239 



THESMOPHORIA. 



THIALDINE. 



230 



pended a sliding valve, or damper, d. By increasing the temperature 

 of the chamber or vessel in which the thermostat is placed, the com- 

 pound bar will assume the curved form indicated by the dotted lines, 

 by which means the position of the lever will be altered, the valve c 

 will be turned on its axis, and the damper will be raised. Pig. 2 

 shows another arrangement, in which two compound bare, a, a, fixed 

 at b, are made to open and close a valve, c, in a pipe through which 

 air, water, or any other fluid is passed. By increasing the temperature 

 of the apparatus, the upper or moveable ends of the bars would recede 

 from each other, and, consequently, alter the position of the valve. 

 fig. 3 shows the principal part of a thermostatic apparatus in which 

 three pairs of compound bars, a, a, a, are used to give motion to a 

 sliding-rod d, d, with which any kind of valve may be connected by a 

 rack and pinion, a chain and pulley, or otherwise, b, b, in this figure, 

 is a straight guide-rod, which is fixed at one end by a screw-nut c. The 



Fig. 3. 



thermostatic bars are nearly or quite straight when cold, and become 

 more or less curved by the action of heat ; but in some modifications 

 of the apparatus the bars are always curved, and the action of the 

 apparatus depends upon the increase or decrease of the ordinary 

 flexure. Fiy. 4, for example, represents a thermostatic hoop, a, a, 

 which may be immersed horizontally beneath the surface of the 

 water-bath of a still. The hoop is fixed at b, and to its free ends are 

 attached short links c, c, which impart longitudinal motion to the 

 rod d. e is a lever-handle moved by the sliding-rod, and turning a 

 valve on its axis /. The outer end of this lever carries an index, 

 which moves against a graduated scale, g is a screw-nut, moveable 

 up' ni the gliding-rod to adjust the apparatus before graduating the 

 r arc traversed by the index. [PYROMETER.] 



T 1 I liSMOPHO'RIA (erno<t>6pia), a festival with mysteries in honour 

 c.f IOMETER, to whom all the institutions of civilised life, especially 

 of civil and religious laws, were attributed. The festival of the 

 Thesmophoria especially referred to this part of the character of the 

 goddess, as is clear from several of the ceremonies observed at its cele- 

 bration, and from the surname of the goddess, " Thesmophoros," from 

 which the festival derived its name. It was celebrated in various 

 towns in Greece, and in the Greek colonies, as Sparta, Thebes, Eretria, 

 Ephesus, Syracuse, Agrigentuni, and others. But the place where it 

 was held with the greatest solemnity, and where the particulars of its 

 celebration are best known, was Athens. It was introduced at Athens, 

 according to some writers, by Orpheus, and according to Herodotus 

 (ii. 1 71 ) by the daughters of Danaus from Egypt. Its celebration was 

 confined to women, especially married women. It commenced every 

 year on the llth of Pyanepaion, and lasted three days, though some 

 writers extend it to four or even five. The discrepancy in this case, 

 as well as in that of other Greek and Roman festivals, seems to have 

 arisen from the circumstance that the real festival was in many instances 

 led by one or more days devoted to preparations and purifica- 

 tions, and that some writers reckoned these days as belonging to the 

 festival. 



Previous to its celebration, the women of each demos elected from 

 among themselves two matrons to conduct the solemnities, whose 

 husbands, provided they had received a dowry of not less than three 

 talents, had to pay the expenses of the festival as a liturgy. (Isseus, 

 ' De Cironis Heredit.,' p. 208). The first day of the festival was called 

 Kcoio; or K<i0o8os, that is, the procession ; because the women went 

 from Athens to Eleusis in a procession in which they carried on their 

 heads certain laws (8<r/w/) written either in books or upon tablets. 

 During the night between the first and second day the women solem- 

 nised their mysteries at Eleusis. The second day, called njirrefa, or 

 " The Fast," was a day of mourning, on which the women were not 

 allowed to take any other food than cakes of sesame and honey, and 

 the greater part of it they spent sitting in mournful attitudes on the 

 ground around the statue of the goddess. Heursiun and others think 

 that the procession to the Thesmophorion (the temple of Demeter 

 Thesmophoros) at Athens, which is alluded to by Aristophanes 

 (' Thesmophor.,' 276, &c.), and in which the women walked behind a 

 waggon laden with baskets containing mystic symbols, took place in 

 the afternoon of this day, the whole of which was a sacred day at 

 Athens, on which neither the senate nor the people were allowed to 

 hold their usual meetings. The third day was called KoAAryeVfia, a 

 surname of Demeter, by which she was invoked on this occasion. 

 (Aristoph., ' Thesmophor.,' 296, with the Scholiast) On this day the 

 women made up for the day of mourning, and indulged in various 

 kinds of merriment, in imitation of lambe, who was believed to have 

 created a smile on the face of the goddess during her grief. 



