Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 18.djvu/775

P H I P H I 741 the first Arctic expedition ever sent out from America sailed from Philadelphia. The vessel, called the " Argo," was commanded by Captain Swaine, but her voyage accomplished nothing of import ance. In 1770 the first factory for the manufacture of fine porce lain in the colonies was established at Philadelphia by a Swiss and an Englishman, but the difficulty of obtaining competent workmen forced its abandonment two years later. During the war of the re volution Philadelphia was the virtual capital of the colonies and the scene of all the prominent civil events of those stirring times. The first Congress met at Carpenter s Hall on 4th September 1774 ; on 24th May 1775 Congress reconvened in the old State house and here continued its sittings, except when the city was threatened by the enemy and in his possession. On 2d July 1776 the " resolutions respecting independency " were passed, and on the 4th July 1776 Philadelphia was the scene of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence ; and the old State house became ever afterwards Independence Hall. On 9th July 1778 "the articles of confedera tion and perpetual union between the independent States of America " were here adopted and signed, and in the same place the convention to frame a constitution for the United States of America met on 14th May 1787, with Washington as presiding officer, and continued its sessions until 17th September, when the work was finished and the fundamental law of the land given to the world. The affairs of state were thus placed on a firm foundation, while the affairs of the church had received the attention of the people the previous year. In June 1786 the clerical and lay delegates from the Protestant Episcopal churches in the United States met in Philadelphia and formally organized " the Protestant Episcopal Church in North America." The Congress of the United States had held its opening session in New York, but in December 1790 it reassembled at Philadelphia ; and for ten years the seat of govern ment was at Philadelphia, until it Avas permanently removed to the District of Columbia. Here Washington delivered his farewell address to the people of the United States, and here he retired from public life. As in Philadelphia the first bank in the colonies had been opened the bank of North America in 1781 so in Phil adelphia the first mint for the coinage of the money of the United States was established in 1792. Both of these institutions are still in full operation. In April 1816 Congress incorporated the bank of the United States, which was the second banking institution of that name chartered by the Government, and fixed it at Philadel phia. The affairs of this institution form a very important chapter in the history of the city, as indeed in the history of the whole country. It had an unsettled existence, until the final blow came from President Jackson, towards the close of his first term of office, in 1833. Being opposed to the continuance of the bank, he with drew the public deposits, amounting to about $8,000,000, the result of which was widespread ruin and business depression, not only in Philadelphia but elsewhere. The two events of greatest note which have taken place in the city in recent years have been the centennial celebration of the independence of the colonies in 1876, and the bi-ceritennial cele bration of the landing of William Penn in 1882. The centennial celebration was of the greatest moment, owing to the Exposition of the Industries of All Nations, which was open from ] Oth May to 10th November ; the total admissions reached the number of 9,910,966 persons. (C. H. H*.) PRILJK. See EGYPT, vol. vii. p. 783 sy. PHILEMON, the oldest poet of the New Attic Comedy, was the son of Damon, and was born at Soli in Cilicia, or, according to others, at Syracuse ; but early in life he settled at Athens. Since he died in 262 B.C. at an age variously stated at from 96 to 101 years, he must have been born somewhere about 360. He was thus older than his contemporary and great rival Menander, whom he fre quently vanquished in poetical contests, and Avhom he long survived. Posterity, however, reversed the judgment of their contemporaries and assigned the palm to Menander. Philemon s first play was put on the stage about 330, while Menander did not exhibit until 321. It appears that, once being worsted in a poetical competition, Philemon went into exile. He certainly made a journey to the East, but whether on the occasion of his exile or in compliance with the invitation of Ptolemy, king of Egypt, we cannot say. On this journey, being driven by a storm to the coast of Gyrene, he was treated with cool contempt by Magas, king of Gyrene, whom he had satirized. From the various legends told about his death he would seem to have died in the full enjoyment and use of his poetical powers. Of the ninety-seven plays which he is said to have composed none are extant ; the titles of fifty-three have been preserved, but some of these may have been the work of his son, the younger Philemon, who is said to have composed fifty-four comedies. The Merchant and The, Treasure, of Philemon were the originals respectively of the Mercator and Trinummus of Plautus. The New Attic Comedy, of which Philemon was in a sense tho founder, dealt mainly Avith subjects drawn from private life, which were worked up in elaborate plots and treated in a prosaic style, to the exclusion, on the whole, of the political tendency, stinging personal satire, and warm poetical colouring, which had marked the Old Attic Comedy. These characteristics of the New Comedy had already appeared, though in a less degree, in the Middle and even in the Old Attic Comedy ; so that to Philemon belongs the credit, not of inventing, but of developing a style which had occasionally been employed before. In its absence of poetical idealism and restriction to the prosaic realism of daily life the New Comedy stands to the Old somewhat as the comedies of Moliere or Sheridan stand to those of Shakespeare. Its repertoire was limited to a few stock characters the imprudent lover, the designing fair, the stingy father, the greedy parasite, the blustering swashbuckler and its plots rang the changes on the well- worn theme of thwarted but faithful love, rescued from its difficulties by the discovery of a long-lost relative and ending in marriage. In the many fragments of Philemon preserved by Stobseus, Athenaeus, and other writers there is much wit and good sense. The fragments have been collected and edited by Meineke, Menandri et Philcmonis Rcliquise, Berlin, 1823 ; and again in his Fragmenta Comicorum Gr&corum, vol. iv., Berlin, 1841. They are also appended to the Didot edition of Aristophanes (Paris, 1839). PHILEMON, EPISTLE TO. This, which is the shortest of the extant epistles of St Paul, stands to the other books of the New Testament in a relation similar to that of the book of Ruth to the other books of the Old Testament. It is an idyl of domestic life. Onesimus, the slave of one of Paul s converts in Asia Minor, had run away from his master, probably, as was often the case with runaways, after stealing some of his money. He had come to Paul, more probably at Rome than, as some have thought, at Caesarea, and Paul had converted him. Paul sends him back to his master, begging that he may be kindly treated as being now a brother Christian, and formally undertak ing to repay what he owed. The epistle is addressed not only to Philemon but to Apphia, who was probably his wife, to Archippus (possibly the head of the community at Colossse or Laodicea, Col. iv. 17), and to the community which either, like some of the Roman collegia, consisted of Philemon s household or held its meetings in his house. It has sometimes been regarded as an appendix to the epistle to the Colossians on the grounds (1) that Onesimus was sent with both letters (Col. iv. 9 ; Philem. 10-12), (2) that in both letters salutations are sent to Archippus (Col. iv. 17 ; Philem. 2), and (3) that the same persons are men tioned in both letters as being with Paul at the time of writing (Col. i. 1, iv. 7-14; Philem. 1, 23, 24). This ap parent connexion with the epistle to the Colossians is the basis of the chief arguments which have been used against its genuineness. Baur (Paul, E. T., vol. ii. p. 84) thinks that this "attractive, graceful, and friendly letter" is merely a practical commentary, in the form of a fiction, on the general conception of the relations of masters to Christ ian slaves which is set forth in Col. iv. 1. But this view has few supporters. The genuineness of the epistle is almost universally admitted. The best modern works upon it are Bishop Lightfoot s Colossians and Philemon (3d ed., London, 1879) and Holtzmann s essay, "Dei- Brief an Philemon," in the Zeitschr. f. luissensch. Theol., 1873, p. 428.