[1] In practice this means every one receiving such a patent,
commission or appointment.
ESQUIROL, JEAN ETIENNE DOMINIQUE (1772-1840), French alienist, was born
at Toulouse on the 3rd of February 1772. In 1794 he became a pupil of
the military hospital of Narbonne, and subsequently studied in Paris at
the Salpetriere under P. Pinel, whose assistant he became. In 1811 he
was chosen physician to the Salpetriere, and in 1817 he began a course
of lectures on the treatment of the insane, in which he made such
revelations of the abuses existing in the lunatic asylums of France that
the government appointed a commission to inquire into the subject.
Esquirol in this and other ways greatly assisted Pinel's efforts for the
introduction of humaner methods. The asylums of Rouen, Nantes and
Montpellier were built in accordance with his plans. In 1823 he became
inspector-general of the university of Paris for the faculties of
medicine, and in 1826 chief physician of the asylum at Charenton. He
died at Paris on the 13th of December 1840. Besides contributing to the
_Dictionnaire des sciences medicales_ and the _Encyclopedie des gens du
monde_, Esquirol wrote _Des maladies mentales, considerees sous les
rapports medical, hygienique, et medico-legal_ (2 vols., Paris, 1838).
ESQUIROS, HENRI FRANCOIS ALPHONSE (1812-1876), French writer, was born
in Paris on the 23rd of May 1812. After some minor publications he
produced _L'Evangile du peuple_ (1840), an exposition of the life and
character of Jesus as a social reformer. This work was considered an
offence against religion and decency, and Esquiros was fined and
imprisoned. He was elected in 1850 as a social democrat to the
Legislative Assembly, but was exiled in 1851 for his opposition to the
Empire. Returning to France in 1869 he was again a member of the
Legislative Assembly, and in 1876 was elected to the senate. He died at
Versailles on the 12th of May 1876. He turned to account his residence
in England in _L'Angleterre et la vie anglaise_ (5 vols., 1859-1869).
Among his numerous works on social subjects may be noted:--_Histoire des
Montagnards_ (2 vols., 1847); _Paris, ou les sciences, les institutions
et les moeurs au XIX^e siecle_ (2 vols., 1847); and _Histoire des
martyrs de la liberte_ (1851).
ESS, JOHANN HEINRICH VAN (1772-1847), German Catholic theologian, was
born at Warburg, Westphalia, on the 15th of February 1772. He was
educated at the Dominican gymnasium of his native town, and in 1790
entered, as a novice, the Benedictine abbey of Marienmunster, in the
bishopric of Paderborn. His Benedictine name was Leander. He was priest
at Schwalenberg from 1799 to 1812, after which he became extraordinary
professor of theology and joint-director of the teachers' seminary at
Marburg. In 1818 he received the doctorate of theology and of canonical
law. In 1807, in conjunction with his cousin Karl van Ess, he had
published a German translation of the New Testament, and, as its
circulation was discountenanced by his superiors, he published in 1808 a
defence of his views, entitled _Auszuge aus den heiligen Vatern und
anderen Lehrern der katholischen Kirche uber das nothwendige und
nutzliche Bibellesen_. An improved edition of this tractate was
published in 1816, under the title _Gedanken uber Bibel und Bibellehre_,
and in the same year appeared _Was war die Bibel den ersten Christen?_
In 1822 he published the first part of a German translation of the Old
Testament, which was completed in 1836. In 1822 he resigned his offices
at Marburg in order to devote his whole time to the defence of his views
regarding Bible reading by the people, and to endeavour to promote the
circulation of the scriptures. He was associated first with the Catholic
Bible Society of Regensburg, and then with the British and Foreign Bible
Society. He died at Affolderbach in the Odenwald on the 13th of October
1847.
ESSAY, ESSAYIST (Fr. _essai_, Late Lat. _exagium_, a weighing or
balance; _exigere_, to examine; the term in general meaning any trial or
effort). As a form of literature, the essay is a composition of moderate
length, usually in prose, which deals in an easy, cursory way with the
external conditions of a subject, and, in strictness, with that subject,
only as it affects the writer. Dr Johnson, himself an eminent essayist,
defines an essay as "an irregular, undigested piece"; the irregularity
may perhaps be admitted, but want of thought, that is to say lack of
proper mental digestion, is certainly not characteristic of a fine
example. It should, on the contrary, always be the brief and light
result of experience and profound meditation, while "undigested" is the
last epithet to be applied to the essays of Montaigne, Addison or Lamb.
Bacon said that the Epistles of Seneca were "essays," but this can
hardly be allowed. Bacon himself goes on to admit that "the word is
late, though the thing is ancient." The word, in fact, was invented for
this species of writing by Montaigne, who merely meant that these were
experiments in a new kind of literature. This original meaning, namely
that these pieces were attempts or endeavours, feeling their way towards
the expression of what would need a far wider space to exhaust, was lost
in England in the course of the eighteenth century. This is seen by the
various attempts made in the nineteenth century to coin a word which
should express a still smaller work, as distinctive in comparison with
the essay as the essay is by the side of the monograph; none of these
linguistic experiments, such as _essayette_, _essaykin_ (Thackeray) and
_essaylet_ (Helps) have taken hold of the language. As a matter of fact,
the journalistic word _article_ covers the lesser form of essay,
although not exhaustively, since the essays in the monthly and quarterly
reviews, which are fully as extended as an essay should ever be, are
frequently termed "articles," while many "articles" in newspapers,
dictionaries and encyclopaedias are in no sense essays. It may be said
that the idea of a detached work is combined with the word "essay,"
which should be neither a section of a disquisition nor a chapter in a
book which aims at the systematic development of a story. Locke's _Essay
on the Human Understanding_ is not an essay at all, or cluster of
essays, in this technical sense, but refers to the experimental and
tentative nature of the inquiry which the philosopher was undertaking.
