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sensation are very far exceeded by the 
pleasures of sensation. — This will be still 
more evident when we recollect that the 
pleasurable sensations are those of constant 
occurrence, the painful sensations much 
more rare. In the early part of life, most 
sfensations that are not painful are plea- 
surable; and tile pleasurable are continually 
recurring. The eye and the ear seem to 
convey scarcely any thing but pleasurable 
sensations to the infant mind ; the taste and 
smelt are continually pouring in their plea- 
surable sensations seldom mixed with pain ; 
the feeling, when the body is healthy, 
“ when life is felt in every limb,” is also 
constantly adding to the stock of plea- 
surable sensations, those derived from the 
glow of health and the active motions of 
childhood ; to balance all this there are, in 
some few cases, frequent pains of body, but 
more frequently the pains arising from ill 
health are of seldom recurrence, and the 
artificial sensible pains are still less fre- 
quently received. Such is the matter of 
fact, and if we consider the cause of the 
sensible pleasures and pains as differing 
Only in degree, we shall readily admit, that 
On the whole the pleasurable sensations 
very far exceed the painful sensations ; for 
the sensible pains being produced by an 
excessive action of the organs of sensation. 
Common impressions will not produce them, 
and should they befcome very frequent by 
the grand law of sensation already stated, 
they will gradually diminish in vividness, 
and at last come within the limits of plea- 
sure. 
SENSITIVE plant. See Mimosa. 
SENTICOSjE, in botany, the name of 
the thirty-fifth order in Linnmns’s Frag- 
ments of a Natural Method, consisting of 
the rose, bramble, and other plants that re- 
semble them in external structure. 
SEPIA, in natural history, cuttle-fish, a 
genus of the Vermes Mollnsca class and or- 
der. Body fleshy, receiving the breast in a 
sheath, with a tubular aperture at its base ; 
eight arms, beset with numerous warts or 
suckers, and in most species two peduncu- 
lated tentacula ; head short ; eyes large ; 
mouth resembling a parrot’s beak. Eight 
species are mentioned. They inhabit va- 
rious Seas, and in hot climates grow to 
a very considerable size; they are armed 
with a most terrible apparatus Of holders, 
furnished with suckers, by which they fas- 
ten upon and convey their prey to the 
mouth. 
S. octopus is found in the Mediterranean 
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and Indian Seas, and in the latter it is some- 
times so large that the arms are said to be 
nine fathoms long. In these seas the Indi- 
ans never venture out without hatchets in 
their boats, to cut off the arms, should it 
attempt to fasten upon them and draw them 
under water. 
S. ofBcinalis inhabits the ocean, and is 
the prey of the whale tribe and plaise ; its 
arms are also frequently eaten off by the 
conger eel, and are reproduced. See Re- 
PRonucTioN. The bony scale on the back 
is that which is sold in the shops, and which, 
when reduced to fine powder, is reckoned 
excellent for the teeth, as well for keeping 
them white as for preserving them. It is 
also used as pounce. These animals have 
the power of squirting out a black fluid 
resembling ink, which is said to be an in- 
gredient us'ed in the composition of Indian 
ink. They deposit their eggs upon sea- 
weed, which resemble a bunch of grapes. 
When first deposited they are white, but 
when impregnated by the male they be- 
come black ; they are round, with a little 
point at the end, and in each of them is in- 
closed a living cuttle-fish, surrounded with 
a gelatinous fluid. The flesh is used as food 
by the Italians. 
SEPIARI^, in botany, the name of the 
forty-fourth order in Linnmus’s Fragment* 
of a Natural Method, consisting of many 
beautiful woody plants, both of the shrub 
and tree kind, most of which do not drop 
their leaves till nearly the time in which the 
new leaves begin to appear. Among the 
plants of this order are the fraxinus, or ash ; 
jasminum, jessamine tree; ligustrum, privet; 
syringa, lilac. 
SEPTAS, in botany, a genus of the 
Heptandria Heptagynia class and order,- 
Natural order of Succulentse. Sempervivse, 
Jussieu. There is but one species, viz. S. 
capensis, round-leaved septas, a native of 
the Cape of Good Hope. 
SEPTEMBER, the ninth month of the 
year, consisting of only thirty days: it took 
its name as being tlie seventh month, reck- 
oning from March, with which the Romans 
began their year. 
SEPTUAGINT, the name given to a 
Greek version of the books of the Old 
Testament, from its being supposed to be 
performed by seventy-two Jews, who are 
usually called the seventy ihterpreters, be- 
cause seventy is a round number. The his- 
tory of this version is expressly written by 
Aristeas, an oflicer of the guards to Pto- 
lemy Fbiladelphus, the substance of whose 
