Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 09.djvu/525

LEFT TBANSIT INSTRUMENT 463 TRANSMISSION order to relieve the pivots from friction and facilitate the turning of the tele- scope, counterpoises are provided oper- ated through levers, carrying friction rollers, on which the axis turns. When the instrument is in proper adjustment, the telescope should continue in the plane of the meridian when revolved entirely round on its axis, and for this purpose the axis must lie in a line directly E. and W. To effect this adjustment its ends are provided with screws by which a motion, both in azimuth and altitude, may be imparted. The telescope has a series of parallel wires crossing its ob- ject glass in a vertical direction. When a star, designed to be the subject of ob- servation, is seen approaching the me- ridian, the observer looks at the hour and minutes on a clock placed at hand for tha purpose. He then notes the passage of the star across such wire, listening at the same time to the clock beating seconds. The exact time at which the star passes each wire is then noted and the mean between the time of passing each two wires equidistant from the cen- ter being taken gives a very close ap- TRANSIT INSTRUMENT proximation to the truth. The transit instrument is the most important of what may be called the technical astronomical instruments. The smaller and portable kinds are used to ascertain the local time by the passage of the sun or other object over the meridian, while the larger and more perfect kinds, in first-class observa- tories, are used for measuring the posi- tions of stars, for forming catalogues, its special duty being to determine with the greatest accuracy the right ascension of heavenly bodies. TRANSMIGRATION, in comparative religions, metempsychosis; the doctrine of the passage of the soul from one body into another. It appears among many savage races in the form of the belief that ancestral souls return, imparting their own likeness to their descendants and kindred, and Tylor thinks that this notion may have been extended so as to take in the idea of rebirth in bodies of animals. In this form the belief has no ethical value. Transmigration first ap- pears as a factor in the gradual purifica- tion of the spiritual part of man, and its return to God, the source and origin of all things, in the religion of the ancient people of India, whence it passed to the Egyptians, and, according to Herodotus, from them to the Greeks. It was one of the characteristic doctrines of Pythag- oras, and Pindar the Pythagorean lets the soul return to bliss after passing three unblemished lives on earth. Plato in the dream of Er deals with the condi- tion and treatment of departed souls; and extends the period of the return of souls to God to 10,000 years, during which time they inhabit the bodies of men and animals. Vergil, Persius and Horace allude to it, and Ovid sets forth the philosophy and pre-existences of Pythagoras. Traces of it appear in the "Apocrypha,"^ and that at least some Jews held it in the time of Jesus seems indicated in the disciples' question (John ix: 2). St. Jerome alludes to the exist- ence of a belief in transmigration among the Gnostics, and Origen adopted this belief as the only means of explaining some Scriptural difficulties, such as the struggle of Jacob and Esau before birth (Gen. XXV : 22), and the selection of Jere- miah (Jer. i: 5). In modern times Les- sing held it and taught it, and it formed part of the system of Swedenborg. TRANSMISSION OF ELECTRIC POWER. Under this heading are con- sidered methods of conveying electrical energy from one locality to another. The need for such transmission arises chiefly from economic causes. In the center of a city, electricity can seldom be gener- ated except at high cost. It is a common practice to produce the electricity at some point where there is a cheap source of power (such, for instance, as water power, or a readily available and abun*