Of the curious use of the word so repeatedly made by Pope mention will
be made below.
The essay, as a species of literature, was invented by Montaigne, who
had probably little suspicion of the far-reaching importance of what he
had created. In his dejected moments, he turned to rail at what he had
written, and to call his essays "inepties" and "sottises." But in his
own heart he must have been well satisfied with the new and beautiful
form which he had added to literary tradition. He was perfectly aware
that he had devised a new thing; that he had invented a way of
communicating himself to the world as a type of human nature. He
designed it to carry out his peculiar object, which was to produce an
accurate portrait of his own soul, not as it was yesterday or will be
to-morrow, but as it is to-day. It is not often that we can date with
any approach to accuracy the arrival of a new class of literature into
the world, but it was in the month of March 1571 that the essay was
invented. It was started in the second story of the old tower of the
castle of Montaigne, in a study to which the philosopher withdrew for
that purpose, surrounded by his books, close to his chapel, sheltered
from the excesses of a fatiguing world. He wrote slowly, not
systematically; it took nine years to finish the two first books of the
essays. In 1574 the manuscript of the work, so far as it was then
completed, was nearly lost, for it was confiscated by the pontifical
police in Rome, where Montaigne was residing, and was not returned to
the author for four months. The earliest imprint saw the light in 1580,
at Bordeaux, and the Paris edition of 1588, which is the fifth, contains
the final text of the great author. These dates are not negligible in
the briefest history of the essay, for they are those of its revelation
to the world of readers. It was in the delightful chapters of his new,
strange book that Montaigne introduced the fashion of writing briefly,
irregularly, with constant digressions and interruptions, about the
world as it appears to the individual who writes. The _Essais_ were
instantly welcomed, and few writers of the Renaissance had so instant
and so vast a popularity as Montaigne. But while the philosophy, and
above all the graceful stoicism, of the great master were admired and
copied in France, the exact shape in which he had put down his thoughts,
in the exquisite negligence of a series of essays, was too delicate to
tempt an imitator. It is to be noted that neither Charron, nor Mlle de
Gournay, his most immediate disciples, tried to write essays. But
Montaigne, who liked to fancy that the Eyquem family was of English
extraction, had spoken affably of the English people as his "cousins,"
and it has always been admitted that his genius has an affinity with the
English. He was early read in England, and certainly by Bacon, whose is
the second great name connected with this form of literature. It was in
1597, only five years after the death of Montaigne, that Bacon published
in a small octavo the first ten of his essays. These he increased to 38
in 1612 and to 58 in 1625. In their first form, the essays of Bacon had
nothing of the fulness or grace of Montaigne's; they are meagre notes,
scarcely more than the headings for discourses. It is possible that when
he wrote them he was not yet familiar with the style of his predecessor,
which was first made popular in England, in 1603, when Florio published
that translation of the _Essais_ which Shakespeare unquestionably read.
In the later editions Bacon greatly expanded his theme, but he never
reached, or but seldom, the freedom and ease, the seeming formlessness
held in by an invisible chain, which are the glory of Montaigne, and
distinguish the typical essayist. It would seem that at first, in
England, as in France, no lesser writer was willing to adopt a title
which belonged to so great a presence as that of Bacon or Montaigne. The
one exception was Sir William Cornwallis (d. 1631), who published essays
in 1600 and 1617, of slight merit, but popular in their day. No other
English essayist of any importance appeared until the Restoration, when
Abraham Cowley wrote eleven "Several Discourses by way of Essays," which
did not see the light until 1668. He interspersed with his prose,
translations and original pieces in verse, but in other respects Cowley
keeps much nearer than Bacon to the form of Montaigne. Cowley's essay
"Of Myself" is a model of what these little compositions should be. The
name of Bacon inspires awe, but it is really not he, but Cowley, who is
the father of the English essay; and it is remarkable that he has had no
warmer panegyrists than his great successors, Charles Lamb and Macaulay.
Towards the end of the century, Sir George Mackenzie (1636-1691) wrote
witty moral discourses, which were, however, essays rather in name than
form. Whenever, however, we reach the eighteenth century, we find the
essay suddenly became a dominant force in English literature. It made
its appearance almost as a new thing, and in combination with the
earliest developments of journalism. On the 12th of April 1709 appeared
the first number of a penny newspaper, entitled the _Tatler_, a main
feature of which was to amuse and instruct fashionable readers by a
series of short papers dealing with the manifold occurrences of life,
_quicquid agunt homines_. But it was not until Steele, the founder of
the _Tatler_, was joined by Addison that the eighteenth-century essay
really started upon its course. It displayed at first, and indeed it
long retained, a mixture of the manner of Montaigne with that of La
Bruyere, combining the form of the pure essay with that of the
character-study, as modelled on Theophrastus, which had been so popular
in England throughout the seventeenth century. Addison's early _Tatler_
portraits, in particular such as those of "Tom Folio" and "Ned Softly,"
are hardly essays. But Steele's "Recollections of Childhood" is, and
here we may observe the type on which Goldsmith, Lamb and R.L. Stevenson
afterwards worked. In January 1711 the _Tatler_ came to an end, and was
almost immediately followed by the _Spectator_, and in 1713 by the
_Guardian_. These three newspapers are storehouses of admirable and
typical essays, the majority of them written by Steele and Addison, who
are the most celebrated eighteenth-century essayists in England. Later
in the century, after the publication of other less successful
experiments, appeared Fielding's essays in the _Covent Garden Journal_
(1752) and Johnson's in the _Rambler_ (1750), the _Adventurer_ (1752)
and the _Idler_ (1759). There followed a great number of polite
journals, in which the essay was treated as "the bow of Ulysses in which
it was the fashion for men of rank and genius to try their strength."
