The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 371

REDEMPTIONISTS, better known as TRINITARIANS (q. v.), a name bestowed on an order of monks consecrated to the work of redeeming Christian captives from slavery.

REDESDALE, in Northumberland, the valley of the river Reed, which rises in the Cheviots and flows SE. through pastoral and in part dreary moorland till it joins the North Tyne; at the S. end is the field of OTTERBURN (q. v.).

REDESWIRE, RAID OF THE, a famous Border fight took place in July 1575 at the Cheviot pa.s.s which enters Redesdale; through the timely arrival of the men of Jedburgh the Scots proved victorious; is the subject of a Border ballad.

REDGAUNTLET, an enthusiastic Jacobite character in Sir Walter Scott's novel of the name, distinguished by a "horse-shoe vein on his brow, which would swell up black when he was in anger."

REDGRAVE, RICHARD, painter, born at Pimlico, in London; studied at the Royal Academy, won his first success in "Gulliver on the Farmer's Table," became noted for his _genre_ and landscape paintings, held Government appointments, and published among other works "Reminiscences"

and "A Century of English Painters" (1804-1888).

REDING, ALOYS VON, a Swiss patriot, born in Schwyz; was the bold defender of Swiss independence against the French, in which he was in the end defeated (1755-1818).

REDOUBT KALI, a Russian fort on the E. coast of the Black Sea, 10 m.

N. of Poti, the chief place for shipping Circa.s.sian girls to Turkey; captured by the British in 1854.

REDRUTH (10), a town of Cornwall, on a hilly site nearly 10 m. SW.

of Truro, in the midst of a tin and copper mining district.

RED-TAPE, name given to official formality, from the red-tape employed in tying official doc.u.ments, whence "red-tapism."

REES, ABRAHAM, compiler of "Rees' Cyclopedia" (45 vols.), born in Montgomeryshire; became a tutor at Hoxton Academy, and subsequently ministered in the Unitarian Chapel at Old Jewry for some 40 years (1743-1825).

REEVE, name given to magistrates of various cla.s.ses in early English times, the most important of whom was the SHIRE-REEVE or sheriff, who represented the king in his shire; others were BOROUGH-REEVES, PORT-REEVES, &c.

REEVE, CLARA, an English novelist, born, the daughter of a rector, at Ipswich; the best known of her novels is "The Champion of Virtue,"

afterwards called "The Old English Baron," a work of the school of Mrs.

Radcliffe and of Walpole (1725-1803).

REEVES, JOHN SIMS, distinguished singer, born at Shooter's Hill, Kent; made his first appearance at the age of 18 as a baritone at Newcastle, and then as a tenor, and the foremost in England at the time; performed first in opera and then as a ballad singer at concerts, and took his farewell of the public on May 11, 1891, though he has frequently appeared since; _b_. 1822.

REFERENDUM, a practice which prevails in Switzerland of referring every new legislative measure to the electorate in the several electoral bodies for their approval before it can become law.

REFORM, the name given in England to successive attempts and measures towards the due extension of the franchise in the election of the members of the House of Commons.

REFORMATION, the great event in the history of Europe in the 16th century, characterised as a revolt of light against darkness, on the acceptance or the rejection of which has since depended the destiny for good or evil of the several States composing it, the challenge to each of them being the crucial one, whether they deserved and were fated to continue or perish, and the crucial character of which is visible to-day in the actual conditions of the nations as they said "nay" to it or "yea," the challenge to each at bottom being, is there any truth in you or is there none? Austria, according to Carlyle, henceforth "preferring steady darkness to uncertain new light"; Spain, "people stumbling in steep places in the darkness of midnight"; Italy, "shrugging its shoulders and preferring going into Dilettantism and the Fine Arts"; and France, "with accounts run up on compound interest," had to answer the "writ of summons" with an all too indiscriminate "Protestantism" of its own.

REFORMATION, MORNING STAR OF THE, the t.i.tle given to JOHN WYCLIFFE (q. v.).

REFORMATORIES, schools for the education and reformation of convicted juvenile criminals (under 16). Under an order of court offenders may be placed in one of these inst.i.tutions for from 2 to 5 years after serving a short period of imprisonment. They are supported by the State, the local authorities, and by private subscriptions and sums exacted from parents and guardians. Rules and regulations are supervised by the State. The first one was established in 1838. There are now 62 in Great Britain and Ireland; but the numbers admitted are diminishing at a remarkable rate.

