Encyclopaedia Britannica Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 Part 9

The last naval operations took place in the West Indies, where the Spaniards, who had for a time been treated as a negligible quant.i.ty, were attacked on the coast of Cuba by a British [v.03 p.0045] squadron under Sir Charles Knowles. They had a naval force under Admiral Regio at Havana. Each side was at once anxious to cover its own trade, and to intercept that of the other. Capture was rendered particularly desirable to the British by the fact that the Spanish homeward-bound convoy would be laden with the bullion sent from the American mines. In the course of the movement of each to protect its trade, the two squadrons met on the 1st of October 1748 in the Bahama Channel. The action was indecisive when compared with the successes of British fleets in later days, but the advantage lay with Sir Charles Knowles. He was prevented from following it up by the speedy receipt of the news that peace had been made in Europe by the powers, who were all in various degrees exhausted. That it was arranged on the terms of a mutual restoration of conquests shows that none of the combatants could claim to have established a final superiority. The conquests of the French in the Bay of Bengal, and their military successes in Flanders, enabled them to treat on equal terms, and nothing had been taken from Spain.

The war was remarkable for the prominence of privateering on both sides. It was carried on by the Spaniards in the West Indies with great success, and actively at home. The French were no less active in all seas. Mahe de la Bourdonnais's attack on Madras partook largely of the nature of a privateering venture. The British retaliated with vigour. The total number of captures by French and Spanish corsairs was in all probability larger than the list of British--partly for the reason given by Voltaire, namely, that more British merchants were taken because there were many more British merchant s.h.i.+ps to take, but partly also because the British government had not yet begun to enforce the use of convoy so strictly as it did in later times.

See Beatson's _Naval and Military Memoirs_ (London, 1804); _La Marine militaire de la France sous le regne de Louis XV_, by G. Lacour-Gayet (Paris, 1902); _The Royal Navy_, by Sir W. L. Clowes and others (London, 1891, &c.).

(D. H.)

AUTHENTIC (from Gr. [Greek: authentes], one who does a thing himself), genuine, as opposed to counterfeit, true or original. In music it is one of the terms used for the ecclesiastical modes. The t.i.tle of _Authentics_ was also used for Justinian's _Novells_.

AUTOCEPHALOUS (from Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: kephale] head), of independent heads.h.i.+p, a term used of certain ecclesiastical functionaries and organizations.

AUTOCHTHONES (Gr. [Greek: autos], and [Greek: chthon], earth, _i.e._ people sprung from earth itself; Lat. _terrigenae_; see also under ABORIGINES), the original inhabitants of a country as opposed to settlers, and those of their descendants who kept themselves free from an admixture of foreign peoples. The practice in ancient Greece of describing legendary heroes and men of ancient lineage as "earthborn" greatly strengthened the doctrine of autochthony; for instance, the Athenians wore golden gra.s.shoppers in their hair in token that they were born from the soil and had always lived in Attica (Thucydides i. 6; Plato, _Menexenus_, 245). In Thebes, the race of Sparti were believed to have sprung from a field sown with dragons' teeth.

The Phrygian Corybantes had been forced out of the hill-side like trees by Rhea, the great mother, and hence were called [Greek: dendrophueis]. It is clear from Aeschylus (_Prometheus_, 447) that primitive men were supposed to have at first lived like animals in caves and woods, till by the help of the G.o.ds and heroes they were raised to a stage of civilization.

AUTOCLAVE, a strong closed vessel of metal in which liquids can be heated above their boiling points under pressure. Etymologically the word indicates a self-closing vessel ([Greek: autos], self, and _clavis_, key, or _clavus_, nail), in which the tightness of the joints is maintained by the internal pressure, but this characteristic is frequently wanting in the actual apparatus to which the name is applied. The prototype of the autoclave was the digester of Denis Papin, invented in 1681, which is still used in cooking, but the appliance finds a much wider range of employment in chemical industry, where it is utilized in various forms in the manufacture of candles, coal-tar colours, &c. Frequently an agitator, pa.s.sing through a stuffing-box, is fitted so that the contents may be stirred, and renewable linings are provided in cases where the substances under treatment exert a corrosive action on metal.