Goldsmith reached a higher level than the Chesterfields and Bonnel
Thorntons had dreamed of, in the delicious sections of his _Citizen of
the World_ (1760). After Goldsmith, the eighteenth-century essay
declined into tamer hands, and passed into final feebleness with the
pedantic Richard Cumberland and the sentimental Henry Mackenzie. The
_corpus_ of eighteenth-century essayists is extremely voluminous, and
their reprinted works fill some fifty volumes. There is, however, a
great sameness about all but the very best of them, and in no case do
they surpass Addison in freshness, or have they ventured to modify the
form he adopted for his lucubrations. What has survived of them all is
the lightest portion, but it should not be forgotten that a very large
section of the essays of that age were deliberately didactic and
"moral." A great revival of the essay took place during the first
quarter of the nineteenth century, and foremost in the history of this
movement must always be placed the name of Charles Lamb. He perceived
that the real business of the essay, as Montaigne had conceived it, was
to be largely personal. The famous _Essays of Elia_ began to appear in
the _London Magazine_ for August 1820, and proceeded at fairly regular
intervals until December 1822; early in 1823 the first series of them
were collected in a volume. The peculiarity of Lamb's style as an
essayist was that he threw off the Addisonian and still more the
Johnsonian tradition, which had become a burden that crushed the life
out of each conventional essay, and that he boldly went back to the rich
verbiage and brilliant imagery of the seventeenth century for his
inspiration. It is true that Lamb had great ductility of style, and
that, when he pleases, he can write so like Steele that Steele himself
might scarcely know the difference, yet in his freer flights we are
conscious of more exalted masters, of Milton, Thomas Browne and Jeremy
Taylor. He succeeded, moreover, in reaching a poignant note of personal
feeling, such as none of his predecessors had ever aimed at; the essays
called "Dream Children" and "Blakesmoor" are examples of this, and they
display a degree of harmony and perfection in the writing of the pure
essay such as had never been attempted before, and has never since been
reached. Leigh Hunt, clearing away all the didactic and pompous elements
which had overgrown the essay, restored it to its old _Spectator_ grace,
and was the most easy nondescript writer of his generation in
periodicals such as the _Indicator_ (1819) and the _Companion_ (1828).
The sermons, letters and pamphlets of Sydney Smith were really essays of
an extended order. In Hazlitt and Francis Jeffrey we see the form and
method of the essay beginning to be applied to literary criticism. The
writings of De Quincey are almost exclusively essays, although many of
the most notable of them, under his vehement pen, have far outgrown the
limits of the length laid down by the most indulgent formalist. His
biographical and critical essays are interesting, but they are far from
being trustworthy models in form or substance. In a sketch, however
rapid, of the essay in the nineteenth century, prominence must be given
to the name of Macaulay. His earliest essay, that on Milton, appeared in
the _Edinburgh Review_ in 1825, very shortly after the revelation of
Lamb's genius in "Elia." No two products cast in the same mould could,
however, be more unlike in substance. In the hands of Macaulay the essay
ceases to be a confession or an autobiography; it is strictly
impersonal, it is literary, historical or controversial, vigorous,
trenchant and full of party prejudice. The periodical publication of
Macaulay's Essays in the _Edinburgh Review_ went on until 1844; when we
cast our eyes over this mass of brilliant writing we observe with
surprise that it is almost wholly contentious. Nothing can be more
remarkable than the difference in this respect between Lamb and
Macaulay, the former for ever demanding, even cajoling, the sympathy of
the reader, the latter scanning the horizon for an enemy to controvert.
In later times the essay in England has been cultivated in each of these
ways, by a thousand journalists and authors. The "leaders" of a daily
newspaper are examples of the popularization of the essay, and they
point to the danger which now attacks it, that of producing a purely
ephemeral or even momentary species of effect. The essay, in its best
days, was intended to be as lasting as a poem or a historical monograph;
it aimed at being one of the most durable and precious departments of
literature. We still occasionally see the production of essays which
have this more ambitious aim; within the last quarter of the nineteenth
century the essays of R.L. Stevenson achieved it. His _Familiar Studies_
are of the same class as those of Montaigne and Lamb, and he approached
far more closely than any other contemporary to their high level of
excellence. We have seen that the tone of the essay should be personal
and confidential; in Stevenson's case it was characteristically so. But
the voices which please the public in a strain of pure self-study are
few at all times, and with the cultivation of the analytic habit they
tend to become less original and attractive. It is possible that the
essay may die of exhaustion of interest, or may survive only in the
modified form of accidental journalism.
The essay, although invented by a great French writer, was very late in
making itself at home in France. The so-called _Essais_ of Leibnitz,
Nicole, Yves Marie Andre and so many others were really treatises.
Voltaire's famous _Essai sur les moeurs des nations_ is an elaborate
historical disquisition in nearly two hundred chapters. Later, the
voluminous essays of Joseph de Maistre and of Lamennais were not essays
at all in the literary sense. On the other hand, the admirable
_Causeries du lundi_ of Sainte-Beuve (1804-1869) are literary essays in
the fulness of the term, and have been the forerunners of a great army
of brilliant essay-writing in France. Among those who have specially
distinguished themselves as French essayists may be mentioned Theophile
Gautier, Paul de Saint-Victor, Anatole France, Jules Lemaitre, Ferdinand
Brunetiere and Emile Faguet. All these are literary critics, and it is
in the form of the analysis of manifestations of intellectual energy
that the essay has been most successfully illustrated in France. All the
countries of Europe, since the middle of the 19th century, have adopted
this form of writing; such monographs or reviews, however, are not
perfectly identical with the essay as it was conceived by Addison and
Lamb. This last, it may be supposed, is a definitely English thing, and
this view is confirmed by the fact that in several European languages
the word "essayist" has been adopted without modification.
