PROTEST, in commerce, is a writing executed by a notary public to secure to the holder of a bill recourse upon the indorsers when the drawer refuses to accept, or the acceptor fails to pay. PROTEST, in parliament. Any of the lords in parliament have a right to protest their dissent from any bill passed by a majority; which protest is entered in form. This is said to be a very ancient privilege. The commons have no right to protest.

PROTESTANTISM. The emperor Charles V. called a diet at Spires, in 1529, to request aid from the German princes against the Turks, and to devise the most effectual means for allaying the religious disputes which then raged in consequence of Luther's opposition to the established religion. The emperor being at Barcelona, at the meeting of this diet, his brother Ferdinand, archduke of Austria, was appointed to preside. In this diet it was decreed, by Ferdinand and other popish princes, that, in the countries which had embraced the new religion, it should be lawful to continue in it till the meeting of a council; but that no Roman Catholic should be allowed to turn Lutheran; and that the reformers should deliver nothing in their sermons contrary to the received doctrine of the church. This decree was justly considered as iniquitous and intolerable by the elector of Saxony, the langrave of Hesse, and other members of the diet. Nor was any one of them so simple, or so little acquainted with the politics of Rome, as to look upon the promises of assembling speedily a general council in any other light than an artifice to quiet the minds of the people; since it was easy to perceive that a lawful council, free from the despotic influence of Rome, was the very last thing that a pope would grant in such a critical situation of affairs. Against this decree, therefore, six Lutheran princes (John and George, the electors of Saxony and Brandenburg; Ernest and Francis, the two dukes of Lunenberg; the landgrave of Hesse; and the prince of Anhalt), with the deputies of thirteen imperial towns (Strasburg, Ulm, Nuremburg, Constance, Rottingen, Windsheim, Memmingen, Nortlingen, Lindau, Kempten, Heilbron, Wissemburg, and St. Gall), formally and solemnly protested, and declared that they appealed to a general council; and hence the name of PROTESTANTS, which, from this period, has been given to the followers of Luther. Nor was it confined to them; for it soon after included the Calvinists, and has now of a long time been applied indiscriminately to all the churches, sects, and denominations, in whatever country they may be found, which have separated from the see of Rome.

The important period which was distinguished by this reformation of religion, is not, as Protestants contend, to be considered as the period when the principles then embraced first made their appearance. Long, very long, had purity of doctrine and discipline slept beneath church of Rome; and there was a time when. the overloaded ornaments and corruptions of the that church herself might have boasted of her primitive purity and freedom from error, with other churches of Christ: never, indeed, was there a time, from the date of her first departure from sound principles, wherein there were not witnesses to the truth; or some, more or less, who withstood the corruptions and depravity of their respective ages, maintained orthodox and primitive doctrine, and exhibited in their lives the genuine fruits of our most holy faith

We are not to wonder that Protestantism soon exhibited a variety of religious opinion and practice. The active spirit of enquiry, natural to men who had just broken loose from the despotism of popery, operating differently on different intellects and dispositions, almost necessarily produced a variety of sects; and, in some cases, gave birth to extreme wildness and extravagance of unscriptural doctrine and practice. Protestants, therefore, have been far from unanimous in all points of doctrine, worship, church government, or discipline: on the contrary, while they agree only in receiving the Scriptures as the supreme rule of their faith and practice, and in rejecting the distinguishing doctrines of the church of Rome, particularly the authority ascribed by her members to tradition as a rule of faith, in many other respects they still differ not more widely from that church than they do from one another. And, to ascertain their doctrines, it will be necessary to examine their several libri symbolici, or the confessions and articles of the different churches, sects, and parties, into which professors of the reformed religion are now subdivided. The learned Chillingworth, addressing himself to a writer ia favor of the church of Rome, speaks of the religion of Protestants in the following terms, worthy, as has been well observed, to be inscribed in letters of gold:- Know then, Sir, that when I say the religion of Protestants is, in prudence, to be preferred before yours; on the one side, I do not understand by your religion the doctrine of Bellarmine, or Baronius, or any other private man amongst you, nor the doctrine of the Sorbonne, or of the Jesuits, or of the Dominicans, or of any other particular company among you, but that wherein you all agree, or profess to agree, "The doctrine of the council of Trent.' so accordingly, on the other side, by the religion of Protestants I do not understand the doctrine of Luther, or Calvin, or Melancthon, nor the confession of Augsburg, or Geneva, nor the catechism of Heidelberg, nor the articles of the church of England-no, nor the harmony of Protestant confessions; but that wherein. they all agree, and which they all subscribe with a greater harmony, as a perfect rule of faith and action, that is, the Bible. The Bible, I say, the Bible only, is the religion of Protestants. Whatsoever else they believe besides it, and the plain

