter; I think so too; for never gazed the moon Upon the water, as he'll stand and read My daughter's eyes. Id. Winter's Tale. That e'er this tongue of mine, That laid the sentence of dread banishment On yond proud man, should take it off again With words of sooth! Shakspeare. Id. Richard II In soothing them, we nourish 'gainst our senate The cockle of rebellion, insolence, sedition. I cannot flatter: I defy The tongues of soothers. Id. Henry IV. A soothsayer bids you beware the ides of March. Shakspeare. If I have any skill in soothsaying, as in sooth I have none, it doth prognosticate that I shall change caps. threats. The beldame Camden's Remains. Sooths her with blandishments, and frights with I did not mean to chide you; Rowe. Thinks he that Memnon, soldier as he is, Thoughtless and dull, will listen to his soothing? I've tried the force of every reason on him, Soothed and caressed, been angry, soothed again; Laid safety, life, and interest in his sight; But all are vain, he scorns them all for Cato. Id. Addison's Cato. Who sooths to dear delight his anxious mind; Thus soothed and reconciled each seeks The seat of empire is her cheeks, soppe. Shakspeare. Congreve. A fig for the sultan and sophi. SOPHI, or SOFI, a title given to the emperor of Persia, importing wise, sage, or philosopher. The title is by some said to have taken its rise from a young shepherd named Sophi, who attained to the crown of Persia in 1370; others derive it from the sophi or sages anciently called magi. Vossius gives a different account of the word. sophi in Arabic, he says, signifies wool; and he adds that it was applied by the Turks out of derision to the kings of Persia ever since Ishmael's time; because, according to their scheme of religion, he is to wear no other covering on his head but an ordinary red woollen stuff; whence the Persians are also called hezel-baschs, q. d. red-heads. But Bochart assures us that sophi, in the original Persian language, signifies one that is pure in his religion, and who prefers the service of God in all things; and derives it from an order of religious called by the same name. The sophis value themselves on their illustrious extraction. They are descended in a right line from Houssein, second son of Ali, Mahomet's cousin, and Fatima, Mahomet's daughter. SOPHIS, or SOFEES, a kind of order of religious among the Mahometans in Persia, answering to what are otherwise called dervises, and among the Arabs and Indians faquirs. Some will have them called sophis from a kind of coarse camblet which they wear, called souf, from the city of Souf in Syria, where it is principally manufactured. The more eminent of these sophis are complimented with the title of schiek, that is, reverend, much as in Romish countries the religious are called reverend fathers. Schiek Sophi, who laid the foundation of the grandeur of the royal house of Persia, was the founder, or rather the restorer of this order: Ishmael, who conquered Persia, was himself a sophi, and greatly valued himself on his being so. He chose all the guards of his person from among the religious of this order; and would have all the great lords of his court sophis. The king of Persia is still grand master of the order; and the lords continue to enter into it, though it has now fallen under some contempt. SOPHISM, n. s. SOPHIST, SOPH'ISTER, SOPHISTICAL, adj. SOPHISTICALLY, adv. SOPHISTICATE, v. a., part., & SOPHISTICATION, n.s. [ adj. SOPH'ISTRY. Lat. sophisma. A fallacious argument; a fal lacy: sophist and sophister mean, one skilled in, or a proJfessor of sophis try: sophistical is fallacious; ambiguous; logo machical: the adverb corresponding: to sophisticate is to perplex; adulterate; corrup: with something spurious: the two noun substantives corresponding. His sophistry prevailed; his father believed. Sidney. Alcidimus the sophister hath arguments to prove that voluntary and extemporal far excelleth premeditated speech. Hooker. If the passions of the mind be strong they easily sophisticate the understanding; they make it apt to believe upon every slender warrant, and to imagine infallible truth where scarce any probable shew appeareth. A subtle traitor needs no sophister. Id. Shakspeare. Henry VI. Here's three of us are sophisticated. Shakspeare. Neither know I whether I should prefer for madChrist should be in a thousand places at once of this ness, and sophistical cozenage, that the same body of sublunary world. Wine sparkles brighter far than she, 'Tis pure and right, without deceit, And that no woman e'er will be; Hall. Cowley. No, they are all sophisticate. If a heathen