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One of the reasons, Mr. Robertson says, that induced him to make these experiments was a desire of knowing what quantity of fir or oak timber would be sufficient to keep a man afloat in river or sea-water, thinking that most men were specifically heavier than river or common fresh water; but the contrary appears from the trials above recited for, excepting the first and last, every man was lighter than his equal bulk of fresh water, and much more so than his equal bulk of sea-water: consequently, if persons who fall into water had presence of mind enough to avoid the fright usual on such accidents, many might be preserved from drowning; and a piece of wood not larger than an oar would buoy a man partly above water as long as he had spirits to keep his hold.-Philosophical Transactions, vol.

1. art. 5.

SPECIFICATION. See PATENT.

SPECIFICATION, in Scotch law, signifies the making a new property from the materials belonging to another: as wine from grapes; or other instances in which the thing converted can by no means be reduced to its original state. SPECIFICK. See SPECIFIC and SPECIFICAL.

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Their specious deeds on earth, which glory excites,
Or close ambition varnished o'er with zeal. Id.

Somewhat of specious they must have to recommend themselves to princes; for folly will not easily go down in its natural form.

Dryden.

Temptation is of greater danger, because it is covered with the specious names of good nature and Rogers. good manners.

This is the only specious objection which our Romish adversaries urge against the doctrine of this church in the point of celibacy. Atterbury. SPECK, n. s. & v. a. Sax. гpecec. A small discoloration; a spot.

So dreadfully he towards him did pass,
Forelifting up aloft his speckled breast,

And often bounding on the bruised grass,
As for great joy of his new comen guest.

Flower

Speckled vanity

Will sicken soon and die,

Faerie Queene.

Milton.

SPECIFICS, in medicine. By specifics is not Carnation, purple, azure, or speck'd with gold.
meant such as infallibly, and in all patients, pro-
duce salutary effects. Such medicines are not to
be expected, because the operations and effects
of remedies are not formally inherent in them,
but depend upon the mutual action and re-action
of the body and medicine upon each other;
hence the various effects of the same medicine in
the same kind of disorders in different patients,
and in the same patient at different times. By
specific medicines we understand such medicines
as are more infallible than any other in any par-
ticular disease. See MEDICINE, Index.

And leprous sin will melt from earthly mould. Id.
Then are they happy, when
No speck is left of their habitual stains;
But the pure æther of the soul remains.

SPECIMEN, n. s. Lat. specimen. A sample; a part of any thing exhibited, that the rest may be known.

Several persons have exhibited specimens of this art before multitudes of beholders.

Addison's Spectator. SPECIOUS, adj. Į Fr. specieux; Lat. speSPECIOUSLY, adv. ciosus. Showy; pleasing to the view the adverb corresponding.

Thus in the glebe the deadly nightshade grows, Flaunts in the sun and mingles with the rose, The specious bane the prowling urchin spies : Touch, touch it not !-He gorges it, and dies.

Whyte's Poems.

Dryden's Æneid.
Saw'st thou not late a speckled serpent rear
His gilded spires to climb on yon fair tree!
Before this happy minute I was he.
Every speck does not blind a man.

Dryden.

Government of the Tongue.
The smiling infant in his hand shall take
The crested basilisk and speckled snake;
Pleased the green lustre of the scales survey,
And with their forky tongue and pointless sting shall
play.
Pope's Messiah.
The tortoise here and elephant unite,
Transformed to combs, the speckled and the white.

Id.

SPECTACLE, n. s. Į Fr. spectacle; Latin SPECTACLED, adj. spectaculum. A show; a gazing stock; any thing exhibited to the view as eminently remarkable: in the plural, glasses to assist the sight: spectacled, furnished with such glasses.

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Cowper.

Claps spectacles on her sagacious nose, Peruses closely the true Christian's face, And finds it a mere mask of sly grimace, Usurps God's office, lays his bosom bare, And finds hypocrisy close lurking there. SPECTACLES, in dioptrics, a machine consisting of two lenses set in silver, horn, &c., to assist the defects of the organ of sight. Old people, and others who have flat eyes, use convex spectacles, which cause the rays of light to converge so as to meet upon the retina: whereas myopes, or short-sighted people, use concave lenses for spectacles, which cause the rays to diverge, and prevent their meeting ere they reach the retina. See OPTICS, Index.

