450 F L E 
Fair, long, and flowing, as if made of flax.—I bough,t a. 
fine flaxen long wig. Addifon. 
FLAX'WENCH,/. [poflibly for fome reafon no longer 
exilting.] An incontinent female : 
My wife’s a hobby-horfe, deferves a pame 
As rank as any flaxzoench , that puts to 
Before her troth-plight. Sha/ufpeare. 
To FLAY, v. a. \_adfaa, Iflandic; fae, Danifh; vlacn , 
Dutch.] To (trip off the fkin.—Whilft the old levitical 
hierarchy,continued, it was part of the minifterial office 
to flay the facrifices. South. 
Then give command the facrifice to hafte; 
Let the fay'd victims in the plains be caff; 
And facred vows, and myftic fong, apply’d 
To griffy Pluto and his gloomy bride. Pope. 
To take oft’the fkin or furface of any thing.—They flay 
their ikin from off them, break their bones, and chop 
them in pieces. Maccabees. 
FLAY'AT, a town of France, in the department of 
the Creufe, and chief place of a canton, in the diflridl of 
Pelletin': eleven miles fouth-eaft of Felletin. 
FLAY'ER, f. He that ftrips off the fkin of any thing. 
FLEA, f. tp'ea, Sax. vloye, Dut. Jlecxh, Scott.] A 
fmall red infect remarkable for its agility in leaping, 
which fucks-the blood of larger animals. See the article 
Pulkx. — Fleas breed principally of ftraw or mats, where 
there hath been a little moifture. Bacon. 
While wormwood hath feed, get a handful or twain, 
To fave againft March to make fca to refrain: 
Where chamber is fweeped and wormwood is ftrown, 
No fca for his life dare abide to be known. Tujfer. 
To FLEA, v. a. To clean from fleas. 
FLEA BANE, f. in botany. See Conyza, Erige- 
ron, and Inula. 
FLE'ABITE, or Fx.e'abiting, f. Red marks caufed 
by fleas fucking the blood.—The attendance of a cancer 
is commonly a breaking out all over the body, like a fea- 
biting. Wifeman. —A fmall hurt or pain, like that cauled 
by the fling of a flea.—A gout, a cholic, a cutting off an 
arm or leg, or fearing the flefli, are but jleabites to the 
pains of the foul. Harvey. 
FLEA'BITTEN, adj. Stung by fleas. Mean ; worth- 
lefs: 
Fleabitten fynod, an affembly brew’d 
Of clerks and elders ana, like the rude 
Chaos of prefbyt’ry, where laymen guide, 
Vv'ith the tame vvoolpack clergy by their fide. Cleaveland. 
FLE'AGR ASS, f. in botany. See Carex. 
FLEAK, v. a. [from foccus, Lat. See Flake.] A 
fmall lock, thread, or twill.—The bufineffes of men de¬ 
pend upon tliefe little long Jleaks or threads of hemp and 
flax. More. 
FLEAM, f. [corrupted from <p\z.( 3 orov.ov, Gr. the in- 
ffrument ufeci in phlebotomy.] An inflrument ufed to 
bleed cattle, which is placed on the vein, and then driven 
by a blow. 
FLEA WORT, f. in botany. See Plantago. 
FLECHE (La), a town of France, and principal place 
of a diftricl, in the department of the Sarte, containing 
about fix thoufand fouls : feven leagues fouth-fouth-wefl 
of Le Mans. Lat. 47. 42. N. Ion. 17. 31. E. Ferro. 
FLECHI'ER (Efprit), a learned French prelate, born 
at Pernes, in the county of Avignon, in 1632, of obfeure 
parents, who were defeended from noble anceftors. The 
case of young Flechier’s education was undertaken by his 
uncle, father Hercules Audifert, fuperior of the congre¬ 
gation of the Chriftian Dodlrine, of which his nephew 
became a member, and diftinguilhed himfelf by the pro¬ 
ficiency which he made in the different branches of lite¬ 
rature. Being appointed profeffor of rhetoric in the col¬ 
lege belonging to his order at Narbonne, the duties of his 
place obliged'him to write much in Latin. Fie felt, how- 
F L E 
ever, the difficulty of appearing tolerable after Cicero, 
Virgil, and Horace, in a language no longer fpoken, and 
expreffed his fentiments on the fubjedl m a Latin poem 
On Modern Latinity, in which he ufed his belt endea¬ 
vours not to give at the fame time the criticifm and the 
example. While he was in this fituation, he was called 
upon to deliver before the dates of Languedoc a funeral 
oration for Claude de Rebe, archbilhop of Narbonne. 
