LAC 
have alfo an abridgment, entitled Injlitutionum Epitomt, 
infcribed by Ladlantius to his brother Pentadius. This 
was imperfect at the beginning, in St. Jerome’s copy, and 
was fo in thofe which reached modern times, till, to the 
great joy of the learned world, a perfect or nearly perfect 
copy was found in the library of the king of Sardinia at 
Turin, by Dr. Chriftopher Matthew Pfaff, and publifhed 
by him at Paris in 1712. A curious account of the ma- 
nufcript, and the fortunate difcovery of it, may be read in 
the preliminary difl'ertation, and in M. la Roche’s Me¬ 
moirs of Literature. This abridgment is a ufeful book, 
containing in it fome things not to be found in the Infti- 
tutions themfelves. In his treatife De Ira Dei, which is 
particularly commended by Jerome as a learned and ele¬ 
gant piece, and a complete treatife upon the fubjedt, Lac- 
tantius endeavours to prove, that God is capable of anger 
as well as of mercy and companion; and, in his treatife 
De Opijicio Dei, he eftabliffies the dodtrine of God’s pro¬ 
vidence, by demonllrating the excellence of his principal 
work, which is man, giving an elegant defcription of the 
parts of the human body, and the properties or faculties 
of the foul. What we have already noticed are the only 
works remaining, which are universally allowed to be the 
genuine produdlions of Ladlantius. Refpedling the well- 
known book De Mortibus Pcrfecutcrum, the learned world 
has been divided in opinion; one party maintaining that 
it is to be afcribed to that father, and the other that it 
carries ftrong intrinfic marks of having been written by 
another hand. The reader may find a reference to the 
authors on both fides the queftion in Lardner. Whether 
it be genuine or not, it is, however, a very valuable work, 
containing a fhort account of the fufferings of the Chrif- 
tians under feveral of the Roman emperors, from the 
death and refurredlion cf Chrift to Dioclefian; and then 
a particular hiftory of the perfecution railed by that em¬ 
peror, and the caufes and fprings of it; as likewife the 
mrferable deaths of the chief inftruments employed in it. 
This piece furnifhes us with feveral remarkable facts, 
which are recorded no-where elfe. It is a work which 
none of the ancients after the time of Jerome have no¬ 
ticed ; and was firft publifhed by Stephen Baluze, in the 
i'econd volume of his Mifcellanea, in the year 1679. No¬ 
thing need be faid of the poems De Phanice, De Pafcka, 
and De PaJJione Domini, which are joined with the works of 
Ladlantius in molt editions, but are now generally allow¬ 
ed to be fpurious. The editions of this father’s works 
are very numerous, and are moll of them mentioned by 
Cave and Pupin. The firft edition was publilhed at Rome, 
in 14.68, in folio, by Conrad Lewenheim; and the laft, 
which is the moft corredl, was edited at Paris, in 1748, in 
two volumes quarto, by the abbe Lenglet. Fabricii Bibl. 
Eccl. Cave's Hijl. Lit. Lardner. 
LAC'TARY, adj. [laftareus, Lat.] Milky; full of juice 
like milk.-—From laElary or milky plants, which have a 
white and lacleous juice difperfed through every part, 
there arile flowers blue and yellow. Brown. 
LAC'TARY, f. \_IaElarium, Lat.] A milk-houfe. 
LACTATION, f. \_la£io, Lat.] The adl or time of 
giving fuck. See Infant. 
LACTE'AL, adj. [from lac, Lat.] Milky; conveying 
chyle ofthe colour of milk.—As the food paffes, the chyle, 
which is the nutritive part, is feparated from the excre- 
mentitious by the laCleal veins; and from thence convey¬ 
ed into the blood. Locke. 
LACTE'AL, f. The veflel that conveys chyle.—The 
mouths of the ladleals may permit aliment, acriminious or 
not fufficiently attenuated, to enter in people of lax con- 
flitutions, whereas their fphindters will fhut again!! them 
in fucli as have ftrong fibres. Arbulhnot. 