In the above remarks it has been taken for granted that the essay is
always in prose. Pope, however, conceived an essay in heroic verse. Of
this his _Essay on Criticism_ (1711) and his _Essay on Man_ (1732-1734)
are not good examples, for they are really treatises. The so-called
_Moral Essays_ (1720-1735), on the contrary, might have been
contributed, if in prose, either to the _Spectator_ or the _Guardian_.
The idea of pure essays, in verse, however, did not take any root in
English literature. (E. G.)
ESSEG, ESSEGG or ESSEK (Hung. _Esszek_; Croatian _Osjek_), a royal free
town, municipality, and capital of the county of Virovitica (_Verocze_),
in Croatia-Slavonia, on the right bank of the Drave, 9 m. W. of its
confluence with the Danube, and 185 m. S. of Buda-Pest by rail. Pop.
(1900) 24,930; chiefly Magyars and Croats, with a few Germans and Jews.
At Esseg the Drave is crossed by two bridges, and below these it is
navigable by small steamers. The upper town, with the fortress, is under
military authority; the new town and the lower town, which is the
headquarters of commerce, are under civil authority. The only buildings
of note are the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, Franciscan and
Capuchin monasteries, synagogue, gymnasium, modern school, hospital,
chamber of commerce, and law-courts. Esseg has a thriving trade in
grain, fruit, live-stock, plum-brandy and timber. Tanning, silk-weaving
and glass-blowing are also carried on.
Esseg owes its origin to its fortress, which existed as early as the
time of the Romans under the name of _Mursia_; though the present
structure dates only from 1720. At the beginning of the Hungarian
revolution of 1848 the town was held by the Hungarians, but on the 4th
of February 1849 it was taken by the Austrians under General Baron
Trebersberg.
ESSEN, a manufacturing town of Germany, in the Prussian Rhine province,
22 m. N.E. from Dusseldorf, on the main line of railway to Berlin, in an
undulating and densely populated district. Pop. (1849) 8813; (1875)
54,790; (1905) 229,270. It lies at the centre of a network of railways
giving it access to all the principal towns of the Westphalian iron and
coal fields. Its general aspect is gloomy; it possesses few streets of
any pretensions, though those in the old part, which are mostly narrow,
present, with their grey slate roofs and green shutters, a picturesque
appearance. Of its religious edifices (twelve Roman Catholic, one Old
Catholic, six Protestant churches, and a synagogue) the minster, dating
from the 10th century, with fine pictures, relics and wall frescoes, is
alone especially remarkable. This building is very similar to the
Pfalz-Kapelle (_capella in palatio_) at Aix-la-Chapelle. Among the
town's principal secular buildings are the new Gothic town-hall, the
post office and the railway station. There are several high-grade
(classical and modern) schools, technical, mining and commercial
schools, a theatre, a permanent art exhibition, and hospitals. Essen
also has a beautiful public park in the immediate vicinity. The town
originally owed its prosperity to the large iron and coal fields
underlying the basin in which it is situated. Chief among its industrial
establishments are the famous iron and steel works of Krupp (q.v.), and
the whole of Essen may be said to depend for its livelihood upon this
firm, which annually expends vast sums in building and supporting
churches, schools, clubs, hospitals and philanthropic institutions, and
in other ways providing for the welfare of its employees. There are also
manufactories of woollen goods and cigars, dyeworks and breweries.
Essen was originally the seat of a Benedictine nunnery, and was formed
into a town about the middle of the 10th century by the abbess Hedwig.
The abbess of the nunnery, who held from 1275 the rank of a princess of
the Empire, was assisted by a chapter of ten princesses and countesses;
she governed the town until 1803, when it was secularized and
incorporated with Prussia. In 1807 it came into the possession of the
grand dukes of Berg, but was transferred to Prussia in 1814.
See Funcke, _Geschichte des Furstenthums und der Stadt Essen_
(Elberfeld, 1851); Kellen, _Die Industriestadt Essen in Wort und Bild_
(Essen, 1902); and A. Shadwell, _Industrial Efficiency_ (London,
1906).
ESSENES, a monastic order among the Jews prior to Christianity. Their
first appearance in history is in the time of Jonathan the Maccabee
(161-144 B.C.). How much older they may have been we have no means of
determining, but our authorities agree in assigning to them a dateless
antiquity. The name occurs in Greek, in the two forms [Greek: Essenoi]
and [Greek: Essaioi]. [Greek: Essenoi] is used by Josephus fourteen
times, [Greek: Essaioi] six, but the latter is the only form used by
Philo (ii. 457, 471, 632). [Greek: Essenoi] is also used by Synesius and
Hippolytus, and its Latin equivalent by Pliny and Solinus; [Greek:
Essaioi] by Hegesippus and Porphyry. In Epiphanius we find the forms
[Greek: Ossaioi, Ossenoi], and [Greek: Iessaioi]. There is a place named
Essa mentioned by Josephus (Ant. xiii. 15, S 3), from which the name may
have been formed, just as the Christians were originally called [Greek:
Nazarenoi] or [Greek: Nazoraioi], from Nazara. This etymology, however,
is not much in favour now. Lightfoot explains the name as meaning "the
silent ones," others as meaning "physicians." Perhaps there is most
authority in favour of deriving it from the Syriac [Hebrew: chseich],
which in the emphatic state becomes [Hebrew: chaseia], so that we have a
Semitic correspondence to both the Greek forms [Greek: Essenoi] and
[Greek: Essaioi]. This etymology makes the word mean "pious." It has
also been urged in excuse for Philo's absurd derivation from [Greek:
hosios].
The original accounts we have of them are confined to three
authors--Philo, Pliny the Elder, and Josephus. Philo describes them in
his treatise known as _Quod omnis probus liber_ (SS 12, 13; ii.
