The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 342

PAUL, the name of five popes: PAUL I., Pope from 757 to 797; PAUL II., pope from 1464 to 1471; PAUL III., Pope from 1534 to 1549, was zealous against the Protestant cause, excommunicated Henry VIII. in 1536, sanctioned the Jesuit order in 1540, convened and convoked the Council of Trent in 1545; PAUL IV., Pope from 1555 to 1559, originally an ascetic, was zealous for the best interests of the Church and public morality, established the Inquisition at Rome, and issued the first _Index Expurgatorius_; PAUL V., Pope from 1605 to 1621, his pontificate distinguished by protracted strife with the Venetian republic, arising out of the claim of the clergy for immunity from the civil tribunals, and which was brought to an end through the intervention of Henry IV. of France in 1607; it need not be added that he was zealous for orthodoxy, like his predecessors.

PAUL, ST., originally called Saul, the great Apostle of the Gentiles, born at Tarsus, in Cilicia, by birth a Jew and a Roman citizen; trained to severity by Gamaliel at Jerusalem in the Jewish faith, and for a time the bitter persecutor of the Christians, till, on his way to Damascus, in the prosecution of his hostile purposes, the overpowering conviction flashed upon him that he was fighting against the cause that, as a Jew, he should have embraced, and which he was at once smitten with zeal to further, as the one cause on which hinged the salvation, not of the Jews only, but of the whole world. He did more for the extension, if not the exposition, of the Christian faith at its first promulgation than any of the Apostles, and perhaps all of them together, and it is questionable if but for him it would have become, as it has become, the professed religion of the most civilised section of the world.

PAUL I., Czar of Russia, son of the Empress Catharine II., and her successor in 1796; was a despotic and arbitrary ruler; fought with the allies against France, but entered into an alliance with Napoleon in 1799; was murdered by certain of his n.o.bles as he was being forced to abdicate (1734-1801).

PAUL AND VIRGINIA, a celebrated novel by Saint-Pierre, written on the eve of the French Revolution, in which "there rises melodiously, as it were, the wail of a moribund world: everywhere wholesome Nature in unequal conflict with diseased, perfidious art; cannot escape from it in the lowest hut, in the remotest island of the sea"; it records the fate of a child of nature corrupted by the false, artificial sentimentality that prevailed at the time among the upper cla.s.ses of France.

PAUL SAMOSATA, so called as born at Samosata, on the Euphrates, a heresiarch who denied the doctrine of three persons in one G.o.d, was bishop of Antioch, under the sway of Zen.o.bia, but deposed on her defeat by Aurelian in 272.

PAULDING, American writer, born in New York State; author of "History of John Bull and Brother Jonathan," and the novels "The Dutchman's Fireside" and "Westward Ho" (1779-1860).

PAULI, REINHOLD, German historian of England, born in Berlin; studied much in England, and became professor of History at Gottingen; wrote "Life of King Alfred," "History of England from the Accession of Henry II. to the Death of Henry VII.," "Pictures of Old England," and "Simon de Montfort" (1823-1882).

PAULICIANS, a heretical sect founded by Constantine of Mana.n.a.lis about A.D. 660 in Armenia, and persisting in spite of severe persecution, were transferred to Thrace in 970, where remnants were found as late as the 13th century; they held that an evil spirit was the creator and G.o.d of this world, and that G.o.d was the ruler of the next; they refused to ascribe divinity to Christ, to worship Mary, to reverence the cross, or observe the sacraments of Baptism and Eucharist; their name was derived from the special regard in which they held the writings of St. Paul, from which they professed to derive their tenets; they were charged with Manichaeism, but they indignantly repudiated the imputation.

PAULINE, Browning's first poem, written at 19 and published at 21, "breathless, intense, melodramatic," says Professor Saintsbury, "eschewing incident, but delighting in a.n.a.lysis, which was to be one of the poet's points throughout, and ultimately to prevail over the others."

PAULINUS, the first archbishop of York, sent in company with Augustin from Rome by Gregory to Britain in 601: laboured partly in Kent and partly in Northumbria, and persuaded Edwin of Northumbria to embrace Christianity in 629; _d_. 644.

