Gentiles is chaotic and unsystematic, while its erudition is rendered almost valueless by the complete absence of any critical discrimination.
His other writings are: A True Idea of Jansenism (1669); Theophil, or a Discourse of the Saint’s Amitie with God in Christ (1671); Anatomie of Infidelitie (1672); Idea theologiae (1673); Philosophia generalis (1676).
GALE, THOMAS (?1636–1702), English classical scholar and antiquarian, was born at Scruton, Yorkshire. He was educated at Westminster school and Trinity College, Cambridge, of which he became a fellow. In 1666 he was appointed regius professor
of Greek at Cambridge, in 1672 high master of St Paul’s school,
in 1676 prebendary of St Paul’s, in 1677 a fellow of the Royal
Society, and in 1697 dean of York. He died at York on the 7th
(or 8th) of April 1702. He published a collection, Opuscula
mythologica, ethica, et physica, and editions of several Greek and
Latin authors, but his fame rests chiefly on his collection of old
works bearing on Early English history, entitled Historiae
Anglicanae scriptores and Historiae Britannicae, Saxonicae,
Anglo-Danicae scriptores XV. He was the author of the inscription
on the London Monument in which the Roman Catholics
were accused of having originated the great fire.
See J. E. B. Mayor, Cambridge in the Time of Queen Anne, 448-450.
GALE. 1. (A word of obscure origin; possibly derived from
Dan. gal, mad or furious, sometimes applied to wind, in the sense
of boisterous) a wind of considerable power, considerably
stronger than a breeze, but not severe enough to be called a storm.
In nautical language it is usually combined with some qualifying
word, as “half a gale,” a “stiff gale.” In poetical and figurative
language “gale” is often used in a pleasant sense, as in “favouring
gale”; in America, it is used in a slang sense for boisterous or
excited behaviour.
2. The payment of rent, customs or duty at regular intervals; a “hanging gale” is an arrear of rent left over after each successive “gale” or rent day. The term survives in the Forest of Dean, for leases granted to the “free miners” of the forest, granted by the “gaveller” or agent of the crown, and the term is also applied to the royalty paid to the crown, and to the area mined. The word is a contracted form of the O. Eng. gafol, which survives in “gavel,” in gavelkind (q.v.), and in the name of the office mentioned above. The root from which these words derive is that of “give.” Through Latinized forms it appears in gabelle (q.v.).
3. The popular name of a plant, also known as the sweet gale or gaul, sweet willow, bog or Dutch myrtle. The Old English form of the word is gagel. It is a small, twiggy, resinous fragrant shrub found on bogs and moors in the British Islands, and widely distributed in the north temperate zone. It has narrow, short-stalked leaves and inconspicuous, apetalous, unisexual flowers borne in short spikes. The small drupe-like fruit is attached to the persistent bracts. The leaves are used as tea and as a country medicine. John Gerard (Herball, p. 1228) describes it as sweet willow or gaule, and refers to its use in beer or ale. The genus Myrica is the type of a small, but widely distributed order, Myricaceae, which is placed among the apetalous families of Dicotyledons, and is perhaps most nearly allied to the willow family. Myrica cerifera is the candleberry, wax-myrtle or wax-tree (q.v.).
GALEN, CHRISTOPH BERNHARD, Freiherr von (1606–1678),
prince bishop of Münster, belonged to a noble Westphalian
family, and was born on the 12th of October 1606.
Reduced to poverty through the loss of his paternal inheritance,
he took holy orders; but this did not prevent him from fighting
on the side of the emperor Ferdinand III. during the concluding
stages of the Thirty Years’ War. In 1650 he succeeded Ferdinand
of Bavaria, archbishop of Cologne, as bishop of Münster. After
restoring some degree of peace and prosperity in his principality,
Galen had to contend with a formidable insurrection on the part of
the citizens of Münster; but at length this was crushed, and the
bellicose bishop, who maintained a strong army, became an
important personage in Europe. In 1664 he was chosen one of
the directors of the imperial army raised to fight the Turk;
and after the peace which followed the Christian victory at St
Gotthard in August 1664, he aided the English king Charles II.