THESSALONIANS, EPISTLES TO THE. Christianity was introduced 

 among the Thessalonians 'in A.D. 50, by St. Paul, when he first passed 

 over from Asia Minor into Europe to preach the gospel. St. Paul 

 found at Thessalonica a synagogue of the Jews, " and went in unto 

 them, and for three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the 

 Scriptures," endeavouring to convince them that Jesus was the Christ 

 or Messiah expected by them. Though some of them believed, his 

 success with the Jews does not appear to have been great ; but a con- 

 siderable number of the " devout Gentiles " were converted, and many 

 women of distinction ; so that the Christian church at Thessalonica 

 was composed both of Jews and Gentiles, of whom the latter were the 

 more numerous. The unconverted Jews stirred up a persecution 

 against him, so that himself and his companions " were sent away by 

 night by the brethren " to the neighbouring city of Beroea. Here, 

 again, the Jews of Thessalonica stirred up a tumult against .St. Paul, 

 so that he was obliged to retire to Athens, leaving, however, Silas and 

 Timothy at Bercca. At Athens he was subsequently joined by them, 

 and being anxious about his recent converts at Thessalouica, " when 

 he could no longer forbear" (1 Thes., iii., 1), he sent Timothy from 

 Athens " to establish them, and to comfort them concerning the faith." 

 St. Paul then visited Corinth, and on the return of Timothy with 

 " good tidings of their faith and charity, and that they had a good 

 remembrance of him always " (1 Thes., iii. 6), he wrote his first epistle 

 to them, A.D. 52, from Corinth, and not from Athens, as the subscrip- 

 tion of the epistle imports. 



It was one of the earliest, if not the very first, of all St. Paul's 

 epistles, the doubt lying between this epistle and that to the Corinth- 

 ians, written from the same place. That to the Galatians was also pro- 

 bably written from Corinth before the Second Epistle to the Thessa- 

 lonians. The genuineness of the first epistle has always been admitted : 

 together with the second epistle, it is quoted and recognised as the work 

 of St. Paul, by Irenams, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, and 

 all subsequent ecclesiastical writers. The immediate occasion of St. Paul's 

 writing this epistle was the favourable intelligence brought by Timothy 

 of the steadiness with which the Thessalonians adhered to Christianity, 

 in spite of the persecution with which they were assailed by their own 

 countrymen. Besides being exposed to direct persecution, there can 

 be little doubt that they were also in danger of being moved by the 

 reasonings of their religious adversaries, to which the sudden disappear- 

 ance of St. Paul from Thessalonica, and his apparent desertion of them 

 at a critical moment, might give some plausibility and apparent con- 

 firmation. To counteract the natural result of all this was one of the 

 chief objects of Timothy's mission, and the First Epistle to the Thes- 

 salonians was written with the same design. Accordingly, in chap, i., 

 after a short introduction, in which he couples the names of Timothy 

 and Sylvanus (the Roman form of Silas) with his own, he expresses his 

 thankfulness for their " work of faith and labour of love, and patience 

 of hope in the Lord Jesus Christ," and then (v. 5-1 0) reminds them 

 of the " proofs of power and of the Holy Ghost " with which the 

 preaching of the gospel among them was accompanied, as evidences of 

 its truth, and commends them for the constancy of their faith. 



The Second Epistle to the Thessalonians was undoubtedly written 

 soon after the first ; Sylvanus and Timothy being joined with the 

 apostle in the inscription of this Epistle as well as of the former ; and 

 as in chap, iii., vcr. 2, he requests the prayers of the Thessalonians 

 for his deliverance from wicked men, it is not improbable that he wrote 

 it soon after the insurrection of the Jews at Corinth, when they dragged 

 him before Gallio, and accused him of persuading men to worship God 

 contrary to the law. This Epistle seems to have been occasioned by 

 the information which St. Paul received on the state of the church at 

 Thessalonica from the messenger who conveyed his first letter to the 

 elders of the church, and his report of the effect produced by its con- 

 tents. From some expressions in that Epistle (iv. 15 ; v. 4-6), com- 

 pared with chapter ii. of the second, it would seem that a number of 

 Thessalonians had come to the conclusion that the day of judgment 

 was at hand, and would happen in their generation. To correct this 

 misapprehension, and to preveat the anxiety and the neglect of secular 

 affairs which resulted from it, appears to have been the main object 

 and design of St. Paul in writing this Second Epistle to them. 



This Second Epistle to the Thessalonians is, next to that to 

 Philemon, the shortest of St. Paul's Epistles, but not inferior to any 

 in- stylo or spirit, and it is also remarkable as containing a distinct 

 prophecy of the corruptions and delusions which were to arise in the 

 Christian Church. 



The undesigned coincidences between these Epistles and the " Acts 

 of the Apostles " are given in Paley's " Horae Paulinae." 



THIACETIC ACID (HS, C 4 H 3 2 S). The product of the action of 

 tersulphide or pentasulphide of phosphorus upon monohydrated acetic 

 acid. It is a colourless liquid, possessing at the same time an odour of 

 acetic acid and a sulphurous smell. It unites with bases, and may 

 also be made to yield an anhydride thiacetic anhydride (C^H^O^S + 

 C.H 3 0,S). 



THIACETONINE (C 11 H, (C !! H S ). ! NS,). An artificial organic base 

 produced by the simultaneous action of ammonia and sulphuretted 

 hydrogen upon acetone. 



THIALDINE (C,.,H 13 NS.). An alkaloid produced by the action of 

 sulphuretted hydrogen upon aldehydide of ammonium. It is volatile 

 and crystalline, very slightly soluble in water, but readily so in alcohol 



