The ensuing discourse lest I chance to be traduced for a plagiary by him who has played the thief, was one of those that, by a worthy hand, were stolen from me. Id. PLAGIARY, in philology, is a purloiner of another man's works, who puts them off as his own. Among the Romans, plagiarius was properly a person who bought, sold, or retained a freeman for a slave; and was so called because, by the Flavian law, such persons were condemned ad plagas, 'to be whipped.' Thomasius has an express treatise De plagio literario, wherein he lays down the laws and measures of the right which authors have to one another's writings.'Dictionary-writers,' it is observed by Chambers, 'seem exempted from the common laws of meum and tuum. Their works are supposed, in great measure, compositions of other people; and what they take from others they take avowedly. In effect, their quality gives them a title to every thing that may be for their purpose, wherever they find it; and if they rob, they do not do it any otherwise than as the bee does, for the public service. Their occupation is not pillaging, but collecting contributions; and, if you ask them their authority, they will produce you the practice of their predecessors of all ages and nations.' Please yourselves, therefore, ye sinful and natural men, with the spiritual condition wherein ye stand: God is no otherwise near to you, but to plague and punish you. Bp. Hall. Thus were they plagued What perils do environ Milton. The man that meddles with cold iron! What plaguy mischiefs and mishaps Do dog him still with after-claps! Hudibras. All those plagues which earth and air had brooded, First on inferior creatures tried their force. And last they seized on man. Lee and Dryden. This whispering bodes me no good; but he has me so plaguily under the lash, I dare not interpret him. Dryden. Good or bad company is the greatest blessing or greatest plague of life. L'Estrange. When a Neapolitan cavalier has nothing else to do, he gravely shuts himself up in his closet, and falls a tumbling over his papers, to see if he can start a law suit, and plague any of his neighbours. Addison. Kissing to day, to-morrow snarling. Sometimes my plague, sometimes my darling, Prior. People are stormed out of their reason, plagued into a compliance, and forced to yield in their own defence. Collier. You looked scornful, and snift at the dean: But he durst not so much as once open his lips, And the doctor was plaguily down in the hips. Swift. PLAGUE. See MEDICINE, Index. In that article we have noticed the most recent medical opinions upon this important subject, and have quoted the strong language of Dr. Gregory, that its being a highly contagious disease cannot for a moment be made a matter of dispute.' This has, however, of late become so seriously controverted, that a committee of the house of commons was for some time engaged on a review of our Quarantine and Sanitary Laws, which government have already considerably relaxed. The whole question of the contagion of plague came thus before a high and most intelligent tribunal the reader will find an account of the evidence and results in our article SANITARY LAWS. We shall in this place only notice the general account of historians respecting what has been called the plague in former times. Thucydides, lib. ii., gives an account of a dreadful plague which happened at Athens about A. A. C. 430, and with which he himself was infected, while the Peloponnesians under the command of Archidamus wasted all her territory abroad; but of these two enemies the plague was by far the most severe. The most dreadful plague that ever raged at Rome was in the reign of Titus, A. D. 80. The emperor left no remedy unattempted to abate the malignity of the distemper, acting during its continuance like a father to his people. The same fatal disease raged in all the provinces of the Roman empire in the reign of M. Aurelius, A. D. 167, and was followed by a dreadful famine, earthquakes, inundations, and other calamities. About A. D. 430, the plague visited Britain, just after the Picts and Scots had made a formidable invasion of the southern part of the island. It raged with uncommon fury, and swept away most of those whom the sword and famine had spared, so that the living were scarcely sufficient to bury the dead. About A. D. 1348 this disease is said to have become almost general over Europe. Many authors give an account of it as having appeared first in the kingdom of Kathay in 1346, and to have proceeded gradually west to Constantinople and Egypt. From Constantinople it passed into Greece, Italy, France, and Africa, and by degrees along the coasts of the ocean into Britain and Ireland, and afterwards into Germany, Hungary, Poland, Denmark, and the other northern kingdoms. According to Antonius, archbishop of Florence, the distemper carried off 60,000 people in that city. In 1656 the plague was brought from Sardinia to Naples, being introduced into the city by a transport with soldiers on board. It raged with excessive violence, carrying off in less than six months 400,000 of the inhabitants. In 1720 the city of Marseilles was visited with this destructive disease, brought in a ship from the Levant; and in seven months, during which it continued, it