and outside of this, at a depth of 11 ft., was a road leading N. W., and on its side a row of bases of square piers such as might have supported a stoa or covered portico. This he supposed to be the stoa built by Damianus in the 2d century from the Magnesian gate to the temple, to shelter processions in bad weather. He discovered also another similar road from another gate, and standing at the point where these two roads would converge, he found in 1869 the angle of an enclosing wall, with an inscription to the effect that Augustus had built the wall around the temple of Diana out of the revenues of the goddess. This wall he traced for 1,200 ft. until it turned westward, and within this enclosure he found by sinking pits extensive Roman foundations, a mosaic representing a Triton, many inscriptions, a pavement of Greek character, and fragments of statuary, besides several drums of Ionic columns of white marble. In 1871 the wall of the cella on the south and remains of piers came in sight; and on the west were found the lower drum of a column nearly entire weighing 7 tons, with figures in high relief, portions of other drums, and the sculptured base of a column and an Ionic capital, according with Pliny's description of the 36 sculptured columns of the temple. Many of the fragments and inscriptions discovered have been sent to the British museum. S. E. of Mount Prion, near the city, is the grotto of the seven sleepers, who are said to have taken refuge here from the persecutions during the reign of Diocletian, and falling asleep to have waked 200 years after and come into the city. The tradition was received by Mohammed and embodied in the Koran, and the cave is a place of pilgrimage with Moslems and Christians. The names of the seven sleepers, and also of the dog Ketmehr which slept with them, are reverenced throughout the East as of talismanic power. Not far from here tradition places the grave of St. John the apostle. EPHOD, one of the articles of the official dress worn by Hebrew priests, consisting of two parts, one covering the breast and the other the back, united upon the shoulders, and sometimes described as thrown over the shoulders, crossed upon the breast, and then carried round the waist to serve as a girdle for the robe. It was of two kinds: one of plain linen, for the priests; and the other, for the high priest, "of gold, and blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen," richly embroidered. On the shoulders of the high priest's ephod were two onyx stones, set in gold, having engraved on them the names of the 12 tribes, 6 on each stone; and where it crossed the breast was a square ornament, called the pectoral or breast plate, in which were set 12 precious stones, each bearing the name of one of the 12 tribes engraved on it. The ephod was worn by others besides priests. EPHORS (Gr. ¿popoɩ, from εgopāv, to oversee), popular magistrates at Sparta. The origin of the office seems to have been too ancient for its institution to be historically traced. The authority of the ephors was designed as a counterpoise to that of the kings and council. They were five in number, and chosen from and by the people without any qualification of age or property. The mode of their election is not known. Aristotle calls it puerile, and it is supposed to have been by lot. They held their office for one year, entering upon it at the autumnal solstice, the beginning of the Lacedæmonian year. They met daily and took their meals together, in the building in which foreigners and ambassadors were entertained. They had judicial authority in civil cases, and the power to scrutinize the conduct of all magistrates. In early times the privileges of the office were very great, and they were gradually increased, until even the kings were called before its tribunal, and the assemblies of the people were convened only by its authority. During the Peloponnesian war the ephors received foreign ambassadors, subscribed treaties of peace, and sent out armies; and even on the battle field the king was attended by two ephors as councillors of war. The ephoralty is thought by Müller to have been the cause of the instability and final dissolution of the Spartan state. The kings were obliged to court popular favor in order to uphold their power, and thus, contrary to the spirit of the Spartan constitution, the government became a democracy. The ephors became at length associated with all opposition to the extension of popular privileges, and the office was abolished by Cleomenes III. (about 225 B. C.), but restored by the Romans. His EPHRAEM SYRUS, the most prominent instructor of the old Syrian church, and one of the most prolific theological writers of the early Christian church in general, died probably in 378. He was born at Nisibis or Edessa, and was educated by Jacob of Nisibis, who took him to the council of Nice. He entered on a monastic life, and carried on his philosophical studies, only coming out to preach and teach. reputation for learning and piety was so great that he was elected bishop, but declined the office. He spent the greater part of his life in writing and preaching on devotional and moral subjects, and against the heresies of his time, especially Arianism. When Edessa was suffering from famine, he called on the rich to assist