His difeourfe on this occafion was highly applauded ; and 
the fuccefs of this firft attempt at Inch compofitions, in¬ 
dicated the path to fame which nature had pointed out 
to him. After the death of his uncle, he withdrew from 
the congregation, and went to Paris, where he refolved 
to devote his chief attention to the cultivation of pulpit 
eloquence; and foon role to confiderable celebrity among 
the mod able and admired preachers of his time. The 
fly le of his fermons in general is correct, pure, and fre¬ 
quently elevated, but too ftudied and artificial ; whence 
they were more calculated to excite the admiration of 
his hearers, than to move and aftedl their hearts. But it 
was on his funeral orations that his reputation for pulpit 
eloquence was chiefly built. On this fpecies of compo- 
lition he exerted all his energies, and with f'uch fuccefs 
that his countrymen have afligned him a rank in it fecond 
only to that of Boffuet. “ Their ftyle, (fays d’Alembert,) 
is not only pure and correct, but full of fweetnefs and ele¬ 
gance. Poetry, to which Flechier had given his atten¬ 
tion before he mounted the pulpit, and by which he had 
approached to eloquence, rendered him very fenfible to 
the charms refulting from the happy arrangement of 
words. Flechier, notvvithffanding, had a monotony in his 
difeourfes, which would fatigue and chill the reader, 
were it not from time to time relieved and animated by 
ftrokes of pathetic fenfibility, which by their genial 
warmth impart a new breath of life to the whole mafs. 
This tinge of the pathetic became dill more fenfible, 
when thefe orations were pronounced by their author. 
His ferious action, and his flow and fomewhat feeble 
voice, brought the hearers into a difpofition of fympa- 
thetic forrow ; the foul felt itfelf gradually penetrated by 
the Ample exprellions of the fentiment, and the ear by 
the foft cadence of the periods. Hence he was fometimes 
obliged to make a paufe in the pulpit, that he might 
leave a free courfe to plaudits, not of the tumultuous 
kind which re found at profane fpsclacles, but expreffed 
by that general and modeft murmur which eloquence 
wrefts, even in our temples, from an audience deeply 
moved; a kind of involuntary explofion of the public 
enthuliafm, which not even the fluidity of the place can 
reprefs.” The mod finiflied and celebrated of thefe pro- 
dudions is his funeral oration for the great Turenne. in 
1673, Flechier was chofen one of the forty members of 
the French Academy. In 1679, he published his Hiflory 
of the Emperor Theodofius the Great, quarto ; which was 
drawn up with the defign of exhibiting, for the inftrudion 
of the dauphin, the model of a pious and Chriftian mo- 
narch. Afterwards he publifhed The Life of Cardinal 
Ximenes, quarto. I11 1685, Flechier was nominated by 
Louis XIV. to the biftioprjc of Lavaur; on which occa. 
lion that monarch Laid to him, “ I have made you wait 
fome time for a place which you have long deferved, but 
I was unwilling fooner to deprive myfelf of the pleafure 
of hearing you.” In 1687, he was tranflated from the fee 
of Lavaur to tiiat of Nifrnes. Having entered on his new 
charge, he applied himfelf afliduoufly to the converfion 
of the reformed ; but reforted only to the means of mild 
perfuafion and paftoral admonition. Flechier, likewife, 
was eminent for his benevolence. During the fcarcity in 
1709, his charities were immenfe, and equally fliared be¬ 
tween catholics and proteflants, the meafure being what 
they endured, not what they believed. To his other 
virtues he added a freedom from all pride, being never 
afhamed of his humble origin, nor yet inflated with va¬ 
nity on account of the dignity to which lie had railed 
himfelf by his fuperior merits. On proper occafions, 
however^ 
