STATICE 



STATISTICS 



695 



and again in 1819, the question was raised in con- 

 nection with the United States Bank Charter, 

 Henry Clay, and afterwards the state of Maryland, 

 maintaining that congress had no power to incor- 

 porate companies or to create a bank. So far the 

 advocates of States' Rights had spoken only ; in 

 1832, in South Carolina, they made the first 

 attempt to carry the principle into action (see 

 NULLIFICATION); in 1860-61 (South Carolina again 

 the first), and in the years which followed, the 

 seceding states carried out that principle, of which 

 they assumed the truth, to the full. The war of 

 secession was the logical outcome of the disputes 

 and agitation of sixty years ; with its failure it 

 may be presumed that the doctrine which inspired 

 it, at least in its extreme form and as a factor in 

 practical politics, fell too. 



Static*-. See PLUMBAGINELS. 



Statics, the branch of dynamics which treats of 

 equilibrium. The ordinary Balance (q.v.) is oneof 

 the most important of statical instruments. With 

 it we balance the weight of a body of unknown 

 mass against the combined weights of a number of 

 standard masses, and so determine the unknown 

 mass in terms of recognised units. The general 

 principle of statics is that which describes tne con- 

 dition of equilibrium amongst a number of given 

 forces. The condition is that the vector sum of 

 the moments of the forces about any and every 

 point vanishes. It is more usual in text-books to 

 break this statement up into two, which admit of 

 ready application. The first is that the sum of the 

 components of the forces along each of three non- 

 coplanar directions vanishes ; and the second that the 

 sum of the moment* of the forces al>out each of these 

 three directions also vanishes ( see MOMENT ). These 

 two rules give six conditions for the equilibrium of a 

 rigid body, three for translation, and three for rota- 

 tion. Used in combination with other roots, the word 

 statics always implies equilibrium or relative rest. 

 Thus we have Hydrostatics (q.v.) dealing with the 

 equilibrium of fluids, and Electrostatics (see ELEC- 

 TRICITY ) treating of the equilibrium of electrified 

 bodies. See also DYNAMICS and KINETICS. Min- 

 chin's Statics (4th ed. 1890-91 ) is the best English 

 treatise on the subject. See also GRAPHIC STATICS. 



Stationers' Hall, the hall of the 'Master 

 and Keepers or Wardens and Commonalty of the 

 Mystery or Art of the Stationers of the City of 

 London.' The Company was incorporated in 1557, 

 and had until the passing of the Copyright Act in 

 1842 an absolute monopoly, as all printers were 

 obliged to serve an apprenticeship to a member of 

 the Company, and every publication, from a Bible 

 to a ballad, was required to l)e ' Entered at 

 Stationers' Hall.' This registration is no longer 

 compulsory, but the practice of registering is still 

 useful in making good claims of Copyright (q.v.). 

 The series of registers of books entered for publica- 

 tion, commencing in 1554, is of enormous value 

 in the history of English literature. A transcript 

 of these from 1554 to 1640 has been published by 

 Professor Arber, in 5 vols. 



Stationery Office, an office in London estab- 

 lished by the Lords of the Treasury in 1786, for 

 the purpose of providing for the supply of books, 

 stationery, &c. for the government offices at home 

 and abroad. Its main function, however, is in 

 making contracts for the printing of all reports 

 and other matters laid before the House of Com- 

 mons. The duties are performed by a controller 

 and assistant-controller, a storekeeper, and alwut 

 thirty clerks or other subordinate officers. There 

 is a branch establishment in Dublin. The Lords 

 of the Treasury make the principal appoint- 

 ments, but clerkships are open to competitive 

 examination. 



Stations (Lat. statio), a name applied in the 

 Roman Catholic Church to certain places reputed of 

 special sanctity, which are appointed to be visited 

 as places of prayer. The name is particularly 

 applied in this sense to certain churches in the city 

 of Rome, which, from an early period, have been 

 appointed as churches which the faithful are par- 

 ticularly invited to visit on stated days. The 

 names of these churches are found on the several 

 days in the Roman missal prefixed to the liturgy 

 peculiar to the day. The word, however, is 

 employed in a still more remarkable manner in 

 reference to a very popular and widely-received 

 devotional practice of the Roman Catholic Church, 

 known as that of 'The Stations of the Cross.' 

 This devotion prevails in all Catholic countries ; 

 and the traveller often recognises it even at a 

 distance by the emblems which are employed in 

 directing its observance-^-the lofty ' Calvary ' 

 crowning some distant eminence, with a series of 

 fresco-pictures or bas-reliefs arranged at intervals 

 along the line of approach. But the same series 

 of images or pictures is ranged round most Roman 

 Catholic churches, usually starting from one side 

 of the high altar and ending at the other. These 

 representations, the subjects of which are supplied 

 by scenes from the several stages of the Passion of 

 our Lord, are called Stations of the Cross, and the 

 whole series is popularly known as the Via Calvarii, 

 or Way of Calvary. The origin of this devotional 

 exercise, like that of local pilgrimages, is traceable 

 to the difficulty of access to the Holy Places of 

 Palestine, consequent on the Moslem occupation 

 of Jerusalem ami the Holy Land ; these represen- 

 tations being designed to serve as some analogous 

 incentive to the piety and faith of the Christian 

 worshipper of our Lord in His Passion. The 

 number of the so-called ' stations ' is properly four- 

 teen, although in some places fifteen, and in others, 

 as Vienna, only eleven ; but, whatever may be tlieir 

 number, the subject of all is a sort of pictorial 

 narrative of the Passion. The devotional exercise 

 itself is performed by kneeling at the several 

 stations in succession, and reciting certain prayers 

 at each. Forms of prayer are prescribed to those 

 who can read. The po'or and ignorant recite the 

 Lord's Prayer and Hail, Mary ! all being directed 

 to fix their thoughts in grateful memory upon ' the 

 sufferings which each representation describes our 

 Lord as having undergone, in atonement for the 

 sins of mankind. ' Many ' indulgences ' are granted 

 to those who, having duly repented of their sins, 

 shall piously perform this exercise. One Anglican 

 church at least, that of Frome in Somerset, has 

 sculptured Stations of the Cross. 



Statistics, that branch of Political Science 

 which has for its object the collecting and arrang- 

 ing of facts bearing on the condition, social, moral, 

 and material, of a people. The collecting of such 

 facts, and the taking of censuses for military pur- 

 poses, have been in use since the earliest times : 

 King David numbered his people, and Egyptians 

 and Romans had censuses. But the treatment of 

 the statistics of all nations as a branch of study 

 dates from the time of Conring ( 16(16-81 ), in Ger- 

 many, to whose distinguished successor Achenwalli 

 of Gottingen ( 1719-72) the name of the study (Ger. 

 Die Statistik) seems to be due. As distinguished 

 from the early and simple 'descriptive statistics,' 

 in which the figures were but illustrations to the 

 text, a more scientific arithmetical or mathematical 

 method may be credited to Sussmilch (1707-67), 

 whose work hail been simplified by the working out 

 of probabilities and averages in connection with 

 mortality tables and otherwise, by Petty and 

 Halley in England, and others. But most of all to 

 Quetelet (q.v.), the great Belgian statistician, is 

 the science indebted for its present standing. The 



