Imputation.

IMPROVING LEASE, a lease, in Scotland, by which the tenant undertakes to keep the premises in repair; called a repairing lease in England.

IMPROVISATOʻRI, an Italian term, designating poets who utter verses without previous preparation on a given theme, and who sometimes sing and accompany their voice with a musical instrument. The talent of improvisation is found in races in which the imagination is more than usually lively, as in the Arabs, and in many tribes of negroes. Amongst the ancients, Greece was the land of improvisation. In modern Europe, it has been almost entirely confined to Italy, where Petrarch, in the 12th c., introduced the practice of singing improvised verses to the lute; and down to the present day, the performances of improvisatori constitute one of the favorite entertainments of the Italians. Females (improvisatrices) have frequently exhibited this talent in a high degree. Improvisation is by no means limited to brief poems of a few verses and of very simple structure, but is often carried on with great art, aud in the form and to the length of a tragedy or almost of an epic poem. But when the productions of the most admired improvisatori have been given to the world through the press, they have never been found to rise above mere mediocrity. It is worthy of notice that the greater number of the celebrated improvisatori of Italy have been born in Tuscany or the Venetian territories. Siena and Verona have been especially productive of them. Some of the prin cipal are Serafino d'Aquila (died 1500), Metastasio (q.v.), who soon abandoned the art, Zucco (died 1764), Serio and Rossi (beheaded at Naples, 1799), Gianni (pensioned by Bona parte), and Tommaso Sgricci (died 1836). The best-known improvisatrices are Magdalena Moralli Fernandez (died 1800), Teresa Bandettini (born 1756), Rosa Taddei (born 1801), Signora Mazzei (probably the first in point of talent), and more lately Giovannina Milli.

IMPULSIVE MADNESS. The approaches of mental discase are generally slow and perceptible; but instances occur where, without announcement, without any preliminary stage of disease or disturbance, an individual, apparently hitherto of sound mind, is suddenly seized with mania, presents symptoms of incontrollable violence, perpetrates acts of atrocity or absurdity, altogether inconsistent with his previous disposition and deportment; and then, nearly as quickly, subsides into his ordinary state and habits, retaining no, or a very imperfect, recollection of the events which occurred during the paroxysm. It is not, however, in the suddenness or shortness of the paroxysm that the essential characteristic consists. During the continuance of such an affection, three mental conditions are distinctly traced: 1. The sudden birth and irresistible dominion of a propensity; 2. The abolition or impairment of the apprehension of the real and ordinary relations of the individual; and 3. The suspension of the powers by which such propulsions are prevented from arising, or ruled and regulated when they do arise. Alienation of this kind has been chiefly recognized when the instincts are involved; and the most striking illustrations are derived from cases of homicidal or sanguinary tendency, simply because the results may convulse society, or come under the notice of courts of law. But many examples exist of brief periods of aberration which could not be instigated by passion, and involved nothing criminal. A lady is mentioned who never entered church but she was impelled to shriek, or saw plate-glass but she was impelled to break it; and the incongruous laughter, the grotesque gesticulations, and the involuntary and repulsive associations to which good and great men have been subject, must all be placed under this category.

Marc, De la Folie considérée dans ses Rapports avec les Questions Medico Judiciaires, t. i. p. 219, and t. ii. p. 473.

IMPUTATION is one of the most common technical expressions in Christian theology. It is meant to denote the transference of guilt or of merit of punishment or reward. The doctrine of the imputation of sin, for example, is the doctrine which inculcates that all mankind are sharers in the fact and consequences of Adam's fall from innocence; and the correlative doctrine of the imputation of Christ's righteousness is that which inculcates that the merit or righteousness of Christ is transferred to those who believe in him, or, in other words, that they become sharers in his merit or righteousness. This idea of transference of intercommunication of good and evil, is a pervading one in Christian theology, and answers to undoubted realities of the spiritual life; but the idea is also apt to become degraded and materialized, and has become so in some of it; common representations in popular theology. The doctrine of the imputation of Adam's sin, for example, expresses to some minds not only the idea of the participation of the human race in the consequences of Adam's transgressior, so that, because he sinned and fell from innocence, they, the inheritors of his corrupt nature, also sin, and are involved in the miseries of a sinful state; but, moreover, the idea, that the sin of Adam in its direct guilt and wickedness is transferred to his posterity. They reason after this manner: it is undeniable that man suffers on account of original sin, but suffering and sin are inseparably connected. If man suffers on account of original sin, therefore, it is only because he is guilty of it. The sin of Adam in eating the forbidden fruit is equally the sin of his posterity. According to this mode of reasoning, there is a formal imputation of the sin of Adam to all his descendants. God is supposed, as it were, to charge the one to the account of the other, and by a direct and arbitrary act to hold mankind guilty because Adam fell. To give a logical justification to this view, it is assumed that God entered into a covenant with Adam (see COVENANT), by which the latter was

