PER 
thefword. Job, xxxiii. 18.—I pcrijh with hunger. St. Luke, 
xv. 17.—The Tick, when their cafe comes to be thought 
defperate, are carried out and laid on the earth to peri/h 
without afliftance or pity. Locke. 
Still when the luft of tyrant pow’r fucceeds 
Some Athens perijhes, or fome Tully bleeds. Pope. 
To be in a perpetual ftate of decay.—Duration, and time 
which is a part of it, is the idea we have of perijhing dif- 
tance, of which no two parts exift together, but follow 
in fucceffion; as expanfion is the idea of lading diftance, 
all whofe parts exift together. Locke. —To be loft eter¬ 
nally.—O fuft'er me not to peri/h in my fins : Lord, cared 
thou not that I peri/h, who wilt that all fhould be faved 
and that none fhould peri/h? Bp. Moretons Daily Ex- 
ercife. 
To PER'ISH, v. a. Todeftroy; to decay. Not in life. 
—Rife, prepar’d in black to mourn thy perijh'd lord. 
Dry den. 
The fplitting rocks cow’r’d in the finking fands. 
And would not dafh me with their ragged fides 5 
Becaufe thy flinty heart, more hard than they, 
Might in thy palace peri/h Margaret. Shakefpeare. 
His miferies have perijh'd his good face, 
And taken off the fweetnefs that has made 
Him pleafing in a woman’s underftanding. 
Beaum. and Fletcher's Hon. Man's Fortune. 
Familiar now with grief, your ears refrain. 
And in the public woe forget your own : 
You weep not for a perijh'd lord alone. Pope. 
PER'ISHABLE, adj. Liable to perifh; fubjefl to de¬ 
cay ; of fhort duration.—It is princes’ greateft prefent fe¬ 
licity to reign in their fubje&s’ hearts ; but thefe are too 
pcri/hable to preferve their memories, which can only be 
done by the pens of faithful hiftorians. Swift. —Human 
nature could not fuftain the refie&ion of having all its 
fchemes and expe&ations to determine with this frail and 
perijhable compofition of flefh and blood. Rogers. 
Thrice has he feen the perijhable kind 
Of men decay. Pope's Odyjfey. 
PER'ISH ABLENESS, /. Liablenefs to be deftroyed; 
liablenefs to decay.—Suppofe an ifland feparate from all 
commerce, but having nothing, becaufe of its common- 
nefs and perijhablenefs, fit to fupply the place of money; 
what reafon could any have to enlarge pofleflions beyond 
the ufe of his family? Locke. 
PER'ISHMENT, f . Deftruftion.—Amidft this general 
feene of perijhment and change, the holy gofpel ftill re¬ 
mains. Hewlett's Sermons, vol. iii. 
PERISSOL'OGY, f . [from the Gr. fuperflu- 
ous, and Aoyo;, a word.] A fpeech abounding with fuper- 
fluous words. 
PERISSO'SIS, f. A word ufed by flippocrates tb ex- 
prefs a redundance of humours. 
PERISTAL'TIC, adj. [from the Gr. mp, about, and 
to contradl.] Belonging to that vermicular motion 
of the guts, which is made by the contra&ion of the fpi- 
ral fibres, whereby the excrements are prefied downwards 
and voided.—The perifialtic motion of the guts, and the 
continual expreflion of the fluids, will not luffer the leaft 
matter to be applied to one point the leaft inftant. Ar- 
luthnot. 
PERIS'TERA, in mythology, a nymph whom Cupid 
was fuppofed to have changed into a dove. 
PERISTE'RION, f . The herb vervain. 
PERISTERI'TF.S, f . the Pigeon-stone ; a name 
given by fome whimfical people to an odd conformation 
of a pebble, which they fuppofe to reprefent very exa&ly 
a pigeon without its wings. It feems to have been a 
mere lufus naturce in the formation of a common pebble. 
The variations of figure in the common pebbles are fo in¬ 
finite, that a perfon of a fertile imagination might find re- 
femblances to all the parts of the creation in the ftones of 
Vol. XIX, No. 1330. 