philosopher brings arguments from reason, which none of our atheistical sophisters can confute, for the immortality of the soul, I hope they will so weigh the consequences as neither to talk nor live as if there was no such thing. Denham. Besides easy submission to sophistications of sense, junior reasons. we have inability to prevent the miscarriages of our Glanville. Since then a great part of our scientifical treasure is most likely to be adulterate, though al: bears the image and superscription of truth; the only way to know what is sophisticate and what is not so is to bring all to the examen of the touchstone. Id. That may seem a demonstration for the present, which to posterity will appear a mere sophistical knot. More. Divers experiments succeeded not because they were at one time tried with genuine materials, and at another time with sophisticated ones. Boyle. adulterated by the fraudulent avarice of the sellers, The drugs and simples sold in shops generally are especially if the preciousness may make their sophistication very beneficial. Id. When the state of the controversy is well understood, the difficulty will not be great in giving answers to all his sophistical cavils. Stilling fleet. The court of Croesus is said to have been much resorted to by the sophists of Greece in the happy beginning of his reign. Temple. Yet the rich cullies may their boasting spare; Where both the giver and the taker cheat. Dryden. Id. The only persons amongst the heathens who se phisticated nature and philosophy, were the Stoicks; who affirmed a fatal, unchangeable, concatenation of causes, reaching even to the elicite acts of man's will.. South's Sermons, These men have obscured and confounded the natures of things by their false principles and wretched sophistry; though an act be never so sinful they will strip it of its guilt. South. Sophistication is the act of counterfeiting or adulterating any thing with what is not so good, for the sake of unlawful gain. Quincy. Not all the subtle objections of sophisters and rabbies, against the gospel, so much prejudiced the re A SOPHISM, in logic, is a specious argument, having the appearance of truth, but leading to falsehood. Sophisms are reduced by Aristotle into eight classes, an arrangement so just and comprehensive that it is equally proper now as in former times. 1. Ignoratio elenchi, in which the sophist seems to determine the question, while he only does it in appearance. Thus the question, Whether excess of wine be hurtful?' seems to be determined by proving that wine revives the spirits and gives a man courage: but the principal point is here kept out of sight; for still it may be hurtful to health, to fortune, and reputation. 2. Petitio principii, a begging of the question, or taking for granted that which remains to be proved; as if any one should undertake to prove that the soul is extended through all the parts of the body because it resides in every member. This is affirming the same thing in different words. 3. Reasoning in a circle; as when the Roman Catholics prove the Scriptures to be the word of God by the authority of the church, and the authority of the church from the Scriptures. 4. Non causa pro causa, or the assigning of a false cause to any effect. Thus the supposed principle that nature abhors a vacuum was applied to explain the rising of water in a pump, before Galileo discovered that it was owing to the pressure of the atmosphere. In this way the vulgar ascribe accidents to divine vengeance, and the heresies and infidelity of modern times to learning. 5. Fallacia accidentis, in which the sophist represents what is merely accidental as essential to the nature of the subject. This is nearly allied to the former, and is committed by the Mahometans and Roman Catholics. The Mahometans forbid wine, because it is sometimes the occasion of drunkenness and quarrels; and the Roman Catholics prohibit the reading of the Bible because it has sometimes promoted heresies. 6. By deducing a universal assertion from what is true only in particular circumstances, and the reverse; thus some men argue, Transcribers have committed many errors in copying the Scriptures, therefore they are not to be depended on.' 7. By asserting any thing in a compound sense which is only true in a divided sense: so when the Scriptures assure us that the worst of sinners may be saved, it does not mean that they shall be saved while they remain sinners, but that if they repent they may be saved. 