regarded as a representative of the whole human race; so that when he fell, all mankind sinned and fell with him. In the same manner, the merit or righteousness of Christ is supposed to be imputed to believers by a direct and formal transference of the one to the account of the other. In both cases it is the idea of formal and arbitrary exchange that is prominent; and according to some theologians, this idea alone answers to imputation of sin or of righteousness. To impute sin, is to deal with a man as a sinner, not on account of his own act, or at least not primarily on this account, but on account of the act of another; and to impute righteousness, is to deal with man as righteous, not because he is so, but on account of the righteousness of Christ reckoned as his, and received by faith alone. The act of another stands in both cases for our own act, and we are adjudgedin the one case condemned, in the other acquitted—not for what we ourselves have done, but for what another has done for us.

This is a fair illustration of the tyranny which technical phrases are apt to exercise in theology as in other things. When men coir an imperfect phrase to express a spiritual reality, the reality is apt to be forgotten in the phrase, and men play with the latter as a logical counter, having a force and meaning of its own. Imputation of sin and imputation of righteousness have in this way come to represent legal or pseudo-legal processes in theology, through the working out of the mere legal analogies suggested by the word. But the real spiritual reality which lies behind the phrases in both cases is simple enough. Imputation of sin is, and can be nothing else than the expression of the spiritual unity of Adam and his race. Adam "being the root of all mankind," the stock which has grown from this root must share in its degeneracy. The law of spiritual life, of historical continuity, implies this, and it requires no arbitrary or legal process, therefore, to account for the sinfulness of mankind as derived from a sinful source. We are sinners because Adam fell. The fountain having become polluted, the stream is polluted. We are involved in his guilt, and could not help being so, by the conditions of our historical existence; but, nevertheless, his sin is not our sin, and cannot in the strict sense be imputed to us, for sin is essentially voluntary in every case-an act of self-will, and not a mere quality of nature; and my sin, therefore, cannot be another's, nor another's mine In the same manner, the highest meaning of the imputation of the righteousness of Christ lies in the spiritual unity of the believer with Christ, so that he is one with Christ, and Christ one with him, and in a true sense he becomes a partaker of the divine nature. The notion of legal transference is an after-thought-the invention of polemical logicand the fact itself is deeper and truer than the phrase that covers it. The race one with Adam, the believer one with Christ, are the ideas that are really true in the phrases impu tation of sin and imputation of righteousness. The logic of theology has evolved many more applications of the phrases, but these applications are rather the refinements of theological pedantry than the expression of true spiritual relations.

INACHUS, a name in Grecian mythology given to a river in Argos, and also to the god of the river. When Neptune and Juno disputed about the possession of Argos, and Inachus decided for Juno, Neptune is said to have dried up the river. Inachus is described also as the first king of Argos and leader of the Argives from the mountains to the plains, from whom Argos is called Inachian.

INA'GUA, GREAT and LITTLE, are the two most southerly islands of the Bahama group, the former of which, measuring 50 m. by 25, is remarkable for having its longer dimension placed almost at right angles to those of the rest of the cluster. The Little Inagua lies about 12 m. n., and measures 8 m. by 6. The pop. of both islands together is about 1000, of whom only a small proportion are white.

INAJA' PALM, Maximiliana regia, a South American palm, common in the countries near the Amazon; having a lofty, massive stem; very long, drooping, pinnate leaves, with leaflets in groups of three, four, or five at intervals along the midrib, from which they stand out in different directions; numerous spadices; large woody spathes; and densely clustered elongate fruit, with a hard stony seed, a layer of soft pulp, and a tough skin. The leaves are sometimes more than 50 ft. long. The great woody spathes are used by hunters to cook meat in, and with water in them, they stand the fire well enough for the purpose. They are also used as baskets and as cradles by the Indians. The fruit is eaten by the Indians, and is particularly attractive to monkeys and some kinds of birds.

INANI'TION. See STARVATION.