457-460), and also in his "Apology for the Jews," a fragment of which
has been preserved by Eusebius (_Praep. Ev._ viii. 11, 12). Pliny
(_N.H._ v. 17) has a short but striking sketch of them, derived in all
probability from Alexander Polyhistor, who is mentioned among the
authorities for the fifth book of his _Natural History_. This historian,
of whom Eusebius had a very high opinion (_Praep. Ev._ ix. 17, S 1),
lived in the time of Sulla. Josephus treats of them at length in his
_Jewish War_ (ii. 8), and more briefly in two passages of his
_Antiquities_ (xiii. 5, S 9; xviii. 1, S 5). He has also interesting
accounts of the prophetic powers possessed by three individual members
of the sect--Judas (_B.J._ i. 3, S 5; _Ant._ xiii. 11, S 2), Menahem
(_Ant._ xv. 10, S 5), and Simon (_B.J._ ii. 7, S 3; _Ant._ xvii. 13, S
3). Besides this he mentions an Essene Gate in Jerusalem (_B.J._ v. 4, S
2) and a person called John the Essene, one of the bravest and most
capable leaders in the war against the Romans (_B.J._ ii. 20, S 4; iii.
2, S 1). Josephus himself made trial of the sect of Essenes in his
youth; but from his own statement it appears that he must have been a
very short time with them, and therefore could not have been initiated
into the inner mysteries of the society (_De vita sua_, 2). After this
the notices that we have of the Essenes from antiquity are mere
reproductions, except in the case of Epiphanius (died A.D. 402), who,
however, is so confused a writer as to be of little value. Solinus, who
was known as "Pliny's Ape," echoed the words of his master about a
century after that writer's death, which took place in A.D. 79.
Similarly Hippolytus, who lived in the reign of Commodus (A.D. 180-192),
reproduced the account of Josephus, adding a few touches of his own.
Porphyry (A.D. 233-306) afterwards did the same, but had the grace to
mention Josephus in the context. Eusebius quoted the account as from
Porphyry, though he must have known that _he_ had derived it from
Josephus (_Praep. Ev._ ix. 3, SS 1, 13). But Porphyry's name would
impress pagan readers. There is also a mention of the Essenes by
Hegesippus (Eus. _H.E._ iv. 22) and by Synesius in his life of Dio
Chrysostom. It has been conjectured that the Clementine literature
emanated from Essenes who had turned Christian. (See EBIONITES.)
The Essenes were an exclusive society, distinguished from the rest of
the Jewish nation in Palestine by an organization peculiar to
themselves, and by a theory of life in which a severe asceticism and a
rare benevolence to one another and to mankind in general were the most
striking characteristics. They had fixed rules for initiation, a
succession of strictly separate grades within the limits of the society,
and regulations for the conduct of their daily life even in its minutest
details. Their membership could be recruited only from the outside
world, as marriage and all intercourse with women were absolutely
renounced. They were the first society in the world to condemn slavery
both in theory and practice; they enforced and practised the most
complete community of goods. They chose their own priests and public
office-bearers, and even their own judges. Though their prevailing
tendency was practical, and the tenets of the society were kept a
profound secret, it is perfectly clear from the concurrent testimony of
Philo and Josephus that they cultivated a kind of speculation, which not
only accounts for their spiritual asceticism, but indicates a great
deviation from the normal development of Judaism, and a profound
sympathy with Greek philosophy, and probably also with Oriental ideas.
At the same time we do our Jewish authorities no injustice in imputing
to them the patriotic tendency to idealize the society, and thus offer
to their readers something in Jewish life that would bear comparison at
least with similar manifestations of Gentile life.
There is some difficulty in determining how far the Essenes separated
themselves locally from their fellow-countrymen. Josephus informs us
that they had no single city of their own, but that many of them dwelt
in every city. While in his treatise _Quod omnis_, &c., Philo speaks of
their avoiding towns and preferring to live in villages, in his "Apology
for the Jews" we find them living in many cities, villages, and in great
and prosperous towns. In Pliny they are a perennial colony settled on
the western shore of the Dead Sea. On the whole, as Philo and Josephus
agree in estimating their number at 4000 (Philo, _Q.O.P.L._ S 12; Jos.
_Ant._ xviii. 1, S 5), we are justified in suspecting some exaggeration
as to the many cities, towns and villages where they were said to be
found. As agriculture was their favourite occupation, and as their
tendency was to withdraw from the haunts and ordinary interests of
mankind, we may assume that with the growing confusion and corruption of
Jewish society they felt themselves attracted from the mass of the
population to the sparsely peopled districts, till they found a
congenial settlement and free scope for their peculiar view of life by
the shore of the Dead Sea. While their principles were consistent with
the neighbourhood of men, they were better adapted to a state of
seclusion.
The Essenes did not renounce marriage because they denied the validity
of the institution or the necessity of it as providing for the
continuance of the human race, but because they had a low opinion of the
character of women (Jos. _B.J._ ii. 8, S 2; Philo, "Apol. for the Jews"
in Eus. _Praep. Ev._ viii. 11, S 8). They adopted children when very
young, and brought them up on their own principles. Pleasure generally
they rejected as evil. They despised riches not less than pleasure;
neither poverty nor wealth was observable among them; at initiation
every one gave his property into the common stock; every member in
receipt of wages handed them over to the funds of the society. In
matters of dress the asceticism of the society was very pronounced. They
regarded oil as a defilement, even washing it off if anointed with it
against their will. They did not change their clothes or their shoes
till they were torn in pieces or worn completely away. The colour of
their garments was always white. Their daily routine was prescribed for
them in the strictest manner. Before the rising of the sun they were to
speak of nothing profane, but offered to it certain traditional forms of
prayer as if beseeching it to rise. Thereafter they went about their
daily tasks, working continuously at whatever trade they knew till the
fifth hour, when they assembled, and, girding on a garment of linen,
bathed in cold water. They next seated themselves quietly in the dining
hall, where the baker set bread in order, and the cook brought each a
single dish of one kind of food. Before meat and after it grace was said
by a priest. After dinner they resumed work till sunset. In the evening
they had supper, at which guests of the order joined them, if there
happened to be any such present. Withal there was no noise or confusion
to mar the tranquillity of their intercourse; no one usurped more than
his share of the conversation; the stillness of the place oppressed a
stranger with a feeling of mysterious awe. This composure of spirit was
owing to their perfect temperance in eating and drinking. Not only in
the daily routine of the society, but generally, the activity of the
members was controlled by their presidents. In only two things could
they take the initiative, helpfulness and mercy; the deserving poor and
the destitute were to receive instant relief; but no member could give
anything to his relatives without consulting the heads of the society.
