U A C N 
the perfon conferring the benefit—In the place, therefore, 
I thankfully acknowledge to the Almighty power the affift- 
ance he has given me in the beginning, and the profecu- 
tion of my prefent ftudies. Dryden. 
ACKNOWLEDGING, adj. Grateful; ready to ac¬ 
knowledge benefits received. A Gallicifm, reconnoijfant. 
ACKNOWLEDGMENT,/. Conceflion of any cha¬ 
racter in another; as, exiftence, fuperiority.—The due 
contemplation of the human nature doth, by a neceflary 
connexion and chain of caufes, carry us up to the unavoid¬ 
able acknowledgment of the Deity; becaufe it carries every 
thinking man to an original of every fucceflive individual. 
Hale. —Conceflion of the truth of any pofition. Co.nfef- 
fion of a fault. Confefiion of a benefit received; grati¬ 
tude. Aft of atteftation to any conceflion ; fuch as ho¬ 
mage. Something given or done in confefiion of a bene¬ 
fit received.—The fecond is an acknowledgment to his ma- 
jefty for the leave of filhing upon his coafts; and, though 
this may not be grounded upon any treaty, yet, if it appear 
to be an ancient right on our tide, and cuftom on theirs, 
not determined or extinguiflied by any treaty between us, it 
may with juftice be infilled on. Temple. 
Acknowledgment-money, adj. a certain fum paid 
by tenants, in feveral parts of England, on the death of 
their landlords, as an acknowledgment of their new lords. 
ACKWORTH, Yorklhire, near Pontefraft. In this 
village, the Society of the Friends in Great-Britain have 
a feminary, for their children of both flexes. 
ACLIDES,/. in Roman antiquity, a kind of miflive 
weapon, with a thong affixed to it, whereby to draw it 
back. Mod authors deflcribe it as a fort of dart or jave¬ 
lin ; but Scaliger makes it roundifh or globular, and full 
of fpikes, with a flender wooden ftem to poife it by. 
ACLOWA, f. in botany, a barbarous name of a fpecies 
of Colutea. It is ufed by the natives of Guinea to cure 
the itch: they rub it on the body as we do unguents. 
ACME,/ Gr.] The height of any thing; more 
efpecially ufed to denote the height of a diffemper, which 
is divided into four periods, i. The arche, the beginning 
or firff attack. 2. Anabajis, the growth. 3. Acme, the 
height. And, 4. Paracme, which is the declenfion of the 
diftemper. 
ACMELLA,/. in botany, the trivial name of a fpecies 
of Spilanthus. 
ACMONIA, and Agmonia, in Peutinger’s map, a 
town of Phrygia Major, now in ruins. The inhabitants 
are called Acmonenfles by Cicero, and the city Civitas 
Acmonenfls. Alfo a city of Dacia, on the Danube, near 
the ruins of Trajan’s bridge, built by Severus, and called 
Severicum; diftant 12 German miles from Temefwar, to 
the flouth-eaft. 
ACNIDA,/ [aandxvi^n,anettle; to which it bears fome 
refemblance, without having its puriency.] In botany, a 
genus of the aioecia pentandria clafs, ranking in the natu¬ 
ral order of fcabridse. The generic characters are— 
Male. Calyx : perianthium five-leaved ; leaflets ovate, 
concave, acute, membranaceous on the edge. Stamina: 
filaments five, capillary, very Ihort; antherae verfatile, bi¬ 
locular, forked each way.—Female. Calyx: involucrum 
manv-leaved, linear, deciduous ; perianthium two-leaved 
(three-cleft£.) linear, very fmall, permanent. Piffillum: 
germ fuperior, ovate ; ftyles five, long, reflex, pubefcent; 
ftigmas fimple. Pericarpium : fruit ovate, comprefled, 
many-angled, (three-furrowed, three-fided g.) furrowed, 
covered with the fucculent calyx. Seed: folitary, round, 
comprefled..— EJfential CharaEler. Male. Calyx, five-lea¬ 
ved. Female. Calyx, two-leaved; ftyles, five; feed one, 
covered with the fucculent calyx. 
