EAS 



EBI 



Easter, yet they all agreed in shewing 

 particular respect and honour to this fes- 

 tival : hence, in ancient writers, it is dis- 

 tinguished by the name of dominica guu- 

 dii, i. e. Sunday of joy. On this day pri- 

 soners and slaves were set free, and the 

 poor liberally provided for. The eve, or 

 vigil, of this festival was celebrated with 

 more than ordinary pomp, which conti- 

 nued till midnight, it being a tradition of 

 the church that our Saviour rose a little 

 after midnight ; but in the east, the vigil 

 lasted till cock-crowing. 



It was in conformity to the custom of 

 the Jews, in celebrating their passoveron 

 the fourteenth day of the first month, that 

 the primitive fathers ordered, that the 

 fourteenth day of the moon, from the ca- 

 lendar new moon which immediately 

 follows the twenty-first of March, at 

 which time the vernal equinox happened 

 upon that day, should be deemed the 

 paschal full moon, and that the Sunday 

 after should be Easter-day ; and it is upon 

 this account that our rubric has appoint- 

 ed it upon the first Sunday after the 

 first full moon immediately following the 

 twenty-first day of March. Whence it 

 appears, that the true time for celebrat- 

 ing Easter, according to the intention of 

 the council of Nice, was to be the first 

 Sunday after the first full moon following 

 the vernal equinox, or when the sun en- 

 tered into the first point of Aries; and 

 this was pope Gregory's principal view in 

 reforming the calendar, to have Easter 

 celebrated according to the intent of the 

 council of Nice. 



Having first found the epact and domi- 

 nical letter, according to the method de- 

 livered, see CHRONOLOGY and EPACT, 

 Easter-day may be found by the two fol- 

 lowing rules. 



1. To find Easter-limit, or the day of 

 the paschal full moon, counted from 

 March 1 inclusive, the rule is this : add 

 6 to the epact, and if this sum exceeds 

 30, take 30 from it; then from 50 sub- 

 tract this remainder, and what is left will 

 be the limit ; if the sum of the epact, ad- 

 ded to 6, does not amount to 30, it must 

 be subtracted from 50, and the re- 

 mainder is the limit required; which 

 is never to exceed 49, nor fall short of 

 21. 



2. From the limit and dominical letter, 

 to find Easter-day : add 4 to the domini- 

 cal letter : substract this sum from the 

 limit, and the remainder from the next 

 higher number which contains 7 without 

 any remainder; lastly, add this remain- 

 der to the limit, 'and their sum will 



give the number of days from the first of 

 March to Easter-day, both inclusive. 



Thus, to find Easter-day for the year 

 1808, for instance. First find the epact 

 3, which added to 6 gives 9 : and as this 

 sum does not amount to 3(J, it must be 

 subtracted from 50, and the remainder 41 

 is the limit. Then adding 4 to 2, the 

 number of the dominical letter B, sub- 

 tract this sum, viz. 6, from the limit 41, 

 and the remainder 35 from 42, the next 

 superior number that contains 7 a certain, 

 number of times without any remainder, 

 and there remains 7, which, being added 

 to the limit 41, gives 48 for the number 

 of days from the first of March to Easter- 

 day, both inclusive: hence, allowing 31 

 for March, there remains the 17th of April 

 for Easter-day. Here follows the opera- 

 tion at length. 



3+6 = 9 



50 9 =. 41 = paschal limit 



Dominical letter B = 2 



41 6 =35 

 42 35 = 7 



41 + 7 = 48, from which subtracting 

 31, the number of days in 

 March, 



17, there remains 17, the day 

 of April answering to Easter-day for the 

 year 1808. 



EASTLAND company, under charter 

 from queen Elizabeth in 1579, traded to 

 the east country, meaning the ports in the 

 Baltic, but by statute 25 Car. II. c. 7. all 

 persons may use the Eastland trade ; and 

 they may be admitted a free member of 

 the company for 40s. 



EAU de Luce, a fragrant liquor, pos- 

 sessing and retaining a milky opacity, 

 made chiefly of mastic dissolved in 

 alcohol, to which are added, elemi and 

 aqua ammoniac purx. See Nicholson's 

 Journal. 



EBENUS, in botany, a genus of the 

 Diadelphia Decandria class and order. 

 ^Essential character : calyx with teeth, 

 the length of the corolla; wings scarcely 

 any ; seed one, rough with hairs. There 

 are two species, viz. E. cretica, Creton 

 ebony, and E. pinnata, pinnated ebony : 

 the former grows naturally in Crete, and 

 some islands of the Archipelago ; the 

 latter is found in Barbary and the Lei- 

 vant. 



EBIONITES, in church history, here- 

 tics of the first century, so called from 

 their leader Ebion. They held the same 

 errors witb the Nazarenes, united the 