AUTOCRACY (Gr. [Greek: autokrateia], absolute power), a term applied to that form of government which is absolute or irresponsible, and vested in one single person. It is a type of government usually found amongst eastern peoples; amongst more civilized nations the only example is that of Russia, where the sovereign a.s.sumes as a t.i.tle "the autocrat of all the Russias."

AUTO-DA-Fe, more correctly AUTO-DE-Fe (act of faith), the name of the ceremony during the course of which the sentences of the Spanish inquisition were read and executed. The auto-da-fe was almost identical with the _sermo generalis_ of the medieval inquisition. It never took place on a feast day of the church, but on some famous anniversary: the accession of a Spanish monarch, his marriage, the birth of an infant, &c. It was public: the king, the royal family, the grand councils of the kingdom, the court and the people being present. The ceremony comprised a procession in which the members of the Holy Office, with its familiars and agents, the condemned persons and the penitents took part; a solemn ma.s.s; an oath of obedience to the inquisition, taken by the king and all the lay functionaries; a sermon by the Grand Inquisitor; and the reading of the sentences, either of condemnation or acquittal, delivered by the Holy Office. The handing over of impenitent persons, and those who had relapsed, to the secular power, and their punishment, did not usually take place on the occasion of an auto-da-fe, properly so called. Sometimes those who were condemned to the flames were burned on the night following the ceremony.

The first great auto-da-fes were celebrated when Thomas de Torquemada, was at the head of the Spanish inquisition (Seville 1482, Toledo 1486, &c.).

The last, subsequent to the time of Charles III., were held in secret; moreover, they dealt with only a very small number of sentences, of which hardly any were capital. The isolated cases of the torturing of a revolutionary priest in Mexico in 1816, and of a relapsed Jew and of a Quaker in Spain during 1826, cannot really be considered as auto-da-fes.

(P. A.)

AUTOGAMY (from Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: gamia], marriage), a botanical term for self-fertilization. (See ANGIOSPERMS.)

AUTOGENY, AUTOGENOUS (Gr. [Greek: autogenes]), spontaneous generation, self-produced. Haeckel distinguished _autogeny_ and _plasmogeny_, applying the former term when the formative fluid in which the first living matter was supposed to arise was inorganic and the latter when it was organic, _i.e._ contained the requisite fundamental substances dissolved in the form of complicated and fluid combinations of carbon. In "autogenous soldering"

two pieces of metal are united by the melting of the opposing surfaces, without the use of a separate fusible alloy or solder as a cementing material.

AUTOGRAPHS. Autograph (Gr. [Greek: autos], self, [Greek: graphein], to write) is a term applied by common usage either to a doc.u.ment signed by the person from whom it emanates, or to one written entirely by the hand of such person (which, however, is also more technically described as _holograph_, from [Greek: holos], entire, [Greek: graphein], to write), or simply to an independent signature.

The existence of autographs must necessarily have been coeval with the invention of letters. Doc.u.ments in the handwriting of their composers may possibly exist among the early papyri of Egypt and the clay tablets of Babylonia and a.s.syria, and among the early examples of writing in the East.

But the oriental practice of employing professional scribes in writing the body of doc.u.ments and of using seals for the purpose of "signing" (the "signum" originally meaning the impression of the seal) almost precludes the idea. When we are told (1 Kings xxi. 8) that Jezebel wrote letters in Ahab's name and sealed them with his seal, we are, of course, to understand that the letters were written by the professional scribes and that the impression of the king's seal was the authentication, equivalent to the signature of western nations; and again, when King Darius "signed" the writing and the decree (Dan. vi. 9), he did so with his seal. To find doc.u.ments which we can [v.03 p.0046] recognize with certainty to be autographs, we must descend to the Ptolemaic and Roman periods of Egyptian history, which are represented by an abundance of papyrus doc.u.ments of all kinds, chiefly in Greek. Among them are not a few original letters and personal doc.u.ments, in which we may see the handwriting of many lettered and unlettered individuals who lived during the 3rd century B.C. and in succeeding times, and which prove how very widespread was the practice of writing in those days. We owe it to the dry and even atmosphere of Egypt that these written doc.u.ments have been preserved in such numbers. On the other hand, in Italy and Greece ancient writings have perished, save the few charred papyrus rolls and waxen tablets which have been recovered from the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii. These tablets, however, have a special value, for many of them contain autograph signatures of princ.i.p.als and witnesses to legal deeds to which they were attached, together with impressions of seals, in compliance with the Roman law which required the actual subscriptions, or attested marks, of the persons concerned.