PAULUS, HEINRICH, one of the founders of German rationalism, born near Stuttgart; held in succession sundry professorships; denied the miraculous in the Scripture history, and invented ingenious rational explanations, now out of date (1761-1851).

PAUSANIAS, a famous Spartan general, the grandson of Leonidas, who, as commander-in-chief of the Greeks, overthrew the Persian army under Mardonius at Plataea in 479, but who, elated by this and other successes, aimed at the sovereignty of Greece by alliance with Xerxes, and being discovered, took refuge in a temple at Athens, where he was blockaded and starved to death in 477 B.C., his mother throwing the first stone of the pile that was cast up to bar his exit.

PAUSANIAS, a Greek traveller and topographer, lived during the reigns of Antoninus Pius and M. Aurelius; wrote an "Itinerary of Greece"

in 10 books, the fruit of his own peregrinations, full of descriptions of great value both to the historian and the antiquary.

PAVIA (30), on the Ticino, in Lombardy, is an imposing "city of a hundred towers," with little industry or commerce; in its unfinished cathedral St. Augustine was buried; San Michele, where the early kings of Italy were crowned, dates from the 7th century; the University was founded by Charlemagne, and has now attached to it colleges for poor students, a library, museum, botanic garden, and school of art; stormed by Napoleon in 1796, Pavia was in Austrian possession from 1814 till its inclusion in the kingdom of Italy 1859.

PAXTON, SIR JOSEPH, architect of the Crystal Palace, born in Bedfordshire, was originally a gardener in the service of the Duke of Devonshire, and promoted to the charge of the duke's gardens at Chatsworth, where he displayed the architectural ability in the construction of large gla.s.s conservatories which developed itself in the construction of the Great Exhibition of 1851, for which he received the honour of knighthood (1803-1865).

PAYN, JAMES, English novelist, born at Cheltenham; edited _Chambers's Journal_ and _Cornhill Magazine_; his novels were numerous and of average quality, "Lost Sir Ma.s.singberd" and "By Proxy" among the most successful (1830-1899).

PAYNE, JOHN, actor and playwright, born in New York; resided in London from 1813 to 1832; most of his days a stranger in a strange land, immortalised himself as the author of "Home, Sweet Home"; only his remains buried at home 30 years after his death at Tunis (1792-1852).

PEABODY, GEORGE, philanthropist, born at Danvers, now Peabody, in Ma.s.sachusetts, U.S.; made a large fortune as a dry-goods merchant in Baltimore and as a stockbroker as well in London; gave away for benevolent purposes in his lifetime a million and a half of money, and left to his relatives one million more; died in London; his body was laid beside his mother's at South Danvers, U.S. (1795-1869).

PEACE SOCIETY, a society founded in 1816 for the promotion of permanent and universal peace; advocates a gradual, proportionate, and simultaneous disarmament of all nations and the principle of arbitration.

PEAc.o.c.k, THOMAS LOVE, English novelist, born at Weymouth; was pretty much a self-taught scholar, and no mean one, as his literary activity over half a century abundantly showed; held a post in the India House, his predecessor being James Mill and his successor John Stuart Mill; was an intimate friend of Sh.e.l.ley and the father-in-law of George Meredith; he made his first literary appearance as a poet in two small volumes of poems, and his first novel was "Headlong Hall" as his latest was "Gryll Grange," all of them written in a vein of conventional satire, and more conspicuous for wit than humour; Thackeray owed not a little to him, little as the generality did, he being "too learned for a shallow age"

(1785-1866).

PEARSON, JOHN, English prelate, born in Norfolk; held a succession of preferments in the Church, and in the end the bishopric of Chester, author of a very learned work "Exposition of the Creed," of which Bentley said, "its very dross is gold" (1612-1686).

PEASANT WAR or BAUERNKRIEG, revolt of the peasantry in the S.

and W. of Germany against the oppression and cruelty of the n.o.bles and clergy which broke out at different times from 1500 to 1525, and which, resulting in their defeat, rendered their lot harder than before. The cause of the Reformation, held answerable for the movement, suffered damage as well, but indeed the excesses of the insurgents were calculated to provoke the retribution that was meted out to them.

