Thallus

“ Fifteen free men form a borough, fifteen slaves a household, fifteen fettered serfs a chain-gang. Did I need such a crowd to help me by holding the lustral victims during the lengthy rite? No! the only victims you mentioned were hens! Were they to count the grains of incense? or to knock Thallus down?
48. You assert also that by promising to heal her I inveigled to my house a free woman who suffered from the same disease as Thallus; that she, too, fell senseless as a result of my incantations. ”

“ For, as Pythagoras said, not every kind of wood is fit to be carved into the likeness of Mercury. If that be so, tell me who was that healthy, unblemished, intelligent, handsome boy whom I deemed worthy of initiation into such mysteries by the power of my spells. As a matter of fact, Thallus, whom you mentioned, needs a doctor rather than a magician. For the poor wretch is such a victim to epilepsy that he frequently has fits twice or thrice in one day without the need for any incantations, and exhausts all his limbs with his convulsions. ”

“ The whole of this accusation has been reckless and sudden, and it was only the day before yesterday that Aemilianus demanded that we should produce fifteen slaves before you. The fourteen living in the town are present to-day. Thallus only is absent owing to the fact that he has been banished to a place some hundred miles distant. However, we have sent a man to bring him here in a carriage. I ask you, Maximus, to question these fourteen slaves whom we81 have produced as to where the boy Thallus is and what is the state of his health ”

“ Within the Lecideaceae, the line of evolution seems to have been in the direction of a well-developed exciple and from simpler to more complex spores. With the advance in these two directions has gone a slightly increased development of the thallus.
In structure, the thallus is crustose, and the thalli vary from inconspicuous, evanescent conditions to those which are conspicuous and sometimes even subsquamulous. Rarely the thallus extends upward as a veil which surrounds the apothecia laterally and suggests how the thalloid exciple of higher families probably arose. ”

“ Thallus foliose, but smaller and thinner than that of Peltigera, and devoid of trichomatic hyphae, more or less closely attached to the substratum by rhizoids; cortex well developed on both upper and lower sides; medulla well developed (Fig. 2) ; apothecia confined to the lower side of the thallus, marginal on narrow, slightly elongated lobes, thalloid margin persistent and crenate; hypothecium usually some shade of brown; hymenium [Pg 359] usually pale below and brown above; paraphyses simple or branched; spores brown, 4-celled, 8 in each ascus. ”

“ The thallus is usually encrusted with carbonate of lime; it is of a branched cylindrical form in the well-known Corallina officinalis, Linn. of the British coasts, of an encrusting and foliaceous type, in the genus Lithophyllum, and of a more coral-like form in the genus Lithothamnion. The reproductive organs occur in conceptacles, having the form of small depressed 184cavities in the thallus, or projecting as warty swellings above the surface of the plant. Asexual reproduction is by means of tetraspores formed in conceptacles resembling those containing the sexual cells. ”

“ Thallus, thal′us, n. a vegetative body showing little or no differentiation into leaf, stem, and root, and characteristic of the Thall′ophytes or lower Cryptogamia, including algæ, fungi, and lichens.—adjs. Thall′iform, of the form of a thallus; Thall′ine, Thallod′ic, pertaining to a thallus.—n. Thall′ogen, a thallophyte.—adjs. Thallog′enous, belonging to the thallogens; Thall′oid, Thall′ose, resembling a thallus.—ns. Thall′ōme, a thallus; Tham′nium, the branched shrub-like thallus of fruticulose lichens. [Gr. thallos, a young shoot.] ”

“ The “thallus” characteristic of the Scotch Boghead has been named Pila scotica, and that of the Autun Boghead, Pila bibractensis.
In the latter form, which has been studied in more detail by MM. Renault and Bertrand, the thallus consists of about 6–700 cells, and is irregularly ellipsoidal in form, from ·189–·225mm. in length, and ·136–·160mm. broad. The surface-cells are radially disposed and pyramidal in shape, the internal cells are polygonal in outline and less regularly arranged (fig. 36, 2) . The Pila thalli make up 3⁄4ths of the mass in an average sample of the Autun Boghead. ”

