SECRET SOCIETIES 323 SECULAR lative Freemasonry does not go further back than the 18th century; its objects are philanthropic and moral. There are associations similar in character to it jn Tahiti and others of the Pacific islands, and among the Foulah and the Negroes of Sierra Leone and the adjacent parts of Africa. The celebrated "Vehmgerich- te" or secret courts of Westphalia arose in a time of great public confusion, and made it their business to maintain that order and respect for the law which it should have been the concern of the em- peror and his associates to have secured and preserved. There existed in Sicily from the 12th to the 18th century an or- ganization (the Beati Paoli) very similar to the "Vehmgerichte." On the other hand, there have been numerous associa- tions of a secret kind formed for criminal purposes, and for mutual assistance against and in defiance of the laws of the land; the Assassins in Persia and Syria, the Thugs in India, the Camorra, the Ma- fia, and the Decisi (1815) in Italy, the Chauffeurs in France (who arose during the religious wars and were not sup- pressed till the Revolution), and the Gar- duna in Spain (formed after the wars against the Moors; suppressed in 1822) may be instanced. The Illuminati, the authors of a move- ment that grew up in Germany in the end of the 18th century, united political and religious ends, and may be said, sum- marily, to have aimed at realizing the ideals of the French Revolution. The following century was wonderfully pro- lific in political secret societies. Italy was literally honeycombed with them dur- ing the years she was struggling for her independence; the best known was that of the Carbonari. At the same time there were similar societies in other countries of Europe, as the Burschenschaft and Landsmannschaft societies in Germany, the Associated Patriots in France, the Communeros in Spain, the Hetairia in Greece, the Society of United Slavonians and the Decabrists in Russia, the Polish Templars, and the associations known as Young Germany, Young Italy, Young Po- land, Young Switzerland. Nearly all the political revolutions that took place in France during the course of the 19th cen- tury were greatly fomented by secret so- cieties, especially the revolution of 1848. The most momentous movements of a so- cio-political tendency that have sprung up on the Continent, and spread to some extent to England, are those of the Nihil- ists, the Anarchists, and various sects of extreme Socialists. The murder of the Archduke Ferdinand which precipitated the World War was claimed by the Aus- trian Government to have been plotted by a Serbian secret society. There are perhaps no people in the world who favor secret societies more than the Chinese and the inhabitants of the United States. The most powerful organization of this nature in China is the Tien-ti Hwuy (Union of Heaven and Earth), which presents many features analogous to Freemasonry. Its principal object was the overthrow of the Manchu dynasty and the restoration of the last Chinese dynasty of the Myng. But about the real purposes of this, as of most other secret societies that exist among the Chi- nese, our information is exceedingly scanty. The Society of the Elder Breth- ren, which is, generally speaking, a com- bination of the most lawless elements of the population in the central provinces (Honan to Hunan), proclaims a fanati- cal hatred to all foreigners, including the Manchus. Secret societies of all kinds, and for nearly all conceivable purposes, are found in the United States. SECTOR, in geometry, that portion of the area of a circle included between two radii and an arc. The area of a sector is equal to the product of the arc of the sector by half of the radius. If the angle at the center is given, the length of the arc of the sector may be found, since it is equal to x multiplied by the radius into the ratio of 180° to the number of de- grees of the sector. A spherical sector or the sector of a sphere is a volume or solid that may be generated by revolving a sector of a circle about a straight line drawn through the vertex of the sector as an axis, or it is the conic solid whose vertex coincides with the center of the sphere, and whose base is a segment of the same sphere. In mathematics and surveying, a mathematical instrument used for laying down plans, measuring angles, etc. It has two legs, united by a rule-joint, and graduated. The scales put on sectors are divided into single and double; the former has a line with inches divided into eighths or tenths; a second, into decimals containing 100 parts; a third, into chords; the fourth has sines; the fifth, tangents ; the sixth, rhombs ; the seventh and eighth have latitudes, hours, etc. The double scale contains a line of lines; second, a line of chords; third, a line of sines; fourth, tangents to 45°; fifth, secants; sixth, tangents above 45°; seventh, polygons. In surveying, the in- strument is mounted on a leg or tripod, and the bob depending from the axis of the rule-joint indicates the station ex- actly. SECULAR, occurring or observed once in an age, century, or cycle; as a secular year. Also pertaining or relating to an age, generation, or period of time; as secular inequality. Or pertaining or hav-
