Encyclopaedia Americana: a popular dictionary of arts, sciences, literature, history, politics and biography, brought down to the present time : including a copious collection of original articles in American biography : on the basis of the seventh edition of the German Conversations-Lexicon (Volume 4).
- Date:
- 1830-33
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Encyclopaedia Americana: a popular dictionary of arts, sciences, literature, history, politics and biography, brought down to the present time : including a copious collection of original articles in American biography : on the basis of the seventh edition of the German Conversations-Lexicon (Volume 4). Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)
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![CREDIT—CREED. in exciting the enterprise, and quickening the industry, of a community. The first requisite to industry is a stock of instru- ments, and of materials on which to em- ploy them: a very busy and productive community requires a great stock of both. Now if this stock, being ever so great, were hoarded up; if the possessors would neither use, let, nor sell it, as long as it should be so withdrawal fi-om circu- lation, it would have no effect upon the general activity and productiveness. This is partially the case when a general dis- trust and impression of decay and decline cause the possessoi-s of the stock and ma- terials to be scrupulous about putting them out of their hands, by sale or otherwise, to be used by others; and others, again, having no confidence in the markets, and seeing no prospect of profits, hesitate to purchase materials, or to buy or hire the implements, mills, ships, &c., of others, or to use their own in tlie processes of pro- duction and transportation. This state of surplusage and distrust is sure to be fol- lowed by a reduction of money prices; and every one who has a stock on hand, and whose possessions are estimated in money, is considered to be growing poorer and poorer every day. But when prices have reached their lowest point, €and begin regularly to rise, eveiy body begins to esteem himself and others as being pros- perous, and the opinion contributes pow- erfully to verify itself. Credit begins to expand ; all the stores of the commu- nity are unlocked, and the whole of its resources is thrown open to enterprise. Every one is able readily to command a sufficiency of means for the employment of his industry ; capital is easily procured, and services are readily rendered, each one relying upon the success of the others, and their readiness to meet their engage- ments ; and the acceleration of industiy, and the extension of credit, go on until a snrjjlus and stagnation are again produced. The affairs of eveiy industrious and ac- tive community are always revolving in this circle, in traversing which, general credit passes through its periodical ebbs and flows. This facility and extension of credit constitutes what is commonly called Jiditious capital. The fiction consists in many individuals being supposed to be possessed of a greater amount of clear ca[)ital than tliey are actually worth. The most striking instance of this fictitious- ness of capital, or, in other words, excess of credit, appears in the immense amounts of negotiable paper, that some individuals and companies spread in the community, or of paper currency, where the issuing of notes for supplying cun-ency by com- panies or individuals is permitted. Indi- viduals or companies thus draw into their hands an immense capital, and it is by no means a fictitious capital when it comes into their possession, but actual money, goods, lands, &c.; but, if they are in a bad, losing business, the capital, as soon as they are intrusted with it, becomes fic- titious in respect to those wlio trusted them with it, since they will not again realize it. Extensive credits, both in sales and the issuing of paper, in new and growing communities, which liaAc a small stock and great industiy, giow out of their necessities, and thus become habitual and customary, of which the U. States hith- erto have given a striking example. Creech, Thomas, a scholar of some eminence for his classical translations, was born in 1659. He took the degree of M. A. at Oxford in 1683, having the pre- ceding year established his re])utation as a scholar, by printing his translation of Lu- cretius. He also translated several other of the ancient poets, wholly or in }iart, comprising selections from Homer and Virgil, nearly the whole of Horace, the thiiteenth Satire of Juvenal, the Idyls of Theocritus, and several of Plutarch's Lives, He likewise published an edition of Lucretius in the original, with interpre- tations and annotations. He put an end to his fife at Oxford, in 1700. Various causes are assigned for this rash act, but they are purely conjectural. He owes his fame almost exclusively to his translation of Lucretius, the poetical merit of which is very small, although, in the versification of the argumentative and mechanical parts, some skill is exhibited. As an editor of Lucretius, he is chiefly valuable for his explanation of the Epicurean philosophy, for which, however, he was largely in- debted to Gassendi. Creed; a summaiy of belief; from the Latin credo (I believe), with which the Apostles' Creed begins. In the Eastern church, a summary of this sort was called ixdOrjiJia (the lesson), because it was learn- ed by the catechumens ; ypd^pti (the writ- ing), or k6vu)v (the rule). But the most com- mon name in the Greek church was cvtifioXov (the symbol, q. v.), which has also passed into the Western church. Numer- ous ancient formularies of faith are pre- served in the writings of the early fathers, Irenseus, Origen, TertuUian, &c., which agree in substance, though with some di- vei-sity of expression. The history of creeds would be the history of the church,](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21136737_0013.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