INARCH'ING, or GRAFTING BY APPROACH, a mode of grafting by which branches are united together before any of them is separated from its original stem. Branches growing across one another sometimes unite in this way of themselves, and it is supposednot improbably-that an observation of this circumstance first led to the invention of grafting. Inarching is practiced in cases in which the ordinary modes of grafting are not found readily to succeed, as with camellias. The stocks to be grafted upon are planted, or placed in pots, around the plant from which the grafts are to be taken. Four or five months are generally sufficient to complete the union, but sometimes even two years are necessary. When the union is complete the scion is separated by a sloping cut from its parent plant. Care must always be taken that the parts to be joined together be cut so as to fit one another pretty exactly, and they are then firmly tied together, and so

covered that neither air nor water may penetrate. It is desirable that they be branches of nearly the same thickness. They should be cut almost down to the pith, but the pith must not be injured. Inarching is performed in spring, after the sap has begun to circulate. There are several ways of inarching. For example, two branches of a tree may be bent so as to meet and strike upon a wound in the main stem, by which a gap will be filled up; one growing tree either from the ground or a pot, may be led to unite with another; or several suckers may be led from the ground archwise to strike upon a point in the stem, thus bringing fresh aid to the productive part of the tree. By means such as these, quickset-hedges are sometimes thickened like a net-work, so as greatly to improve their appearance and protective qualities.

IN ARTICULO MORTIS, a phrase used in Scotland to denote a deed executed on death-bed. As a general rule, such a deed, in Scotland, operating like a will, may be set aside by the heir at law.

LIGHT.

INCANDESCENT LAMP, INCANDESCENT LIGHT SYSTEM. See ELECTRIC INCANTATION, like enchant, is derived from a Latin root meaning simply "to sing," as charm is only a disguised form of carmen, a song. It is the term in use to denote one of the most powerful and awe-inspiring modes of magic (q. v.), viz., that resting on a belief in the mysterious power of words solemnly conceived and passionately uttered.

There is in the human voice, especially in its more lofty tones, an actual power of a very wonderful kind to stir men's hearts. When to this we add that poetic utterance is a special and exceptional gift; that the language of primitive nations is crude and unmanageable, the words being as difficult to weld together as pieces of cast-iron; that it is only when the poet's mind has risen to unusual heat that he can fuse them into those rhythmical sequences that please the ear and hang together in the memory; that, in short, his art is a mystery to himself-an inspiration; we need not wonder at the feeling with which everything in the form of verse or meter was viewed.

The singing or saying of such compositions, which could thus stir the blood of the hearers, they knew not how, what other effects might it not produce? Accordingly, there is no end to the power ascribed to incantations, especially when accompanied, as they generally were, with the concocting of drugs and other magical rites. They could heal or kill. If they could not raise from the dead, they could make the dead speak, or "call up spirits from the vasty deep," in order to unveil the future. They could extinguish fire; darken the sun or moon; make fetters burst, a door or a mountain fly open; blunt a sword; make a limb powerless; destroy a crop, or charm it away into another's barn.

The prayers of heathens, whether for blessings or for curses, partake largely of the nature of magical incantations. They are not supposed to act as petitions addressed to a free agent, but by an inherent force which even the gods cannot resist. This notion is very prominent in Hinduism and Buddhism; but it more or less disguisedly pervades all superstitious worship. "They think they shall be heard for their much speaking." For almost every occasion or operation of life, there were appropriate formulas to be repeated in order to secure success; and many of these, with that reverence for antiquity and conservative tendency which always characterize superstition, continue to live in popular memory, although often the words are so old as to be unintelligible. The Romans, in the days of Cato, used incantations, for curing dislocations, full of words the meaning of which had been lost. A form of words used to this day in Shetland for healing a sprain can be traced back to the 10th century. In its earliest form, as found in an old German manuscript, it narrates how Woden and Baldur riding out to hunt, Baldur's horse dislocated its foot, and how Woden, using charmed words, set bone to bone, etc., and so healed the foot. The repetition of this rhymed narration acted as a charm to heal other lamed horses. The modern version of this tradition, as current in Norway, makes the accident happen to the horse of Jesus, and Jesus himself perform the cure. In Shetland, also, it is the Lord, meaning Jesus, that is substituted for Woden; and the formula is applied to the healing of persons' limbs as well as those of horses. The operation is thus described in R. Chambers's Popular Rhymes of Scotland: When a person has received a sprain, it is customary to apply to an individual practiced in casting the wresting thread." This is a thread spun from black wool, on which are cast nine knots, and tied round a sprained leg or arm. During the time the operator is putting the thread round the affected limb, he says, but in such a tone of voice as not to be heard by the bystanders, nor even by the person operated upon:

INCARNATION (Lat. in, and caro, carnis, flesh), a term much used in theology concerning the union of the divine nature of the Son of God with human nature in the