PECHILI, GULF OF, a great land-locked bay opening in the NW. of the Yellow Sea, receives the waters of the Hoang-ho, and on opposite tongues of land at the mouth of it stand Port Arthur and Wei-hai-Wei.

PECKSNIFF, a p.r.o.nounced hypocrite in d.i.c.kens's "Martin Chuzzlewit,"

and who lies and cants whether he is drunk or sober.

PEc.o.c.k, REGINALD, bishop in succession of St. Asaph and Chichester, born in Wales; the author, among other works, of the "Repressor of Over Much Blaming of the Clergy" and the "Book of Faith"; he wrote on behalf of the Church against Lollards, but he offended Churchmen as well as the latter--Churchmen because he agreed with the Lollards in regard to the Bible as the rule of faith, and the Lollards because he appealed to reason as the interpreter of the Bible; he displeased the clergy also by his adoption in theological debate of the mother-tongue, but figures since in literature as the first English theologian; he was accused of treating authority with disrespect as well as setting up reason above revelation, obliged to recant in a most humiliating manner, deprived of his bishopric, and condemned to solitary confinement, away from his books, all to a few, and denied the use of writing materials (1390-1460).

PEDRO I., emperor of Brazil, second son of John VI. of Portugal; reigned from 1822 to 1831, when he abdicated in favour of his son (1798-1834).

PEDRO II., emperor of Brazil, son of preceding, ascended the throne in 1831; reigned peacefully till 1889, when a sudden revolution obliged him to resign, and retire to Europe and take up his abode in France, where he indulged his taste for science and learning (1825-1891).

PEEBLES, PETER, a character in Scott's "Redgauntlet."

PEEBLESSHIRE (19), a lowland Scottish county bordered by Lanark, Midlothian, Selkirk, and Dumfries; comprises hilly pastoral land watered by the upper Tweed; Windlestraw, Hartfell, and Broadlaw are the highest of its gra.s.sy hills; among the lesser rivers are the Leithen and Quair; some crops are grown, but most of the land is devoted to sheep grazing; a little coal is found in the N.; the only towns are Innerleithen (3) and PEEBLES (5), the county town, engaged in Tweed manufacture. The county is known also by the name of Tweeddale; its representation in Parliament is united with that of Selkirk.

PEEL (4), a fishing town and holiday resort on the W. coast of the Isle of Man, 12 m. NW. of Douglas; it is noted for its castle.

PEEL, SIR ROBERT, English statesman, born near Bury, Lancashire, the son of a wealthy cotton-spinner, to whose large fortune and baronetcy he succeeded; graduated at Oxford in 1808, and next year entered Parliament as Tory member for Cashel; he afterwards sat for his own university, and after 1832 for Tamworth; he was appointed Under-Secretary for the Colonies in 1811. and from 1812 till 1818 was Secretary for Ireland; in 1822 he became Home Secretary, but seceded from the Government when Canning became Premier in 1827; the question at issue was Catholic Emanc.i.p.ation, and it was characteristic of Peel that in the Government which succeeded Canning's he had the courage, having changed his opinions, to introduce the measure which removed the disabilities; opposed to Reform he became leader of the Conservative opposition in the Parliament of 1833; called to the Premiership in 1834 he could not maintain his administration, and it was not till 1841 that the victory of protection over the free-trade agitation gave him a stable majority in the Commons; his first measure was a modification of the corn laws on protectionist principles, 1842; then followed the 7d. income-tax and general tariff revision; in 1845 the agitation for free-trade in corn was brought to a crisis by the Irish potato famine; Peel yielded, and next year carried the final repeal of the corn laws; his "conversion" split the Tory party and he retired from office, becoming a supporter of the Whig ministry in its economical and ecclesiastical policy; he was a master of finance, an easy speaker, slow to form but conscientious to act upon his convictions, a man of the highest character; his death was the result of a fall from horseback (1788-1850).

PEEL TOWERS, the name given to fortresses of the moss-troopers on the Scottish border.