SAT 
691 
SAT 
system of this raving philosopher, created by seven angels, 
which presided over the seven planets. This work was 
carried on without the knowledge of the benevolent deity, 
and in opposition to the will of the material principle. The 
former, however, beheld it with approbation, and honoured 
it with several marks of his beneficence. He endowed with 
rational souls the beings who inhabited this new system, to 
whom their creators had imparted nothing more than the 
mere animal life; and having divided the world into seven 
parts, he distributed them among the seven angelic archi¬ 
tects, one of whom was the .god of the Jews; and reserved 
to himself the supreme empire over all. To these creatures, 
whom the benevolent principle had endowed with reason¬ 
able souls, and with dispositions that led to goodness and 
virtue, the evil being, to maintain his empire, added another 
kind, whom he formed of a wicked and malignant character; 
and hence the difference we see among men. When the 
creators of the world fell from their allegiance to the supreme 
deity, God sent from heaven, into our globe, a restorer of 
order, whose name was Christ. This divine conqueror 
came clothed with a corporeal appearance, but not with a 
real body: he came to destroy the empire of the material 
principle, and to point out to virtuous souls the way by which 
they must return to God. This way is beset with diffi¬ 
culties and sufferings; since those souls, who propose re¬ 
turning to the supreme being, after the dissolution of this 
mortal body, must abstain from wine, flesh, wedlock, and, 
in short, from every thing that tends to sensual gratifica¬ 
tion, or even bodily refreshment. Mosheim’s Eccl. Hist, 
vol. i. p. 176, Eng. ed. 8vo. 1758. 
SA'TURNIST, s. One of gloomy or melancholy dis¬ 
position. Unused. 
Seating himself within a darksome cave; 
Such places heavy Saturnists do crave. Browne. 
SA'TYR, s. [ satyrus , Lat.] A sylvan god: supposed 
among the ancients to be rude and lecherous.— Satyrs , as 
Pliny testifies, were found in times past in the eastern moun¬ 
tains of India. Vcacham. 
Bochart (Chan. 1. i. c. 12.) deduces Satyr from the 
Hebrew word Sair, which signifies a devil under the shape 
of a goat; and hence, as he says, they are represented as a 
sort of goats, dancing and frisking in a lascivious manner. 
The Satyrs were painted half men and half goats: the 
upper part was human, excepting horns on the head ; and 
the lower brutal, with the tail and legs of a goat : the whole 
covered with hair. 
The poets usually confound the Sators, Sylvans, Sileni, 
Fauns, and Panes. 
Nonnus, in his Dionysiaca, makes the Satyrs the off¬ 
spring of Mercury and a Doric nymph, called Ypthima, and 
gives us the names of several; viz. Paeminius, Thyasus, 
Hypsichorus, Oristas, Apseus, Phlegrseus, Lycon, &c. 
Memnon, in his book against the tyrants of Heracles, 
derives the Satyrs from Bacchus, and a Naiad, called 
Nicaea. 
The introduction of Satyrs into the poetical world was 
probably owing to large monkies, seen in the woods, pretty 
much resembling men; or perhaps to the appearance of 
barbarians, resembling monkies at a distance. This is the 
opinion of Pliny (Hist. 1. 9. c. 54.), who takes the Satyrs 
for a kind of monkies, and who says, that in a mountain of 
the Indies are to be found four-footed Satyrs, who might 
be taken at a distance for men. These monkies had fre¬ 
quently terrified the shepherds, and sometimes pursued the 
shepherdesses; and this circumstance probably gave rise 
to so many fables about their amorous disposition. To this 
we may add, that shepherds covered with goat-skins, and 
some priests of Bacchus, frequently counterfeited Satyrs, to 
seduce the innocent shepherdesses; and thus we have the 
true explication of the fable. Hence the opinion spread, 
that the woods were full of these mischievous divinities. 
The shepherdesses trembled for their honour, and the shep¬ 
herds for their flocks; for which reason they sought to ap¬ 
pease them by sacrifices, and by the offerings of the firstlings 
of thejr flocks. Some songs were composed, which the 
shepherds sung in the forests, where they endeavoured, by 
invoking them, to recommed themselves to their favour. 