Incest.

person of Christ. We read in John, i: 14, that "the Word was made flesh;" but this is understood not as signifying a change of nature, but an assumption of human nature into personal union with the divine nature. In accordance with Luke, i. 35, and other texts of Scripture, the formation of the human nature of Christ is ascribed to the Holy Ghost. The reality of the human nature of Christ was much disputed in the first ages of Christianity, but in our times the chief dispute as to the person of Christ relates to his divine nature. Whilst the doctrine of the incarnation is generally asserted by all who profess Christianity, except Unitarians (q. v.), no explanation of it is attempted or deemed possible. It is regarded, however, as a doctrine fraught with most important consequences, affecting the whole system of Christianity. In the doctrine of the incarnation, it is maintained that in union with the divine nature of the Son of God, there was, and is, in the person of Christ, not only a true human body, but a human "reasonable" soul.

INCARNATION, THE (ante). The coming of the Son of God in human flesh is the great fact which gives unity to the Scriptures and reveals God to men. Before it was accomplished it was prefigured in a series of preliminary manifestations of the Deity in human form, to whom the Scriptures ascribe the names Angel Jehovah, Jehovah, and God. See JEHOVAH. The incarnation of God in Jesus Christ, fully denied by some, indeterminately held by many more, but by the great majority of thinkers in Christendom accepted in various forms of philosophic statement, may be briefly outlined from the Scriptures on whose testimony it rests. A permanent and perfect union of the Divine being and the human nature has been constituted in human history in the person of Jesus the Christ, and this not as creating a unity previously non-existent, but as restoring and historically developing a perfectly natural union. 1. That this would be done was foretold by prophecy. (1) It promised that the Messiah of God would be a man. The first announcement of a deliverer was made after the fall of man, in the Lord's declaration to Satan under the guise of the serpent: "I will put enmity between thy seed and the seed of the woman; he shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel." The promise to Abraham was that in him and his seed (whence, according to the flesh, Christ came) all the families of the earth should be blessed. Jacob's prophecy implied that the Shiloh, the giver of peace, would be a descendant of Judah. The Lord's covenant with David was that, in the distant future, his exalted son should sit on his throne. David describes the mortal suffering of a man whose soul should not be given up to the dead, nor his body to the corruption of the grave. Isaiah foretold that a child would be born who should exercise government on the throne of David; that a man would be as a covert from the tempest; and that the anointed servant of the Lord would be a man of sorrows, rejected of men, bearing the sins of many, and that he would die and be buried. Jeremiah prophesied that there would be raised up to David a righteous branch and prosperous king. Daniel was instructed by the angel that, at the time appointed, the Messiah would be cut off, but not for himself. Zechariah proclaimed the man whose name is " the Branch;" who would be a king and priest on his throne; would be lowly, riding on the foal of an ass; and be smitten as the shepherd of the flock. Micah announced that the promised ruler of Israel would be born at Bethlehem. (2) Prophecy declared that the Messiah would be a divinely human personality. David called him who in the future would sit on his throne, his lord; saying, Jehovah said to my lord, sit thou on my right hand. Therefore, since in his human nature he was to be David's son, he must possess also the divine personality in order to be David's lord. Isaiah foretold that the name of the child to be born and to rule over the kingdom of David would be Wonderful, Counselor, the mighty God, the father of eternity—that is, according to the Hebrew idiom, the Eternal. Jeremiah prophesied that the name of the future righteous son of David would be Jehovah our righteousness. Zechariah said that the man who would be smitten as the shepherd is the "fellow" of Jehovah; and that he whose feet would stand on the Mount of Olives is Jehovah. Micah declared that the going forth to rule of him who would be born in Bethlehem was only one of those goings forth which have been from of old, even from everlasting. Malachi gives the closing assurance that the angel of the covenant, the Messiah, who would suddenly come to his temple, is the Lord. 2. The New Testament declares that the union of the divine being and the human nature has been historically constituted in the person of Jesus Christ. (1) It speaks of him as a man of the house and lineage of David; narrating his birth, childhood, youth, manhood, words, works, sufferings, and death; recording more than 60 times his own application to himself of the title, the Son of Man; and saying that he ate, spake, heard, slept, walked, wept, and became weary; ascribing to him the emotions, affections, and sentiments of a true humanity. (2) It ascribes to him a personality properly divine: recording more than 100 times the application to him of the title Son of God in a sense in which it is not given to any other being; appropriating to him hundreds of times the title Lord, which corresponds to Jehovah in the Old Testament; affirming that he was "the Word" which was in the beginning with God, was God, and is the true God; assigning to him the attributes of God; prescribing for him the worship and honor due to God, and attributing to him the works of God. (3) Affirming his pre-existence in the bosom of the Father-and his even then continuing existence therein-together with his historical assumption of the