carried off not fewer than 60,000 people. The ravages of this disease have been dreadful whereever it has made its appearance. On the first arrival of Europeans at the island of Grand Canary, it contained 14,000 fighting men, soon after which two-thirds of these inhabitants fell a sacrifice to the plague. The destruction it has made in Turkey in Europe, and particularly in Constantinople, must be known to every reader; and its fatal effects have been particularly heightened there by that firm belief which prevails among the people of predestination, &c. It is generally brought into European Turkey from Egypt; where it is very frequent, especially at Grand Cairo. To give even a list of all the plagues which have desolated many flourishing countries, would extend this article beyond all Of flat fish there are soles, flowkes, dabs, and plaice. Carew. PLAICE, OF PLAISE, is the English name of a species of pleuronectes. See PLEURONECTES. PLAIN, adj., adv., n. s., & v. a.~ PLAINDEALING, adj. & n. s. PLAIN'LY, adv. PLAIN'NESS, n. s. PLAIN WORK. Fr. plain; Belg. pleyn; Latin planus. Flat; smooth; level; even; hence bare; unornamented; simple; not varied; and hence, metaphorically, evident; open; clear; artless; simple; mere: as an adverb, distinctly; simply as a noun substantive, level open ground; opposed to that which is hilly or much diversified a field of battle: as a verb active, to make level, or even (obsolete): plaindealing is, honest, open dealing; sincerity: plainly and plainness, follow all the senses of plain as an adjective: plainwork is ordinary or common needle-work. In a plain in the land of Shinar they dwelt. Genesis. The string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake Mark. plain. The south and south-east sides are rocky and mountainous, but plain in the midst. Sandys. For warbling notes from inward cheering flow. Sidney. It was his policy to leave no hold behind him; but to make all plain and waste. Spenser. St. Augustine acknowledgeth that they are not only set down, but also plainly set down in scripture; so that he which heareth or readeth may withHooker. out difficulty understand. He that beguiled you in a plair accent was a plain knave, which, for my part, I will not be. Shakspeare. King Lear. Though I cannot be said to be a flattering honest man; it must not be denied, but I am a plaindealing villain. Shakspeare. Coriolanus neither cares whether they love or hate him; and, out of his carelessness, lets them plainly see't. Id. fruitful lands, and turned the Irish into the woods and mountains. Davies. The Scots took the English for foolish birds fallen into their net, forsook their hill, and marched into the plain directly towards them. Hayward. Upon one wing the artillery was drawn, every piece having his guard of pioneers to plain the ways. Id. Of many plain, yet pious Christians, this cannot be affirmed. Hammond's Fundamentals. They were wont to make their canoes or boats plain without, and hollow within, by the force of fire. Heylin. I am no politician; and was ever thought to have too little wit, and too much plaindealing for a statesDenham. man. By that seed Id. Is meant thy great Deliverer, who shall bruise Milton's Paradise Lost. His diet was of the plainest meats, and commonly not only his dishes, but the parts of them were such as most others would refuse. Fell. The experiments alledged with so much confidence, and told by an author that writ like a plain man, and one whose profession was to tell truth, helped me to resolve upon making the trial. Temple. Thy vineyard must employ thy sturdy steer To turn the glebe; besides thy daily pain To break the clods and make the surface plain. Dryden. A crown of ruddy gold inclosed her brow, Plain without pomp, and rich without a show. Id. It looks as fate with nature's law may strive, To shew plaindealing once an age would thrive. Id. Hilly countries afford the most entertaining prospects, though a man would chuse to travel through a plain one. Addison. It is plain that these discourses are calculated for none but the fashionable part of womankind. Id. Spectator. Goodman Fact is allowed by every body to be a plain-spoken person, and a man of very few words; tropes and figures are his aversion. Addison. We see plainly that we have the means, and that nothing but the application of them is wanting. Id. To speak one thing, mixed dialects they join; Divide the simple, and the plain define. Prior. Pour forth Britannia's legions on the plain. Arbuthnot. Plainness and freedom, an epistolary stile required. Wake, and open Felton. Our troops beat an army in plain fight field. From Epiphanius's censure of Origen, one may perceive plainly that he thought the Anti-nicene church in general, both before and after Origen, to be of a very contrary judgment to that which he condemns in Lucian and Origen, that is, to Arianism. Waterland. Some have at first for wits, then poets past, Turned criticks next, and proved plain fools at last. Pope. You write to me with the freedom of a friend, setting down your thoughts as they occur, and dealing plainly with me in the matter. Id. As shades most sweetly recommend the light, So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit. Id. While here the ocean