the poor, and saw that the latter received what was intended for them. He was called by his countrymen the cithara of the Holy Ghost, and, because he transplanted Greek learning into the Syrian church, the prophet of the Syrians. His commentaries extended over the whole Bible. Hymns and prayers which are ascribed to him are still in use in the Chaldean, Syrian, and Maronite churches. Some of his numerous works are extant in the original Syriac, many others exist in Greek, Latin, and Armenian translations, and many are lost. The most complete edition is that of Rome (6 vols., 3 con in the "Manual" and "Philosophical Lectures" compiled from his discourses by his pupil Arrian. Like the other Stoic philosophilosophy to be neither profound speculation nor eloquent discourse, but the love and practice of virtue. His teachings are summed up in the formula, "Bear and forbear." Recognizing only will and reason, his highest conception of life was to be passionless under whatever circumstances. "Man," he said, "is but a pilot; observe the star, hold the rudder, and be not distracted on thy way." Epictetus himself is supposed to have committed nothing to writing. The best edition of all the remaining works of Arrian is that of Schweighäuser, in the collection entitled Epictetea Philosophia Monumenta (5 vols. 8vo, Leipsic, 1799-1800). They were translated into English by Elizabeth Carter (London, 1758). A new translation by T. W. Higginson, with a sketch of Epictetus, appeared in Boston in 1865. taining the works in Syriac and Latin and 3 the Greek texts, 1732-46). A good German translation of a large portion of his works was published by Pius Zingerle, at Innspruck (1830-phers, he taught by his example. He esteemed 38). A tasteful English translation of several hymns, songs, and homilies was made by Henry Burgess ("Select Metrical Hymns and Homilies of Ephraem Syrus," 2 vols., London, 1853). Bickell has edited Ephraemi Syri Carmina Nisibena, additis Prolegomenis et Supplemento Lexicorum Syriacorum (2 vols., Leipsic, 1866). EPHRAIM, second son of Joseph, the founder of the tribe of Ephraim. The tribe occupied one of the finest and most fruitful territories of Palestine, in the very centre of the land. It included most of the province afterward called Samaria, and contained many of the most distinguished places of Palestine between the Jordan and the Mediterranean, having the tribes of Dan and Benjamin on the south and of Manasseh on the north. It was crossed by the mountain range bearing its name. The tribe of Ephraim often appears as the representative of the ten tribes, or the northern Hebrew state, both in historical and prophetical passages of the Scriptures. It held for a long time the ark and the tabernacle at Shiloh. Next to Judah it was the most warlike of the tribes, and gave to Israel several celebrated leaders and kings. EPICHARMUS, a Greek dramatic poet, born on the island of Cos about 540 B. C., died in 450, or according to Lucian in 443. He went to Syracuse about 483, and there passed the remainder of his life. He conceived the idea of transforming the loosely constructed farces of which the Sicilian comedy consisted into pieces as regular and correct as the Athenian tragedies. He effected as great a reform in comedy as Eschylus in tragedy, diminishing the number of the actors, and introducing a more elegant and poetic language and a more elaborate plot. He was the author of 52, or according to some of 35 comedies, of which only the titles remain. His works were especially esteemed by Plato, who makes many quotations from them. EPICTETUS, a Roman Stoic philosopher, born in Hierapolis, Phrygia, in the 1st century of our era, died in the first half of the 2d century. In his youth he was a slave of Epaphroditus, one of the guards of Nero. Epaphroditus having struck him heavily on the leg, he said to him, "You will break my leg." The prediction was speedily fulfilled, when the philosophic slave said again calmly, "Did not I tell you you would break it?" This extreme insensibility to pain was a fundamental principle in the philosophy of Epictetus. He became a freedman, though neither the cause nor the time of his emancipation is known. Ile was involved in the proscription by which Domitian banished all philosophers from Rome, and retired to Nicopolis in Epirus, where he opened a school of Stoic philosophy, and held those conversations which have been preserved EPICURUS, a Greek philosopher, born in the island of Samos in 342 B. C., died in 270. When 18 years of age he went to Athens, where he became a pupil of Pamphilius, and an admirer of the doctrines of Democritus. He travelled for several years, and in his 30th year established a school of philosophy at Athens, to which his fame soon attracted a great number of pupils. With them he constituted a community which has always been considered as a model of its kind. He enjoyed the respect and love of his followers to such a degree that his sayings had almost the value of oracles. No other ancient school of philosophy has evinced a cohesive power equal to that of Epicurus. Epicureanism has become almost a synonyme of sensualism, or at least a refined voluptuousness, but nothing was further from the meaning of his doctrines. It is true that he taught evdaμovía to be the highest end