The poets, laying hold of the amusing subject, invented a 
thousand tales. The painters also contributed to propagate 
those fables, by painting Pan and the Satyrs like men. 
Such, says Banier, are the origin of these rural divinities, 
and such was the origin of their worship, and of the sacri¬ 
fices that were offered to them 
Satyrs made part of the dramatis person® in the ancient 
Greek tragedies, which gave rise to a new species of poetry, 
called satirical. 
SATYRI, a wandering people in the interior of Africa, 
according to Pomponius Mela. 
SATYRIASIS, s. A disease.'—If the chyle be very plen¬ 
tiful, it breeds a satyriasis, or an abundance of seminal 
lymphas. Floyer. See Pathology. 
SATY'RION, s. [ satyrium , Lat.] A plant.— Satyrion 
near, with hot eringoes stood. Pope. 
SATYRIUM [SarvyiovofDioscorides. Satyrimn of Pliny], 
in Botany, a genus of the class gynandria, order diandria, 
natural order of orchideae.—Generic Character. Calyx: 
spathes wandering; spadix simple; perianth none. Corolla: 
petals five, ovate-oblong: three exterior; two interior con¬ 
verging upwards into a helmet. Nectary one-leafed, an¬ 
nexed to the receptacle by rts lower side between the division 
of the petals; upper lip erect, very short; lower fiaf, pendu¬ 
lous, prominent behind at the base in a serotiform bag. 
Stamina: filaments two, very slender and very short, placed 
on the pistil. Anthers obovate, covered by the two-celled 
fold of the upper lip of the nectary. Pistil: germ oblong,, 
twisted, inferior. Style fastened to the upper lip of the nec¬ 
tary, very short. Stigma compressed, obtuse. Pericarp: 
capsule oblong, one-celled, three-keeled, three-valved, open¬ 
ing in three parts under the keels, cohering at the top and 
bottom. Seeds numerous, very small, irregular like saw-dust. 
— Essential Character. Nectary serotiform or twin-in¬ 
flated behind the flower. 
1. Satyrium hircinum, or lizard satyrion.—Bulbs undivided, 
leaves lanceolate, lip of the nectary trifid, middle segment li¬ 
near, oblique, praemorse. It is the tallest English plant of this 
tribe, frequently attaining the height of three feet, and produc¬ 
ing from twenty to sixty or more flowers, remarkable for their 
fetid goat-like smell. The upper part of the lip is downy, 
and marked with elegant purple spots on a white ground; 
otherwise the flowers are more singular than beautiful.—Na¬ 
tive of Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France, Italy, and 
England. This plant varying in size and the breadth of the 
leaves, has given occasion to old authors to make two species 
of it. The flowers are sometimes quite white. 
2. Satyrium tabulare.—Bulbs round, stem leafy, lip trifid, 
middle segment emarginate. Found at the Cape of Good 
Hope, on the top of the Table Mountain; whence its trivial 
name. 
3. Satyrium triste.—Bulbs undivided, helmet one-spurred, 
lip entire. Large and panicled. 
4. Satyrium giganteum, or gigantic satyrion.—Bulbs 
round, stem naked, lip sagittate. This is a fathom in height, 
with large orange-coloured flowers. 
5. Satyrium aculeatum.—Bulbs round, stem leafy, lip en¬ 
tire, unarmed, prickly. The lip is muricate, with white and 
purple prickles.—This and the two preceding are natives of 
the Cape. 
6. Satyrium viride, or frog satyrion.—Bulbs palmate, 
leaves oblong, blunt, lip of the nectary linear, trifid, the 
middle segment obsolete. Stem from five to eleven inches 
high and solid, with unequal sharp angles, formed from the. 
edges of the leaves and bractes. Spike lanceolate, from one 
to three inches long, loose, with few flowers. Bractes subu¬ 
late-lanceolate, keeled, somewhat bowed in. The roots have 
but few divisions. The lower leaves sheath the stem.—Na¬ 
tive of many parts of Europe; common in England. There 
is a variety with larger flowers. 
7. Satyrium nigrum, of black-flowered satyrion.—Bulb6 
palmate, lip of the nectary resupine, undivided. Stem about 
nine 