Tliefe veflels were not known to Erafiftatus and Hero- 
philus, but are diftinclly mentioned by Galen. It was 
fiuppofed, very early, that they conveyed the nutriment 
from the inteftines; but, as ufually the liver was confi- 
dered to be the part in which the blood was elaborated, 
Jhefe vefTels were faid to terminate in that organ. Plates 
L A r 7 r 
ftill exift in which they are reprefented as taking this 
courfe, though it had been contradicted by Galen. To 
Afeliius the credit of the difcovery has been given, and 
the exadt day fixed, viz. the 23d of June, 1622, when 
opening a dog for an experiment of a very different na¬ 
ture : bat, in reality, he faw them only as Galen and his 
predeceffors had done; and, fo far from tracing their 
courfe to the thoracic dudt, he defcribed them as termi¬ 
nating in the liver. He faw, however, their valves ; and 
conjedfured, rather than demonftrated, that they receive 
their contents by orifices opening into the inteftines. It 
is fingular that he had not connedted with this difcovery 
the defcription of the thoracic dudl by Euftachius, in 
1563, which would at once have cleared up the principal 
circumftances of this courfe of the lymph or chyle. Afel¬ 
iius never faw the ladleals in the human body, but fup¬ 
pofed their exiftence from analogy ; and it was twelve 
years afterwards, viz. in 1634, that Veflingius firft difico- 
vered them, and added, in the year 1649, the revival of 
the difcovery of Euftachius, viz. the exiftence of the com¬ 
mon receptacle of the ladleals and lymphatics, the thora¬ 
cic dudf. Rudbeck, nearly at the fame era, without any 
previous communication, difcovered the lymphatics in 
quadrupeds ; and about the ye.1ct.1654 traced the dudf in 
the human body. About the kva^time our countryman. 
Dr. Jolyfe, allb difcovered the eftcleals -and lymphatics, 
without any knowledge of Rudbetk’s fuccefs. As thefe 
authors difcovered them in man and in quadrupeds, fo 
Bartholine feems firft to have feen them in fifh. 
The lymphatics and ladleals are the fame in ftrudlure, 
di reef ion, and office. The lymphatics fometimes carry 
a milky fluid, and the ladleals aferous one; each conveys 
occafionally blood, diffolved or fnfpended offeous matter; 
in fliort, every thing which nature requires to be removed 
from the cellular or other cavities of the body. 
The ladleals arife from the cavity of the inteftines, from 
beginnings almoft imperceptible : they run along the in- 
teltines in a longitudinal direction, freely anaftomifing 
with each other ; but the courfe of the contents of thefe 
veflels is oppofite to that of the blood. This longitudi¬ 
nal diredfion is continued for fome w'ay ; and the ladteal 
then turns towards the mefentery, at an angle more or lefs 
acute. This lengthened courfe is probably defigned for 
fome peculiar purpofe, probably for the animalifation cf 
this newly-introduced aliment. The veflel then proceeds 
to the glands interpofed, in which they are loft, and from 
which limilar veflels of larger iize, but lefs numerous, 
emerge. Thefe are ftyled glands of the firft order, as in 
their courfe to the thoracic dudt other glands are found. 
In the whole of their progrefs, numerous valves are inter¬ 
pofed to prevent regurgitation ; fo that fometimes a lac¬ 
teal, injedled with quickfilver, refembles rather a firing of 
filver beads than a continuous veflel. In the courfe of 
the ladleals to the firft order of glands there are few' anaf- 
tomofes; but before entering the glands they are minute¬ 
ly divided. It fometimes happens alfo, that a ladteal, 
when it arrives at a gland, will creep over it without be¬ 
ing immerfed in it; and, at others, a trunk will pafs at a 
little diftance. The ladleals, which come off at the upper 
portion of the canal, pafs through fewer glands than thofe 
from the ileon ; and in old age many of the glands are 
obliterated. In the duodenum, perhaps, the more perfect 
chyle is feparated ; and in old perfons the fluids are lb 
highly animalifed, that lefs precaution is neceflary in pre¬ 
paring the new> aliment. In the colon, the caecum, and 
redtum, no lacteals have been difcovered; though, from 
the numerous lymphatic glands in the mefocolon, lacleais 
miifl exift there. From the glands the ladteals pafs on 
to the thoracic dtidl, and probably, in their courfe, anaf- 
tomofe with fome of the lymphatics. Dr. Harvey difco¬ 
vered the lymphatics in the year 3616. In 1627 they 
were publilhed by another author. Uzzalius difcovered 
the ladleals in a dog, running to the mefenteric glands, in 
the year 1662. 
LACTE'OUS, adj. Milky.—Though we leaye out the . 
lacleous - 