and purpose of human life, but this word was intended to designate a state of supreme mental bliss, to be attained only by temperance, chastity, and a healthy intellectual development. That bliss, consisting in a perfect repose of mind, in an equilibrium of all mental faculties and passions, is perhaps not very different from the state of mind which the Stoics considered the acme of human perfection, although they were the most unrelenting adversaries of Epicureanism. Epicurus was a man of unsullied morality. Diogenes Laërtius estimates the number of his works at 300 or more. He boasted of having never used any quotations in order to swell his volumes. Few of his writings have been preserved, but a full analysis of his doctrines is to be found in Diogenes Laërtius, and this, taken in connection with numerous passages in the writings of Lucretius, Cicero, Pliny, and others, gives us a full insight into his philosophical system. Within the present century a fragment of his book on nature has been recovered from the ruins of Herculaneum, and published by Orelli | the soul of the soul. The soul is not immortal; nevertheless death is by no means to be considered as an evil, since after death no consciousness of annihilation remains. Of all obre-jects filling space infinitely delicate images are secreted. These images, coming into contact with the organs of sense, create perceptions. The conceptions of imagination are arbitrary combinations of such delicate images of real objects. By frequent perceptions, the human mind attains to general abstractions, which are merely collective conceptions of the features common to a larger or smaller number of individual perceptions. Since the senses are the receivers of mechanical secretions of objects (images), the knowledge obtained through them is real and objective, the only correct standard of truth; but the workings of imagination, being likewise the result of sensitive perception, although an indirect one, point also to existing realities. Hence it follows that the universality of the belief in the existence of a Supreme Being is proof conclusive of such existence. The gods are living beings, of human shape but colossal proportions. They also consist of atoms. They are immortal, although their bodies are similar to the human body. This contradiction is explained by a certain equilibrium of contrasts in the universe. The gods are living in eternal bliss, that is to say, in absolute inactivity, in the quiet enjoyment of sublime wisdom and virtue. The spaces between the different celestial bodies (intermundia) are the seats of the gods. (Leipsic, 1818). Philosophy, according to Epi- EPIDAMNUS. See DYRRHACHIUM. EPIDAURUS (now Epidavro), an ancient city of Greece, on the eastern shore of the Peloponnesus, on the Saronic gulf, nearly opposite the harbors of Athens, from which it was distant only a six hours' sail, in the district called Argolis after the decline of Grecian power. Throughout the period of the country's greatness the city and its adjacent territory formed a small independent state. According to Strabo, it was founded by a Carian colony, and originally named Epicarus. It subsequently received an Argive colony, and became a part of the Doric league, of which Argos was the head. It severed its connection with Argos, however, and during the Peloponnesian war was an ally of Sparta. It had an aristocratic constitution, was an important commercial city, and colonized Ægina; but it rapidly declined in the 6th century B. C., its commerce passing into the hands of the Eginetans. It was chiefly distinguished for its splendid temple of Esculapius, bearing the inscription, "Let only pure souls enter here,” which stood five miles west of the city on the road to Argos, between two mountains, in a thickly wooded grove, in which it was unlawful for any one to be born or to die. The temple was near the centre of this sacred grove, and contained a gold and ivory statue of the god. Near the temple were the Tholus, a circular structure containing medicines for all diseases, a theatre, the bath of Esculapius, and temples dedicated to other divinities. Pil- | grimages were made to this temple by the sick, and every four years a festival was celebrated here. It was plundered by the Romans. Some of its foundations are still traced, and the theatre is one of the best preserved of all the old Greek edifices. The modern Epidavro is a small village, noted as the place of assembly of the first Greek congress in 1821, which promulgated the constitution called after the place. EPIDEMIC DISEASES (Gr. ¿ní, upon, and duos, people) are those which attack at the same time a great number of persons in a given locality, depending on some temporary, accidental, and generally inappreciable cause; differing in this respect from endemic diseases, or those developed under the influence of some constant or periodic cause. Many diseases, ordinarily sporadic, may become epidemic under certain ill-understood conditions; or some new disease, introduced by contagion or other favorable circumstances, may spread epidemically. Having ascertained the cause, or the epidemic tendency of the season, the treatment must depend on the nature of the disease and the constitution of the patient; even when remedial measures seem powerless, the