frequent steamers from Liverpool and other ports. The shore of the bay is sandy and gently sloping, and excellent bathing is afforded. A golf links, a geological and antiquarian museum, the Mooragh Park by the side of the lake, and the palace or concert hall, are among the attractions to visitors. Ramsey is connected with Laxey, the summit of Snaefell, and Douglas by electric tramway, and has connexion with the western part of the island by the Manx Northern railway. The Albert tower, on a. wooded hill above the town, commemorating a visit of the Prince Consort in 1847, is a favourite view-point. The harbour has some coasting and fishing trade.
RAMSGATE, a municipal borough, watering-place, seaport
and member of the Cinque Port of Sandwich, in the Isle of
Thanet parliamentary division of Kent, England, 79 m. E. by
S. of London by the South Eastern & Chatham railway.
Pop. (1901) 27,733. This is one of the most popular resorts
on the Kent coast, well situated on the east coast of Thanet,
practically contiguous with Broadstairs to the north, with
which and Margate to the north-west it is united by an electric
tramway. During the season steamers connect it with London
and the intermediate watering-places on the north coast, and
with Calais and Boulogne. The harbour has an area of 42 acres,
and a considerable coasting and fishing trade is carried on.
There is a fine sea front, and the beach is of firm sand. The
promenade pier was erected in 1881. Near it an obelisk
commemorates the departure of George IV. to Hanover from
here, and his return, in 1821. The church of St George
was built in 1826, its tower forming a conspicuous landmark,
and the Roman Catholic church of St Augustine was built
from the designs and at the expense of A. W. Pugin, who
was long a resident here. The neighbouring Pegwell Bay,
famed for its shrimps, is supposed to have been the scene
of the landing of Hengist and Horsa, and at Clifi”s End (Ebbs
Fleet) a monolithic cross marks the landing-place of St Augustine
in 596. On the summit of Osengal Hill, about- a mile to the
west of the town, a graveyard of early Saxon settlers was
discovered during the cutting of the railway. The remains
proved it to belong to the 5th and 6th centuries. Ramsgate
was incorporated in 1884, and is governed by a mayor,
6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 2304 acres.
Ramsgate (Ramesgate) was originally a small but comparatively
prosperous place united until 1827 to the parish
of St Lawrence. The charter of Charles II. mentions it as
having been “time out of mind” a member of Sandwich.
In 1884 it was incorporated by royal charter, under the title
of mayor, aldermen and councillors. A commission of the
peace was granted in 1893. Since then the jurisdiction of
the Cinque Ports' justices has ceased within its limits, which
include the parishes of Ramsgate and St Lawrence Intra. A
daily market was obtained in 1784 by grant from George III.
No fair was then held, but from 1792 onwards there has been
one yearly on the 10th of August. Under Elizabeth, Ramsgate
was still unimportant though possessed of a fair before the
reign of Henry VIII. After 1668 the growth of trade increased
its prosperity, and at the beginning of the reign of George I.
the pier was enlarged and pier-wardens appointed to collect
the droits. In 1749, having been selected as a Harbour of
Refuge for the Downs, it underwent great improvements, and
henceforward paid £200 yearly to Sandwich out of the droits
for clearing the Channel and repairing the banks of the river
Stour within the Liberty; but by 1790 the harbour was of
small account.
RAMSONS, in botany, the popular name for Allium ursinum, a bulbous plant 6 to 18 in. high, with ovate-lanceolate stalked leaves tapering at the apex, surrounding a naked stalk bearing a flat-topped umbel of small white flowers. A rather pretty plant, common in woods and in hedge banks in spring, but with a pungent garlic-like smell, which is characteristic of the genus (see Allium).