8. By an abuse of the ambiguity of words. Thus Mr. Hume reasons in his Essay on Miracles: Experience is our only guide in reasoning concerning matters of fact; now we know from experience that the laws of nature are fixed and invariable. On the other hand, testimony is variable, and often false; therefore, rests solely on testimony, which is variable, and since our evidence for the reality of miracles our evidence for the uniformity of the laws of nature is invariable, miracles are not to be believed.' The sophistry of this reasoning depends on the ambiguity of the word experience, which in the first proposition signifies the maxims which we form from our own observation and reflection; in the second, it is confounded with testimony; for it is by the testimony of others, as well as our own observation, that we learn whether the laws of nature are variable or invariable. The Essay on Miracles may be recommended to those who wish to see more examples of sophistry, as we believe most of these eight species of sophisms are well illustrated by examples in that essay. SOPHIST, in ancient Grecian history, from Zopos, wise, was an appellation assumed by those who devoted their time to the study of science. This appellation appearing too arrogant to Pythagoras, he declined it, and wished to be called a philosopher; declaring that, though he could not consider himself as a wise man, he was indeed a lover of wisdom. True wisdom and modesty are generally united. The example of Pythagoras was followed by every man of eminence; while the name sophist was retained only by those who with a pomp of words made a magnificent display of wisdom upon a very slight foundation of knowledge. Tifose men taught an artificial structure of language, and a false method of reasoning, by which, in argument, the worst might be made to appear the better reason. See ORATORY, and SOPHISM. In Athens they were long held in high repute, and supported, not only by contributions from their pupils, but by a regular salary from the state. They were among the bitterest enemies of the illustrious Socrates, because he embraced every opportunity of exposing to contempt and ridicule their vain pretensions to superior knowledge, and the pernicious influence of their doctrines upon the taste and morals of the Athenian youth. SOPHISTICATION, in trade, is the mixing of any thing with what is not genuine; a practice too common in the making up of medicines for sale; as also among vintners, distillers, and others, who are accused of sophisticating their wines, spirits, oils, &c., by mixing with them cheaper and coarser materials; and in many cases the cheat is carried on so artfully as to deceive the best judges. SOPHOCLES, a celebrated Greek tragic poet, the son of Sophilus an Athenian, born at Colonos, in Attica, near Athens. Superior vigor and address in the exercises of the palestra, and skill in music, were the great accomplishments of young men in the states of Greece. In these Sophocles excelled; nor was he less distinguished by the beauty of his person. He was, like most of the Athenians, zealously attached to his country, which he served in some embassies, and in high military command with Pericles. He was also remarkable for the inviolable integrity of his life, but his studies were early devoted to the agic muse; the spirit of Eschylus lent a fire to his genius, and excited that noble emulation which led him to contend with and sometimes to bear away the prize from his great master. He wrote forty-three tragedies, of which only seven are extant. Having testified his love of his country by refusing to leave it, though invited by many kings; and having enjoyed the uninterrupted esteem of his fellow-citizens, which few of their great men could boast, he died in the ninety-first year of his age, about A. A. C. 406. The burial place of his ancestors was at Decelia, which the Lacedemonians had seized; but Lysander, their general, permitted the Athenians to inter their deceased poet; and the Spartans joined in paying him all the honors due to his patriotism, integrity, and high poetic excellence. Eschylus had attained the highest pitch in poetry, the true sublime; but Sophocles had an elevation of mind, tempered with so fine a taste, that he never passed the bounds of propriety. Under his conduct the tragic muse appeared with dignity, harmony, and grace. From him the theatre received additional embellishments, and the drama the advantage of a third speaker; but his distinguished excellence is in the judicious disposition of the fable, and so nice a connexion and dependence of the parts on each other that they all agree to make the event not only probable, but even necessary. This is peculiarly admirable