Spectacles are certainly the most valuable of all optical instruments, though there is not the same science and mechanical ingenuity displayed in the making of them as in the construction of microscopes and telescopes. A man, especially if accustomed to spend his time among books, would be much to be pitied, when his sight begins to fail, could he not in a great measure restore it by the aid of spectacles; but there are some men whose sight cannot be aided by the use either of convex or concave glasses. The following method adopted by one of these to aid his sight is certainly worthy of notice :--When about sixty years of age, this man had almost entirely lost his sight, seeing nothing but a kind of thick mist, with little black specks, which appeared to float in the air. He knew not any of his friends; he could not even distinguish a man from a woman; nor could he walk in the streets without being led. Glasses were of no use to him; the best print, seen through the best spec

tacles, seemed to him like a daubed paper. Wearied with this melancholy state, he thought of the following expedient. He procured some spectacles with very large rings; and, taking out the glasses, substituted in each circle a conic tube of black Spanish copper. Looking through the large end of the cone, he could read the smallest print placed at its other extremity. These tubes were of different lengths, and the openings at the end were also of different sizes; the smaller the aperture the better could he distinguish the smallest letters; the larger the aperture the more words or lines it commanded, and consequently the less occasion was there for moving the head and the hand in reading. Sometimes he used one eye, sometimes the other, alternately relieving each; for the rays of the two eyes could not unite upon the same object when thus separated by two opaque tubes. The thinner these tubes, the less troublesome are they. They must be totally blackened within so as to prevent all shining, and they should be made to lengthen or contract, and enlarge or reduce the aperture at pleasure. When he placed convex glasses in these tubes, the letters indeed appeared larger, but not so clear and distinct as through the empty tube; he also found the tubes more convenient when not fixed in the spectacle rings; for, when they hung loosely, they could be raised or lowered with the hand, and one or both might be used as occasion required. It is almost needless to add that the material of the tubes is of no importance, and that they may be made of iron or tin as well as of copper, provided the insides of them be sufficiently blackened. See La Nouvelle Bigarure for February 1754, or Monthly Magazine for April 1799.

SPECTATION, n. s. Lat. spectatio. Regard; respect.

This simple spectation of the lungs is differenced from that which concomitates a pleurisy. Harvey. SPECTATOR, n.s. Fr. spectateur: Latin spectator. A looker-on; a beholder.

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What pleasure hath the owner more than the spectator? Seed.

SPECTRA, OCULAR, images presented to the eye after removing them from a bright object, or closing them. When any one has long and attentively looked at a bright object, as at the setting sun, on closing his eyes, or removing them, an image, which resembles in form the object he was attending to, continues some time to be visible. This appearance in the eye we shall call the ocular spectrum of that object These ocular spectra are of four kinds: 1. Such as are owing to a less sensibility of a defined part of the retina or spectra from defect of sensi

bility. 2. Such as are owing to a greater sensibility of a defined part of the retina or spectra from excess of sensibility. 3. Such as resemble their object in its color as well as form; which may be termed direct ocular spectra. 4. Such as are of color contrary to that of their object, which may be termed reverse ocular spectra. SPECTRE, n. s. Fr. spectre; Lat. spectrum. Apparition; supposed appearance of persons

dead.

The very poetical use of the word for a spectre, doth imply an exact resemblance to some real being it represents. Stillingfleet.

The ghosts of traitors from the bridge descend, With bold fanatick spectres to rejoice. Dryden. Those are nothing but spectres the understanding raises to itself, to flatter its own laziness. Locke.

This prism had some veins running along within the glass, from the one end to the other, which scattered some of the sun's light irregularly, but had no sensible effect in increasing the length of the coloured spectrum. Newton's Opticks.