irrefragable, indubitable, consequences of it, well may they hold it as a matter of opinion; but, as a matter of faith and religion, neither can they, with coherence to their own grounds, believe it themselves, nor require belief of it of others, without most high and most schismatical presumption. I, for my part, after a long, and (as I verily believe and hope) impartial search of the true way to eternal happiness, do profess plainly, that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my foot, but upon this rock only. I see plainly, and with my own eyes, that there are popes against popes, and councils against councils; some fathers against other fathers, the same fathers against themselves; a consent of fathers of one age, against a consent of fathers of another age. Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended, but there are few or none to be found no tradition, but that of Scripture, can derive itself from the fountain, but may be plainly proved either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ, or that in such an age it was not in. In a word, there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only, for any considering man to build upon. This, therefore, and this only, I have reason to believe. This I will profess according to this I will live; and, for this, if there be occasion, I will not only willingly, but even gladly, lose my life; though I should te sorry that Christians should take it from me. Propose me any thing out of this book, and require whether I believe or no, and, seem it never so incomprehensible to human reason, I will subscribe it with hand and heart, as knowing no demonstration can be stronger than this, God hath said so, therefore it is true. In other things, I will take no man's liberty of judging from him; neither shall any man take mine from me.'

But though the Bible is, properly speaking, their only symbolic book, or the only sure foundation upon which all true Protestants build every article of the faith which they profess, and every point of doctrine. which they teach, whereby they may be said to unite in subscribing to the sixth article of the United Church of England and Ireland; and though all other foundations, whether they be the decisions of councils, the confessions of churches, the rescripts of popes, or the expositions of private men, are considered by them as sandy and unsafe, or as in no wise to be ultimately relied on; yet, on the other hand, they do by no means fastidiously reject them as of no use. For while they admit the Bible, or the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, to be the only infallible rule by which we must measure the truth or falsehood of every religious opinion, they are sensible that all men are not equally fitted to apply this rule, considered in all its latitude; and that the wisest men want, on many occasions, all the helps of human learning, to enable them to understand its precise nature, and to define its certain extent. That is, the consistent Protestant must admit that all men are not equal judges of what nature, i. e. the national sense of propriety, taught the Corinthian ladies respecting the wearing of their hair, see 1 Cor. xi. 15, nor of the geographical question, whether the river of Egypt, given as a boundary to Canaan in the

important grant, Gen. xv. 18, were or were not the river Nile: but it is an essential part of consistent Protestantism to maintain, with Chillingworth, not only the fulness, but the plainness, of Scripture, as a rule in all things needful to salvation. 'He that would usurp an absolute lordship over conscience,' says this admirable writer, 'need not put himself to the trouble and difficulty of abrogating and disannulling the laws made to maintain the common liberty; for he may frustrate them entirely, and compass his own design as well, if he can get the power and authority to interpret them as he pleases, and add to them what he pleases.' 'If you will stand to your rule, that Scripture is as perfect a rule of faith and practice as a writing can be, you must then grant it both so complete that it needs no addition, and so evident that it needs no interpretation; for both these properties are requisite to a perfect rule, and a writing is capable of both these properties' The helps adverted to are great and numerous, having been supplied, in every age of the church, by the united labors of learned men in every country, and, we may add, particularly in Protestant communions.

With regard to church government, it may be here remarked in general, that, however widely Protestants may differ in other respects, they all agree in rejecting a universal, visible, supreme head of the church, together with the infallibility of any church governors or councils whatsoever, from the days of the apostles. They all likewise agree in adopting the principle of the independency of every church, either in its national or congregational character; as subject to no spiritual head but Christ; as conceding no superiority, and claiming no preeminence of jurisdiction; and as authorized to frame its own laws, and to regulate its own government: while, at the same time, a very great proportion of them equally concur in admitting the union of church and state, or the lawfulness of national establishments of religion. It is very remarkable,' says dean Comber, that a Romanist may turn Protestant without adding any one article to his faith; but a Protestant cannot turn to Rome unless he embrace many new articles: for our doctrines are generally confessed by both sides to be true; but those of the Roman church are rejected by our reformers as novel additions, and such as have no good foundations in Scripture nor genuine antiquity: and therefore the Protestant doctrines are the surer and safer, as in which both sides agree. For example, we and they both hold there are two states after this life, heaven and hell; but they add a third, which is purgatory; and this we deny: we and they both say that sins are to be remitted by the merits of Christ's death; but they add the merits of the saints, and their own satisfactions, with the merit of their own good works, which we deny to be expiatory, or such as can merit remission for us: we hold there be two sacraments, baptism and the eucharist: these they confess are the chief, but add five more, to which we affirm the name of sacraments doth not properly belong: we say that God alone is to be worshipped: they confess he is chiefly to be worshipped; but, then, they say the blessed Virgin Mary, angels, and saints,