Their office-bearers were elected. They had also their special courts of
justice, which were composed of not less than a hundred members, and
their decisions, which were arrived at with extreme care, were
irreversible. Oaths were strictly forbidden; their word was stronger
than an oath. They were just and temperate in anger, the guardians of
good faith, and the ministers of peace, obedient to their elders and to
the majority. But the moral characteristics which they most earnestly
cultivated and enjoined will best appear in their rules of initiation.
There was a novitiate of three years, during which the intending member
was tested as to his fitness for entering the society. If the result was
satisfactory, he was admitted, but before partaking of the common meal
he was required to swear awful oaths, that he would reverence the deity,
do justice to men, hurt no man voluntarily or at the command of another,
hate the unjust and assist the just, and that he would render fidelity
to all men, but especially to the rulers, seeing that no one rules but
of God. He also vowed, if he should bear rule himself, to make no
violent use of his power, nor outshine those set under him by superior
display, to make it his aim to cherish the truth and unmask liars, to be
pure from theft and unjust gain, to conceal nothing from his
fellow-members, nor to divulge any of their affairs to other men, even
at the risk of death, to transmit their doctrines unchanged, and to keep
secret the books of the society and the names of the angels.
Within the limits of the society there were four grades so distinct that
if any one touched a member of an inferior grade he required to cleanse
himself by bathing in water; members who had been found guilty of
serious crimes were expelled from the society, and could not be received
again till reduced to the very last extremity of want or sickness. As
the result of the ascetic training of the Essenes, and of their
temperate diet, it is said that they lived to a great age, and were
superior to pain and fear. During the Roman war they cheerfully
underwent the most grievous tortures rather than break any of the
principles of their faith. In fact, they had in many respects reached
the very highest moral elevation attained by the ancient world; they
were just, humane, benevolent, and spiritually-minded; the sick and
aged were the objects of a special affectionate regard; and they
condemned slavery, not only as an injustice, but as an impious violation
of the natural brotherhood of men (Philo ii. 457). There were some of
the Essenes who permitted marriage, but strictly with a view to the
preservation of the race; in other respects they agreed with the main
body of the society.
It will be apparent that the predominant tendency of the society was
practical. Philo tells us expressly that they rejected logic as
unnecessary to the acquisition of virtue, and speculation on nature as
too lofty for the human intellect. Yet they had views of their own as to
God, Providence, the soul, and a future state, which, while they had a
practical use, were yet essentially speculative. On the one hand,
indeed, they held tenaciously by the traditional Judaism: blasphemy
against their lawgiver was punished with death, the sacred books were
preserved and read with great reverence, though not without an
allegorical interpretation, and the Sabbath was most scrupulously
observed. But in many important points their deviation from the strait
path of Judaic development was complete. They rejected animal sacrifice
as well as marriage; the oil with which priests and kings were anointed
they accounted unclean; and the condemnation of oaths and the community
of goods were unmistakable innovations for which they found no hint or
warrant in the old Hebrew writings. Their most singular feature,
perhaps, was their reverence for the sun. In their speculative hints
respecting the soul and a future state, we find another important
deviation from Judaism, and the explanation of their asceticism. They
held that the body is mortal, and its substance transitory; that the
soul is immortal, but, coming from the subtlest ether, is lured as by a
sorcery of nature into the prison-house of the body. At death it is
released from its bonds, as from long slavery, and joyously soars aloft.
To the souls of the good there is reserved a life beyond the ocean, and
a country oppressed by neither rain, nor snow, nor heat, but refreshed
by a gentle west wind blowing continually from the sea (cf. Hom. _Od._
iv. 566-568), but to the wicked a region of wintry darkness and of
unceasing torment. Josephus tells us too that the Essenes believed in
fate; but in what sense, and what relation it bore to Divine Providence,
does not appear.
The above evidence has left students in doubt as to whether Essenism is
to be regarded as a pure product of the Jewish mind or as due in part to
some foreign influence. On the one hand it might be maintained that the
Essenes out-Pharisee'd the Pharisees. They had in common with that sect
their veneration for Moses and the Law, their Sabbatarianism, their
striving after ceremonial purity, and their tendency towards fatalism.
But if the Pharisees abstained from good works on the Sabbath, the
Essenes abstained even from natural necessities (Jos. _B.J._ ii. 8, S
9); if the Pharisees washed, the Essenes bathed before dinner; if the
Pharisees ascribed some things to Fate, the Essenes ascribed all (Jos.
_Ant._ xiii. 5, S 9). But on the other hand the Essenes avoided
marriage, which the Pharisees held in honour; they offered no
animal-sacrifices in the Temple; they refrained from the use of oil,
which was customary among the Pharisees (Luke vii. 46); above all, they
offered prayers to the sun, after the manner denounced in Ezekiel (viii.