This plant, which is called Virginian hemp, grows na¬ 
turally in Virginia, and in fome other parts of North 
America, but is rarely cultivated in Europe, except in 
fome few botanic gardens. It is near of kin to hemp, un¬ 
der which title it has been ranged by fome former bota- 
A C O 
nifts; there is little beauty in it, and at prefent noufe has 
been made of it. 
ACNUA,/. in Roman antiquity, fignified a meafure of 
land, about the Engliflt rood, or fourth part of an acre. 
ACOEMET/E, or Acoemeti, in church hiftory; or, 
men who lived without fleep: a fet of monks who chanted 
the divine fervice night and day in their places of worfhip. 
They divided themfelves into three bodies, who alternate¬ 
ly fucceeded one another, fo that their churches were ne¬ 
ver filent. This practice they founded upon the precept. 
Pray without ceafing. They flourifhed in the eaft about the 
middle of the 5th century. There are a kind of acoemeti 
ftill fublifting in the Roman church, viz. the religious of 
the holy facrament, who keep up a perpetual adoration, 
fome one or other of them praying before the holy facra¬ 
ment day and night. 
ACOLUTHI, or Acoluthists,/ in antiquity, was. 
an appellation given to thofe perfons who were fteady and 
immoveable in their refolutions : and hence theftoics, be¬ 
caufe they would not forfake their principles, nor alter 
their refolutions, acquired the title of acoluthi. The word 
is Greek, and compounded of x, priv. and xoAevS©-, way ; 
as never turning from the original courfe. 
Acoluthi, among the ancient Chriftians, implied a’ 
peculiar order of the inferior clergy in the Latin church ; 
for they w : ere unknown to the Greeks for above 400 years. 
They were next to the fub-deacon ; and we learn from the 
fourth council of Carthage, that the archdeacon, at their 
ordination, put into their hands a candleftick with a taper, 
giving them thereby to underftand that they were appoint¬ 
ed to light the candles of the church; as alfo an empty 
pitcher, to imply that they were to furniih wine for the 
eucharift. Some think they had another office, that of at¬ 
tending the bifhop wherever he went. The word is Greek, 
and compounded of a, priv. and x&Auw, to hinder or dif- 
turb. 
ACOLYTHIA,/ in the Greek church, denotes the 
office or order of divine fervice; or the prayers, ceremo¬ 
nies, hymns, &c. whereof the Greek fervice is compofed. 
ACOMA, a town of North America, in New Mexico, 
feated on a hill wuth a good caftle. To go into the town, 
you muft walk up fifty fteps cut out of the rock. It is the 
capital of that province, and was taken by the Spaniards 
in 1599. Lat. 35. o. Ion. 104. 15. W. 
ACOMAC, the name of a county in Virginia. It is 
on the eaftern fide of the Chefapeak-bay, on a flip of land, 
by the Virginians called the Eaftern Shore. 
ACOMINATUS (Nicetas), was fecretary to Alexius 
Comnenus and to Ifaacus Angelus fucceflively: he wrote 
an Hiftory from the death of Alexius Comnenus 1118, 
where Zonaras ended his, to the year 1203, which has 
undergone many impreffions, and is much applauded by 
the beft critics. 
ACONCROBA,/ in botany, the indigenous name of 
a plant which grows wild in Guinea, and is in great ef- 
teem among the natives for its virtues in the fmali-pox. 
They give an infufion of it in wine. The leaves of this, 
plant are opake, and as ftiff as thofe of the philyrea; they 
grow in pairs, and ftand on fhort foot-ftalks ; they are fmall 
at each end, and broad in the middle; and the largeft of 
them are about three inches in length, and an inch and a 
quarter in breadth in the middle. Like thofe of our bay, 
they are of a dufky colour on the upper fide, and of a 
pale green underneath. 
ACONITE,/ \_aconitum , Lat.] Properly the herb 
wolf’s-bane, but commonly ufed in poetical language for 
poifon in general: 
Our land is from the rage of tygers freed. 
Nor nourilhes the lion’s angry feed; 
Nor pois’nous aconite is here produc’d, 
Or grows unknown-, or is, when known, refus’d. 
Dryden. 
ACONITI, 
