474 



COR VISART COSMOGONY. 



1 '! magnificent cathedral contains many monuments. 

 In 1819, Paul \Vigand published a history of the 

 abbey of ( 'orvey. 



CORVISART, .!r.\\ Nii-.ii.As, Ixinw, a distin- 

 guished l-'rem-li phv- cian, was born at Dricourl, in 

 llie present dejiartmeni of the. .* nit lines, Feb. 15, 

 1755. !1N f.itl.er, jtrocureur to tlie parliament of 

 1'aris. wished to educate him for the law ; but an in- 

 vincible inclination for medical studies led him into 

 a i. itlcrent career, in which lie wa> soon distinguished 

 tor his intelligence ;.nd his extensive learning. He 

 succeeded Kochcfurt as physician to the tiopitui de la 

 c/tarite,ni\(\ was the lirsi professor of internal clinics 

 in I-' ranee, lie was chief physician to the first consul 

 (1802), and afterwards to the emperor (to whom he 

 was faithfully attached, but with whom he had not, 

 according to the .Mcmolre of him by baron Cuvier, 

 any political influence, as some have asserted), pro- 

 fcNxor in the college de France from 1797, member of 

 the imperial institute, &c. Corvisart's great merit 

 \\.IN not overlooked after the restoration. The place 

 of honorary member of the royal academy of medicine 

 was conferred on him just before his death, which hap 

 penedSept. 18, 1821. Corvisart felt that the most dis- 

 tinguished practitioner of medicine has not performed 

 his whole duty to his science, unless lie leaves some 

 memorial of his experience. He translated some 

 important works, with commentaries, and was the 

 author of several valuable treatises. His two prin- 

 cipal works are a Treatise on Diseases of the 

 Heart, and a Commentary on the work of Auenbrug- 

 ger, a German physician, published in 1763, at Vien- 

 na. In 1770, it was translated into French, but so 

 much forgotten, that Corvisart says, " I could have 

 sacrificed Auenbrugger's name to my vanity, but I 

 did not choose to do so : I only wish to revive his 

 beautiful discovery." His place in the French aca- 

 demy of sciences has been filled by M. Magendie, 

 and his chair in the college of France had been oc- 

 cupied by M. Halle for several years before the time 

 of his death. 



COKYBANTES, (Curetes, Jdai Dactyli, among 

 the Romans, a peculiar order of priests called Galli) 

 are said to have derived their origin from Corybas, 

 son of Cybele and Jasion, who appointed them to 

 perform religious service to his mother, the goddess 

 Cybele, in the island of Crete and in Phiygfe. Ac- 

 cording to much more ancient traditions, they were 

 dcscendents of Vulcan. The story of their clashing 

 together instruments of forged metal, when Rhea 

 gave them the infant Jupiter, in order to prevent Sa- 

 turn from hearing his cries, seems to have some con- 

 nexion with this tradition. According to Apol- 

 lodorus, the Corybantes were sons of Apollo and 

 Thalia ; according to others, of Apollo and Rhetia. 



COS, or COOS ; an island in the ^F.gaean sea 

 ino\v Stanchio or Stinchd), on the. coast of Asia Mi- 

 nor, opposite the towns of Halicarnassus and Cnidos 

 (ninety-rive square miles, 4000 inliabitants) ; the land 

 of Apelles and Hippocrates. Here was a celebrated 

 temple of ^Esculapius. In Cos was manufactured a 

 fine, semi-transparent kind of silk, much valued by 

 the ancients. 



COSEL ; a small, yet not unimportant fortified 

 town, on the left bank of the Upper Oder, in Upper 

 Silesia (197 houses and 3600 inhabitants) ; first for- 

 tified by Frederic the Great, after the conquest 

 of Silesia. It has been several times besieged in 

 vain. 



