Fr. proportion; Latin, proportio. Ratio: comparative relation; settled

relation or graduation;

PROPORTIONALLY, adv. PROPORTIONATE, adj. & v. a. PROPORTIONATENESS, n. s. symmetry; harmonic agreement; form; size: to adjust; form symmetrically: proportionable, proportional, and proportionate, mean, having a settled comparative relation; suitable; the adverbs corresponding: proportionality and proportionateness, the state of being proportionate, or comparatively adjusted.

Nature had proportioned her without any fault, quickly to be discovered by the senses; yet altogether seemed not to make up that harmony that Cupid delights in.

Sidney.

Measure is that which perfecteth all things, because every thing is for some end; neither can that thing be available to any end which is not proportionable thereunto: and to proportion as well excesses as defects are opposite.

Hooker.

Let any man's wisdom determine by lessening the territory, and increasing the number of inhabitants, what proportion is requisite to the peopling of a region in such a manner that the land shall be neither too narrow for those whom it feedeth, nor capable of a greater multitude.

Raleigh. It is good discretion not to make too much of any man at the first; because one cannot hold out that vroportion. Lord Bacon.

All things received, do such proportions take, As those things have, wherein they are received; So little glasses little faces make,

And narrow webs on narrow frames are weaved.

The parts of a great thing are great, and there are proportionably large estates in a large country. Arbuthnot.

Since every single particle hath an innate gravitation toward all others, proportionated by matter and distance, it evidently appears that the outward atoms of the chaos would necessarily tend inwards, and descend from all quarters towards the middle of the whole space. Bentley's Sermons. Harmony, with every grace, Plays in the fair proportions of her face.

Mrs. Carter.

Hast thou incurred His anger, who can waste thee with a word, Who poises and proportions sea and land, Weighing them in the hollow of his hand, And in whose sight all nations seem As grasshoppers, as dust, a drop, a dream?

Couper.

PROPORTION, the identity or similitude of two ratio between them are said to be proportional; ratios. Hence quantities that have the same e. gr. if A be to B as C to D, or 8 be to 4 as 30 to 15; A, B, C, D, and 8, 4, 30, and 15, are said to be in proportion, or are simply called proportionals. Proportion is frequently confounded with ratio, yet the two convey in reality very different ideas, which ought by all means to be distinguished. Ratio is properly that relation or habitude of two things which determines the quantity of one from the quantity of another, without the intervention of any third; thus we say the ratio of 5 and 10 is 2, the ratio of 12 and 24 is 2. Proportion is the sameness or likeness of two such relations; thus the relations between 5 and 10 and 12 and 24 being the same, or equal, the four terms are said to be in proportion. Hence ratio exists between two numbers, but proportion requires at least three.

PROPORTION is also used for the relation between unequal things of the same kind, whereby their several parts correspond to each other with an equal augmentation or diminution.

PROPORTION, in architecture, denotes the just magnitude of the members of each part of a building, and the relation of the several parts to the whole; e. gr. of the dimensions of a column, &c., with regard to the ordonnance of a whole building.

PROPOSE', v. a. & v. n.Ital. proporre ; PROPOSAL, n.s. Span. proponer; PROPOSER, Fr. proposer; Lat. PROPOSITION, propono. To subPROPOSITIONAL, adj. mit to consideration; offer as a verb neuter, lay schemes: a

proposal is the scheme laid; design proposed; offer to the mind: the proposer, he who forms or offers a proposal or scheme: proposition, one of the three logical parts of an argument; a sentence which affirms or denies any thing; offer: the adjective corresponding.

Run thee into the parlour,

There shalt thou find my cousin Beatrice, Proposing with the prince and Claudio.

Shakspeare.

The first proposition of the precedent argument is not necessary. White. Chrysippus, labouring how to reconcile these two propositions, that all things are done by fate, and yet that something is in our own power, cannot extricate himself. Hammond.

The enemy sent propositions, such as upon delivery of a strong fortified town, after a handsome defence, are usually granted.

Clarendon.

Raphael to Adam's doubt proposed, Benevolent and facile thus replied. Milton. The compounding the representation of things, with an affirmation or negation, makes a proposition. Hale.

Faith is the assent to any proposition, not made out by the deductions of reason, but upon the credit of the proposer, as coming from God.

Locke.

My design is to treat only of those who have chiefly proposed to themselves the principal reward of their labours.

Tatler.

wild and irregular, I will propound a rule. Wotton.

To leave as little as I may unto fancy, which is

The parliament, which now is held, decreed Whatever pleased the king but to propound.

Dar'st thou to the Son of God propound To worship thee?