gains, In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains. Id. She went to plainwork, and to purling brooks. Id. A man of sense can artifice disdain, As men of wealth may venture to go plain. Young. There is little, however, that can be contradicted, even when a plainer tale comes to be told. Johnson. PLAIN, v. n. PLAINT, n. s. PLAINTFUL, adj. PLAINTIFF, n. s. & PLAINTIVE, adj. Fr. plaint, plaintif; of Latin plango. To lament; comadj.plain: a plaint is, a lamentation; com plaint; expression of injury or sorrow: plaintful, full of complaint; audibly sorrowful: plaintiff, the complainant of damage or injury in a law-suit (opposed to the defendant); it is also used by Prior as an adjective, for complaining; lamenting; or in the sense of plaintive. Long since my voice is hoarse, and throat is sore, With cries to skies, and curses to the ground: But more I plain, I feel my woes the more. Sidney. Then pour out plaint, and in one word say this: Helpless his plaint, who spoils himself of bliss. Id. Can nature's voice Plaintive be drowned or lessened in the noise; Pope. Defendant thus becomes a name, with a black wash; the projectures on the ground are drawn in full lines, and those supposed over hem in dotted lines. The augmentations or alterations to be made are distinguished by a color different from what is already built; and the tints of each plan made lighter as the stories are raised. In large buildings it is usual to have three several plans for the first three stories. PLANCH'ED, adj. Į Fr. plancher. Made PLANCH'ER, n. s. of boards; a floor so Cowper. PLAINFIELD, a town of Cheshire county, New Hampshire, north America, on the Connecticut River, eleven miles south of Dartmouth College, and fourteen North of Claremont. Union Academy, a well endowed seminary, is in this place, and opposite to the town the Quechy flows into the Connecticut with a considerable fall. PLAIT, n. s. & v. a. Corrupted from plyght, from to ply or fold. A fold; a double: to fold; weave; involve. Let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair. Should the voice directly strike the brain, It would astonish and confuse it much; 1 Peter. Therefore these plaits and folds the sound restrain, That it the organ may more gently touch. Davies. Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides, Who covers faults at last with shame derides. Shakspeare. 'Tis very difficult to trace out the figure of a vest through all the plaits and foldings of the drapery. Addison. Nor shall thy lower garments artful plait, Prior. Will she on Sunday morn thy neckcloth plait ? Gay. The busy sylphs surround their darling care, Some fold the sleeve, while others plait the gown; And Betty's praised for labours not her own. Pope. Your hands have not been employed in plaiting the hair, and adorning your persons; but in making cloaths for the naked. Law. Oak, cedar, and chestnut, are the best builders; some are best for planchers, as deal; some for tables, cupboards, and desks, as walnuts. Bacon. PLANCUS (Lucius Munatius), a writer of the Augustan age, an orator and a disciple of Cicero. He was with Cæsar in Gaul, and became governor of a province in Gallia Celtica (where he built Lugdunum, now Lyons); and was made consul with Brutus. He then favoured the republican cause, but afterwards deserted to Cæsar. He disgraced himself still more, by becoming a servile flatterer of Antony and Cleopatra; to please whom he acted as a stage dancer, and in a comedy personated the sea-god Glaucus, by dancing quite naked, with his body painted green, a crown of reeds on his head, and the tail of a large fish appended to his back. Finding that this sycophantic adulation procured him contempt instead of approbation, even from Antony, he deserted to Octavius, before the battle of Actium; who received him with great marks of respect; which Plancus returned by proposing in the senate to confer on him the title of Augustus. About this period Horace dedicated his seventh Ode to him. The elegance of his Letters to Cicero, which are still extant, prove that he was not unworthy of a literary compliment. PLANCUS (Francis), M. D., was born at Amiens in 1696, and was author of some celebrated works. 1. A complete System of Surgery, in 2 vols. 12mo. 2. A choice Library of Medicine, continued and completed by M. Goulin, making in all 9 vols. 4to., or 18 vols. 12mo. 3. A Translation of Vander Wiel's Observations on Medicine and Surgery, 1758, 2 vols. 12mo. Plancus was the editor of various editions of works on medicine and surgery, and enriched them with notes. He died September 19th, 1661, aged sixty-nine. PLANE, n. s. & v. a. Lat. planus. In geometry, level surface: in carpentry, an instrument by which boards are made of level surface: to level, smooth; use a plane. The iron is set to make an angle of forty-five deMoren. grees with the sole of the plane. These hard woods are more properly scraped than planed. Id. Mechanical Exercises. The foundation of the Roman causeway was made of rough stone, joined with a most firm cement; upon this was laid another layer of small stones and cement, to plane the inequalities of the rough stone, in which the stones of the upper pavement were fixt. Arbuthnot on Coins. Comets, as often as they are visible to us, move in planes inclined