PER 627 
a Angle gravel-pit. The giving names to fuch accidental 
things is not only unneceflary, but mifehievous, as it 
caufes great confufion in natural hiftory. 
PER'ISTOME, /'. The fringe, or teeth, furrounding 
the mouth of the capfule in modes. 
PERISTYLE, /, [from the Gr. mpi, about, and rvAo?, 
a pillar.] A circular range of pillars.—The Villa Gor- 
diana had a perijlyle of two hundred pillars. Arbuthnot 
on Coins. 
PERISYS'TOLE, J. [from the Gr. vnpi, about, and 
aVToXn, a contraction.] Thepaufe orinterval betwixt the 
two motions of the heart or pulfe; namely, that of the 
fyftole, or contraction of the heart, and that of the duftole, 
or dilatation. 
PERITA'NUS, an Arcadian who enjoyed the company 
of Helen after her elopement with Paris. 
PER'ITAS, a favourite dog of Alexander the Great, 
in whofe honour the monarch built a city. 
PER'ITAS, a ifland in the Spanifh Maine: ten miles 
weft of Cumana Bay. 
PERI'TE, adj. [per it us, Lat.] Skilful. Not in ufe .— 
A confumption of the whole body, left by the moll pe- 
rite phyficians as incurable. Whitaker's Blood of the 
Grape, 1654.. 
PERI'TO, a tpwn of Naples, in Abruzzo Ultra: fix- 
teen miles weft-fouth-weft of Celano. 
PERITONE'UM, f . [from the Gr. vepi, about, and 
jmeo, toftretch out.] The foft thin membrane that lies 
immediately under the mufcles of the lower belly, and 
which enclofes all the bowels contained in the lower 
belly, covering all the infide of its cavity.—Wounds pe¬ 
netrating into the belly, are fuch as reach no farther in¬ 
ward than to the peritoneum. Wifeman. 
PERITONI'TIS, /. An inflammation of the perito¬ 
neum, or membranelining thecavity of the abdomen, and 
invefting all its vifeera. For its caufes and cure, fee the 
article Pathology, p. 253, 4, of this volume. 
PERITO'NIUM, in ancient geography, a town of 
Egypt, on the weftern fide of the Nile, efteemed of great 
importance, as being one of the keys of the countrj'. 
Antony was defeated there by C. Gallus, the lieutenant 
of Auguftus. 
PERITRO'CHIUM, / [from the Gr. we/k, about, and 
Tpexu, to run.] A wheel or circle concentric with the bale 
of a cylinder, and movable together with it, about an 
axis. The axis, wfith the wheel and levers fixed in it to 
move it, conftitutes that mechanical power, called axis 
in peritrochio; which fee. See alfo Mechanics. 
PER'IVALE, a town of Hindooftan, in Marawar : fe- 
ven miles north of Ramanadporum. 
PER'IVALE, the modern name given to a finall vil¬ 
lage, formerly called Little Greenford, or Ganford, on the 
north fide of Great Ealing and Caftlebare-Hill; but is 
more properly that rich vale of excellent corn-land that 
extends from Hefton to Harrow on the Hill and Pinner, 
including Northold, Southold, Norcote, Greenford, 
Hayes, See. 
PERJURA'TION, f . The a£l of committing perjury. 
Bailey. 
PER'JURE, f [peijurus, Lat.] A perjured or for- 
fworn perfon. NotnowinuJe. 
Hide thee, thou bloody hand, 
Thou perjure, and thou fimular of virtue, 
Thou art inceftuous. Shakefpeare's K. Lear. 
To PER'JURE, v. a. [from per, by, an djuro, tofwear.] 
To forfwear; to taint with perjury. It is ufed with the 
reciprocal pronoun; as, He perjured himfelf. —The law is 
not made for a righteous man, but for the lawlefs and dif- 
obedient, for perjured perfons. 1 Tim. i. 10. 
Who fhould be trufted now, when the right hand 
Is perjur'd to the bofom ? ShakeJ'peare. 
PER'JURER, f . One that fwears falfely.—The com¬ 
mon oath of the Scythians was by the fword and fire; for 
7 X that 