physician can do much to check an epidemic by inspiring confidence and moral courage, and by withdrawing the attention of a community from the continual consideration of any supposed causes. The human constitution may become acclimated to epidemic diseases in malarious climates, as is shown by the greater mortality among new comers. In the white races there is no acclimation against endemics of intermittent and bilious fevers and other marsh diseases, as the experience of our southern states and the Pontine marshes of Italy fully proves. Negroes to a certain extent become insusceptible to the effluvia of the rice fields, but not so much so to the causes of disease on the cotton plantation; they suffer more than whites from cholera, typhoid diseases, plague, and smallpox, but are much less liable to intermittents, and the smallest admixture of negro blood is a great protection against yellow fever. (See ACCLIMATION.) EPIDERMIS, or Cuticle, the thin semi-transparent pellicle which covers the surface of the dermis or true skin. It is composed of layers of tessellated or pavement epithelium cells, of a flattened oval or polygonal shape, and about Too of an inch in diameter; each cell contains a nucleus with several distinct paler granules. The cells are developed from germs supplied by the basement membrane, nourished by the subjacent vessels, and cast off externally from time to time, to be succeeded by others; when first formed they are spherical, gradually becoming dry and flattened; the deeper layers are more distinctly cellular, while the outer ones are scale-like. The epidermis has no vessels nor nerves, but is pierced by the ducts of the sebaceous and sweat glands, and by the shafts of the hair or feathers. The rete mucosum seems to be composed of the same microscopic elements as the overlying epidermis, being the principal seat of the pigment cells which give the color to the skin. The epidermis covers the whole exterior of the body, even the front of the eye, and is continuous with the epithelium of the internal mucous membrane; it is thickest in those parts most subjected to friction, as on the heel and the palms of the hands, where it becomes almost as hard as horn. Its use is to protect the sensitive true skin from mechanical injury or the contact of air; in the living body, when abraded, it is speedily replaced; but when it is removed after death, the cutis underneath soon becomes brown and dry. The chemical composition of the thick epidermis of the heel has been found to be very nearly the same as that of the corneous matter of nails, hoofs, horns, and hair. The epidermis is familiarly seen in the occurrence of blisters, constituting the raised portion under which the fluid is effused. The epidermis prevents not only evaporation from the dermis, but also absorption of fluids from without; it is well known to the physician that in introducing medicinal agents into the system by the endermic method, the process is rendered very much more rapid and effectual by previously removing the epidermis by a blister. EPIGONI (Gr. Eπiyovoi, descendants), the seven sons of the seven Argive heroes who, under command of Adrastus, made an unsuccessful expedition against Thebes, in which all but the leader lost their lives. At the suggestion of Adrastus, the sons made war on Thebes ten years later, to avenge the death of their fathers. Their names are not the same in all the accounts, but as usually given they are Alemæon, Ægialeus, Diomedes, Promachus, Sthenelus, Thersander, and Euryalus. Under command of Alemaon, the Argive forces attacked and defeated the Thebans, who lost their leader, Laodamas; while of the Epigoni, Ægialeus, the son of Adrastus, was slain. The Thebans then abandoned their city and sued for peace, but the Argives razed it to the ground. This war of the Epigoni was celebrated in verse, and statues of the seven heroes were erected at Delphi. EPILEPSY (Gr. ἐπιληψία, from ἐπιλαμβάνειν, to seize upon), a disease characterized by sudden and temporary seizures of unconsciousness, accompanied by convulsions. This is one of the most horrible diseases that afflict mankind, and it is not surprising that in ignorant ages, in Rome, in Egypt, and elsewhere, epileptics were considered as having excited the anger of the gods, or were worshipped as possessing supernatural powers. This was due to the violence and extraordinary force developed by the muscles in epileptic convulsions; the screaming, the changes in color, the contortions of the face, and the biting of the tongue, followed by a comatose state and afterward by a degree of mental alienation. There are so many varieties of epilepsy that it is impossible | body in the ear, &c., are known to have caused to give a definition of the disease that will ap- epilepsy. It is quite certain that great mental ply to them all. In most cases it is charac- excitement has originated it in many cases, terized by convulsions and loss of conscious- but it seems probable that the disease was ness, occurring at longer or shorter intervals, not introduced by those causes, but was only during which the patient is almost in good brought by them to manifest itself. When a health. The absence of fever in epileptics complete fit is about to take place, it is ususerves to distinguish their affection