CABAL CABBAGE. 



783 



for pernicious counsels. Ashley (more known as the 

 t>arl of Shaftesbury), bold, ambitious, eloquent, insi- 

 nuating, subtle, united great industry with a sound 

 judgment of business and of men. Buckingham, 

 with the advantages of a graceful person, high 

 rank, splendid forUme, and a lively wit, but with- 

 out prudence or principle, sacrificing, in turn, hon- 

 our to interest, interest to pleasure, and pleasure 

 to caprice, dissipated his fortune, and ruined his 

 health, by his riot and debauchery, and destroyed his 

 character, in public life, by his want of secrecy and 

 constancy. Laiulenlale, tyrannical, ambitious, im- 

 placable, insolent,_yet abject, had a great ascendency 

 over the king. Clifford, daring, impetuous, yet art- 

 ful, and eloquent, and Arlington, of moderate capacity, 

 without courage or integrity, were, secretly, Catholics. 

 Shaftesbury was at once a deist,and addicted to astro- 

 logy; Lauderdale, a bigoted, and, earlier, a furious 

 Presbyterian." 



Cabal; a beverage made in Portugal, by bruising 

 twenty pounds of raisins, and saturating them with 

 white wine during three mouths. The mixture is 

 rich, clear, and agreeable. 



CABALA, or CABBALA, (i. e. oral tradition), is used by 

 the Jews to denote sometimes the doctrines of the 

 prophets, sometimes the traditions of their ancestors, 

 sometimes, and most commonly, their mystical philo- 

 sophy. The opinions of scholars respecting the origin 

 of the cabalistic philosophy are very various. The 

 Jews derive the cabalistic mysteries from the most 

 ancient times of their nation, nay, even from Adam 

 himself. But, although a secret doctrine existed 

 among the Hebrews in the earliest ages, this had re- 

 ference merely to religious worship. The origin of 

 the philosophical cabala is to be sought for in Egypt, 

 and dates from the times of Simeon Schetachides, who 

 conveyed it from Egypt to Palestine. It was first 

 committed to writing in the second century, lest it 

 might be lost with the dispersion of the Jewish nation. 

 Later expositors have mingled with it much foreign 

 matter. The cabala is divided into the symbolical 

 and the real. The symbolical portion treats princi- 

 pally of letters, to which it gives mystical significa- 

 tions. The real, which is opposed to the symbolical, 

 and comprehends doctrines, is divided into the theo- 

 retical and practical. The aim of the theoretical is to 

 explain the Holy Scriptures according to the secret 

 traditions, and to form therefrom a philosophical sys- 

 tem of metaphysics, physics, and pneumatology. The 

 practical portion, on the other hand, pretends to teach 

 the art of performing miracles, and that merely by an 

 artificial application of the divine names and sentences 

 in the Sacred Scriptures. After the revival of science, 

 many scholars studied the cabala. The most famous 

 modern cabalists are Henry Morus and Christian 

 Knorr, the last of whom has made a compilation of 

 the most important parts of the cabalistic writings, in 

 two Latin volumes, in 4to. Respecting the mysteries 

 of the cabala, see Pet. Beer's History of the Doctrines 

 and Opinions of all the Jewish Sects, and of the 

 Cabala, Brunn, 1822, 2 vols. ; also Brucker's history 

 of Philosophy, by doctor Enfield, vol. ii. Allen's 

 Modern Judaism, ch. v. ; and Budsei Introductio ad 

 Historiam Philosophic Hebraeoram. 