Daniel.

Milton. The existence of the church hath been propounded as an object of our faith in every age of Christianity. Pearson.

The arguments which Christianity propounds to us are reasonable encouragements to bear sufferings patiently. Tillotson.

PROPRETOR, a Roman magistrate, who, having discharged the office of pretor at home, was sent into a province to command there with his former pretorial authority. It was also an appellation given to those who, without having been pretors at Rome, were sent extraordinarily into the provinces to administer justice,,with the authority of pretors.

PROPRIETY, n. s.
PROPRIETARY, n. s. & adj.
PROPRIETOR, N. S.
PROPRIETRESS.

Fr. proprieté, proprietaire;

(Lat. proprietas.

Peculiar posses

sion or right; hence accuracy; justness; correctness of behaviour: a proprietary is a possessor in his own right; the adjective means belonging of right to a certain owner: proprietor, an owner; possessor in his own right: proprietress, the feminine of that noun.

You must have promised to yourselves propriety in love, Know women's hearts like straws do move.

Suckling.

Benefit of peace, and vacation for piety, render it necessary by laws to secure propriety. Hammond. Hail, wedded love! mysterious law, true source In Paradise! of all things common else. Of human offspring, sole propriety

Milton. Dryden.

They secure propriety and peace. A big-bellied bitch borrowed another bitch's kennel to lay her burden in; the proprietress demanded possession, but the other begged her excuse.

L'Estrange.

Man, by being master of himself, and proprietor of his own person, and the actions or labour of it, had still in himself the great foundation of property. Locke.

Common use, that is the rule of propriety, affords some aid to settle the signification of language. Id. Though sheep, which are proprietary, are seldom marked, yet they are not apt to straggle. Grew.

'Tis a mistake to think ourselves stewards in some of God's gifts, and proprietaries in others: they are

What propugnation is in one man's valour, To stand the push and enmity of those This quarrel would excite? Shakspeare. Thankfulness is our meet tribute to those sacred champions for propugning of our faith. Hammond. So zealous propugners are they of their native creed, that they are importunately diligent to instruct men in it, and in all the little sophistries for defending it. Government of the Tongue.

PROPULSION, n. s. Lat. propulsus. The act of driving forward.

Joy worketh by propulsion of the moisture of the brain, when the spirits dilate and occupy more room.

Bacon.

The evanescent solid and fluid will scarce differ, and the extremities of those small, canals will by propulsion be carried off with the fluid continually.

Arbuthnot on Aliments.

PRORE', n.s. Lat. prora. The prow; the forepart of the ship. A poetical word, used for a rhyme.

There no vessel with vermilion prore,
Or bark of traffic, glides from shore to shore.

Pope. PROROGUE', v. a. Į Fr. proroger; Latin PROROGATION, n. s. prorogo. To protract; prolong; put off; in a particular sense withhold the sitting of parliament: the noun substantive corresponding.

My life was better ended by their hate, Than death prorogued, wanting of thy love. Shakspeare.

By the king's authority alone they are assembled, and by him alone are they prorogued and dissolved; but each house may adjourn itself.

Baron.

He prorogued his government, still threatening to dismiss himself from publick cares. Dryden.

The fulness and effluence of man's enjoyments, in the state of innocence, might seem to leave no place for hope, in respect of any farther addition, but only of the prorogation and future continuance of what already he possessed.

South.

It would seem extraordinary, if an inferior court should take a matter out of the hands of the high court of parliament, during a prorogation. Swift.

But Savage easily reconciled himself to mankind without imputing any defect to his work, by observing that his poem was unluckily published two days after the prorogation of parliament.

Johnson.

PROROGATION differs from an adjournment of parliament in this, that by prorogation the session is ended, and such bills as passed in either house, or both houses, and had not the royal assent, must at the next assembly begin again.

PRORUPTION, n. s. Lat proruptus, prorumpo. The act of bursting out.

Others ground this disruption upon their continued or protracted time of delivery, whereat, excluding

Some utterly proscribe the name of chance, as a word of impious and profane signification; and, indeed, if taken by us in that sense in which it was used by the heathens, so as to make any thing casual, in respect of God himself, their exception ought justly to be admitted. South.

In the year 325, as is well known, the Arian doctrines were proscribed and anathematized in the famous council of Nice, consisting of 318 bishops, very unanimous in their resolutions, excepting a few reclaimants. Waterland.

That he who dares, when she forbids, be grave, Shall stand proscribed, a madman or a knave, A close designer rot to be believed, Or, if excused that charge, at least deceived.

Cowper.

Hocker.