to the plane of the ecliptick in all kinds of angles. Bentley. Projectiles would ever move on in the same right line, did not the air, their own gravity, or the ruggedness of the plane on which they move stop their motion. Cheyne. PLANE, in geometry, denotes a surface that. lies evenly between its bounding lines; and, as a right line is the shortest extension from one point to another, so a plane surface is the short est extension from one line to another. PLANE, in joinery, consists of a piece of wood, very smooth at bottom, as a stock or shaft; in the midst of which is an aperture, through which a steel edge, or chisel, placed obliquely, passes; which, being very sharp, takes off the inequalities of the wood along which it slides. Planes have various names, according to their various forms, and uses: as, 1. The fore-plane, a very long one, and usually that which is first used: the edge of its iron or chisel is not ground straight, but rises with a convex arch in the middle; its use is to take off the greater irregularities of the stuff, and to prepare it for the smoothing-plane. 2. The smoothing-plane is shorter, its chisel being finer; and its use is to take off the greater irregularities left by the fore-plane, and to prepare the wood for the jointer. 3. The jointer is the longest of all; the edge of its chisel is very fine, and does not stand out above a hair's breadth; it is chiefly used for shooting the edge of a board perfectly straight, for jointing tables, &c. 4. The strike-block is like the jointer, but shorter: its use is to level short joints. 5. The rabbit-plane, which is used in cutting the upper edge of a board, straight down into the stuff, so that the edge of another cut after the same manner may join in with it, on the square the chisel of this plane is as broad as its stock, that the angle may cut straight, and it delivers its shavings at the sides, and not at the top, like the others. 6. The plough, which is a narr, rabbit plane, with the addition of two staves, on which are shoulders; its use is to plough a narrow square groove on the edge of a board. 7. Moulding planes which are of various kinds, acommodated to the various forms and profiles of the moulding; as the roundplane, the hollow-plane, the ogee, the snipe's bill, &c., which are all of several sizes from half an inch to an inch and a half. PLANE, PERSPECTIVE, in perspective, is supposed to be pellucid, and perpendicular to the horizon; the horizontal plane, supposed to pass through the spectator's eye, parallel to the horizon; the geometrical plane, likewise parallel to the horizon, wherein the object to be represented is supposed to be placed, &c. PLANE SAILING. See NAVIGATION. PLANE-TREE, n. s. Fr. plane, platane; Lat. platanus. The beech, the swimming alder, and the plane. Dryden. The plane-tree hath an amentaceous flower, consisting of several slender stamina, which are all collected into spherical little balls and are barren; but the embryos of the fruit, which are produced on separate parts of the same trees, are turgid, and afterwards become large spherical balls, containing many oblong seeds intermixed with down it is generally supposed that the introduction of this tree into England is owing to lord chancellor Bacon. Miller. PLANE TREE, in botany. See PLATANUS. Fr. planette; Lat. planeta; Greek λavnτns, wanderers. A star or heavenly body wandering or continually changing its position with respect to other stars. See below, and ASTRONOMY, Index. Planetary and planetic mean erratic; pertaining to, or governed by, a planet or planets: planetstruck is used also in this last sense. Barbarous villains! hath this lovely face Ruled like a wandering planet over me, And could it not enforce them to relent? Shakspeare. and stars, as if we were villains by an enforced obeWe make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon dience of planetary influence. Id. Wonder not much if thus amazed I look, Since I saw you, I have been planetstruck ; A beauty, and so rare I did descry. Suckling. The Chaldeans were much devoted to astrological devices, and had an opinion that every hour of the day was governed by a particular planet, reckoning them according to their usual order, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, Mercury, Luna. Wilkins. And planets, planet-struck real eclipse Then suffered. Milton's Paradise Lost. Their planetary motions and aspects. Milton. There are seven planets or errant stars in the lower orbs of heaven. Browne's Vulgar Errours. Add the two Egyptian days in every month, the of sun and moon, conjunctions and oppositions plainterlunary and plenilunary exemptions, the eclipses netical. Browne. Darkling they mourn their fate, whom Circe's power, That watched the moon and planetary hour, We behold bright planetary Jove, Planets are the erratick or wandering stars, and which are not like the fixt ones always in the same position to one another: we now number the earth among the primary planets, because we know it moves round the sun, as Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury do, and that in a path or circle between Mars and Venus: and the moon is accounted among the secondary planets or satellites of the primary, since she moves round the earth. Harris. |