are to be worshipped also; which additions we deny: we say Christ is our only mediator and advocate: they confess he is principally so, but add that saints and angels are so in an inferior manner; which we utterly deny: we say Christ is really present in the sacrament of the altar: this they confess, but add he is corporally there, by the transubstantiation of the bread, &c.; and this we deny: we say there are twenty-two books of the Old Testament canonical, and they confess these all to be so, but they add divers others, and call them canonical, which we affirm to be apocryphal we say the Scriptures are the rule of faith; and they will not absolutely deny it, but add their own traditions, which we reject. I could give more instances; but these may suffice to show that the Protestant doctrines look most like the ancientest, as being received by both parties; but the Roman opinions are novel enlargements added to the old Catholic truths.' PROTEUS, in mythology, a sea deity, the son of Oceanus and Tethys, or, as others say, of Neptune and Phoenice. From Neptune he received the gift of prophecy, and was often consulted on the coast of the Carpathian Sea by mortals. But on these occasions he was sometimes very shy, and shifted his votaries by assuming the shapes of various animals; and, while they held him fast as a sea god, eluded their grasp in the form of a fish or a serpent, unless they previously bound him with fetters. Hercules, Aristeus, and many other heroes, consulted him. Some say he reigned long in Egypt. He had two sons, Telegonus and Polygonus; and three daughters, Cabira, Fidothea, and Rhetia.

PROTEUS, in zoology, a genus of the class reptilia, order batraciens, of Cuvea, discovered in 1789 in the limestone caves of Carniola, and also in Mexico. The first protei described by Laurenti and Scopoli were not procured from the lake of Zirknitz, as has been commonly represented, nor from any of the caverns of Carniola, but were found accidentally by the peasants in small puddles of water near the mouths of certain caverns, a little distant from Sittich, on the road to Newstadt, in Lower Carniola, cast out of the caverns probably by the overflowing of their water after heavy rains. It was not till the year 1797 that these animals were discovered in the caverns of Maddalena. At present, the peasants of Adelsberg, when the season suits, go to fish for them, and preserve them alive, till they sell them to the curious, who visit Carniola, or convey them to Trieste, where they are sold for the small sum of two or three lire each.

Hermann and Schreibers wrote on the proteus, but described only its external parts, and contributed nothing to clear up the many doubts and conjectures respecting it. In this state of uncertainty, Dr. Schreibers first had recourse to anatomy, as the only satisfactory mode of gaining correct information: but unfortunately he possessed only three protei which had been sent to him from Carniola, preserved in spirits; which circumstance precluded him from giving that complete information which might otherwise have been expected from so eminent a naturalist. His description was published in 1801; and, among many excellent ob

servations, he points out the striking difference of form between the lungs of the sirena lacertina and those of the proteus. Next to Schreibers we have to notice two zoologists of the highest celebrity, MM. Cuvier and Rudolphi, both of whom examined the internal structure of this animal. The former first discovered, and accurately described, the organs of generation in the female, and established, on a solid foundation, that the proteus was not a larva, as many had supposed, but a perfect animal; an opinion now generally followed, and confirmed by the recent observations of Rudolphi, who has described the generative system in the male.

The sirena lacertina occupies the same class and order, and is another genus consisting only of one species. It is said, like the proteus, to retain through its whole life three gills on each side the neck, and to possess, at the same time, lungs internally. A most ample description of this curious reptile was furnished to the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, by professor Configliachi, and Dr. Rusconi, to the fourth volume of which we must refer the reader for more ample information.

PROTHON'OTARY, n. s. Fr. protonotaire; Lat. protonotarius. The head register.

Saligniaeus, the pope's prothonotary, denies the Nubians professing of obedience to the bishop of Rome.

Brerewood.

He had the prothonotariship of the chancery. Carew.

PROTHONATORY [from poros Gr. first, and notarius, Lat.] properly signifies first notary, and was anciently the title of the principle notaries of the emperors of Constantinople.

