Encyclopaedia Britannica, or, a Dictionary of arts, sciences, and miscellaneous literature : enlarged and improved. Illustrated with nearly six hundred engravings > Volume 6, CHI-Crystallization

CON
rfa- In the conduct of it, be not eager to interrupt
• others, or uneafy at being yourfelf interrupted; fince
riC', you fpeak either to amufe or ioftruft the campany, or
to receive thofe benefits from it. Give all, therefore,
leave to fpeak in turn. Hear with patience, and an-
fwer .with precifion. Inattention is ill manners $ it
{hows contempt $ and contempt is never forgiven.
Trouble not the company with your own private
concerns, as you do not love to be troubled with thofe
of others. Yours are as little to them as theirs are to
you. You will need no other rule whereby to judge of
this matter.
Contrive, but with dexterity and propriety, that
each perfon may have an opportunity of difeourfing
on the fubjeft with which he is belt acquainted. He
will be pleafed, and you will be informed. By obfer-
ving this rule, every one has it in his power to aflid
in rendering conyerfation agreeable 3 fince, though he
may not choofe, or be qualified, to fay much himfelf,
he can propofe queftions to thofe wTho are able to an-
fwer them.
Avoid dories, unlefs (hort, pointed, and quite a-pro-
fios. He who deals in them, fays Swift, irmft either
have a very large Itock, or a good memory, or mud
often change his company. Some have a fet of them
ftrung together like onions 3 they take poffefiion of
the converfation by an early introduction of one, and
then you mud have the whole rope ; and there is an
end of every thing elfe, perhaps, for that meet¬
ing, though you may have heard ail twenty times be¬
fore.
I alk often, but not long. The talent of harangue*
ing private company is mfupportable. Senators and
barrifters are apt to be guilty of this fault 3 and mem¬
bers who never harangue in the houfe will often do
it out of the houfe. If the majority of the company
be naturally filent, or cauiious, the converfation will
flag, unlefs it be often renewed by one among them
who can dart new fubjech. Forbear, however, if pof-
fible, to broach a fecond before the fird is out, led
your dock diould not lad, and you ftiould be obliged
to come back to the old barrel. There are thofe who
will repeatedly crofs upon and break into the converfa¬
tion with a fre(h topic, till they have touched upon all
and exhauded none. Economy here is neceffary for
mod people.
Laugh not at your own wit and humour 3 leave that
to the company.
When the converfation is flowing in a ferious and
ufeful channel, never interrupt it by an ill-timed jed.
The dream is fcattered, and cannot be again colleded.
Difcourfe not in a whifper, or half-voice, to your
next neighbour. It is ill-breeding, and, in fome degree,
a fraud 3 converfation-dock being, as one has well ob-
ferved, a joint and common property.
In reflexions on abfent people, go no farther than
you would go if they were prefent. “ I refolve (fays
Bifhop Beveridge) never to fpeak of a man’s virtues to
his fare, nor of his faults behind his back —A golden
rule ! the obfervatlon of which would, at one droke,
hamfh flattery and defamation from the earth.
CONVERSE, in Mathematics. One propofition is
called the canverfe of another, when, after a conclu-
fion is drawn from fomething fuppcfcd in the converfe
G O N
propofition, that conclufion is fuppofed ) and then, that
which in the other was fuppofed, is now drawn as a
conclufion from it: thus when two fides of a triangle
are equal, the angles under thefe fides are equal 3 and,
on the converfe, if thefe angles are equal, the two fides
are equal.
CONVERSION, in a moral fenfe, implies a re¬
pentance for a temper and conduCl unworthy our na¬
ture, and unbecoming our obligations to its Author,
and a refolution to aCl a wifer and a better part for the
future.
Conversion, in War, a military motion, whereby
the front of a battalion is turned where the flank was, in
cafe the battalion is attacked in the flank.
Conversion of Equations, the fame with redudion of
equations by multiplication. See Algebra.
CONVERT, a perfon who has undergone a conver*
fion.
Convert is chiefly ufed in refpeCl of changes from
one religion, or religious fed, to another. Converts
with relation to the religion turned to, are denomi¬
nated apojlates with regard to that they have relin-
quiflied.
The Jews formerly converted to Chriftianity in Eng¬
land, were called converfos. Henry III. built them a
houfe in London, and allowed them a competent fub-
fiftence for their lives ; which houie was called damns
converforum. But the number afterwards increafing,
they grew a burden to the crown j upon which they
were diftributed among the monalteries : and after the
expulfion of the Jews under Edward III. the domus
converforum was given for keeping of the rolls.
Converts, in a monaftic fenfe, are lay-friars, or
brothers, admitted for the fervice of the houfe 3 with¬
out orders, and not allowed to fing in the choir. Till
the eleventh century, the word was ufed for perfons
who embraced the monkifh life at the age of difere-
tion 3 by which they were diftinguifiied from thofe de¬
voted in their childhood by their parents, called ohlatu
But in the eleventh century, when they began to re¬
ceive into, monafteries illiterate perfons, incapable of
being clerks, and only deftined for bodily labour, the
fignification of the word was necefiarily changed.
F. Mabillon obferves, that it was John fnfi; abbot of
Vallombrofa who firfl introduced thefe brother-con¬
verts, difiinguiftied by their ftate from the monks of
the choir, who were then either clerks or capable of
becoming fo.
CONVEX, an appellation given to the exterior fur-
face of gibbous or globular bodies 3 in oppofition to
the hollow inner furface of fuch bodies, which is called
concave; thus we fay, a convex fueze, lens, mirror,
fuperfices, &c.
CONVEXITY, the exterior furface of a convex,
i. e. gibbous and globular thing 3 in oppofidon to con¬
cavity, or the inner furface, which is hollow or de-
prdLd. See Concave.
The word is of particular import in catoptrics and
dioptrics 3 where it is applied to mirrors and lenfes.
A convex mirror reprefents its images fmaller than
the objefls 3 as a concave one reprefents them larger ;
a convex mirror refle&s the rays from it, diverging 3
and therefore difperfes and weakens their ,tSe6l : as
•a concave one refle&s them converging 3 fo as they
4 G 2 conchy
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Converfe
II .