RAMUS, PETRUS, or Pierre de la Ramée (1515–1572), French humanist, was born at the village of Cuth in Picardy in 1515, a. member of a noble but impoverished family; his father was a charcoal-burner. Having gained admission, in a menial capacity, to the college of Navarre, he worked with his hands by day and carried on his studies at night. The reaction against scholasticism was still in full tide; it was the transition time between the old and the new, when the eager and forward looking spirits had first of all to do battle with scholastic Aristotelianism. Ramus outdid his predecessors in the impetuosity of his revolt. On the occasion of taking his degree (1536) he actually took as his thesis “Everything that Aristotle taught is false.” This tour de force was followed up by the publication
in 1543 of Aristotelicae Animadversiones and Dialecticae Partitiones, the former a criticism on the old logic and the latter a new textbook of the science. What are substantially fresh editions of the Partitiones appeared in 1547 as Institutiones
Dialecticae, and in 1548 as Scholae Dialecticae; his Dialectique
(1555), a French version of his system, is the earliest work on the subject in the French language. Meanwhile Ramus, as graduate of the university, had opened courses of lectures; but his audacities drew upon him the hostility of the conservative party in philosophy and theology. He was accused of undermining the foundations of philosophy and religion, and the matter was brought before the parlement of Paris, and finally before Francis I. By him it was referred to a commission
of five, who found Ramus guilty of having “acted
rashly, arrogantly and impudently,” and interdicted his
lectures (1544). He withdrew from Paris, but soon afterwards returned, the decree against him being cancelled through the influence of the cardinal of Lorraine. In 1551 Henry II. appointed him professor of philosophy and eloquence at the Collège de France, where for a considerable time he lectured before audiences numbering as many as 2000. He published fifty works in his lifetime and nine appeared after his death. In 1561, however, the enmity against him was fanned into flame by his adoption of Protestantism. He had to flee from
Paris; and, though he found an asylum in the palace of
Fontainebleau, his house was pillaged and his library burned in his absence. He resumed his chair after this for a time, but in 1568 the position of affairs was again so threatening that he found it advisable to ask permission to travel. Returning to France he fell a victim to his opponents in the massacre of St
Bartholomew (1572).
The logic of Ramus enjoyed a great celebrity for a time, and there existed a school of Ramists boasting numerous adherents in France, Germany and Holland. As late as 1626 F. Burgersdyk divides the logicians of his day into the Aristotelians, the Ramists and the Semi-Ramists, who endeavoured, like Goclenius of Marburg, to mediate between the contending parties. Ramus's works appear among the logical textbooks of the Scottish universities, and he was not without his followers in England in the 17th century. There is even a little treatise from the hand of Milton, published two years before his death, called Artis Logicae Plenior Institutio ad Petri Rami Methodum concinnata. It cannot be said, however, that Ramus’s innovations mark any epoch in the history of logic. His rhetorical leaning is seen in the definition of logic as the “ars disserendi”; he maintains that the rules of logic may be better learned from observation of the way in which Cicero persuaded his hearers than from a study of the Organon. The distinction between natural and artificial logic, i.e. between the implicit logic of daily speech and the same logic made explicit in a system, passed over into the logical handbooks. Logic falls, according to Ramus, into two parts—invention (treating of the notion and definition) and judgment (comprising the judgment proper, syllogism and method). This division gave rise to the jocular designation of judgment or mother-wit as the “secunda Petri.” He is, perhaps, most suggestive in his emendations of the syllogism. He admits only the first three figures. as in the original Aristotelian scheme, and in hislater works he also attacks the validity of the 'third figure, following in this the precedent of Laurentius Valla. Ramus also set the modern fashion of deducing the figures from the position of the middle term in the premises, instead of basing them, as Aristotle does, upon the different relation of the middle to the so-called major and minor term. On the whole, however, though Ramus may be allowed to have advanced logical study by the wholesome fermentation of thought which he caused, there is little ground for his pretentious claim to supersede Aristotle by a new and independent system.
See Waddington-Kastus, De Petri Rami vita, scriptis, philosophia (Paris, 1848); Charles Desmaze, Petrus Ramus, professeur au Collège de France, sa vie, ses écrits, sa mort (Paris, 1864); P. Lobstein,