16). These and other points of divergences are not explained by
Ritschl's interesting theory that Essenism was an organized attempt to
carry out the idea of "a kingdom of priests and an holy nation" (Ex.
xix. 6).
Granting then that some foreign influence was at work in Essenism, we
have four theories offered to us--that this influence was Persian,
Buddhist, Pythagorean, or lastly, as maintained by Lipsius, that of the
surrounding Syrian heathenism. Each of these views has had able
advocates, but it must not be supposed that they are mutually exclusive.
If we consider how Philo, while remaining a devout Jew in religion, yet
managed to assimilate the whole Stoic philosophy, we can well believe
that the Essenes might have been influenced, as Zeller maintained that
they were, by Neo-Pythagoreanism. But as Pythagoras himself came from
Samos, and his doctrines have a decidedly Oriental tinge, it may very
well be that both he and the Essenes drew from a common source; for
there is no need to reject, as is so commonly done, the statements of
our authorities as to the antiquity of the Essenes. This common source
we may believe with Lightfoot to have been the Persian religion, which
we know to have profoundly influenced that of Israel, independently of
the Essenes.
The fact that the Pharisees and Sadducees so often figure in the pages
of the New Testament, while the Essenes are never mentioned, might
plausibly be interpreted to show that the New Testament emanated from
the side of the Essenes. So far as concerns the Epistle of St James this
interpretation would probably be correct. That work contains the
doctrine common to the Essenes with Plato, and suggestive of Persian
Dualism, that God is the author of good only. There are also certain
obvious points of resemblance between the Essenes and the early
Christians. Both held property in common; both had scattered communities
which received guests one from the other; both avoided a light use of
oaths; both taught passive obedience to political authority. The list
might be enlarged, but it would not necessarily prove more than that the
early Christians shared in the ideas of their age. Christianity was to
some extent a popularization of Essenism, but there is little reason for
believing that Jesus himself was an Essene. De Quincey's contention that
there were no Essenes but the early Christians is now a literary
curiosity.
The original sources of our knowledge of the Essenes have been
mentioned at the beginning of this paper; the best modern discussions
of them are to be found in such works as Zeller's _Philosophie der
Griechen_, vol. iii.; Ewald, _Geschichte d. V. Israel_, iii. 419-428;
Reuss, _La Theologie chretienne au siecle apostolique_, i. 122-131;
Keim, _Life of Jesus of Nazara_, vol. i.; Lightfoot on the Colossians;
Lucius, _Der Essenismus in seinem Verhaltniss zum Judenthum_;
Wellhausen, _Israelitische und judische Geschichte_; Ed. Schurer, _The
Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ_, div. ii. vol. ii. S 30.
The copious bibliography in Conybeare's edition of Philo's _De vita
contemplativa_ bears upon the Essenes as well as upon the Therapeutes.
For a specially Jewish view of the Essenes see Kohler's article in the
_Jewish Encyclopaedia_. They are there regarded as being "simply the
rigorists among the Pharisees." But we are also told that "the
Pharisees characterized the Essene as 'a fool who destroyed the
world.'" (T. K.; St G. S.)
ESSENTUKI, a watering-place of south Russia, in the government of Terek,
11 m. by rail W. from Pyatigorsk; altitude, 2096 ft. Its alkaline and
sulphur-alkaline mineral waters, similar to those of Ems, Selters and
Vichy, are much visited in summer. The climate shows great variations in
temperature. Pop. (1897) 9974.
ESSEQUIBO, or ESSEQUEBO, one of the three settlements of British Guiana,
taking its name from the river Essequibo. (See GUIANA.)
ESSEX, EARLS OF. The first earl of Essex was probably Geoffrey de
Mandeville (q.v.), who became earl about 1139, the earldom being
subsequently held by his two sons, Geoffrey and William, until the death
of the latter in 1189. In 1199 Geoffrey Fitzpeter or Fitzpiers (d.
1213), who was related to the Mandevilles through his wife Beatrice,
became earl of Essex, and on the death of Geoffrey's son William in 1227
the earldom reverted for the second time to the crown. Then the title to
the earldom passed by marriage to the Bohuns, earls of Hereford, and
before 1239 Humphrey de Bohun (d. 1275) had been recognized as earl of
Essex. With the earldom of Hereford the earldom of Essex became extinct
in 1373; afterwards it was held by Thomas of Woodstock, duke of
Gloucester, a son of Edward III. and the husband of Eleanor de Bohun;
and from Gloucester it passed to the Bourchiers, Henry Bourchier (d.
1483), who secured the earldom in 1461, being one of Gloucester's
grandsons. The second and last Bourchier earl was Henry's grandson
Henry, who died early in 1540. A few weeks before his execution in 1540
Thomas Cromwell (q.v.) was created earl of Essex; then in 1543 William
Parr, afterwards marquess of Northampton, obtained the earldom by right
of his wife Anne, a daughter of the last Bourchier earl. Northampton
lost the earldom when he was attainted in 1553; and afterwards it passed
to the famous family of Devereux, Walter Devereux, who was created earl
of Essex in 1572, being related to the Bourchiers. Robert, the 3rd and
last Devereux earl, died in 1646. In 1661 Arthur Capel was created earl
of Essex, and the earldom is still held by his descendants.