in his war with the Dutch, until the intervention of Louis XIV.
and Frederick William I. of Brandenburg compelled him to
make a disadvantageous peace in 1666. When Galen again
attacked Holland six years later he was in alliance with Louis, but
he soon deserted his new friend, and fought for the emperor
Leopold I. against France. Afterwards in conjunction with
Brandenburg and Denmark he attacked Charles XI. of Sweden,
and conquered the duchy of Bremen. He died at Ahaus on the
19th of September 1678. Galen showed himself anxious to reform
the church, but his chief energies were directed to increasing his
power and prestige.
See K. Tücking, Geschichte des Stifts Münster unter C. B. von Galen (Münster, 1865); P. Corstiens, Bernard van Galen, Vorst-Bisschop van Munster (Rotterdam, 1872); A. Hüsing, Fürstbischof C. B. von Galen (Münster, 1887); and C. Brinkmann in the English Historical Review, vol. xxi. (1906). There is in the British Museum a poem printed in 1666, entitled Letter to the bishop of Munster containing a Panegyrick of his heroick achievements in heroick verse.
GALEN (or Galenus), CLAUDIUS, called Gallien by Chaucer and other writers of the middle ages, the most celebrated of ancient medical writers, was born at Pergamus, in Mysia, about
A.D. 130. His father Nicon, from whom he received his early
education, is described as remarkable both for excellence of
natural disposition and for mental culture; his mother, on the
other hand, appears to have been a second Xanthippe. In 146
Galen began the study of medicine, and in about his twentieth
year he left Pergamus for Smyrna, in order to place himself
under the instruction of the anatomist and physician Pelops, and
of the peripatetic philosopher Albinus. He subsequently visited
other cities, and in 158 returned from Alexandria to Pergamus.
A few years later he went for the first time to Rome. There he
healed Eudemus, a celebrated peripatetic philosopher, and other
persons of distinction; and ere long, by his learning and unparalleled
success as a physician, earned for himself the titles of
“Paradoxologus,” the wonder-speaker, and “Paradoxopoeus,”
the wonder-worker, thereby incurring the jealousy and envy of
his fellow-practitioners. Leaving Rome in 168, he repaired to
his native city, whence he was soon sent for to Aquileia, in
Venetia, by the emperors Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius. In
170 he returned to Rome with the latter, who, on departing
thence to conduct the war on the Danube, having with difficulty
been persuaded to dispense with his personal attendance,
appointed him medical guardian of his son Commodus. In
Rome Galen remained for some years, greatly extending his
reputation as a physician, and writing some of his most important
treatises. It would appear that he eventually betook himself to
Pergamus, after spending some time at the island of Lemnos,
where he learned the method of preparing a certain popular
medicine, the “terra lemnia” or “sigillata.” Whether he ever
revisited Rome is uncertain, as also are the time and place of his
death. According to Suidas, he died at the age of seventy, or in
the year 200, in the reign of Septimius Severus. If, however,
we are to trust the testimony of Abul-faraj, his decease took
place in Sicily, when he was in his eightieth year. Galen was one
of the most versatile and accomplished writers of his age. He
composed, it is said, nearly 500 treatises on various subjects,
including logic, ethics and grammar. Of the published works
attributed to him, 83 are recognized as genuine, 19 are of doubtful
authenticity, 45 are confessedly spurious, 19 are fragments, and
15 are notes on the writings of Hippocrates.
Galen, who in his youth was carefully trained in the Stoic philosophy, was an unusually prolific writer on logic. Of the numerous commentaries and original treatises, a catalogue of which is given in his work De propriis libris, one only has come down to us, the treatise on Fallacies in dictione (Περὶ τῶν κατὰ τήν λέξιν σοφισμάτων). Many points of logical theory, however, are discussed in his medical and scientific writings. His name is perhaps best known in the history of logic in connexion with the fourth syllogistic figure, the first distinct statement of which was ascribed to him by Averroes. There is no evidence from Galen’s own works that he did make this addition to the doctrines of
