43S 



NEPOTISM 



NKKO 



potiiBl (IUL nepote, ' nephew ), a word 

 used to signify Uie system or custom practised by 

 several pope* subsequent to Innocent VIII. of 

 granting high honours, dignities, offices, pensions, 

 and the like U> their family relations, generally 

 their nephews, altogether irrespective of merit. 



\eptlinr. tlie Italian god of the sea. Attempt* 

 have been made to show that his worship g<* 

 back to Aryan times, by Identifying his name TOO 

 tin- Sanskrit ami Iranian Ap.im Nai.at, 'offspring 

 .if the water.' But this is one of those unfortun- 

 ate identifications which show tliat comparative 

 mvthologiste are not always comparative phil- 

 ohigist*. Further, as there is nothing whatever to 

 make it in the least probable that Neptune was 

 ever anything but a sea-god, and a the primitive 

 mo were not acquainted with the sea, it is 

 evident that he cannot have been an Aryan deity. 

 Indeed, as it won not until after the Italians had 

 entered Italy that they became at all familiar With 

 the sea, it was proliahly not until after they had 

 settled in Italy that they ma.le acquaintance with 

 Neptune. Nor in all probability was he their own 

 invention. We may conjecture that he was 

 borrowed by them from the Etruscans, a maritime 

 nation, who worshipped as their sea-god Nethuns 

 or Netlmnus. Had the Italians never come in 

 <-<intact in historical times with the Greeks, 

 Ncthunus or Neptunus would have remained a 

 iii-re abstraction, like all other Italian deities, who 

 were rather Miimiiia than personal beings. But 

 communication with Greece resulted in the Italians 

 identifying their god of the sea with Poseidon (a.v.), 

 the Greeks' god of the sea. For the planet Nep- 

 tune, see PLANETS ; for the Neptunist theory, see 

 GEOLOGY, Vol. V. p. 148. 



rblldda (more correctly NARBADA), a river 

 of India, rises on the Amarkantak plateau, 3493 

 feet above sea-level, in 22 41' N. lat., 81" 49' E. 

 long., and flows west, through the Central Provinces, 

 pant Jabalpur ( 190 miles from its source), through 

 the great depression between the Vindhya Moun- 

 tains on the north and the Satpura Mountains on 

 the south, known as the Valley of the Nerlmilda, 

 and reaches the Gulf of Cambay half-way between 

 Baroda and Surat. It has a total length of 800 

 miles, and drains 36,400 sq. m. It is navigable as 

 far a Itroacli. :t" mile- from its month. The river 

 ranks as a sacred stieam in the eyes of the Hindus 

 Mime have held it likelv to supersede the Oiinge- 

 iii sanctity. It is regarded as a meritorious act to 

 walk from the sea to it* source and back again 

 alongside the river. 

 >-rrliin>k. See NERTCHINSK. 

 Nereid. See NYMPH. 

 r'is. a common genus of marine worms o 

 Chip U>|MM|S, the members of which live in the san< 

 or more freely in the sea. See CH^.TOPODS, am 



\VoRMS. 



Nerl. PuiLii 1 , the founder of the Congregatioi 

 of the Oratory and a canonised saint of the Roman 

 Catholic Church, was liorn at Florence, July 21 

 1815, and was the youngest wm of Francesco Neri 

 n attorney in that city. His singular modesty 

 his piety, and affectionate heart won for him in hi 

 Ixiyhood the name of the 'Good I'iiipo.'. Philip' 

 uncle, a prosperous merchant, wished to make Inn 

 his heir ; but the youth, with the view of abandon 

 ing all worldly pursuits, left his family and lietool 

 himself in his eighteenth year to Rome. Here fo 

 many years he lived a* a layman a humble am 

 retired life. A Florentine gentleman gave him i 

 small room as a lodging am) a daily allowance o 

 meal. Philip spent most of his time in visiting th 

 sick, in instructing the poor and ignorant, and ii 

 solitary prayer in the catacombs. It was not til 



551, when he was thirty -six years of age, that he 

 was persuaded to Iwcome a priest. He now took 

 li his quarters iii the little church of S. Girolamo, 

 uid gathering round him a number of disciples, 



o (if whom were men of go<nl family and high 



ittainments, he started the exercises of devotion 

 vhich made his name famous. At first these 

 imple services or prayer-meetings were held with 

 i few young men in his own room. In 1558 they 

 were transferred to an oratory which he was per- 

 mitted to build over the nave of the church. These 

 laily services, which were a great novelty at tin; 

 ime, consisted of three sermons of aliout half 

 an hour's duration, delivered in a familiar style. 

 m.l interspersed with vernacular hymns, reading, 

 uid prayers. The preachers were for the most part 

 aymen. During the day Philip t<K>k many of his 

 lenitenls round the hospitals. His object was to 

 nake religion attractive, especially to the young. 

 At the carnival or in holiday seasons he instituted 

 nusical entertainments and the acting of religious 

 Iramas, the origin of the modern oratorio. At 

 it her times he took numbers of men in procession 

 through the streets on a pilgrimage to the seven 

 lunches, alternately singing hymns and praying in 

 silence, and would take refreshment and recreation 

 in the vineyard or garden of some wealthy friend. 

 It is said that before Philip's death the UinbM 

 of these pilgrims rose to two thousand. 



In I">o4 Philip had some of his companions 

 ordained priests, and established among them a 

 community life at a church given to him by the 

 Florentines. One of these priests was (. esare 

 Baronio, the historian of the church, and after 

 wards cardinal. Ten years htfer the community, 

 now much increased in numlier, moved to S. Maria 

 in Vallicella, on the site of which Philip built a 

 larger church, known as the Chiesa Nuova, or New 

 Church. Here the institute of the Oratory received 

 the formal approbation of the pope, and here 

 Philip died, May 25, 1595. 



The saint was not an orator or a learned man, 

 and although he was the favourite of popes and 

 cardinals, as lie was of the poor, he never received 

 any ecclesiastical office or dignity. He never 

 meddled with politics or public affairs. But his 

 gentle and joyous nature, his tender charity, and 

 the example of his innocent life were among the 

 most potent of the influences which brought about 

 the revival of ecclesiastical piety and the reform*- 

 tion of morals in Home during the later half of 

 the 16th century, and which earned for him his 

 title of 'the Apostle of Home.' Many miracles 

 were attributed to the saint, even the raising of 

 the dead. A notable phenomenon connected with 

 his life is one which is to Philip what the Mi 

 were to Francis of Awiri astraiige palpitation of 

 the heart and fracture of the ribs attributed to the 

 supernatural effects of divine love which came 

 upon him suddenly one day at prayer in the 

 catacombs. Philip was canonised with Ignatius 

 Loyola and others in 1622. 



Philip's literary remains consist of a few letters (8vo, 

 Padua, 17M) and some sonnets printed in the coll' ction 

 of the Kinir Onettt. The bent life of the saint was written 



(1000). An English translation made from a later 

 edition of Baoci, appeared under the adUonhip Of r. " 

 Kaber in 184!t. A popular biography has been written 

 by Mrs Hope (Bums and Oates, 1859) ; and see also the 

 Life by Archbishop CapeoeUtro (Eng. trans. 1882). 



XTis-les-Balns. See MONTLU^ON. 



Nero, the last of the Ciesars and the mystic 

 antichrist of primitive Christian tradition, Homan 

 emperor from 54 to 68 A.I)., was born at 

 Antium, on the coast of Latiuin, 1MB December 