Daniel.

Wilkins.

Dryden.

Locke.

Many offer at the effects of friendship, but they do not last; they are promising in the beginning, but they fail, jade, and tire in the prosecution.

South.

Their jealousy of the British power, as well as their prosecutions of commerce and pursuits of universal monarchy, will fix them in their aversions to

wards us.

Addison.

PROSECUTION. See LAW. PROSELYTE, n.s. & v.a. Fr. proselite; Gr. ρoσηλUTO. A convert; one brought over to a new opinion: to convert.

Matthew.

Ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte. Never any Pharisee was so eager to make a proselyte, as our late factors of Rome.

Hall.

He that saw hell in's melancholy dream, Scared from his sins, repented in a fright, Had he viewed Scotland, and turned proselyte. Cleaveland.

Where'er you tread,

Millions of proselytes behind are led,
Through crowds of new-made converts still you go.
Granville.

Men become professors and combatants for those opinions they were never convinced of, nor proselytes

to.

Locke. What numbers of proselytes may we not expect? Addison.

Men, of this temper cut themselves off from the opportunities of proselyting others, by averting them from their company. Government of the Tongue. PROSELYTE, in theology, is used to denote any new convert. The term was frequent in the primitive church; and the Jews likewise had their proselytes, who from Gentiles became Jews, following the precepts of the Mosaic law. It is generally believed that among the Hebrews there were two kinds of proselytes; one calied prose

lytes of righteousness, or proselytes of the covenant, who became complete Jews, by submitting to the rite of circumcision, and were in all respects united to the Jewish church and nation. The other called proselytes of the gate, who did not embrace the Jewish religion, so as to be obliged to receive or observe the ceremonial law, and yet were suffered to live among the Jews under certain restrictions; as that they should not practice idolatry, nor worship any other god beside the God of Israel; that they should not blaspheme the God of Israel; that they should keep the Jewish sabbath, so far at least as to refrain from working on that day. Besides forsaking idolatry, they were under an obligation to observe the seven precepts, which, as the Talmudists pretend, God gave to Adam, and afterwards to Noah, who transmitted them to posterity. The first of these precepts forbids idolatry, and the worship of the stars in particular; the second recommends the fear of God; the third forbids sixth enjoins respect and veneration for magismurder; the fourth adultery; the fifth theft; the trates; and the seventh condemns eating of flesh with the blood.

Dr. Lardner, with whom Dr. Doddridge and others also agree, is of opinion that there was but one sort of proselytes among the Jews. They were circumcised, and thus they became Jews by religion, and were permitted to eat the passover, and to partake of all religious privileges, as the Jews by descent did. They were called sojourners,' as they were allowed to dwell or strangers, or proselytes within the gates, and sojourn among the people of Israel. And they were so called, because, according to the law of Moses, they could not possess land. This is the sense of the word in all the texts of the New Testament where it is used. Dr. Lardner thinks that the notion of two kinds of Jewish proselytes cannot be found in any Christian writer before the fourteenth century or later. This learned writer pays no regard to what the later Jewish rabbins say of the method of initiating proselytes by circumcision, baptism, and sacrifice. See Lardner's works, and Doddridge on the Acts.

PROSELYTE BAPTISM. The Jews (see our article BAPTISM) are said from an early period to have practised the baptism of all their proselytes fron the heathen. We have given the ingenious parallelism that has been drawn by some writers between that supposed custom and Christian baptism: the most modern and respectable authors, we may add, continue to quote the constant practice, as it has been called, of the Jews in this matter before our Saviour's time, as the foundation of infant baptism.' The editor of the last edition of Dr. Gale's Reply to Dr. Wall wholly disputes, however, the validity of this argument, and insists that no foundation can be found for it in authentic history. As we have not met elsewhere with so detailed an examination of the authorities commonly referred to, we subjoin his remarks on those of Dr. Wall's Introduction.

Dr. Wall, as this writer concedes, has rested on the authority of some considerable names. That is, he has transferred from the pages of Ainsworth, Hammond, Lightfoot, &c., what they