But, when we now speak of autographs and autograph collections, we use such terms in a restricted sense and imply doc.u.ments or signatures written by persons of some degree of eminence or notoriety in the various ranks and professions of life; and naturally the only early autographs in this sense which could be expected to survive are the subscriptions and signatures of royal personages and great officials attached to important public deeds, which from their nature have been more jealously cared for than mere private doc.u.ments.

Following the Roman practice, subscriptions and signatures were required in legal doc.u.ments in the early centuries of our era. Hence we find them in the few Latin deeds on papyrus which have come to light in Egypt; we find them on the well-known Dacian waxen tablets of the 2nd century; and we find them in the series of papyrus deeds from Ravenna and other places in Italy between the 5th and 10th centuries. The same practice obtained in the Frankish empire. The Merovingian kings, or at least those of them who knew how to write, subscribed their diplomas and great charters with their own hands; and their great officers of state, chancellors and others, countersigned in autograph. The unlettered Merovingian kings made use of monograms composed of the letters of their names; and, curiously, the illiterate monogram was destined to supersede the literate subscriptions.

For the monogram was adopted by Charlemagne and his successors as a recognized symbol of their subscription. It was their _signum manuale_, their sign manual. In courtly imitation of the royal practice, monograms and other marks were adopted by official personages, even though they could write. The notarial marks of modern times are a survival of the practice.

By the illiterate other signs, besides the monogram, came to be employed, such as the cross, &c., as signs manual. The monogram was used by French monarchs from the reign of Charlemagne to that of Philip the Fair, who died in 1314. It is very doubtful, however, whether in any instance this sign manual was actually traced by the monarch's own hand. At the most, the earlier sovereigns appear to have drawn one or two strokes in their monograms, which, so far, may be called their autographs. But in the later period not even this was done; the monogram was entirely the work of the scribe. (See DIPLOMATIC.)

The employment of marks or signs manual went out of general use after the 12th century, in the course of which the affixing or appending of seals became the common method of executing deeds. But, as education became more general and the practice of writing more widely diffused, the usage grew up in the course of the 14th century of signing the name-signature as well as of affixing the seal; and by the 15th century it had become established, and it remains to the present time. Thus the _signum manuale_ had disappeared, except among notaries; but the term survived, and by a natural process it was transferred to the signature. In the present day it is used to designate the "sign manual" or autograph signature of the sovereign.

The Anglo-Saxon kings of England did not sign their charters, their names being invariably written by the official scribes. After the Norman conquest, the sign manual, usually a cross, which sometimes accompanied the name of the sovereign, may in some instances be autograph; but no royal signature is to be found earlier than the reign of Richard II. Of the signatures of this king there are two examples, of the years 1386 and 1389, in the Public Record Office; and there is one, of 1397, in the British Museum. Of his father, the Black Prince, there is in the Record Office a motto-signature, _De par h.o.m.ont_ (high courage), _Ich dene_, subscribed to a writ of privy seal of 1370. The kings of the Lancastrian line were apparently ready writers. Of the handwriting of both Henry IV. and Henry V.

there are specimens both in the Record Office and in the British Museum.

But by their time writing had become an ordinary accomplishment.

Apart from the autographs of sovereigns, those of famous men of the early middle ages can hardly be said to exist, or, if they do exist, they are difficult to identify. For example, there is a charter at Canterbury bearing the statement that it was written by Dunstan; but, as there is a duplicate in the British Museum with the same statement, it is probable that both the one and the other are copies. The autograph MSS. of the chronicles of Ordericus Vitalis, of Robert de Monte, and of Sigebert of Gembloux are in existence; and among the Cottonian MSS. there are undoubtedly autograph writings of Matthew of Paris, the English chronicler of Henry III.'s reign. There are certain doc.u.ments in the British Museum in the hand of William of Wykeham; and among French archives there are autograph writings of the historian Joinville. These are a few instances.