“ Thus he spread the worship of himself through all lands. But at what time they lived can easily be inferred. For Thallus writes in his history, that Belus, the king of the Assyrians, whom the Babylonians worship, and who was the contemporary and friend of Saturnus, was three hundred and twenty-two years before the Trojan war, and it is fourteen hundred and seventy years since the taking of Troy. From which it is evident, that it is not more than eighteen hundred years from the time when mankind fell into error by the institution of new forms of divine worship. ”

“ A vertical section through an apothecium of Buellia parasema, the thallus below, and a portion of the woody substratum: a, the hymenium, composed of asci and paraphyses; b, the strongly developed, dark colored exciple; c, the dark colored hypothecium; d, the thallus, composed of interwoven hyphae, and enclosing cells of the algal host, a portion of the woody substratum. ”

“ Thallus a thin, smooth or roughened, ash-gray and darkening crust, forming a continuous layer, becoming inconspicuous and rarely disappearing; apothecia minute to small, 0.3 to 0.5 mm. in diameter, adnate to sessile, concave to slightly convex, black, the exciple concolorous, prominent, and rarely becoming covered; hypothecium dark brown; hymenium pale below and pale brown above; paraphyses wide and strong, distinct to coherent-indistinct; asci clavate; spores oblong-ellipsoid, 8 to 12 mic. long and 3.5 to 4.75 mic. ”

“ Thaler, tä′lėr, n. a dollar, in Germany a silver coin worth about 3s. [Ger. Cf. Dollar.]
Thalia, thā-lī′a, n. one of the nine muses, who presided over pastoral and comic poetry.—adj. Thālī′an. [Gr. Thaleia, Thalia—thallein, to bloom.]
Thalictrum, thā-lik′trum, n. a genus of perennial herbs of the Crowfoot family, the meadow-rues: a plant of this genus. [Gr. thaliktron—thallein, to bloom.] ”

“ There is very likely a substratum of truth in the stories which make the birth, or rather the revival, of learning in Greece come from Egypt and Crete. Thales knew that the light of the moon came from the sun. He was the first of those natural philosophers of Greece whose main object was to find the “principle” of the universe. Thales held that all things originated from water. Another of the Seven was Bias of Priene, whose activities were mainly political, and who invented maxims like “He is unfortunate who cannot bear misfortune,” and “If thou hast done a good deed, ascribe it to the gods.” ”

“ Then he said to the bystanders, "How blind is man to the future. The Athenians would eat this place up with their teeth if they knew what misfortunes it will bring upon them?" A prophetic saying of the same kind is attributed to Thales. He bade his friends bury him in a low and neglected quarter of Miletus, telling them that one day it would be the market-place of the city. ”

“ Thales.
It is said that Thales the Milesian, one of the seven sages, was the first to take in hand natural philosophy. [23] He said that the beginning and end of the universe was water; [24] for that from its solidification and redissolution all things have been constructed and that all are borne about by it. And that from it also come earthquakes and the turnings about [36] of the stars and the motions of the winds. [25] And that all things are formed and flow in accordance with the nature of the first cause of generation; but that the Divinity is that which has neither beginning nor end. ”

“ And if we look to Anaximander, the person next in order of time to Thalês, as well as to Herakleitus, we find them departing, in a great degree, even from that character which all the rest have in common, though both the one and the other are usually enrolled in the list of Ionic philosophers.
Of the old legendary and polytheistic conception of nature, which Thalês partially discarded, we may remark that it is a state of the human mind in which the problems suggesting themselves to be solved, and the machinery for solving them, bear a fair proportion one to the other. ”

“ Thales, who was born in 640 B.C., was a man of exceptional wisdom and one of the Seven Sages of Ancient Greece. He was the father of Greek, and consequently of European philosophy and science. His speculations embraced a wide range of subjects relating to political as well as to celestial matters. One must remember that even up to the 18th century there was no clear distinction between philosophy and science, both being products of the human mind in its attempts to explain reality. ”

