tal power is weak. Some are good musicians. Some can calculate well, while others are ingenious in constructiveness. Ireland classifies idiocy into 10 divisions: (1) Genetous, (2) Microcephalic, (3) Eclampsic, (4) Epileptic, (5) Hydrocephalic, (6) Paralytic, (7) Cretinic, (8) Traumatic, (9) Inflammatory, and (10) by deprivation of the senses. From this it is seen that there are many pathological causes of the disease. It is a popular error to suppose that all idiots have small heads. Three-fifths of them have larger heads than average men, and only a few (the microcephalic) are small headed. It is quality more than quantity of brain that counts for mind. The general causes of idiocy have not yet been fully made out. It is unquestionably hereditary in at least 50 per cent.
IDOLATRY, the worship of idols, images, or representations made by hands to represent divinity, or of any inanimate object; the worship of false gods; paganism.
According to Lubbock idolatry or anthropomorphism is the fifth of six progressive stages in the history of religion.
Ethnic. — The ancient Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans, the modern
Chinese, Burmese, Hindus, etc., are all in that fifth stage of religious development.
Jewish. — In all countries where idolatry exists, the tendency is for the uneducated to worship the idol as if it were a deity. Denunciations by the prophet Isaiah are directed against this. When Aaron made the golden calf he built an altar and proclaimed a feast to Jehovah, but the people said : "These be thy gods, Israel." Idolatry is forbidden in the Decalogue (Exodus xx: 3-6).
Christian. — In the 8th and 9th centuries a party in the Eastern Church (see
Iconoclast) denounced image worship as idolatry, and the Emperor Leo interdicted
the images, but they were restored by the Empress Irene. (See Image Worship.)
IDRIA, a mining town in the former Austrian crownland of Carniola, famous for its Quicksilver mines (discovered in 1497). Pop. about 17,500.
IDRIALIN, or IDRIALINE, in chemistry, C^a H28O, a white crystalline substance, extracted from idrialite. The best solvent is oil of turpentine or amylic alcohol. Heated with sulphuric acid, an intense blue color is formed; with nitric acid an insoluble red powder is produced.
IDYL, or IDYLL, a short poem, the subject, or at least a necessary accompaniment, of which is a simple description of pastoral nature, life, and scenery, or of events in pastoral life; as the idyls of Theocritus among the ancients; Goldsmith's "Deserted Village," etc.
IDZU, a province of Japan. It consists of a mountainous peninsula with numerous bays. It is 32 miles long and 16 miles wide. Its chief industries are the rearing of silk worms and the reeling of silk. It has several rivers, the most important of which is the Kanogawa. The chief towns are Mishima and Shimoda.
IF (ēf), a rocky island in the Gulf of Marseilles, crowned by a castle, the Chateau d'lf, which was built by Francis I. of France, and subsequently used as a state prison. Here were confined, among others, Mirabeau and the Duke of Orleans (Philip Egalite), not to mention "Monte Cristo."
IFNI (if'nē), a small seaport in southern Morocco, 35 miles S. of Aguilon, ceded to Spain in 1883.
IGASURINE, an alkaloid discovered in 1853 by Desnoix, in the mother-liquors from which strychnine and brucine had been precipitated by lime. It crystallizes in feathery groups of white silky needles, which have the bitter taste and poisonous properties of strychnine and brucine. It resembles brucine in its behavior toward reagents.
IGBARA, a name given to a negro people living in the Niger valley in the S. W. of Nigeria. The territory is made of different kingdoms, among them that of Nyffe or Nupé, of which the capital is Bida, and Yarriba, comprised within the Lagos protectorate. The Igbara speech resembles that of Ibo and Ewe. The tribes have an indigenous culture and are partly Mohammedan.
IGLAU (ēg'lou), the second largest town of Moravia; on the Iglawa river; 123 miles N. N. W. of Vienna. It has some old churches (one founded in 799). Its staple industries have always been the manufacture of cloth and woolen goods; glass and tobacco are also manufactured. It has a large trade in corn, flax, wool, cloth, and timber. Here on July 5, 1436, the Emperor Sigismund signed the Prague Compactata, after which he was accepted as king by the Bohemians. In the Thirty Years' War the town was taken by the Swedes and recaptured by the Imperialists.
IGLOOLIK (ig-lō'lik), an island near the E. end of the Fury and Hecla Strait in the Arctic Ocean; the place where Parry passed the winter of 1822-1823.