REFORMED CHURCH, the Churches in Switzerland, Holland, Scotland, and elsewhere under Calvin or Zwingle, or both, separated from the Lutheran on matter of both doctrine and policy, and especially in regard to the doctrine of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist.

REFRACTION. Light travels in straight lines; but when a ray travelling through one medium pa.s.ses obliquely into another of either greater or less density it is bent at the point of incidence. This bending or breaking is called refraction. The apparent bend in a stick set sloping in a sheet of water is due to this phenomenon, as are also many mirages and other optical illusions.

REGALIA, the symbols of royalty, and more particularly those used at a coronation. The English regalia include the crown, the sceptre with the cross, the verge or rod with the dove, St. Edward's staff (in reality dating from Charles II.'s coronation), the orbs of king and queen, the sword of mercy called Curtana, the two swords of spiritual and temporal justice, the ring of alliance with the nation, bracelets, spurs, vestments, &c. These are to be seen in the Tower of London, and are valued at 3,000,000. The regalia of Scotland consist of the crown, the sceptre, and sword of State, and are on exhibition in the Crown-room in Edinburgh Castle.

REGENERATION, THE, "new or second birth" required of Christ before any one can become a member of His kingdom, and which, when achieved, is a resolute and irreversible No to the spirit of the world, and a no less resolute and irreversible Yea to the spirit of Christ, the No being as essential to it as the Yea. For as in the philosophy of Hegel, so in the religion of Christ, the negative principle is the creative or the determinative principle. Christianity begins in No, subsists in No, and survives in No to the spirit of the world; this it at first peremptorily spurns, and then disregards as of no account, what things were _gain_ in it becoming _loss_. A stern requirement, but, as Carlyle says, and knew, one is not born the second time any more than the first without sore birth-pangs. See HIS "EVERLASTING NO" IN "SARTOR," LAST PARAGRAPH.

REGENERATION, BAPTISMAL, the doctrine that the power of spiritual life, forfeited by the Fall, is restored to the soul in the sacrament of baptism duly administered.

REGENSBURG. See RATISBON.

REGGIO (24), an Italian seaport; capital of a province of the same name; occupies a charming site on the Strait of Messina; built on the ruins of ancient Rhegium; is the seat of an archbishop; manufactures silks, gloves, hose, &c.

REGICIDES, murderers of a king, but specially applied to the 67 members of the court who tried and condemned Charles I. of England, amongst whom were Cromwell, Bradshaw, Ireton, and others, of whom 10 living at the time of the Restoration were executed, and 25 others imprisoned for life.

REGILLUS, LAKE, celebrated in ancient Roman history as the scene of a great Roman victory over the Latins in 496 B.C.; site probably near the modern town of Frascati.

REGINA, ST., a virgin martyr of the 3rd century, usually depicted as undergoing the torments of martyrdom, or receiving spiritual consolation in prison by a beautiful vision of a dove on a luminous cross.

REGIOMONTa.n.u.s, name adopted by Johann Muller, a celebrated German astronomer and mathematician, born at Konigsberg, in Franconia; appointed professor of Astronomy in Vienna (1461); sojourned in Italy; settled in Nuremberg, where much of his best work was done; a.s.sisted Pope Sixtus IV.

in reforming the Calendar; was made Bishop of Ratisbon; died at Rome; was regarded as the most learned astronomer of the time in Europe, and his works were of great value to Columbus and other early navigators (1436-1476).

REGISTRAR-GENERAL, an official appointed to superintend registration, specially of births, deaths, and marriages.

REGIUM DONUM, an annual grant formerly voted by Parliament to augment the stipends of the Presbyterian clergy in Ireland, discontinued from 1869.

REGNARD, JEAN FRANcOIS, comic dramatist, born in Paris; inherited a fortune, which he increased by gambling; took to travelling, and was at 22 captured by an Algerine pirate, and when ransomed continued to travel; on his return to Paris wrote comedies, twenty-three in number, the best of them being "Le Joueur" and "Le Legataire," following closely in the steps of Moliere; he was admired by Boileau (1656-1710).