POS 
a privative or negative quantity, which is 
less than nothing, and marked by the sign 
— . Positive quantities are designed by the 
character -}^ prefixed or supposed to be 
prefixed to them. 
Positive, in music, denotes the little 
organ usually placed behind or at the feet 
of an organist, played with the same wind, 
and the same bellow's/and consisting of the 
same number of pipes with the larger one, 
though those much smaller, and in a certain 
proportion : this is properly the choir-or- 
gan. 
Positive degree, in grammar, is the ad- 
jective in its simple signification, without 
any comparison ; or it is that termination 
of the adjective which expresses itself sim- 
ply, and absolutely, without comparing it 
with any other. 
Positive electricity. According to the 
Franklinian system, all bodies are supposed 
to contain a certain quantity of electricity : 
and those, that by any means, are made to 
contain more or less than their natural quan- 
tity, are said to be positively or negatively 
electrified. These electricities being first 
produced by the friction of glass and resin, 
were called by some philosophers vitreous 
and resinous ; the former answering to the 
positive or plus electricity; the latter to 
the negative or minus electricity. ' 
POSSE comitfitus. The power of the 
county, is the attendance of all knights and 
others, above fifteen years of age, to assist 
the sheriff' in quelling riots, &c. 
POSSESSION is two-fold ; actual, and 
in law : actual possession is, when a man 
actually enters into lands and tenements 
to him descended ; possession in law is, when 
the lands or tenements are descended to a 
man, and he has not as yet actually enter- 
ed into them. 
POSSESSIVE, in grammar, a term ap- 
plied to pronouns which denote the enjoy- 
ment or possession of any thing, either in 
particular or in common : as mens, mine, 
and tuns, thine ; nosier, ours, and vester, 
yours. ' 
POST, a word synonimous with courier, 
which is supposed to be originally derived 
from horses for' the conveyance of dis- 
patches, being positi, or placed at- conve- 
nient di,stance,s, as relays or changes for 
those fatigued, and unable to proceed the 
wdiole joumey with the desired speed. 
Hence it has become the practice to term 
horses employed for this and sin)ilar pur- 
poses, po.st-i’.orses ; their riders, post-boys ; 
the houses for the reception of letters thus 
POS 
conveyed, post-offices ; and even the drivers 
of chaises, postilions ; and their vehicles, 
post-chaises ; it is natural, besides, to say, 
he who continues a journey on fresh horses, 
without stopping for more than necessary 
refreshment, rides post. The spaces be- 
tween certain inns, for the reception of tra- 
vellers in England, forming a post, varies 
from twelve to fifteen miles, beyond which 
it is deemed imprudent to urge a horse, 
without a long interval of repose ; and the 
charges per mile for horses furnished from 
those inns, have occasioned continual dis- 
content, and frequent general meetings of 
certain classes of the public. 
Before the establishment of a system for 
the conveyance of important intelligence, 
and in the earliest state of society, it may 
be supposed, horses were seized, or, to use 
a modern term, put into requisition where 
they were wanted ; though it is still more 
probable, that men were tutored to run 
from station to station, as is now the prac- 
tice in the Eastern nations, whose couriers 
fly their prescribed distance with astonish- 
ing velocity, and delivering their dispatches 
to fresh persons, they are by this means con- 
veyed almost as rapidly as by horses. The 
Emperor Trajan, appears to have been the 
first who ordained the keeping of horses for 
this purpose only, and the example has ap- 
peared so rational to succeeding genera- 
tions, that it is highly probable, posting of 
every description has now reached its full 
possible perfection. 
It was customary, in ancient times, to 
convey information by boats, and in cha- 
riots, exclusive of on foot and horseback ; 
nay, even pigeon? have been taught to fly 
from plage to place, with letters attached 
to them ; in England, men who conveyed 
letters were ealled carriers, which was cer- 
tainly, in the then state of the roads, a mitch 
more appropriate term than the present, 
implying, in one acceptation, exceeding 
swiftness. Louis XI., King of France, esta- 
blished the first regular conveyance of this 
description in the year 1464, for the morq 
speedy and certain information he thought 
it necessary to possess, concerning the state 
of his extensive dominions ; the utility of 
the invention was too apparent to escape 
the observation of the surrounding conti- 
nental nations, which adopted the idea, and 
each suited the regulations to their own pe- 
culiar circumstances; England, alone, seems, 
to have preferred her old and tedious sys- 
tem of carriers, till the twelfth year of the 
reign of Charles II., when Parliameut 
