He rests this conclusion on two arguments : first, that otherwise were a second world created exactly like the present it would have an exactly similar history ; and, secondly, that otherwise the mind could make no choice in the many cases where several objects precisely alike were presented to it. He sees clearly, at the same time, that this power is not the free-will which is the condition of praise and blame. In every conceivable case where two objects of choice perfectly equal are presented to the mind, praise or blame for the preference of the one to the other is unreasonable. It is only the preference of the better to the worse that is praiseworthy ; only the preference of the worse to the better that is blameworthy. Accordingly he argues that man has also a power of determining himself better or worse. In the prosecution of this argument he finds it requisite to maintain that there are not two separata faculties in the soul, the one confined to will and the other to understanding, but that there is a soul which wills understandingly and understands willingly. Its first motive principle is the desire of good in general. Its free will is distinctive of a rational imperfect being. A perfect being, essentially good and wise, cannot have such a power, it being impossible it should ever improve, much less impair itself. He endeavours to refute not only the argu ments designed to show freedom impossible, but those
intended to prove it confined to Deity.Vast erudition was combined in Cudworth with remark able speculative power. The extent and obtrusiveness of hia erudition and his discursiveness in argumentation have caused him to get much less credit for philosophical ability than he deserves. It is only the real student of his writ ings who can be expected to recognize it ; and, although he may be often consulted, he is probably now seldom studied.
Thomas Birch s Account of the Life and Writings of Ralph Cud- worth, D.D., is the chief, but very inadequate, biographical authority. In all respects the best view of Cudworth, as a man and a philosopher, is that given by Principal Tulloch in Rational Theology, &c., vol. ii. There is a good special dissertation on " the plastic nature" by Janet, and an excellent estimate of Cudworth as a Platonist in Prof. v. Stein s Sieben Bucher zur Geschichte des Platonismus, B. vi.
CUENCA, a province of New Castile, Spain, lying between 39 20 and 40 40 N. lat., and 1 10 and 3 10 W. long., with the provinces of Guadalajara and Teruel on the N., Valencia on the E., Albacete and Ciudad Real on the S., Toledo on the W., and Madrid on the N.W. Area, 6726 square miles. It occupies the eastern part of the ancfent kingdom of New Castile, and slopes from the Sierra de Cuenca (highest point, the Cerro de San Felipe, on the N.E. border of the province, 5905 feet) down into the great southern Castilian plain watered by the upper streams of the Guadiana. The rocky and bare highland of Cuenca on the north and east includes the upper valley of the Jucar or Xucar and its tributary streams, but in the north-west the province is watered by tributaries of the Tagus. The forests are proverbial for their pine timber, and rival those of Soria ; considerable quantities of timber are floated down the Tagus to Aranjuez, and thence taken to Madrid for building purposes. Excessive droughts prevail ; the climate of the bills and of the high plateaus is rude and cold, but the valleys are excessively hot in summer. The soil where well watered is fertile, but little attention is paid to agriculture, and three-fourths of the area is left under pasture. The rearing of cattle, asses, mules, and sheep is the principal employment of the people ; olive oil, nuts, wine, wheat, silk, wax, and honey are the chief products of the province. Mining of iron, copper, alum, and saltpetre is carried on to a small extent ; jasper and agates are found. Manufactures are limited to the coarsest stuffs. Population in 1870, 238,731.
Cuenca, the capital of the above province, and the seat of a bishop, is finely placed on a rocky eminence girt about with hiWs, beside the river Jucar at its confluence with the stream of the Huecar, at an elevation of 29GO feet above the sea, and distant about eighty-five miles E.S.E. from Madrid. It was once a flourishing town, cele brated in arts and literature, and the focus of the pro vincial wool-trade, but has now a population of barely 7400. Its cathedral was founded by Alphonso VIII. in 1177, and is one of the most remarkable in Spain. A fine bridge (erected in 1523) passes over the Jucar to the convent of San Pablo. A few paper mills, and some wool- washing and silver-working, are the remnant of its former industries.
CUENCA, an inland town of the Andes of Ecuador, S. America, about 190 miles S. of Quito and 60 miles S.E. of the port of Guayaquil. It stands on a plain at an elevation of about 8640 feet above the sea, near the hill of Farqui, chosen by the French astronomers as their meridian in 1742. It is a cathedral city, and contains several mon asteries, besides a college and other educational institutions. Cuenca has an extensive trade in cheese, oats, grain, and other agricultural produce. The population, which is esti mated at 25,000, is in great part Indian. In the re- division of the republic into 1 1 provinces, which took place in 1875, the former province of Cuenca ceased to bear that name.
of a single piece of metal or other rigid material or com posed of two or more pieces, which covers the front of the wearer s person. In a suit of armour, however, since this important piece would be worn in connection with a corre sponding defence for the back, the term cuirass commonly is understood to imply the complete body-armour, in cluding both the breast and the back plates. Thus this complete body-armour appears in the Middle Ages frequently to have been described as a " pair of plates/ The corslet, a comparatively light cuirass, is more strictly a breast-plate only. As parts of the military equip ment of classic antiquity, cuirasses and corslets of bronze, and at later periods also of iron or some other rigid substance, were habitually in use ; but while some special kind of secondary protection for the breast had been worn in earlier times by the men-at-arms in addition ta their mail hauberks and their " cotes " armed with splints and studs, it was not till the 14th century that a regular body-defence of plate can be said to have become an established component of mediaeval armour. As this century continued to advance, the cuirass is found gradu ally to have come into general use, in connection with plate defences for the limbs, until, at the close of the century the long-familiar interlinked chain-mail is no longer visible in knightly figures, except in the camail of the basinet and at the edge of the hauberk. The prevail ing, and indeed almost the universal, usage throughout this century was that the cuirass was worn covered. Thus, the globose form of the breast-armour of the Black Prince, in his effigy in Canterbury Cathedral, 1376, intimates that a cuirass as well as a hauberk is to be con sidered to have been covered by the royalty-emblazoned jupon of the Prince. The cuirass, thus worn in the 14th century, was always made of sufficient length to rest on the hips ; otherwise, if not thus supported, it must have been suspended from the shoulder?, in which case it would have effectually interfered with the free and vigorous action of the wearer. Early in the 15th century, the entire panoply of plate, including the cuirass, began to be worn without any surcoat ; but in the concluding quarter of the century the short surcoat, with full short
sleeves, known as the tabard, was in general use over the