When we come to such a collection as the famous Paston Letters, the correspondence of the Norfolk family of Paston of the 15th century, we find therein numerous autographs of historical personages of the time.

From the 16th century onward, we enter the period of modern history, and autograph doc.u.ments of all kinds become plentiful. And yet in the midst of this plenty, by a perverse fate, there is in certain instances a remarkable dearth. The instance of Shakespeare is the most famous. But for three signatures to the three sheets of his will, and two signatures to the conveyances of property in Blackfriars, we should be without a vestige of his handwriting. For certain other signatures, professing to be his, inscribed in books, may be dismissed as imitations. Such forgeries come up from time to time, as might be expected, and are placed upon the market.

The Shakespearean forgeries, however, of W. H. Ireland were perpetrated rather with a literary intent than as an autographic venture.

Had autograph collecting been the fas.h.i.+on in Shakespeare's days, we should not have had to deplore the loss of his and of other great writers'

autographs. But the taste had not then come into vogue, at least not in England. The series of autograph doc.u.ments which were gathered in such a library as that of Sir Robert Cotton, now in the British Museum, found their way thither on account of their literary or historic interest, and not merely as specimens of the handwriting of distinguished men. Such a series also as that formed by Philippe de Bethune, Comte de Selles et Charost, and his son, in the reign of Louis XIV., consisting for the most part of original letters and papers, now in the Bibliotheque Nationale, might have been regarded as the result of autograph collecting did we not know that it was brought together for historical purposes. It was in Germany and the Low Countries that the practice appears to have originated, chiefly among students and other members of the universities, of collecting autograph inscriptions and signatures of one's friends in alb.u.ms, _alba amicorum_, little oblong pocket volumes of which a considerable number have survived, a very fair collection being in the British Museum. The earliest alb.u.m in the latter series is the Egerton MS. 1178, beginning with an entry of the year 1554. Once the taste was established, the collecting of autographs of living persons was naturally extended to those of former times; and many collections, famous in their day, have been formed, but in most instances only to be dispersed again as the owners tired of their fancy or as their heirs failed to inherit their tastes along with their [v.03 p.0047] possessions. The most celebrated collection formed in England in recent years is that of the late Mr Alfred Morrison, which still remains intact, and which is well known by means of the sumptuous catalogue, with its many facsimiles, compiled by the owner.

The rivalry of collectors and the high prices which rare or favourite autographs realize have naturally given encouragement to the forger. False letters of popular heroes and of popular authors, of Nelson, of Burns, of Thackeray, and of others, appear from time to time in the market: in some instances clever imitations, but more generally too palpably spurious to deceive any one with experience. Like the Shakespearean forgeries of Ireland, referred to above, the forgeries of Chatterton were literary inventions; and both were poor performances. One of the cleverest frauds of this nature in modern times was the fabrication, in the middle of the 19th century, of a series of letters of Byron and Sh.e.l.ley, with postmarks and seals complete, which were even published as _bona fide_ doc.u.ments (Brit.

Mus., Add. MS. 19,377).

There are many published collections of facsimiles of autographs of different nations. Among those published in England the following may be named:--_British Autography_, by J. Thane (1788-1793, with supplement by Daniell, 1854); _Autographs of Royal, n.o.ble, Learned and Remarkable Personages in English History_, by J. G. Nichols (1829); _Facsimiles of Original Doc.u.ments of Eminent Literary Characters_, by C. J. Smith (1852); _Autographs of the Kings and Queens and Eminent Men of Great Britain_, by J. Netherclift (1835); _One Hundred Characteristic Autograph Letters_, by J. Netherclift and Son (1849); _The Autograph Miscellany_, by F.

Netherclift (1855); _The Autograph Souvenir_, by F. G. Netherclift and R.

Sims (1865); _The Autographic Mirror_ (1864-1866); _The Handbook of Autographs_, by F. G. Netherclift (1862); _The Autograph Alb.u.m_, by L. B.

