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LEFT DEMOCRITUS 317 DEMONOLOGY thus increasing the public debt, and the adoption of silver free coinage in the plat- form of 1896 overthrew the party, its presidential candidate, William J. Bryan, being defeated by William McKinley, for whom many Democrats in favor of sound money and the gold standard voted. In 1904 Alton B. Parker, a conserva- tive democrat, was nominated. Theodore Roosevelt was chosen by the Republicans and elected, having obtained 336 elec- toral votes to Judge Parker's 140. In 1908 William J. Bryan and William H. Taft were the contestants. Taft won, re- ceiving 321 Electoral votes to Bryan's 162. Taft was again chosen by the Re- publicans in -1912. The Democratic con- vention held at Baltimore, June 25, after several days' balloting nominated Wood- row Wilson, Governor of New Jersey. The new Progressive party, in conven- tion assembled at Chicago, August 5, nominated Theodore Roosevelt. The re- sult of the election showed, Wilson 435, Roosevelt 88, and Taft 8. At the Demo- cratic convention held at St. Louis, June, 1916, Woodrow Wilson and Thomas Marshall were nominated by acclama- tion. Charles E. Hughes of New York and C. W. Fairbanks of Indiana were nominated by the Republicans. The re- sult of the election was a plurality vote for Woodrow Wilson of 581,941. In 1920 the Democrats nominated J. M. Cox, Gov- ernor of Ohio, T^'ho was defeated by War- ren G. Harding, the Republican nominee, by a vote of 16,132,914 to 9,142,438. DEMOCRITUS (de-mok'ri-tus), a Greek philosopher of the new Eleatic school, a native of Abdera, who was born between 470 and 460 B. c. He traveled to Egypt, where he studied geometry. Among the Greek philosophers he en- joyed the instruction of Leucippus. He afterward returned to his native city, where he was placed at the head of pub- lic affairs. Indignant at the follies of the Abderites, he resigned his office and retired to devote himself exclusively to philosophical studies. He explained the origin of the world by the eternal motion of an infinite num- ber of invisible and indivisible bodies or atoms, which differ from one another in form, position, and aiTangement, and which have a primary motion, which brings them into contact, and forms in- numerable combinations, the result of which is seen in the productions and phenomena of nature. In this way the universe was formed, fortuitously, without the interposition of a First Cause. He applied his atom- ical theory, also, to natural philoso- phy and astronomy. Even the gods he considered to have arisen from atoms. and to be perishable like the rest of things existing. He is said to have written a great deal; but nothing has come to us except a few fragments. He died 370 B. c, at an advanced age. His school was supplanted by that of Epi- curus. DEMODEX, a genus of arachnida, usually placed in the family acarina. D. folliculorum inhabits the sebaceous fol- licles of the face of many persons, es- pecially in the vicinity of the nose. DEMOISELLE, a species of crane (Anthropoides virgo). It is of a slaty- gray color, with the outer portion of the quill-feathers dingy black; a tuft of feathers from the breast blackish. It is found all over Africa, whence it finds its way occasionally to Europe and India. It is called also the Numidian crane. DEMOIVRE, ABRAHAM (de-mwa' vr), a French mathematician; born in Vitry, May 26, 1667. He settled in Lon- don after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. His chief works are: "Mis- cellanea Analjrtica"; "The Doctrine of Chances, or a Method of Calculating the Probabilities of Events at Play"; and a work on "Annuities," besides "Papers" in the "Transactions" of the Royal So- ciety, of which he was a fellow. He died in London, Nov. 27, 1754. DEMON, a name given by the ancient Greeks to beings equivalent to thosf spiritual existences termed angels in tht Bible. The word in Scripture is trans- lated devil, but it meant properly a spirit generally, whether good or evil. DEMONOLOGY, the doctrine that re- lates to demons, a body of spiritual be- ings inferior in rank to deities proper, but yet capable of influencing human affairs. The earlier and more widely spread conception of the demon was merely that of a more or less powerful and intermediate agent between gods and men at one time resolving himself into a kind of special guardian or pa- cron-spirit, at another acting p.s the minister of the divine displeasure. To primitive man the demon was but one of the thousand spiritual beings who controlled every one of the causes of nature, and whose favor must be pi'r- chased by constant tributes of respect and worship. It was perfectly consist- ent with primitive philosophy that the manes or ghosts of the dead should con- tinue after death the influence they on- joyed in life, and thus should pass into the higher class of deities. It is not merely family affection, but actual fear and considerations of prudence, that lead to the worship of ancestors and oi 21— Vol. Ill— Cyc