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SPECTRE OF THE BROKEN, a curious phenomenon observed on the Broken, one of the Harz mountains in Hanover. M. Haue gives the following account of it:- After having been here,' says he, for the thirtieth time, and having procured information respecting the above-mentioned atmospheric phenomenon, I was at length, on the 23d of May 1797, so fortunate as to have the pleasure of seeing it; and perhaps my description may afford satisfaction to others who visit the Broken through curiosity. The sun rose about four o'clock, and, the atmosphere being quite serene towards the east, his rays could pass without any obstruction over the Heinrichshölé. In the south-west however, towards Achtermannshöhe, a brisk west wind carried before it thin transparent vapors, which were not yet condensed into thick heavy clouds. About a quarter past four I went towards the inn, and looked round to see whether the atmosphere would permit me to have a free prospect to the south-west; when I observed, at a very great distance towards Achtermannshöhe, a human figure of a monstrous size. A violent gust of wind having almost carried away my hat, I clapped my hand to it by moving my arm towards my head, and the colossal figure did the same. The pleasure which I felt on this discovery can hardly be described; for I had already walked many a weary step in the hopes of seeing this shadowy image, without being able to gratify my curiosity. I immediately made another movement by bending my body, and the colossal figure before me repeated it. I was desirous of doing the same thing once more-but my colossus had vanished. I remained in the same position, waiting to see whether it would return; and in a few minutes it again made its appearance on the Achtermannshöhe. I paid my respects to it a second time, and it did the same to me. I then called the landlord of the Broken, and, having both taken the same position which I had taken alone, we looked towards the Achtermannshöhe, but saw nothing. We had not, however, stood long, when two such colossal figures were formed over the above eminence, which repeated our compliments by bending their bodies as we did; after which they vanished. VOL. XX

We retained our position; kept our eyes fixed on the same spot, and in a little the two figures again stood before us, and were joined by a third. Every movement that we made by bending our bodies these figures imitated; but with this difference, that the phemomenon sometimes was weak and faint, sometimes strong and well defined. Having thus had an opportunity of discovering the whole secret of this phenomenon, I can give the following information to such of my readers as may be desirous of seeing it themselves. When the rising sun, and according to analogy the case will be the same at the setting sun, throws his rays over the Broken upon the body of a man standing opposite to fine light clouds floating around or hovering past him, he needs only fix his eyes stedfastly upon them, and, in all probability, he will see the singular spectacle of his own shadow, extending to the length of 500 or 600 feet, at the distance of about two miles before him.' In the Manchester Transactions is an account of a similar phenomenon observed by Dr. Ferrier, on a hill in England.

A belief that supernatural beings sometimes make themselves visible, and that the dead sometimes revisit the living, has prevailed among most nations, especially in the rudest stages of society. It was common among the Jews, among the Greeks, and among the Romans, as we find from the Scriptures and from the poems of Homer and Virgil. Celestial appearances were indeed so often exhibited to the Jews that the origin of their belief is not difficult to be explained. The divine being manifested himself to each of the patriarchs by some sensible sign, generally by a flame of fire, as he did to Moses. Under this semblance also did he appear to the Israelites during their abode in the desert and after they obtained a settlement in the land of Canaan, Nor did they believe that heavenly beings alone assumed a sensible appearance: they believed that deceased men also sometimes revisited this world. When Saul went to consult the witch at Endor, he asked her to bring up the person whom he should name to her; a proof that he considered his demand as possible to be performed, and therefore that he probably acted under the influence of popular opinion. The same opinions had been generally entertained at a much earlier period; for necromancy and witchcraft, the arts by which the dead were supposed to be raised, had been prohibited while the Israelites were in the wilderness and yet untainted with the vices of the Canaanites. They must therefore have derived them from Egypt, the cradle of superstition, as well as of the arts and sciences. Among the Greeks and Romans the apparition of spectres was generally believed. On innumerable occasions the gods are said to have discovered themselves to the eyes of mortals, to have held conferences, and to have interposed their aid. The ghosts of the dead, too, are said to have appeared. When Æneas, amidst the distraction and confusion of his mind in flying from the destruction of Troy, had lost his wife by the way, he returned in search of her. Her shade appeared to him, we are told (for she herself had been slain), with the same aspect as before, but her figure was larger. She endeavoured to assuage the grief o

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her unhappy husband by ascribing her death to the appointment of the gods, and by foretelling the illustrious honors which yet awaited him. But when Æneas attempted to clasp her in his arms the phantom immediately vanished into air. From this story we may observe that the ancients believed that the umbræ, or shades, retained nearly the same appearance after death as before; that they had so far the resemblance of a body as to be visible; that they could think and speak as formerly, but could not be touched. This description applies equally well to those shades which had passed the river Styx and taken up their residence in the infernal regions. Such were the shades of Dido, of Deiphobus, and of all those whom Æneas met with in his journey through the subterraneous world.