“ But even for that point of estate and means, I partly lean to Thales' opinion, That a philosopher may be rich if he will. Thus your Lordship seeth how I comfort myself; to the increase whereof I would fain please myself to believe that to be true which my Lord Treasurer writeth; which is, that it is more than a philosopher morally can disgest. But without any such high conceit, I esteem it like the pulling out of an aching tooth, which, I remember, when I was a child, and had little philosophy, I was glad of when it was done. ”

“ It is necessary for me, however, in attempting to show who they are that produce the effects ascribed to the idols, and that they are not gods, to have recourse to some witnesses from among the philosophers. First Thales, as those who have accurately examined his opinions report, divides [superior beings] into God, demons, and heroes. God he recognises as the Intelligence (νοῦς) of the world; by demons he understands beings possessed of soul (ψυχικαί) ; and by heroes the separated souls of men, the good being the good souls, and the bad the worthless. ”

“ So, with his own hands he carried the golden tripod to the little house where Thales lived. He knocked at the door and the wise man himself opened it.
Then the governor told him how the tripod had been found, and how the oracle had said that it must be given to the wisest of the wise.
"And so I have brought the prize to you, friend Thales."
"To me!" said the astonished Thales. "Why, there are many men who are wiser than I. There is my friend Bias [Footnote: Bi'as] of Priene. [Footnote: Prie'ne] He excels all other men. Send the beautiful gift to him." ”

“ A crowd of idle philosophers, discussing all things in Heaven and Earth through the long summer days and balmy nights of Attica, must sometimes have hit on a true opinion, if only by accident; but Thales, or whoever broached the heliocentric dogma, had no reason for his belief, and showed himself not more, but less reasonable than his companions. ”

“ Solon, Pittakus, Bias, and Thalês, were all men of influence—the first two even men of ascendency, [188] —in their respective cities. Kleobulus was despot of Lindus, and Periander (by some numbered among the seven) of Corinth. Thalês stands distinguished as the earliest name in physical philosophy, with which the other contemporary wise men are not said to have meddled; their celebrity rests upon moral, social, and political wisdom exclusively, which came into greater honor as the ethical feeling of the Greeks improved and as their experience became enlarged. ”

“ Thales, too, as Leander and Herodotus relate, was a Phœnician; as some suppose, a Milesian. He alone seems to have met the prophets of the Egyptians. But no one is described as his teacher, nor is any one mentioned as the teacher of Pherecydes of Syros, who had Pythagoras as his pupil. But the Italic philosophy, that of Pythagoras, grew old in Metapontum in Italy. Anaximander of Miletus, the son of Praxiades, succeeded Thales; and was himself succeeded by Anaximenes of Miletus, the son of Eurustratus; after whom came Anaxagoras of Clazomenæ, the son of Hegesibulus. ”

“ It is said that once, when he was taken out of doors by an old woman in order that he might observe the stars, he fell into a ditch, and his cry for help drew from the old woman the retort, "How can you expect to know all about the heavens, Thales, when you cannot even see what is just before your feet?" ”

“ The Ionian Philosophy Turned the Mind Toward Nature.—Greek philosophy began in the seventh century before Christ. The first philosopher of note was Thales, born at Miletus, in Asia Minor, about 640 B.C. Thales sought to establish the idea that water is the first principle and cause of the universe. He held that water is filled with life and soul, the essential element in the foundation of all nature. Thales had great learning for his time, being well versed in geometry, arithmetic, and astronomy. He travelled in Egypt and the Orient, and became acquainted with ancient lore. ”

“ And Thalis, I'd take it kindly if you'd furnish us with a bit of food and drink."
For answer Thalis leaned herself against him, slipping one white arm about his bronzed shoulders. Her sleek naked flank pressed against his thigh and the perfume of her foamy hair was in his nostrils.
"Why dare the desert?" she whispered urgently. "Stay here! I will teach you the ways of Xuthal. I will protect you. I will love you! You are a real man: I am sick of these moon-calves who sigh and dream and wake, and dream again. I am hungry for the hard, clean passion of a man from the earth. ”