Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/619

Rh A L L A L L 581 very difficult in theory, and still more in practice, to adjust the true character and limits. For a state to decide what persons are bound to it by allegiance may be easy, but for a man to know where his allegiance lies when two or more states claim him and hence for jurists to decide what is the reasonable extent to which any state ought to make such a claim is often involved in difficulty. The English doctrine, which was also adopted in the United States, asserted that allegiance was indelible. Nemo potest exuere patriam (Forsyth s Cases and Opinions in Constitutional Law, pp. 257, sqq., 333, sq.) Accordingly, as the law stood before 1870, every person born within the British dominions, though he should be removed in infancy to another country where his family resides, owes an allegiance to the British crown which he could never resign or lose, except by Act of Parliament or by the recognition of the independence or the cession of the portion of British terri tory in which he resided. By the Naturalisation Act, 1870, 33 & 34 Viet, c. 14 (see ALIEN), it was made possible for British subjects to renounce their nationality and allegiance, and the ways in which that nationality is lost are defined. So British subjects voluntarily naturalised in a foreign state are deemed aliens from the time of such naturalisation, unless, in the case of persons naturalised before the passing of the Act, they have declared their desire to remain British subjects within two years from the passing of the Act. Persons who, from having been born within British territory are British subjects, but who at birth became under the law of any foreign state subjects of such state, and also persons who, though born abroad are British subjects by reason of parentage, may by declarations of alienage get rid of British nationality. ALLEGIANCE, Oath of, an oath of fidelity to the sove reign taken by all persons holding public office. By ancient common law it might be required of all persons above the age of twelve, and it has repeatedly been used as a test for the disaffected. It was first imposed by statute in the reign of Elizabeth (I. c. 1), and its form has more than once been altered since. Up to the time of the Revolution the promise was &quot; to be true and faithful to the king and his heirs, and truth and faith to bear of life and limb and terrene honour, and not to know or hear of any ill or damage intended him without defending him therefrom.&quot; This was thought to favour the doctrine of absolute non-resistance, and accordingly the Convention Parliament enacted the form that has been in use since that time &quot; I do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Victoria.&quot; These words are included in the form pre scribed by 21 & 22 Viet. c. 48, which substitutes one oath for the oaths of allegiance, supremacy, and abjuration. ALLEGORY (dXXo?, other, and dyopcvw, to speak), a figurative representation conveying a meaning other than and in addition to the literal. It is generally treated as a figure of rhetoric, but the medium of representation is not necessarily language. An allegory may be addressed to the eye, and is often embodied in painting, sculpture, or some form of mimetic art. The etymological meaning of the word is wider than that which it bears in actual use. An allegory is distinguished from a metaphor by being longer sustained and more fully carried out in its details, and from an analogy by the fact that the one appeals to the imagination and the other to the reason. The fable or parable is a fhort allegory with one definite moral. The allegory has been a favourite form in the literature of nearly every nation. The Hebrew scrip tures present frequent instances of it, one of the most beautiful being the comparison of the history of Israel to the growth of a vine, in the 80th psalm. In classical literature one of the best known allegories is the story of the stomach and its members in the speech of Menenius Agrippa (Livy, ii. 32); and several occur in Ovid s Metamorphoses. Perhaps the most elaborate and the most successful specimens of allegory are to be found in the works of English authors. Spencer s Faerie Queene, Swift s Tale of a Tub, Addison s Vision of Mirza, and, above all, Bunyan s Pilgrim s Progress, are examples that it would be impossible to match in elaboration, beauty, and fitness, from the literature of any other nation. ALLEGRI, ANTONIO. See CORREGGIO. ALLEGRI, GREGORIO, musical composer, probably of the Correggio family, was born at Rome about 1580. He studied music under Nanini, the intimate friend of Pales- trina. Being intended for the church, he obtained a benefice in the cathedral of Fermo. Here he composed a large number of motetts and sacred pieces, which, being brought under the notice of Pope Urban VIII., obtained for him an appointment in the choir of the Sistine chapel at Rome. He held this from Dec. 1629 till his death on the 18th Feb. 1652. His character seems to have been singularly pure and benevolent. Among the musical compositions of Allegri were two volumes of Concerti, published in 1618 and 1619; two volumes of Motetts, published in 1620 and 1621 ; besides a number of works still in manuscript. He was one of the earliest composers for stringed instruments, and Kircher has given one speci men of this class of his works in the Musurgia. But the most celebrated composition of Allegri is the Miserere, still annually performed in the Sistine chapel at Rome. It is written for two choirs, the one of five and the other of four voices, and has obtained a celebrity which, if not entirely factitious, is certainly not due to its intrinsic merits alone. The mystery in which the composition was long enshrouded, no single copy being allowed to reach the public, the place and circumstances of the performance, and the added embellishments of the singers, account to a great degree for much of the impressive effect of which all who have heard the music speak. This view is confirmed by the fact, that when the music was performed at Venice by permission of the pope, it produced so little effect that the Emperor Leopold I., at whose request the manuscript had been sent, thought that something else had been sub stituted. In spite of the precautions of the popes, the Miserere has long been public property. In 1769 Mozart was able to write it down after hearing it twice ; and in 1771 a copy was procured and published in England by Dr Burney. The entire music performed at Rome in Holy Week, Allegri s Miserere included, has been issued at Leipsic by Breitkopf and Hartel. Interesting accounts of the impression produced by the performance at Rome may be found in the first volume of Mendelssohn s letters, and in Miss Taylor s Letters from Italy. ALLEINE, JOSEPH, Nonconformist divine, the author of An Alarm to the Unconverted a book which remains as potential as when first modestly sent forth, scarcely second to Richard Baxter s Call to the Unconverted was otherwise noticeable. Baxter himself wrote a characteristic introduction to his Life fully two centuries ago (1672); while recently (1861) the Rev. Charles Stanford has retold his story and the story of his age with great fulness of knowledge and historical fidelity. The Alleines came out of Suffolk, and as early as 1430 some of them sprung of Alan, lord of Buckenhall settled in the neighbourhood of Calne and Devizes, whence descended the immediate ances tors of &quot; worthy Mr Tobie Alleine of Devizes,&quot; father of our worthy. Joseph Alleine, fourth of a large family, was born at Devizes early in 1634. 1645 is marked in the title-page of a quaint old tractate, by an eye-witness, as his &quot; setting forth in the Christian race.&quot; His eldest brother Edward had been a clergyman, but in this year died, in his twenty-