COSEL, countess of; one of the many mistresses 

 of the prodigal Augustus II., king of Poland and 

 elector of Saxony. She was the wife of the Saxon 

 minister Hoymb, who, well knowing the king's dis- 

 position, kept her far from court ; out, on one oc 

 casiou, when excited by wine, he praised her so much 



to the king, that the latter ordered her to be brought 

 to Dresden. Hie was soon divorced from lloyuib, 

 and appeared at court as the countess of Cosel, the 

 mistress of the king. A palace was built for her, 

 still called the t'osel palace, which was pre-eminent 

 for magnificence and luxury. The furniture alone 

 cost 200,000 Saxon dollars (lf>0,UX) Spanish). It 

 must he remembered that the king had no income 

 from Poland; on the contrary, the royal dignity was 

 a source of great expense to the elector ; thus the 

 little electorate had to support, unaided, the enor- 

 mous extravagance of its ruler. For nine years, the 

 countess succeeded in preserving the king's favour, 

 and exercised an arbitrary sway in affairs of govern- 

 ment. At last, she fell into disgrace, and was dis- 

 missed from the king's presence. She retired into 

 Prussia, and was afterwards arrested at I lulle, at, the 

 request of Augustus, and carried loStolpe, in Saxony, 

 where she remained imprisoned forty-five years, and 

 died eighty years old. So much power had she over 

 the king, when in favour, that dollars and florins 

 were actually coined, bearing the stamp of the royal 

 arms in conjunction with those of the countess. She 

 is one among many similar instances of the advan- 

 tages which legitimacy brings in its train, subjecting 

 nations to the control of profligate monarchs, who 

 are governed by equally profligate mistresses. 



COSENZA, (anciently Cosentia) ; a city of Naples, 

 capital of Calabria Citra, situated on seven small 

 hills, at the foot of the Apennines ; 145 miles S. E. 

 Naples; Ion. 16 27' E. ; hit. 39 22' N. ; popula- 

 tion, 7989. The metropolitan is the only church 

 within the walls ; but there are three parish churches 

 in the faubourgs. There are twelve convents. The 

 environs are beautiful, populous, and well cultivated, 

 producing abundance of corn, fruit, oil, wine, and 

 silk. This town was anciently the capital of the 

 Brutii, and a place of consequence in the second 

 Punic war. Cosenza has frequently suffered from 

 earthquakes, particularly in the year 1038. 



COSMETICS (from *n<rp.iu, I ornament, beautify) ; 

 means for preserving or increasing the beauty of the 

 human body. Every one knows that such means are 

 used by the most savage, as well as the most civilized, 

 nations ; that cosmetics have afforded a rich harvest 

 to charlatans ; and that it is very difhcult to find good 

 ones among die numberless bad ones. 



COSMO I. OF MEDICI. See Medici. 



COSMOGONY,(from the Greek *^, the world 

 anil y'otof, generation,) according to its etymology, 

 should be defined the origin of the world itself; but 

 the term has become, to a great degree, associated 

 with the numerous theories of different nations and 

 individuals respecting this event. Though the origin 

 of the world must necessarily remain forever con- 

 cealed from human eyes, there is, notwithstanding, a 

 strong desire in the breasts of mortals to unvail it ; 

 so that we find hypotheses among all nations, re- 

 specting the beginning of all things. \Ve may divide 

 these hypotheses into three classes : 1. The first re- 

 presents the world as eternal, in form as well as sub- 

 stance. 2. The matter of the world is eternal, but 

 not its form. 3. The world had a beginning, and 

 shall have an end. 



1. Ocellus Lucanus is one of the most ancient 

 philosophers who supposed the world to have exist- 

 ed from eternity. Aristotle appears to have embrac- 

 ed the same doctrine. His theory is, tliat not only 

 the heaven and earth, but also animate and inanimate 

 beings, in general, are withoutbeginning. His opin- 

 ion rested on the belief, that the universe was 

 necessarily the eternal effect of a cause equally 

 eternal, such as the Divine Spirit, which, being at 

 once power and action, could not remain idle. Yet 

 he admitted, that a spiritual substance was the cause 