It appears from the writings of modern travellers who have visited rude and savage nations that the belief of spectres is no less common among them. Mr. Bruce tells us that the priest of the Nile affirmed that he had more than once seen the spirit of the river in the form of an old man with a white beard. Among the Mahometans the doctrine of spectres seems to be reduced to a regular system by the accounts which they give of genii. Whoever has read the Arabian Nights' Entertainments must have furnished his memory with a thousand instances of this kind. Their opinions concerning genii seem to be a corrupted mixture of the doctrines of the Jews and ancient Persians. In Christian countries, too, notwithstanding the additional light which their religion has spread, and the great improve ment in the sciences to which it has been subservient, the belief of ghosts and apparitions was until lately very general, especially among the lower ranks. Many still believe that evil spirits make their appearance in order to terrify wicked men, especially those who have committed murder. They suppose that the spirits of dead men assume a corporeal appearance, hover about church-yards and the houses of the deceased, or haunt the places where murders have been committed. In some places it is believed that beings have been seen bearing a perfect resemblance to men alive. These spectres, in Scotland, are called wreaths, and people are often to be found who affirm that they have seen such wreaths of their relations a longer or shorter time before

their death.

In the Highlands of Scotland the second sight is still believed we know by many (see SECOND SIGHT); viz. that future events are foretold by certain individuals by means of spectral representation: and so general has the belief of spectres, been that this circumstance may be thought by some sufficient to prove that it must have its foundation in human nature, or must rest upon rational evidence. When any doctrine has been universally received by all nations, by generations living several thousand years from one another, and by people in all the different stages of society, there is certainly a strong presumption that such a doctrine has its foundation in reason and in truth. In this way we sometimes argue in favor of the existence of a God, concerning moral distinction, and the doctrine of a future state and certainly so far we argue well. But,

if the same argument be applied to idolatry, to sacrifices, or to apparitions, we shall find that it is applied improperly. Idolatry was very general among ancient nations; so was the offering of sacrifices; so was polytheism; but they were by no means universal. Should we allow, for the sake of shortening the argument, that all ancient nations were polytheists and idolaters, and presented oblations to their imaginary deities, all that could be concluded from this concession is that they fell into these mistakes from their ignorance and from the rude state of society, from which their imperfect knowledge of theology and moral philosophy was never able to rescue them. These erroneous notions filed before the brightness of the Christian system; while the doctrines of the existence of God, of moral distinction, and of a future state, have been more thoroughly confirmed and ascertained. The same thing may be said of the belief of spectres. However geferally it has been adopted in the first stages of society, or by civilised nations who had made but little progress in the study of divine things, it has been rejected, we may say invariably, wherever theology and philosophy have gone hand in hand.

If we glance at the popular evidence in favor of spectres, it will be found very defective. They only appear to one person at a time; they are seen only in the night; they are visible only to ignorant, illiterate, and credulous persons, and never present themselves before men of education and learning. That spectres only appear to one person at a time, even though there are more in company, is also an objection against the credibility of their appearance quite insurmountable. How is it possible that two men of eye-sight equally good, directing their eyes to the same spot, should not see so large an object as that of a man or woman at a small distance equally well? Ghosts have seldom any secrets to disclose; they might be proclaimed to a multitude with as much propriety as confined to one person. See Farmer on Miracles; a book in which this question is fully examined. Spectres again appear only in the night. But why should they shun the light of the sun? Those mischievous ghosts that Glanville mentions might indeed have some reason to choose midnight for the execution of their pranks, as they would be more easily detected in open day. Spectres not only choose the most improper time, but the most improper persons. To render the testimony of any person credible, he must not only be a man of veracity, but he must have sufficient ability to judge of the subject to which he is to bear witness. It is not on the evidence of an ignorant illiterate person, who has more fancy and fear than judgment, that we are to rest our belief of what is supernatural. It is also worthy of remark that we have never heard of a ghost appearing to any person who did not previously believe their existence. A man must be prejudiced in favor of this opinion, or he will never see a ghost. But sensible men know, that he who has been accustomed to hear frightful stories of apparitions gliding through a church yard, or haunting some particular place, can scarcely pass through a church-yard or haunted spot, without conjuring up in his imagi

nation the hideous phantoms which he has been accustomed to associate with such places. Is it strange, then, that an ignorant man, with a mind uncultivated and uninformed, with all the prejudices of the nursery about him, should imagine he sees ghosts in those places where he believes they hover, especially in the dead hour of midnight, when, with the slightest aid of the imagination, a cow may be turned into a monstrous phantom, and the reflection of the beams of the moon from a little water be converted into a ghost with a winding sheet? But why should apparitions shun men of understanding and learning? Why should learning be formidable to them? It was not so with the celestial messengers mentioned in the Scriptures: they appeared to the patriarchs and prophets; and the miracles there recorded were performed in the most public places, before the eyes of Rabbis, of Scribes, and Pharisees. Indeed this circumstance is sufficient to destroy the evidence of spectres. They have never been seen by any but men of weak or distempered minds, or by men who have previously believed in them.