state to be found in the books of the Jews,' without appearing to have consulted the original authorities; partly,' as he states, because the quotations for that purpose are to be searched for in books with which I am not so well acquainted; and partly because those few which I shall produce will make it clear enough that there was such a custom.' He repeatedly presses the importance of establishing this custom in the controversy with Antipædobaptists. The apostles must know that baptism was usually given to infants. They would conceive the command to proselyte and baptize all nations to include infants as a matter of course; Christ took into his hands baptism,' says he, after Lightfoot, 'such as he found it, adding with this, that he exalted it to a nobler purpose and to a larger use; and after Hammond, that The whole nation knew well enough that infants were wont to be baptized. There was no need of a precept for that which was always settled by common use. Suppose there should at this time come out a proclamation in these words, Every one on the Lord's Day shall repair to the public assembly in the church: that man would reason weakly who should conclude that there were no prayers, sermons, psalms, &c., in the public assemblies on the Lord's Day, for this reason, because there was no mention of them in this proclamation; for the proclamation ordered the keeping of the Lord's Day in the public assemblies in general; and there was no need that mention should be made of the particular kinds of divine worship there to be used, since they were, both before and at the time of the said proclamation, known to every body, and in common use. Just so the case stood as to baptism. Christ ordered it to be for a sacrament of the New Testament, by which all should be admitted to the profession of the gospel, as they were formerly to proselytism in the Jews' religion. The particular circumstances of it, as the manner of baptizing, the age of receiving it, which sex was capable of it, &c., had no need of being regulated or set down, because they were known to every body by common usage. It was, therefore, necessary, on the other side, that there should have been an express and plain order that infants and little children should not be baptized, if our Saviour had meant that they should not; for, since it was ordinary in all ages before to have infants baptized, if Christ would have had that usage to be abolished, he would have expressly forbidden it; so that his and the Scriptures' silence in this matter does confirm and establish infant baptism for ever.'

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I. Dr. Wall's first position is, that it is evident 'the custom of the Jews before our Saviour's time (and as they themselves affirm from the beginning of their law) was to baptize as well as circumcise any proselyte that came over to them from the nations.' This custom of theirs, he says, is fully and largely set forth by Maimonides, Isura Bia, cap. xiii. and xiv;' from whom a long quotation states that the ancient Israelites entered into covenant with Jehovah by circumcision, dipping, and sacrifice; that in all ages when an Ethnic is desirous of joining himself to Israel, and take upon him the

yoke of the law, he must be circumcised, and baptized, and bring a sacrifice; or, if it be a woman, be baptized and bring a sacrifice,' with several particulars respecting the nature of the offering that was to be brought, the time of performing the baptism, the number of witnesses necessary, &c. Maimonides further asserts that the judges received no proselytes in David's days, lest they should have come of fear; nor in Solomon's, lest they should have come because of the great prosperity of Israel. Notwithstanding there were many proselytes,' he adds, that in David's and Solomon's time joined themselves in the presence of private persons; and the judges of the great sanhedrim had a care of them. They drove them not away after they were baptized out of any place; neither took they them near to them until their afterfruits appeared.'

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The Babylonian Talmud says the same thing with regard to receiving proselytes by baptism, according to Dr. Wall, and only differs with the Talmud Hiersosol. Jevamoth as to the number of witnesses that should be present; and here follow three quotations, which the doctor says are taken from the latter (published about A. Ď. 230), but which in point of fact are all from the former (compiled not earlier than A. D. 500), as Dr. Gill has long ago remarked. They are all from T. BAB Yebamot, fol. xlvi. 2, et Gloss. So that we have not, as yet, any authority earlier than the Babylonian Talmud, or a Collection of Jewish Traditions and Comments on the Law, published at the beginning of the sixth century of the Christian era. Leo Modena is then quoted to show that the modern Jews continue this practice.

The Gemara Babylon. tit. Cherithoth, and tit. Jabimoth (portions of this Talmud) are afterwards brought forward to prove that the books do speak of this washing or baptism as abso lutely necessary;' that he is no proselyte unless he be circumcised and baptized;' the Talmud Tract Repudii (also a part of the Babylonian Talmud), as quoted by Godwin in his Moses and Aaron, states that Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, was made a proselyte by circumcision and immersion in waters;' the comment of Moses Kotsensis, a Jewish writer of the fourteenth century, that a purification by water' was necessary; and Drusius, a learned Fleming of the sixteenth century, that of a woman proselyte were required only purification by water and oblation." It is on this collection of authorities (and we have mentioned them all) that Dr. Wall remarks, This custom of the Jews continued after Christ's time, and after their expulsion from the Holy Land; and continues, as I showed from Leo Modena, to this day.'

He now cites the testimony of Arrian, who (A. D. 147) calls the Jews ßeßapμeves, the dipped; and proceeds to show how the Jewish doctors prove the necessity of this washing and baptism from Moses' law;' he says that many of them understand the command, Exod. xix. 10, for the people to sanctify themselves, as meaning to wash or baptize themselves; that Aben Ezra, who died A. D. 1174, understands Jacob's injunction to his family on the subject of meeting