PROTHONOTARY is used in England for an officer in the court of king's bench and common pleas; the former of which courts has one, and the latter three. The prothonotary of the king's bench records all civil actions sued in that court, as the clerk of the crown-office does all criminal causes. The prothonotaries of the common pleas enter and enrol all declarations, pleadings, assizes, judgments, and actions; they also make out all judicial writs, except writs of habeas corpus and distringas jurator, for which there is a particular office, called the habeas corpus office; they likewise enter recognizances acknowledged, and all common recoveries; make examplifications of records, &c.

PROTHONOTARY, in the courts of Rome. There is a college of twelve prelates, called apostolical prothonotaries, empowered to receive the last wills of cardinals, to make all informations and proceedings necessary for the canonisation of saints, and all such acts as are of great consequence to the papacy; for which purpose they have the right of admission into all consistories. They also attend on the pope, whenever he performs any extraordinary ceremony out of Rome.

PROTOCOL, n. s. Belg. protokol; Fr. pro. tocole ; Gr. πρωτοκολλον, from πρωτος and κολλη. The original copy of a writing; the rough memorandum of a diplomatic conference.

An original is stiled the protocol, or scriptura matrix; and if the protocol, which is the root and foundation of the instrument, does not appear, the instrument is not valid.

Ayliffe.

PROTOGENES, a celebrated ancient painter, born at Caunas, a city of Caria, subject to the Rhodians, who flourished about A. A. Č. 300. He was at first employed in painting ships, &c., but soon acquired the highest fame for historical pieces. His most celebrated piece was Jalysus, the founder of Jalysus, a city of Rhodes. Apelles gave him fifty talents (about £10,000) for one picture, which the Rhodians purchased back from him at a still higher price. He lived very abstemiously.

PROTOPLAST, n. s. Gr. πowrog and λasos. Original; thing first formed as a copy.

The consumption was the primitive disease, which put a period to our protoplasts, Adam and Eve.

Harvey. PROTOTYPE, n. s. Fr. prototype; Greek TOWTоTUTо. The original of a copy; archetype; exemplar.

Man is the prototype of all exact symmetry.

Wotton.

The image and prototype were two distinct things; and therefore what belonged to the exemplar could not be attributed to the image. Stilling fleet. Lat. protractus. To draw out; to delay; to lengthen; to spin to

PROTRACT, v. a. & n. s.

PROTRACTOR, n. s.

PROTRACTION,

PROTRACTIVE, adj.

length the derivations all corresponding. Since I did leave the presence of my love, Many long weary days I have out-worn,

And many nights, that slowly seemed to move Their sad protract from evening until morn. Spenser. Where can they get victuals to support such a multitude, if we do but protract the war?

Our works are nought else

Knolles.

As to the fabulous protractions of the age of the world by the Egyptians, they are uncertain idle traditions. Hale.

He suffered their protractive arts, And strove by mildness to reduce their hearts. Dryden.

PROTRACTOR, an instrument for laying down and measuring angles upon paper with accuracy and despatch; and by which the use of the line of choris is superseded.

The CIRCULAR FROTRACTOR is a complete circle, and is superior by far to either the rightangled or semici,cnlar, both in point of accuracy and despatch, especially when several angles are to be formed at the same point. The limb of this instrument is divided into 36°, and each degree in some protractors is halved; it has a subdividing scale or vernier, by which an angle may be laid down or measured to a single minute. In the centre of the protractor is a mark, which, when an angle is to be protracted or measured, is to be laid upon the angular point, and O, or zero on the limb, upon the given line forming one side of the angle."

The RECTANGULAR PROTRACTOR is constructed in form of a right-angled parallelogram, which, when applied to a case of mathematical instruments, is substituted in place of the semicircular protractor and scale of equal parts.

PROTREPTICAL, adj. Gr. ρоTрETTIKOS, Hortatory; suasory.

The means used are partly didactical and protreptical; demonstrating the truths of the gospel, and then urging the professors to be stedfast in the faith, and beware of infidelity. Ward on Infidelity. PROTRUDE', v. a. & v. n. Lat. protrudo. PROTRUSION, n. s. To thrust for

ward; thrust itself forward: the act of thrusting forward.

If the spirits be not merely detained, but protrude a little, and that motion be confused, there followeth putrefaction. Bacon.

When the stomach has performed its office upon the food, it protrudes it into the guts, by whose peristaltick motion it is gently conveyed along. Locke.

One can have the idea of one body moved, whilst others are at rest; then the place it deserted gives us the idea of purer space without solidity, whereinto another body may enter without either resistance or protrusion of any thing. Id.