To trace an opinion that has prevailed so generally in the world to its source, however, is a labor not unworthy of the philosopher, even though the opinion be false. It is always gratifying to detect the causes of error: it is no less useful; for, to refute error, it is often sufficient to point out the sources from which it has sprung. To reach the origin of the belief of spectres is not more difficult than to account for idolatry or polytheism. In the infant state of the intellectual powers every thing is considered as possessing life and intelligence. The child beats the stool over which he has fallen, with the same passion that he would treat his companion: the young girl talks to her doll as if it understood her: savages ascribe every change which they observe on the face of nature to the action of some animated being. As knowledge advances, they single out those beings which seem to produce the most striking effects, arrange them into some kind of order, and divide the government of the world among them. Unable, at the same time, to conceive any notion of a pure spirit, they imagine those divinities are corporeal beings. This is the foundation of idolatry. The belief of spectres is but another step. That these animated corporeal beings, to whom they address their prayers, and who preside over the world, should on particular occasions display themselves to the human eye, is what they must be previously disposed to expect. Hence the numberless appearances of the heathen gods, of the Persian and Mahometan genii. The belief of ghosts may be easily deduced from the opinions entertained respecting a future state. These opinions are founded on that essential doctrine of natural religion, that there is another world in which men shall exist when death has removed them hence. This doctrine has been universally received both by savage and civilised nations; but, as might be expected, men have formed very different sentiments concerning the nature of a future state, of the situation and employments of departed spirits, according to the degree of knowledge which they possessed. But the general

opinion in ancient and rude nations was, that departed spirits retained the same external appearance, the same passions and principles as before. Nothing therefore was more natural than the opinion that they might occasionally revisit this world, from an anxious desire to alleviate the sufferings of those beloved friends and relations whom they had left behind them, or to communicate from the unseen world what might be important to their welfare. Upon such an errand did Creusa appear to Æneas. The apparition of the ghosts of murderers is easily explained upon the same general principles. The remorse and horror of mind which the murderer feels are supposed to haunt him in the other world, and to render his situation there intolerable (especially if the murder was never detected and punished), till he return and give information against himself. In this way, then, we think it highly probable the belief of spectres has originated. But many other causes concur to confirm and propagate this belief. These are, imperfect vision united with fear, dreams, opium, diseases, drunkenness, and artifice. 1. Indistinct vision is one source of apparitions, especially when the mind is under the influence of fear. It is well known that the sense of seeing conveys no idea of distance till improved by experience and observation. In the day time we seldom commit mistakes, because we know the object at which we look; but at night when we see objects obscurely, and know not what they are, we have no distinct idea, either of their distances or of their magnitude. We may mistake a bush that is near us for a tree at a distance; or, if the imagination be under the influence of fear, it will easily convert it into a gigantic figure. Objects are always magnified in a fog; so that when a fog happens in the night time, objects may be magnified to an enormous size. But, at any rate, whether there be fog in the night or not, there is such a great analogy between darkness and a fog, that, if the latter deceive us with respect to the size of objects, the former will also deceive us. 2. Dreams are another fertile source of apparitions. It is well known to every person that while the mind is under the influence of a dream it considers it as much a reality as it does any particular action while awake. Now if a person of a weak superstitious mind should have a very lively dream, which interests his passions, particularly the passion of fear, it may make so deep an impression, that he may be firmly convinced that he has actually seen with his eyes what has only passed before his imagination. 3. Spectres are sometimes also occasioned by opium. Gassendi the philosopher, found a number of people going to put a man to death for having intercourse with the devil; a crime which the poor wretch readily acknowledged. Gassendi begged of the people that they would permit him first tc examine the wizard before putting him to deatr.. They did so; and Gassendi, upon examination, found that the man firmly believed himself guilty of this impossible crime. He even offered to Gassendi to introduce him to the devil. The philosopher agreed; and, when midnight came, the man gave him a pill, which he said it was necessary to swallow before setting off. Gassendi took

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