Phillips (1866); _Facsimiles of Autographs_ (British Museum publication), five series (1896-1900). Facsimiles of autographs also appear in the official publications, _Facsimiles of National MSS., from William the Conqueror to Queen Anne_ (Master of the Rolls), 1865-1868; _Facsimiles of National MSS. of Scotland_ (Lord Clerk Register), 1867-1871; and _Facsimiles of National MSS. of Ireland_ (Public Record Office, Ireland), 1874-1884.

(E. M. T.)

AUTOLYCUS, in Greek mythology, the son of Hermes and father of Anticleia, mother of Odysseus. He lived at the foot of Mount Parna.s.sus, and was famous as a thief and swindler. On one occasion he met his match. Sisyphus, who had lost some cattle, suspected Autolycus of being the thief, but was unable to bring it home to him, since he possessed the power of changing everything that was touched by his hands. Sisyphus accordingly burnt his name into the hoofs of his cattle, and, during a visit to Autolycus, recognized his property. It is said that on this occasion Sisyphus seduced Autolycus's daughter Anticleia, and that Odysseus was really the son of Sisyphus, not of Laertes, whom Anticleia afterwards married. The object of the story is to establish the close connexion between Hermes, the G.o.d of theft and cunning, and the three persons--Sisyphus, Odysseus, Autolycus--who are the incarnate representations of these practices.

Autolycus is also said to have instructed Heracles in the art of wrestling, and to have taken part in the Argonautic expedition.

_Iliad_, x. 267; _Odyssey_, xix. 395; Ovid, _Metam._ xi. 313; Apollodorus i. 9; Hyginus, _Fab._ 201.

AUTOLYCUS OF PITANE, Greek mathematician and astronomer, probably flourished in the second half of the 4th century B.C., since he is said to have instructed Arcesilaus. His extant works consist of two treatises; the one, [Greek: Peri kinoumenes sphairas], contains some simple propositions on the motion of the sphere, the other, [Greek: Peri epitolon kai duseon], in two books, discusses the rising and setting of the fixed stars. The former treatise is historically interesting for the light it throws on the development which the geometry of the sphere had already reached even before Autolycus and Euclid (see THEODOSIUS OF TRIPOLIS).

There are several Latin versions of Autolycus, a French translation by Forcadel (1572), and an admirable edition of the Greek text with Latin translation by F. Hultsch (Leipzig, 1885).

AUTOMATIC WRITING, the name given by students of psychical research to writing performed without the volition of the agent. The writing may also take place without any consciousness of the words written; but some automatists are aware of the word which they are actually writing, and perhaps of two or three words on either side, though there is rarely any clear perception of the meaning of the whole. Automatic writing may take place when the agent is in a state of trance, spontaneous or induced, in hystero-epilepsy or other morbid states; or in a condition not distinguishable from normal wakefulness. Automatic writing has played an important part in the history of modern spiritualism. The phenomenon first appeared on a large scale in the early days (_c._ 1850-1860) of the movement in America. Numerous writings are reported at that period, many of considerable length, which purported for the most part to have been produced under spirit guidance. Some of these were written in "unknown tongues." Of those which were published the most notable are Andrew J.

Davis's _Great Harmonia_, Charles Linton's _The Healing of the Nations_, and J. Murray Spear's _Messages from the Spirit Life_.

In England also the early spiritualist newspapers were filled with "inspirational" writing,--_Pages of Ike Paraclete_, &c. The most notable series of English automatic writings are the _Spirit Teachings_ of the Rev.

W. Stainton Moses. The phenomenon, of course, lends itself to deception, but there seems no reason to doubt that in the great majority of the cases recorded the writing was in reality produced without deliberate volition.

In the earlier years of the spiritualist movement, a "planchette," a little heart-shaped board running on wheels, was employed to facilitate the process of writing.

Of late years, whilst the theory of external inspiration as the cause of the phenomenon has been generally discredited, automatic writing has been largely employed as a method of experimentally investigating subconscious mental processes. Knowledge which had lapsed from the primary consciousness is frequently revealed by this means; _e.g._ forgotten fragments of poetry or foreign languages are occasionally given. An experimental parallel to this reproduction of forgotten knowledge was devised by Edmund Gurney. He showed that information communicated to a subject in the hypnotic trance could be subsequently reproduced through the handwriting, whilst the attention of the subject was fully employed in conversing or reading aloud; or an arithmetical problem which had been set during the trance could be worked out under similar conditions without the apparent consciousness of the subject.