from me- ally preceded by some sensation or some change ningitis and other inflammations accompanied in the mind of the patient. If a sensation preby convulsions. The complete loss of con- cedes the fit, it comes most frequently from sciousness also distinguishes epilepsy from hys- some part of the skin, and especially from that teria. As in most nervous diseases, a heredi- of the fingers or toes. This sensation is well tary tendency is among the most frequent pre- known under the name of aura epileptica. disposing causes of epilepsy. Epilepsy often ap- There is as much variation in the kind and the pears in the offspring of persons who have had intensity of the sensation as in its point of various other nervous complaints. Bouchet starting. Most frequently the aura is a sensaand Cazauviehl say that out of 130 epileptics tion of cold, of burning, or that kind of sensa30 were descendants of persons who had been tion produced by a draft of cold air on a limeither epileptic, insane, paralytic, apoplectic, ited part of the body. Sometimes the aura or hysteric. There is no doubt that women starts from the eye or the ear, and then a are much more frequently attacked by epilepsy flash of light or some other sensation comes than men. We find by a comparison of the from the retina, or peculiar sounds are heard. statistics given by several English and French Some epileptics become gay, others mournful, authorities, that the most frequent periods at when they are about to have a fit; in others which epilepsy begins are early infancy and the attack is announced by some change in the the age of puberty. It often appears also in digestive functions. A complete attack usually very old age; Delasiauve remarked that out begins with an extreme paleness of the face, of 285 epileptics the disease began in 10 when and at the same time or nearly so there are they were from 60 to 80 years old. In fact, contractions of several muscles of the face, no age escapes. As regards climate, nothing the eye, and the neck. Observers do not agree very positive has been established, but it seems as regards the first manifestation of a fit, probprobable that the disease is more frequent in ably because the seizure does not always begin hot and in very cold than in temperate climates. with the same phenomenon. Not only have Herpin and others say that epilepsy is more com- we known the first symptom not to be the mon in persons of low stature; but even if this same in different epileptics, but in the same be true, Herpin is wrong in considering short- one we have seen differences in three different ness of stature a predisposing cause of the dis- attacks. Many physicians think the scream is ease, as in many of the cases on which he the first symptom. It often is, but the palegrounds his view it is partly the influence of ness of the face usually precedes it. Some epilepsy that has prevented the development epileptics do not scream. As soon as these of the body. Various malformations of the symptoms have appeared, a rigid tetanic or at body, and especially of the cranium, are cer- least tonic spasm takes place in the limbs, and tainly among the most frequent predisposing the patient falls. Respiration is suspended, causes. Weak constitutions, as proved by and the face becomes quite injected with black Esquirol and Dr. C. B. Radcliffe, are favorable blood, and assumes a hideous aspect both from to the production of epilepsy. Among other the spasms of its muscles and the blackish or predisposing causes are dentition, the first ap- bluish hue. Sometimes a momentary relaxapearance and the cessation of menstruation, tion is then observed in the limbs; but almost onanism, and the abuse of alcoholic drinks. at once clonic convulsions occur everywhere in Almost all kinds of diseases may produce epi- the trunk, the limbs, the face, and often in the lepsy, but among the principal we must place various internal organs of the bladder, the those affections in which the blood becomes bowels, and even in the uterus. The mouth altered or diminished, and organic affections then ejects a frothy saliva, often reddened with of the membranes of the cerebro-spinal axis blood from the bitten tongue. The respiratory and of certain parts of this nervous centre. muscles, after the first spasms which produce Another very powerful cause, the influence of the scream and suffocation, causing a gurgling which has been demonstrated by Marshall Hall, or hissing sound, become relaxed, and then Kussmaul, Jenner, and Brown-Séquard, is ex- those employed in inspiration contract, and cessive loss of blood. Pregnancy, parturition, almost as soon as air has reached the lungs the and menstruation frequently cause epilepsy. A convulsions cease or notably diminish. Orditumor on a nerve, or any cause of irritation on narily the fit is over in a few minutes; but it the trunk of the terminal part of any sensitive is not unfrequently the case that after a gennerve, and especially in the skin or mucous eral relaxation another seizure comes on, and membrane, very often produces it. A wound, sometimes many occur with very short intera burn, worms in the bowels or elsewhere, stone missions. During the whole time the fit lasts in the bladder or in other places, a foreign the patient is deprived of consciousness, and |