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302 VENTURA ventriloquist stands so as to give only a profile view of his face, unless at a distance from his audience, and thus has greater opportunity of concealing any slight motions of the facial mus- cles. In most cases, too, the apparently re- mote voice is a falsetto, this being more within the command of the performer, without per- ceptible facial movement, than the natural tones. (See VOICE.) VENTURA, a 8. W. county of California, bordering on the Pacific ocean, and drained by Buenaventura and Santa Clara rivers; area, about 2,000 sq. m. It has been formed since the census of 1870. The surface is generally mountainous. The valleys are very fertile. Cattle and sheep are largely raised, and Indian corn, barley, grapes, oranges, and other semi- tropical fruits are grown. Various minerals are found. Capital, San Buenaventura. VENTURA DE RAULICA, Gloaeehlno, an Italian pulpit orator, born in Palermo, Dec. 8, 1792, died in Versailles, Aug. 3, 1861. He was edu- cated in the Jesuit college of Palermo, and en- tered the society of Jesus, but left it to be- come a Theatine. His first pulpit discourses marked him as one of the greatest orators in Italy. He became general secretary of his order, contributed largely to its restoration, and published La causa del regolari al tribu- nale del ftuon senso. Subsequently ho was named censor of the press and member of the royal council of public instruction for the kingdom of Naples, and used his influence to introduce into Italy the new traditionalist phi- losophy of France. He became especially dis- tinguished for his funeral orations. In 1824 he was appointed general of the order of the Theatines, and fixed his residence at Rome, where he was made a member of a commis- sion of censorship ; at the same time he was presented to the chair of ecclesiastical law in the university of Rome, and soon after made almoner of the same institution. Ho was prominently employed in diplomatic affairs. In 1828 he published De Methodo Philoso- phandi, in defence of the scholastic philoso- phy. This was bitterly attacked by the abbd Laraennais ; and, wearied of the controversies which ensued, Ventura quitted the pontifical court, and spent ten years in retirement. In 1839 appeared his work Delle bellezze della fede (3 vols. 8vo). During this period also he preached his finest sermons in the church of 8. Andrea della Valle and at St. Peter's, and his published homilies fill 5 vols. 8vo. After the death of Gregory XVI. he exerted himself to secure the election of Cardinal Mastai-Fer- retti, and became one of the private coun- sellors of the new pope. In 1847 he preached the funeral sermon of O'Connell, the liberal opinions advanced in which gave him great influence with the people. At the beginning of 1848 the popular government of Sicily made him minister plenipotentiary and com- missioner extraordinary to the court of Rome. He published a treatise "On the Indepen- VENUS dence of Sicily," another "On the Legitimacy of the Acts of the Sicilian Parliament," and subsequently an octavo volume entitled- Men- songes diplomatique*. He also labored with Gioberti and Rosmini to effect a commercial union of the Italian states as a first step to- ward a political confederacy. On May 4, 1849, he retired under the protection of the French to Civita Vecchia, and afterward to Mont- pellier in France. There he wrote "Letters to a Protestant Minister" (12mo, 1849), in answer to a clergyman of Geneva, who main- tained that St. Peter had never been in Rome. After remaining two years at Montpellier he went to Paris, where he drew crowds to the churches of the Madeleine and St. Louis d'Antin. He published there Histoire de Vir- ginie Bruni (12mo, 1850) ; Let femmes de Vfitangile (12mo, 1852) ; La raison philoso- phique et la raison ccftholique (8vo, 1852); Es- sai sur F origins de ideei (8vo, 1853); La femme catholique (8 vols. 8vo, 1854) ; Uecole Jes miracles, ou les auvres de la puissance et de la grandeur de Jesus-Christ (2 vols. 18mo, 1854-'5); and Le pouvoir chretien (8vo, 1857). VENTS, in Roman mythology, tho goddess of love, especially of sensual love. She was originally considered a divinity of very little importance, and no mention was made of her in the documents relating to the early history of Rome. In later times the Romans identi- fied her with tho Greek Aphrodite, and adopted all tho myths relating to that goddess. Aphro- dite was among the Greeks one of the great Olympian divinities and the goddess of love and beauty. The Iliad makes her the daugh- ter of Jupiter and Dione ; later traditions as- sign to her a different parentage. The one most generally adopted, because best suited to tho poetical imagination of the Greeks, repre- sented her as having sprung from the foam of tho sea, whence her name, from the Greek aftwSf, foam. She first landed at Cythera, and thenco went to Cyprus. Wherever she trod, flowers sprang up. These two islands were the principal seats of her worship, and from them she was called tho Cytherean, Paphian, and Cyprian Aphrodite. She was married to tho deformed god Ilephnestus (Vulcan), but had many amours both with other gods, especially Mars, and with mortals. Of the latter, Adonis inspired her with the fondest passion. To the Trojan Anchises she bore ^Eneas, from whom the Roman poets and historians traced the de- scent of Romulus. Paris awarded her the gold- en apple, the prize of beauty, in preference to Juno and Minerva ; and she consequently sided with the Trojans in the war against their city. She had a cestus or girdle which inspired the beholder with a passionate love for the one who wore it. Among plants and birds, the poppy, apple, myrtle, and rose, and the spar- row, swallow, swan, dove, and lynx or wry- neck, were her favorites. The planet Venus and the month of April were sacred to her. Young animals were sometimes sacrificed to