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 386 ECCLESIASTES ECHINODERMS upon by the senate, but the decrees of the senate might here be approved, altered, or re- jected ; and a new proposition might be intro- duced on any subject which had already been discussed in the senate. According to the older regulations, persons above 50 years of age had the privilege of speaking first ; but this distinc- tion was obsolete in the days of Aristophanes. No new decree could be publicly proposed till it had been shown to the proedri, that they might see whether it contained anything in- jurious to the state or contrary to existing laws. The people voted either by show of hands or occasionally by ballot. The assem- bly could make inquisition into the conduct of magistrates, and in turbulent times exercised a power resembling that of impeachment, as in the cases of Demosthenes and Phocion. It was sometimes suddenly broken up at the oc- currence of an unfavorable omen, as thunder and lightning, sudden rain, or any unusual natural phenomenon. In later Greek and Latin the name signified the church. ECCLESIASTES, or The Preacher (Heb. KoJie- leth, assembler), one of the didactic books of the Old Testament canon, professing to be the words of the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. It contains allusions to the wri- ter's riches, palaces, and parables, and its sen- tentious style reminds one of the author of the Proverbs. Yet its diction is marked by Chal- daisms and linguistic usages which are thought not to have been introduced into the Hebrew language till about the period of the Baby- lonish captivity. The authorship of Eccle- siastes was attributed to Solomon by nearly all the rabbinic commentators and patristic writers; but in modern times this view has been relinquished by all the writers of the various liberal schools without exception, and even by theologians like Hengstenberg, Stuart, and Keil; in fact, no prominent theologian of the 19th century has defended it. Ac- cording to Hengstenberg and Keil, the book was compiled in the time of Nehemiah ; ac- cording to Hitzig, about 200 B. C. ; and ac- cording to Gratz, not until the Herodian time. Some entertain the opinion that its original form must have been a dialogue in which the sage carries on a discussion with a skeptic and a libertine. Yet it is more commonly re- garded as the monologue of a Hebrew moral- izing on life and searching for the highest good, scanning the perversities and follies of man, and at length, after a review of the evi- dence, declaring the verdict that obedience to God is the only real and substantial good. Among the best commentaries on this book are those of Knobel (1836), Hitzig (1847), Stuart (New York, 1851), Elster (1855), Vai- hinger (1858), Hengstenberg (1859 ; English translation, 1860), Ginsburg (London, 1861), Ewald (2d ed., 1867), and Gratz (1871). ECCLESIASTICUS, one of the apocryphal books of the Old Testament, called also " The Wis- dom of Jesus, the Son of Sirach." The author appears to have lived in the 3d and 2d centu- ries B. C., and wrote in Hebrew, though no copy of the Hebrew original has been pre- served ; and his work was subsequently (prob- ably about 130 B. C.) translated into Greek by his grandson. The book contains 1, an an- thology of moral and prudential precepts for the various circumstances of life ; 2, a discourse which the author puts into the mouth of wis- dom herself, inviting men to virtue ; and 3, a panegyric in which the author celebrates the praises of God and eulogizes the great men of his nation. In the Roman Catholic church it has been held as canonical since the council of Carthage, whose decision was confirmed by the council of Trent. The best commentary on the book is by Fritzsche (1859). ECHENE1S. See STICKING FISH. ECHEVERRIA, Esteban, a South American poet, born in Buenos Ayres in 1809, died in Monte- video in 1851. He published his first poems in 1829, subsequently went to France, and on his return prepared several other volumes, after the style of Byron and Lamartine. La cautiva (1837), his best poem, contains exquisite de- scriptions of the pampas and the Argentine peo- ple. Rosas expelled him from Buenos Ayres, and he spent the latter part of his life in Montevideo, where in 1849 he published La insurrection del Sud. ECHIDNA. See POEOUPINE ANT-EATEK, ECHINADES, in ancient geography, a group of islands in the Ionian sea, oif the coast of Acar- nania, near the entrance of the gulf of Corinth. They were said to have been formed by the alluvial deposits of the river Achelous; and Herodotus says that many of them in his time had become reunited to the mainland. They took their name from the echinus, or sea ur- chin, in consequence of their sharp and prickly outlines. The largest of them was Dulichium, now a part of the mainland. Homer de- scribes them as inhabited, but later writers speak of them as barren and deserted. They are now called the Curzolari islands, and have five small villages, but their size is so small, and their productions so few, that they are of little importance. Lord Byron during his voyage from Cephalonia to Missolonghi, in January, 1824, took refuge among them, twice from storms and once from a Turkish cruiser. The great battle of Oct. 7, 1571, commonly called the battle of Lepanto, was fought off these islands instead of off the city of Naupac- tus, or Lepanto, and within the gulf, as the name implies. ECHINODERMS, or Echinodermata (Gr. i x tvoe, a hedgehog, and dippa, skin), the highest class of radiated animals, so named from the spines with which many of the genera are covered. They all have a tough envelope, containing calcareous particles, or a kind of shell of mova- ble pieces, provided with tubercles or spines ; the oral or actinal region is beneath, the aboral or abactinal above, the parts radiating from the former and meeting above ; along