in his Edipus, King of Thebes; and in this important point he is far superior to every other ancient dramatic writer. While other eminent Athenians suffered by the ingratitude of their countrymen, Sophocles was vexed by that of his own children. They wished to become immediate masters of their father's possessions; and therefore, tired of his long life, they accused him before the Areopagus of insanity. The only defence the poet made was to read his tragedy of (Edipus at Colonos, and then he asked his judges whether the author of such a performance could be taxed with insanity? Upon this he was acquitted, and the children were dismissed with merited disgrace. The seven tragedies which remain are Ajax, Electra, Edipus king of Thebes, Antigone, The Trachiniæ, Philoctetes, and Edipus at Colonos. These, together with the Greek Scholia which accompany them, have been translated into Latin by Johnson, and into English by Dr. Franklin and Mr. Potter. SOPHONISBA, the daughter of Asdrubal, the celebrated Carthaginian general, a lady of uncommon beauty and other accomplishments. She was married to Syphax, a Numidian prince, who was at first very successful against his rival Masinissa, but was afterwards totally defeated, and his kingdom reduced by the combined forces of Masinissa and the Romans. See NUMIDIA. On this occasion Sophonisba fell into the hands of Masinissa, and by her beauty soon captivated her conqueror. Her husband, Syphax, dying soon after at Rome, Masinissa married her. But this act displeased the Romans, because she was a Carthaginian princess, and the king, though the firm ally of Rome, had not forsooth asked the consent of these proud republicans. Scipio Africanus Senior, in other respects a great and virtuous character, disgraced his name to eternity on this occasion, by ordering the timid Numidian monarch to dismiss Sophonisba. The meanspirited monster, instead of resenting such an imperious insult as he ought to have done, by breaking with the Romans, and joining the Carthaginians (in which case probably Carthage might have vied with Rome for ages), went to his wife, and advised her to die like the daughter of Asdrubal. She accordingly drank the cup of poison sent her by her husband with uncommon resolution and serenity, about A. A. C. 203; and upon this melancholy scene our countryman Thomson composed his admired tragedy of Sophonisba. But, by this act of infernal tyranny, Scipio and the Romans disgraced their name as much as it was afterwards honored by the opposite generous and virtuous conduct of Scipio the Younger. SOPHORA, in botany, a genus of the monogynia order, and decandria class of plants; natural order thirty-second, papilionaceæ: CAL quinquedentate and gibbous above: cor. papilionaceous; the wings being of the same length with the vexillum: the seed is contained in a legumen. There are sixteen species, viz. 1. S. alba; 2. alopecuroides; 3. aurea; 4. australis; 5. biflora; 6. Capensis; 7. flavescens; 8. genistoides; 9. hirsuta; 10. japonica; 11. lupinoides; 12. macrophylla; 13. occidentalis; 14. tetraptera; 15. tinctoria; and 16. tomentosa. SOPORIF'EROUS, adj. Latin, sopor and SOPORIF'IC. Sfero, or facio. Caus ing sleep; narcotic. The color and taste of opium are, as well as its soporific or anodyne virtues, mere powers depending on its primary qualities. Locke. While the whole operation was performing I lay in a profound sleep, by the force of that soporiferous medicine infused into my liquor. Swift. SOPHRON, a comic poet of Syracuse, the son of Agathocles and Damasellus. His poems were universally admired, and even Plato read them with rapture. But none of them are extant. SOPHRONISCUS, the father of Socrates. SOPORIFICS, or hypnotics, are medicines that produce sleep; such as opium, laudanum, the seed or extract of poppies, &c. But it is now generally admitted among physicians that they produce this effect, not by any direct sedative power or quality, as the great Cullen erroneously supposed, but, as Brown first observed, first by stimulating and exciting the whole system to a high pitch of vigor, and afterwards by inducing indirect debility, which, in proportion to the quantity taken of these high stimuli, and the previous state of the excitement, either ends in sleep and recovery, or death. SORACTES, a mountain of ancient Etruria, near the Tiber. SORANI, the people of the ancient Sora. SORANUS, an ancient physician of Ephesus, who flourished under Trajan and Adrian. He practised first at Alexandria, and afterwards at Rome. He was of the sect called Methodists, and a follower of Thessalus, Trallian, &c., and |