They were not left, upon the sea's being protruded forwards, and constrained to fall off from certain coasts by the mud or earth, which is discharged into it by rivers. Woodward. His left arm extended, and fore finger protruded. Garlick. Lat. protubero. Something swelling out: prominence; tumor; the adjective corresponding.

PROTU'BERANCE, n. s. Į
PROTU BERANT, adj.

If the world were eternal, by the continual fall and wearing of waters, all the protuberances of the earth would infinite ages since have been levelled, and the superficies of the earth rendered plain.

Hale.

Mountains seem but so many wens and unnatural protuberances upon the face of the earth. More.

One man's eyes are more protuberant and swelling out, another's more sunk and depressed.

Glanville.

If the navel protuberates, make a small puncture with a lancet through the skin, and the waters will be voided without any danger of a hernia succeeding. Sharp's Surgery.

PROUD, adj. Sax. prude, prire; Goth. PROUDLY, adv. S and Swed. prud. See PRIDE. Arrogant; self-exalted; haughty; elated, taking of before the object of pride; daring; presumptuous; ostentatious; salacious; exuberant; swelling (as proud flesh'); lofty of mien or manner; grand; splendid: the adverb follows these senses.

Job.

By his understanding he smiteth through the proud. The patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit. Eccles. Drayton.

The blood foretold the giant's fall,
By this proud palmer's hand.

I better brook the loss of brittle life,
Than those proud titles thou hast won of me.
Shakspeare.

Even to my person, than I thought he would. Id.

He bears himself more proudly

So much is true, that the said country of Atlantis, as well as that of Peru, then called Coya, as that of Mexico, then named Tyrambel, were mighty and proud kingdoms in arms, shipping, and riches.

Bacon's New Atlantis.

What is all righteousness that men devise!
What-but a sordid bargain for the skies?
But Christ as soon would abdicate his own,
As stoop from heaven to sell the proud a throne.

Cowper. PROVE, v. a. & v. n. I Fr. prouver; Ital. PROVE ABLE, adj. Sprovare; Spanish probar; Lat. probo. To evince; to show or attest by argument or testimony; to try; experience; endure as a verb neuter to make true; be found experimentally; succeed: proveable is, demonstrable; that may be proved.

For the dai of the Lord schal declare, for it schal be schewid in fier, the fier schal prue the werk of ech man, what maner of werk it is.

Wielif. 1 Cor. 3. Who so delyteth to prouen and assay, Of waveryng fortune the vncertayne lot, If that the aunswere please you not alway, Blame ye not me. Sir T. More.

Wilt thou thy idle rage by reason prove? Or speak those thoughts which have no power to move?

Let the trumpet sound:

Sandys.

If none appear to prove upon thy person
Thy heinous, manifest, and many treasons,
There is my pledge: I'll prove it on thy heart.
Shakspeare.

Delay not the present, but Filling the air with swords advanced, and darts, We prove this very hour. Id. Coriolanus. Children prove, whether they can rub upon the breast with one hand, and pat upon the forehead with another. Bacon.

If the experiment proved not, it might be pretended that the beasts were not killed in the due

time.

Id.

PROV'ENDER, n. s. Fr. provende; Ital. provenda; Belg. provande. Dry food for brutes; hay and corn.

Good provender labouring horses would have. Tusser.

I do appoint him store of provender; It is a creature that I teach to fight. Shakspeare. For a fortnight before you kill them, feed them with hay or other provender.

Mortimer.

Whene'er he chanced his hands to lay
On magazines of corn or hay,
Gold ready coined appeared, instead
Of paltry provender and bread.

Swift's Miscellanies. PROVENCE, a ci-devant province of France, bounded by Dauphine on the north, by the late Piedmontese on the east, by the Mediterranean on the south, and by the Rhone, which separated it from Languedoc, on the west, being 138 miles long and 100 broad. The air is cold near the Alps, hot on the coast, and temperate in the middle. Since the revolution it has been divided into the following departments :— Sq. Miles. Population. 146,000

The Lower Alps

2845

The Var

It

To these is to be added a portion of the depart-
ment of the Vaucluse. The principal towns are
Marseilles, Toulon, Aix, Arles, and Grasse.
was divided into the Upper and Lower Provence.
PROV'ERB, n. s. & v. a. Fr. proverbe;
PROVERBIAL, adj.
Ital. proverbio;
PROVERBIALLY, adv. Lat. proverbium.

A pithy saying; a saw; an adage: the verb, to mention in, or provide with, a proverb, has been very properly disused: the adjective and adverb correspond with the noun substantive.

Thou hast delivered us for a spoil, and a proverb of reproach. Tob. iii. 4.