CABANIS, Peter John George, physician, philoso- 

 pher, and liter ateur, was born at Cognac, in 1757, 

 went to Paris in his fourteenth year, and devoted him- 

 self with zeal to the sciences. In his sixteenth year, 

 he went to Warsaw as secretary of a Polish lord. The 

 proceedings of the stormy diet of 1773 filled him with 

 melancholy and contempt of mankind. He began at 

 Paris a complete translation of the Iliad. In Auteuil, 

 near Paris, he became acquainted with madame Hel- 

 vetius, and, through her, with Holbach, Franklin, and 

 Jefferson, and became the friend of Condillac, Turgot, 



and Thomas. In his Serment d'un Medecin, he for- 

 mally took leave of the belles lettres. He professed 

 the principles of the revolution, and was intimately 

 connected with Mirabeau, who made use of his ideas, 

 and obtained from him the work on public education, 

 which Cabanis published himself, in 1791, after the 

 death of Mirabeau. He lived in still closer intimacy 

 with Condorcet. At the time of his death, May 5th, 

 1808, he was a member of the senate. His Rapport* 

 du Physique et du Moral de I'Homme (Paris, 1802, 

 2 vols., improved in 1805), are highly esteemed. His 

 works appeared in Paris, 1824, complete in 4 vols. 



CABBAGE. The cabbage, including many species of 

 the numerous genus of brassica, is a biennial plant, 

 too well known to need description, and constitutes 

 one of our most valuable classes of vegetables. There 

 are several species of the wild or original stock, from 

 which the garden cabbage has been derived by culti- 

 vation. These are natives of various parts of Europe, 

 Africa, &c., and, although very remote in appearance 

 from the full, round head, which our plants present, 

 are scarcely more so than the kale, cauliflower, bro- 

 coli, &c., all of which belong to tiie cabbage family. 

 In general terms, we may consider this plant as 

 divided into three classes the common headed cab- 

 bage of the field and garden ; the cauliflower, brocoli, 

 &c., which form their stalks into a loose head ; and 

 the kale, colewort, &c., which grow in a natural 

 branching way, without forming any heads at all. Of 

 these, the common cabbage is by far the most valu- 

 able, both to man, and to the beasts by whose assis- 

 tance he is able to make the earth so fertile. It is 

 also the most productive ; for it is believed that an 

 acre of ground will yield a greater weight of green 

 vegetable matter (and thus be more profitable to the 

 farmer), in the shape of cabbage, than in that of any 

 other vegetable whatever. It is very abundantly pro- 

 duced by clay soils, which are unfit for turnips, and 

 the farmers who cultivate such soils will find it a ve- 

 getable worthy of much attention. The cabbage 

 furnishes green fodder for cows and sheep, which is, 

 at least, as good as turnips or carrots, fattening the ani- 

 mals equally fast, and rendering their milk, butter, c., 

 to the full as sweet ; and is far preferable, as it keeps 

 later in the spring, and thus supplies green food when 

 no other can be procured. It is eaten by men in three 

 forms, all of which have their admirers, but which vary 

 much in respect to their wholesomeness and digesti- 

 bility. These forms are, the sliced raw cabbage, plain 

 boiled cabbage, and salted cabbage or sour-crout, the 

 favourite disli of the whole German nation. In the 

 first form, of raw cabbage, sliced fine, and eaten with 

 vinegar, whether entirely cold, or hot enough merely 

 to wilt the vegetable, it is one of the lightest and most 

 wholesome articles of vegetable food, and, in this 

 shape, will supply a green summer vegetable through 

 the whole of the winter. Its use cannot be too highly 

 recommended. Boiled cabbage, is, on the contrary, 

 one of the worst articles of diet that a weak stomach 

 can be tried with, and is rarely got rid of without a 

 troublesome colicky pain. Sour-crout, or, properly, 

 saner-kraut, is much eaten by the Germans, and they 

 consider it very wholesome^ although it is nearly, if 

 not quite, as difficult of digestion as boiled cabbage. 

 It is prepared in the following manner : Cabbage is 

 sliced up fine, and a layer of it placed in the bottom 

 of a barrel, which is plentifully salted; it is then 

 well bruised with a heavy mall or pestle, or is trodden 

 down by a pair of heavy boots, till the barrel is half 

 filled .with the froth that arises from this operation. 

 Successive layers of cabbage and salt are added in 

 this manner, each receiving the same treatment, till 

 the vessel is nearly full. Some cold water is then 

 poured in, and the tqp of the barrel is pressed down 

 with heavy stones. The contents undergo a brisk 



