G E S 



G E S 



of tlicm tliey make ufe of die infinitiTt, in the fame manner as 

 the French ; r:;o;:QTtu.,pour boire. When the articlehappens 

 to be made ufe of, then its genitive is put for the gerund in di, 

 as Ttf ■z-oi^xttfacifttdl, of doing ; the dative or ablative tk is put 

 for the gerund in do ; and the neuter for the gerund in diim. 

 But the infinitive in this fenfe is often exprefled witliout the 

 article, as "A^irot aV.wiJnv, jaculand't perilus, an excellent 

 archer; Ai'-= 'f'-^ir;, ferendiim dedil, he gave it to carry. In 

 Greek, however, the termination ts'ov correfponds to the 

 ■Latin gerunds ; thus, from x/-/!-, to fay, is deduced X-x'sor, 

 dicendum, it mult be faid. Thefe verbal adjectives, as thev 

 may be called, fometimes denominated gerunds, are ufed 

 occafioiially either in an active or a paffive fenfe; Tr,:yry 

 m Sf{acr-uT!<», it is for thee to cultivate the ground : rri yvvuvi 

 TR vK'.^fiT^ii sOir^a* 70 ^xuvy xat *) 'juva-rEiv crvv -ro/oir xsti ic^-jTuy the 

 body fiiould be accultomed to obey the underftanding, and 

 be difciplined with toils and fweat. Xenophon. 



An ingenious grammarian obferves, that the Latin ge- 

 runds in di, do, and dtim, are but the participle in dus in the 

 oblique cafes ; and at this is taken from the prefent parti- 

 ciple, they have its fenfe, namely, an adinie fejife. On the 

 fame principle that participles exprefs powers or hallts in 

 a<Etion, and their tendency is to fignify thofe powers, and 

 not their operatien, i. e. to become abllradt nouns ; the oblique 

 cafes of the participle in dus, when alone, become in their 

 nature al>iiract nouns. Hence gerunds, being thus nouns 

 in reality, are governed like other nouns in the genitive, 

 dative, accufative, and ablative, either with or without a 



tprepofition ; as ratio fcribend;, the art of writing ; chaj-ta 

 uj'iHs /..riLmdo, paper is ufeful for writing ; promptus ad aud'i- 

 endum, ready for hearing,' or to hear ; memoria excokndo 

 augdur, the memory is increafed by cultivating. Gerunds 

 alfo, having the nature of nouns, may govern a genitive ; 

 2& fjcidtas a^orum Jms lalronibas condonandi, the power of the 

 beftowing of his lands on his thieves. The germids, how- 

 exTr, as retaining in a degree their verbal ckarafter, govern 

 the cafe of their refpecti\'e verbs, as infendi domum poteflas, 

 veii'tt ad recipiendum pcciinuis, parando liidis. As adjecti\-es 

 affume the nature of nouns when ufed alone in tlie neuter 

 termination, fo the gerunds in dum, the neuter of partici- 

 ples in dus, become fubftantives, denoting, with ejl, neccf- 

 ijty or obligation, as vivsridum e/} mihi recfe, living well mull 

 be to me, or I muft live well. Jones's Grammar of the 

 Latin Tongue, 1800. 



GERY, St. in Geography, a town of France, in the de- 

 partmeBt of the Lot, and chief place of a canton, in tlie 

 diitrift of Cahors, 5 miles N. W. of Cahors. The place 

 contains 125c, and the canton 6^35 inhabitants, on a terri- 

 tory of 180 kiliometres, in 9 communes. 



GERYON, a name given by foms of the affected che» 

 mical' writers to quickfdver. 



GERZAT, in Geography, a town of France, in the de- 

 partment of the Puy de Dome; 4 miles N. E. of Clermont. 



GERZEN, atown of Bavaria; 11 miles E. of Landfhut. 



GESAN, atown of the Arabian Irak; 8 miles S. E. 

 of Mendali. 



GESAS, a town of Silefia, in the principality of Neifle; 

 3 miles S. E. of Patfchau. 



GESEKE, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of 

 Weilphalia; 9 miles E. S. E. of Lipitadt. 



GESERICH, a lake of Pruffia, in Oberiand^ near Dutch 

 Evlau. 



'GESERVAGHERD, atown of PerCa, in Chorafan; 

 30 miles S. of Esfenan. 