Automatic writing for the most part, no doubt, brings to the surface only the debris of lapsed memories and half-formed impressions which have never reached the focus of consciousness--the stuff that dreams are made of. But there are indications in some cases of something more than this. In some spontaneous instances the writing produces anagrams, puns, nonsense verses and occasional blasphemies or obscenities; and otherwise exhibits characteristics markedly divergent from those of the normal consciousness.

In the well-known case recorded by Th. Flournoy (_Des Indes a la planete Mars_) the automatist produced writing in an unknown character, which purported to be the Martian language. The writing generally resembles the ordinary handwriting of the agent, but there are sometimes marked differences, and the same automatist may employ two or three distinct handwritings. Occasionally imitations are produced of the handwriting of other persons, living or dead. Not infrequently the writing is reversed, so that it can be read only in a looking-gla.s.s (_Spiegelschrift_); the ability to produce such writing is often a.s.sociated with the liability to spontaneous somnambulism. The hand and arm are often insensible in the act of writing. There are some cases on record in which the automatist has seemed to guide his hand not by sight, but by some special extension of the muscular sense (Carpenter, _Mental Physiology_, -- 128; W. James, _Proceedings American S.P.R_. p. 554).

Automatic writing frequently exhibits indications of telepathy. The most remarkable series of automatic writings recorded in this connexion are those executed by the American medium, Mrs Piper, in a state of trance (_Proceedings S.P.R._). These writings appear to exhibit remarkable telepathic powers, and are thought by some to indicate communication with the spirits of the dead.

[v.03 p.0048] The opportunities afforded by automatic writing for communicating with subconscious strata of the personality have been made use of by Pierre Janet and others in cases of hystero-epilepsy, and other forms of dissociation of consciousness. A patient in an attack of hysterical convulsions, to whom oral appeals are made in vain, can sometimes be induced to answer in writing questions addressed to the hand, and thus to reveal the secret of the malady or to accept therapeutic suggestions.

See Edmonds and Dexter, _Spiritualism_ (New York, 1853); Epes Sargent, _Planchette, the Despair of Science_ (Boston, U.S.A., 1869); Mrs de Morgan, _From Matter to Spirit_ (London, 1863); W. Stainton Moses, _Spirit Teachings_ (London, 1883); _Proceedings S.P R. pa.s.sim_; Th. Flournoy, _Des Indes a la planete Mars_ (Geneva, 1900); F. Podmore, _Modern Spiritualism_ (London, 1902); F. W. H. Myers, _Human Personality_ (London, 1903); Pierre Janet, _L'Automatisme psychologique_ (2nd ed., Paris, 1894); Morton Prince, _The Dissociation of a Personality_ (London, 1906).

(F. P.)

AUTOMATISM. In philosophical terminology this word is used in two main senses: (1) in ethics, for the view that man is not responsible for his actions, which have, therefore, no moral value; (2) in psychology, for all actions which are not the result of conation or conscious endeavour.

Certain actions being admittedly automatic, Descartes maintained that, in regard of the lower animals, all action is purely mechanical. The same theory has since been applied to man, with this difference that, accompanying the mechanical phenomena of action, and entirely disconnected with it, are the phenomena of consciousness. Thus certain physical changes in the brain result in a given action; the concomitant mental desire or volition is in no sense causally connected with, or prior to, the physical change. This theory, which has been maintained by T. Huxley (_Science and Culture_) and Shadworth Hodgson (_Metaphysic of Experience and Theory of Practice_), must be distinguished from that of the psychophysical parallelism, or the "double aspect theory" according to which both the mental state and the physical phenomena result from a so-called "mind stuff," or single substance, the material or cause of both.

Automatic acts are of two main kinds. Where the action goes on while the attention is focused on entirely different subjects (_e.g._ in cycling), it is purely automatic. On the other hand, if the attention is fixed on the end or on any particular part of a given action, and the other component parts of the action are performed unconsciously, the automatism may be called relative.