COM 



COM 



of the inrolmentof nes and recoveries, 

 and clerk of the errors. 



COMMON pwyer is the 1'turgy in the 

 Church of England. Clergymen are 

 to use the public form ot prayers pre- 

 scribed by the Book of Common Prayer; 

 and refusing to do so, or using- any other 

 public prayers, are punishable by 1 Eliz. 

 c. ii. 



COMMON, in grammar, denotes the gen- 

 der of nouns, which are equally applica- 

 ble to both sexes ; thus parens, a parent, 

 is of the common gender. 



COMMON, in geometry, is applied to an 

 angle, line, or the like, which belongs 

 equally to two figures. 



COMMON divisor, a quantity or number 

 which exactly divides two or more other 

 quantities or numbers, without leaving 

 any remainder. 



COMMON measure, is such a number as 

 exactly measures two or more numbers 

 without a remainder. 



( COMMON, greatest, measure, of two or 

 more numbers, is the greatest number 

 that can measure them : as 4 is the great- 

 est common measure of, 8 and 12. 



COMMONS, in a general sense, con- 

 sist of all such men of property in the 

 kingdom, as have not seats in the House 

 of Lords, every one of whom has a voice 

 in parliament, either personally, or by 

 his representatives. In a free state, says 

 judge Blackstone, every man, who is sup- 

 posed a free agent, ought to be in some 

 measure his own governor, and therefore 

 a branch, at least, of the legislative power 

 should reside in the whole body of the 

 people. In so large a state as ours, it is 

 therefore wisely contrived, that the peo- 

 ple should do that by their representa- 

 tives, which it is impracticable to per- 

 form in person; representatives chosen 

 by a number of minute and separate dis- 

 tricts, wherein all the voters are, or easi- 

 ly may be, distinguished. 



COMMONS, in parliament, are the lower 

 house, consisting 1 of knights elected by 

 the counties, and of citizens and bur- 

 g-esses by the cities and borough towns. 

 In these elections, anciently, all the peo- 

 ple hud votes; but in the 8th and 10th of 

 King Henry VI. for avoiding tumults, 

 laws were enacted, that none should vote 

 for knights but such as were freeholders, 

 did reside in the county, and had forty 

 shillings yearly revenue, equivalent to 

 near 2(J/. a year of our present money : 

 the persons elected for counties to be 

 tnilites notabiles, at least esquires, or gen- 

 tlemen fit for knight-hood ; native Eng- 

 lishmen, at least naturalized ; and twen- 



ty-one years of age ; no judge, sheriff, or 

 ecclesiastical person, to sit in the House 

 for county, city, or borough. 



The House of Commons, in Fortes- 

 cue's time, who wrote during the reign 

 of Henry VI. consisted of upwards of 300 

 members: In Sir Edward Coke's time 

 their number amounted to 493. At the 

 time of the union with Scotland, in 1707, 

 there were 513 members for England 

 and Wales, to which 45 representatives 

 for Scotland were added : so that the 

 \vhole number of members amounted to 

 558. In consequence of the union with 

 Ireland in 1801, 100 members were 

 added for that country ; and the whole 

 House of Commons now consists of 658 

 members. 



COMMONS, Doctors. See COLLEGE of 

 Civilians. 



COMMUNIBUS locis, a Latin term, 

 frequently used by philosophical writers, 

 implying some medium or common rela- 

 tion between several places. Thus Dr. 

 Keil supposes the ocean to be one quar- 

 ter of a mile deep, communibus locis, that is, 

 at a medium, or taking one place with 

 another. 



COMMUNIBUS annis has the same mean- 

 ing with regard to time, that comnmnibus 

 locis has with regard to places. 



COMMUNICATION of motion, the act 

 whereby a body at rest is put into motion 

 by a moving body ; or it is the accelera- 

 tion of motion in a body already moving. 

 See MECHANICS. 



COMMUTATION, in law, the change 

 of a penalty or punishment from a greater 

 to a less; as when death is commuted for 

 banishment, &c. 



COMOCLADIA, in botany, a genus 

 of the Triandria Monogynia class and 

 order. Natural order of Terebintacese, 

 Jussieu. Essential character : calyx 

 three-parted ; corolla three-parted ; 

 drupe oblong, with a two-lobed nucleus. 

 There are three species, natives of the 

 West-Indies. 



COMPANY, in commerce, an associa- 

 tion formed for carrying on some branch 

 of trade which requires a greater capital 

 than private traders can usually command, 

 or which is liable to engagements to 

 which individual responsibility is deem- 

 ed inadequate. In the infancy of com- 

 merce, almost every branch of foreign 

 trade was carried on by a particular com- 

 pany, which generally possessed exclu- 

 sive privileges ; and such institutions 

 were then necessary and beneficial ; but 

 in modern times, when individuals have 

 accumulated larger capitals, and the im- 

 provement of navigation facilitated com- 