GESHEN, Roch and rivers of. See Amhara. 



GESHURITES, in Scripture Geography, a people who 

 dwelt beyond Jordan, in the half tribe of Manaffeh, 



GE3IS, in Guigraphy, \ town of Gi^fmany, 111 the county 

 of Feldkirch ; 4 miles E. of Fcldkirch. 



GESKENDORF, atown of Pruflla, in Obcrland : 7 



miles S.S.E. of Salfeldt. 



GESMOLD, a town of Germany, in the bilhopric of 

 Ofnabruck ; 12 miles S. E. of Vordeii. 



GESNER, CoNKAD, in Biography, " the grcateft natu- 

 rahil the world had fetn linco Ariilotle," the firft who 

 ever collected a mufeum of natural hillor)-, and the difco- 

 verer of tlie only true principles of botanical arrangement iii 

 the flower and fruit, " to wliith the very exigence of botany 

 as a fcience is owing," was born at Zurich in 1516. Like 

 mofl of thofe who have rendered the moil eminent fervici.* 

 to fcience or their fellow-crcaturcs, he had to coiiteud with 

 the greatcft difficulties, efpecially with poverty in his youth, 

 and with a feeble and Cckly conftitution to the day of hij 

 death. He very early imbibed an ardent love of plants 

 from his mother's brother, named Friccius, and this feems 

 to have led him to the ftudy of aninuls, and even of foCils. 

 He was educated for the medical profeflion, which he fub- 

 fequently practifed in his native town, and to the emolu- 

 ments of which he was indebted for the means of purfuing 

 and promioting, by various expenfive means, his darling 

 lludies. He founded and fupported a botanic garden j 

 kept a painter and an engraver in wood ccnftanlly in his 

 fervice, and acquired a ver)- extcnfive library. He exercifed 

 the pencil himfelf with great fuccefs, to which the excel- 

 lence of the botanical cuts he has left us, with refpect to 

 the habit as well as fruiftification of plants, is owing. Many 

 of thefe appear in the Epitome of CamerariuP, and a large 

 collection of the whole has been publiflied in more recent 

 times by Trew and Schmiedel, printed from the original 

 blocks. Gefner undertook various laborious journeys in 

 purfuit of plants, efpecially on the Alps; and while he was, 

 perhaps, the moil learned naturalill of his own or any age, 

 he rivalled the moll experienced of his contemporaries in 

 pradlical obfcrvation. He united to the inveftigation of the 

 external characters of plants, the m.oil affiduous attciition to 

 their medical properties, and his own health and lif- were 

 frequently endangered by the experiments he made for the 

 good of others. He was reported to liave killed himfelf 

 with a dofc of two drams of the root oi Doromcum, but th.~ugh 

 hij ilomacfi was at firft debilitated, he fpeedily recovered, 

 and amufed his friends with a narrative of his cafe. At 

 length this great man fell a victim to the more inmediate 

 duties of his profeflion, having caught the plagtje> of which 

 he died on the 13th of December, 1565, aged 49. AVhcn 

 be found his end approaching, he requefted to be carried into 

 his mufeum, where he expired amid the monuments of his 

 labours, thankful for what he had been able to accoinphlli, 

 and fupported by all the pious hopes and confolations of a 

 Chriiiian philofopher. His pietv and benevolence were no 

 lefs eminent than his talaits. He was the general peaco 

 maker among fuch of his literar)- acquaintances as wire 

 more irafcible or lefs candid, and he laid .Tfide, for a while, 

 his own immediate em.ployments, to devote his fervices to 

 the family of a deceafed friend, Moiban, wliofo work on 

 Diofcoriiies he fupervifed, and publiilicd for their emolu- 

 ment. He was much attaciied, by fimilarity of tafle, to 

 Valerius Cordus, who died in IJ44 at Rome, on his tra- 

 vels, at the early age of 29, and wh.ofe " Hilloria Planti- 

 rum'' was fubfcquently edited bv Gcfcer. Thefe able 

 botanifts had never had a perfonal interview, and Ge'.ner 

 was more intimately acquainted with a young man named 

 David Kyber, v,ho died, at nearly the fame age, of the 

 plague at Stralburgh in 1553, and whofe " Lexicon Rei 

 Herbari-.e Trihngue" (Latin, Greek, »nd GermaB) he pub- 

 E e 2 tflied 