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human nature, the New Testament teaches that he unites the true divine being and the true humanity in one person. It declares that the Son to whom it was said, "Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever," was brought into this world; that the Word who was with God and was God became flesh and dwelt among men, some of whom saw his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father; that he who was in the form of God took on himself the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men; that that which was from the beginning, the word of life, the eternal life which was with the Father, manifested in the world, was heard, seen, gazed on, and touched by men; that God was manifested in the flesh; and that he who is a descendant from the whole scriptural line of the fathers, is also over all, God blessed forever.

The view, not widely spread but ably advocated, that Christ was in no strict and proper sense the incarnation of God, does not base itself on the Scriptures, though seeking incidental confirmations in them. On the point under consideration, it stands in either a philosophical or a historical denial, usually in both; and this denial involves at least one of three modes of dealing with the Bible: (1) a refining of its language into a sense far from the ordinary use of words; (2) a doubt of the correctness of the scriptural documents as documents, in view of their liability to accidental changes in their transmission from antiquity; (3) a denial of the original authority of the Scriptures as a declaration of truth-this denial extending beyond the question of their infallibility, beyond that of their divine inspiration, to that of their truthfulness as mere human history or of their truthfulness as the testimony of men who claimed to be eye-witnesses of the facts which they record.

Philosophically, the incarnation of God touches the deepest problems; and historically its principle is traceable through many distortions in the great religions of the world.

INCAS. See PERU.

INCEN DIARY LETTER, a letter threatening to burn the house or premises of a person, generally called a threatening letter. To send such a letter is felony, punishable by three years' penal servitude. The offense is punishable in Scotland according to the discretion of the court.

INCENDIARY SHELLS, another name for carcasses (q.v.).

INCENSE (Heb. miktar, kitter, and kitturoth), a perfume, the odor of which is evolved by burning, and the use of which, in public worship, prevailed in most of the ancient religions. The incense at present in use consists of some resinous base, such as gum olibanum, mingled with odoriferous gums, balsams, etc. There is no regular formula for it, almost every maker having his own peculiar recipe. The ingredients are usually olibanum, benzoin, styrax, and powdered cascarilla bark. These materials, well mingled, are so placed in the censer or thurible as to be sprinkled by falling on a hot plate, which immediately volatilizes them, and diffuses their odor through the edifice.

Among the Jews, the burning of incense was exclusively employed as an act of worship, and, indeed, would appear to have been in itself regarded in the light of a sacred offering. The same would also appear for the religion of Egypt; but the Persian sculptures exhibit the burning of incense as one of the marks of honor offered to royalty.

In the Catholic church, both of the west and of the east, incense is used in public worship, more particularly in connection with the eucharistic service, which is regarded as a sacrifice; but writers are not agreed as to the earliest date at which its use can be traced. St. Ambrose, in the western church, alludes to incense in terms which suppose the practice of burning it to be an established one; and in later writers, it is mentioned familiarly as a part of ordinary public worship. In the Roman Catholic church incense is used in the solemn (or high) mass, in the consecration of churches, in solemn consecrations of objects intended for use in public worship, and in the burial of the dead. There are also minor incensations of the celebrating bishop or priest and inferior ministers; of prelates, princes, and other dignitaries officially present at the public service, and a general incensation of the whole congregation.

In the reformed churches, the use of incense was abandoned at the same time with other practices which have been laid aside by them as without "warrant of Scripture." INCENSED, or ANIME, an epithet applied in heraldry to panthers or other wild beasts borne with flames issuing from their mouths and ears.

*INCEST (Lat. in, not; castus, chaste) is the marrying of a person within the Levitical degrees. In the old ecclesiastical law (now obsolete), and in Scotland, it comprehends cohabitation irrespective of marriage. The law of England enforced these prohibitions by several statutes in the reign of Henry VIII., which are still in force. Recent cases have determined that a marriage between a widower and his deceased wife's sister comes within these rules, and is void, and it makes no difference that the mar riage was celebrated in a foreign country, as, for example. Denmark, where these marriages are legal, provided the parties were domiciled in England, and went there merely to evade the English law. It has also been decided in England that the same rules which apply between legitimate relations apply between natural relations, though one is illegitimate-as, for example, between a man and the daughter of an illegitimate