ESSEX, ARTHUR CAPEL, 1ST[1] EARL OF (1632-1683), English statesman, son
of Arthur, 1st Baron Capel of Hadham (c. 1641), executed in 1649, and
of Elizabeth, daughter and heir of Sir Charles Morrison of Cashiobury in
Hertfordshire, was baptized on the 28th of January 1632. In June 1648,
then a sickly boy of sixteen, he was taken by Fairfax's soldiers from
Hadham to Colchester, which his father was defending, and carried every
day round the works with the hope of inducing Lord Capel to surrender
the place. At the restoration he was created Viscount Malden and earl of
Essex (20th of April 1661), with special remainder to the male issue of
his father, and was made lord-lieutenant of Hertfordshire and a few
years later of Wiltshire.[2]
He early showed himself antagonistic to the court, to Roman Catholicism,
and to the extension of the royal prerogative, and was coupled by
Charles II. with Holles as "stiff and sullen men," who would not yield
against their convictions to his solicitations. In 1669 he was sent as
ambassador to King Christian V. of Denmark, in which capacity he gained
credit by refusing to strike his flag to the governor of Kronborg. In
1672 he was made a privy councillor and lord-lieutenant of Ireland. He
remained in office till 1677, and his administration was greatly
commended by Burnet and Ormonde,[3] the former describing it "as a
pattern to all that come after him." He identified himself with Irish
interests, and took immense pains to understand the constitution and the
political necessities of the country, appointing men of real merit to
office, and maintaining an exceptional independence from solicitation
and influence. He held a just balance between the Roman Catholics, the
English Church and the Presbyterians, protecting the former as far as
public opinion in England would permit, and governing the native Irish
with firmness and moderation. The purity and patriotism of his
administration were in strong contrast to the hopeless corruption
prevalent in that at home and naturally aroused bitter opposition, as an
obstacle to the unscrupulous employment of Irish revenues for the
satisfaction of the court and the king's expenses. In particular he came
into conflict with Lord Ranelagh, to whom had been assigned the Irish
revenues on condition of his supplying the requirements of the crown,
and whose accounts Essex refused to pass. He opposed strongly the lavish
gifts of forfeited estates to court favourites and mistresses, prevented
the grant of Phoenix Park to the duchess of Cleveland, and refused to
encumber the administration by granting reversions. Finally the
intrigues of his enemies at home, and Charles's continual demands for
money, which Ranelagh undertook to satisfy, brought about his recall in
April 1677. He immediately joined the country party and the opposition
to Danby's government, and on the latter's fall in 1679 was appointed a
commissioner of the treasury, and the same year a member of Sir William
Temple's new-modelled council. He followed the lead of Halifax, who
advocated not the exclusion of James, but the limitation of his
sovereign powers, and looked to the prince of Orange rather than to
Monmouth as the leader of Protestantism, incurring thereby the hostility
of Shaftesbury, but at the same time gaining the confidence of Charles.
He was appointed by Charles together with Halifax to hear the charges
against Lauderdale. In July he wrote a wise and statesmanlike letter to
the king, advising him to renounce his project of raising a new company
of guards. Together with Halifax he urged Charles to summon the
parliament, and after his refusal resigned the treasury in November, the
real cause being, according to one account,[4] a demand upon the
treasury by the duchess of Cleveland for L25,000, according to another
"the niceness of touching French money," "that makes my Lord Essex's
squeasy stomach that it can no longer digest his employment."[5]
Subsequently his political attitude underwent a change, the exact cause
of which is not clear--probably a growing conviction of the dangers
threatened by a Roman Catholic sovereign of the character of James. He
now, in 1680, joined Shaftesbury's party and supported the Exclusion
Bill, and on its rejection by the Lords carried a motion for an
association to execute the scheme of expedients promoted by Halifax. On
the 25th of January 1681 at the head of fifteen peers he presented a
petition to the king, couched in exaggerated language, requesting the
abandonment of the session of parliament at Oxford. He was a jealous
prosecutor of the Roman Catholics in the popish plot, and voted for
Stafford's attainder, on the other hand interceding for Archbishop
Plunket, implicated in the pretended Irish plot. He, however, refused to
follow Shaftesbury in his extreme courses, declined participation in the
latter's design to seize the Tower in 1682, and on Shaftesbury's
consequent departure from England became the leader of Monmouth's
faction, in which were now included Lord Russell, Algernon Sidney, and
Lord Howard of Escrick. Essex took no part in the wilder schemes of the
party, but after the discovery of the Rye House Plot in June 1683, and
the capture of the leaders, he was arrested at Cashiobury and imprisoned
in the Tower. His spirits and fortitude appear immediately to have
abandoned him, and on the 13th of July he was discovered in his chamber
with his throat cut. His death was attributed, quite groundlessly, to
Charles and James, and the evidence points clearly if not conclusively
to suicide, his motive being possibly to prevent an attainder and
preserve his estate for his family. He was, however, undoubtedly a
victim of the Stuart administration, and the antagonism and tragic end
of men like Essex, deserving men, naturally devoted to the throne,
constitutes a severe indictment of the Stuart rule.
He was a statesman of strong and sincere patriotism, just and unselfish,
conscientious and laborious in the fulfilment of public duties,
blameless in his official and private life. Evelyn describes him as "a
sober, wise, judicious and pondering person, not illiterate beyond the
rule of most noblemen in this age, very well versed in English history
and affairs, industrious, frugal, methodical and every way
accomplished"; and declares he was much deplored, few believing he had
ever harboured any seditious designs.[6] He married Lady Elizabeth
Percy, daughter of Algernon, 10th earl of Northumberland, by whom,
besides a daughter, he had an only son Algernon (1670-1710), who
succeeded him as 2nd earl of Essex.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--See the Lives in the _Dict. of Nat. Biography_ and in
_Biographia Britannica_ (Kippis), with authorities there collected;
Essex's Irish correspondence is in the _Stow Collection_ in the
British Museum, Nos. 200-217, and selections have been published in
_Letters written by Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex_ (1770) and in the
_Essex Papers_ (Camden Society, 1890), to which can now be added the
_Calendars of State Papers, Domestic_, which contain a large number of
his letters and which strongly support the opinion of his
contemporaries concerning his unselfish patriotism and industry; see
also _Somers Tracts_ (1813), x., and for other pamphlets relating to
his death the catalogue of the British Museum.