Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VI.djvu/327

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

DUNSTABLE DU PAGE 319 ceitas, which might be rendered as the this-and- that-ity. Every existing being consists of sub- stance and privation or limitation, while God is the unlimited absolute substance. The pos- sibilities of limitations or individuations of substance are infinite, and hence follows the existence of accidental chances or occurrences ; and hence the free will of individual man and his corresponding responsibility to God. The su- pernatural knowledge which cannot be derived from real experience is afforded by the Bible, but it is the province of philosophy to show the conformity of the teachings of the Bible with reason. The works of Duns were published by Wadding (12 vols. folio, Lyons, 1639). DUNSTABLE, a town and parish of Bedford- shire, England, 29 m. N. W. of London, on the Great Northern railway; pop. in 1871, 4,558. The parish church is part of a cele- brated priory founded in 1131 by Henry I. The town is the principal seat of the British straw plait manufacture. DUJVSTA5T, Saint, an English prelate and states- man, born near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, in 925, died May 19, 988. Under the patronage of his uncle, the archbishop of Canterbury, he passed some years at the court of Athelstan ; but the jealousy of courtiers depriving him of the king's favor, he retired to Winchester, and devoted himself to a monastic life. He built a cell against the wall of Glastonbury church, and there passed his time in prayer, fasting, and manual labor, transcribing manuscripts, painting, and fashioning utensils of metal for the use of the altar. About 942 he became abbot of the then ruined monastery of Glastonbury, and received from King Edmund authority to restore it at the royal charge. In the succeed- ing reign of Edred his power became almost absolute in the national councils. He restored the strictness of ecclesiastical discipline, and brought the Benedictines into England, but on the accession of Edwy was banished from the kingdom. His share in the story of Edwy and Elgiva has brought him into odium with all believers in that much discussed romance, the facts of which are yet unsettled. Edgar re- called the exiled abbot, doubled his honors, made him bishop of the united sees of Worces- ter arid London, and in 959 advanced him to the primacy as archbishop of Canterbury. The prelate ruled both the monarch and the king- dom. He meted out justice with a stern hand, built up the power of the church, placed Bene- dictines in the livings of the. disorderly secu- lar clergy, and forced the king to do a seven years' penance for a sin of licentiousness. On Edgar's death his influence raised Edward to the throne, to the exclusion of a younger son, Ethelred ; but on the accession of the latter in 978 his power was broken, and he retired to Canterbury, and there died. Of the writings attributed to him, only the " Concord of Mo- nastic Rule " is known to be authentic. His life, edited by the Rev. J. R. Green, master of the rolls, was published in London in 1872. 277 VOL. vi. 21 DUNSTER, Henry, the first president of Har- vard college, inaugurated Aug. 27, 1640, died Feb. 27, 1659. He was president till 1654, when, having become a supporter of the prin- ciples of the modern Baptists, he was per- suaded to resign his office. He was respected as a modest and pious man, and esteemed an excellent oriental scholar. See " Life of Dun- ster," by J. Chaplin (Boston, 1872). DUNTOff, John, an English bookseller and author, born in Graff ham, Huntingdonshire, May 4, 1659, died in 1733. He was appren- ticed to a bookseller in London, engaged in business for himself, came to New England in March, 1686, with a cargo of books, where he remained about eight months, and after his return embarked again in business, with little success. He conducted a weekly publication called " The Athenian Mercury," resolving all the most nice and curious questions proposed by the inquiring, of which 20 volumes ap- peared. A selection was made from. this in four volumes, called "The Athenian Oracle." He wrote voluminously on religion, ethics, and politics. He gives us, in his " Life and Errors of John Dunton " (London, 1705 and 1818), the " lives and characters of more than 1,000 contemporary divines and other per- sons of literary eminence," and relates many curious facts in relation to the bookselling business, describing the ministers, booksellers, and other citizens of Boston and Salem. His "Letters from New England," edited by W. H. Whitmore, were published by the Prince society in 1867. DUODECIMAL, proceeding by twelves, a term properly applied to an arithmetical scale using 11 digits and a cipher, which has been zeal- ously advocated as an improvement upon or- dinary decimal arithmetic. Thus if we use g for ten, and g for eleven, the number 275 may be written 199. But the term duodecimal is also given to the system of compound numbers sometimes used by artificers in calculating sur- faces and solidities from measures taken in feet and inches. Duodecimals in the second sense are considered by most mathematicians as worthless, and in the first sense as not having sufficient superiority over decimals to counter- balance the inconvenience of making a change. Dll PAGE, a N. E. county of Illinois, drained by the E. and W. branches of Du Page river ; area, 340 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 16,685. It has a level surface, occupied in great part by prairies. Che soil is exceedingly fertile. The Chicago and Northwestern and the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy railroads traverse it, and the Chicago, Rock Island, and Pacific railroad crosses the S. E. corner. The Illinois and Michigan canal passes along the S. E. border. The chief productions in 1870 were 106,789 bushels of wheat, 331,981 of Indian corn, 860,809 of oats, 72,062 of barley, 141,599 of potatoes, 52,430 tons of hay, 58,504 Ibs. of cheese, 548,453 of butter, and 153,611 of wool. There were 6,247 horses, 10,888 milch cows,