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rolls, or books, is mentioned in Ezra vi. 1, which some imagine tohave consisted of the historians of that nation, and of memoirs ofthe affairs of state; but it seems rather to have been a depositoryof laws, charters, and ordinances of the kings. In chap. v. 17, itis called the king’s treasure-house. We may, with move certainty,call that a library, mentioned in the second of Esdras to haveteen built by Nehemiah , in which were preserved the books ofthe prophets, and the letters of their kings, '1 he first who erect-ed a library at Athens, was the tyrant Pisistratus; though Strabo •Scribes the honour to Aristotle. That of Pisistratus was transport-ed by Xerxes into Persia, and was afterwards brought back bvSeleucus Nicator to Athens , hong after, it was plundered bySylla, and re-established by Adrian. Plutarch says, that underEumenes there was a library at Pergamus, containing 200,000hooks. T/rannian, a celebrated grammarian, contemporary'withBompey, had a library of 30,000 volumes. That of Ptolemy ^hiladelphus, according to A. (Jellies, contained 700,000, all inrolls, burnt by Caisar’s soldiers. Constantine , and his successors,er ected a magnificent one sit Constantinople ; which, in the eighthCentury, contained 300,000 volumes, all burnt by order of Leo"I; and, among the rest, one wherein the Iliad and Odyssey were’•'ritten in letters of gold, on the guts of a serpent. The most ce-lebrated libraries of ancient Rome , were the Ulpian, and the Pa-fiitine. Those of Paulus JEmilitis, who conquered Perseus ; oftccilius, Lucnllus, of Asinius Pollio , Alliens, Julius Severus,^omitius Serenus, Pamphiliu.-, Marly,-, and the emperor; Gordiana nd Trajan , are also much celebrated. Anciently, every large'hturcb had its library; as appears by the writings of St. Jeiome,Anaslasuis, and others. Pope Nicholas laid the Inundation of that.°f the Vatican , in i450. It was destroyed by the constable Bour-b ° n , in the sacking of Rome ; restored by Pope Sixtus V. andConsiderably enriched with books bom that ol Heidelberg, plun-fc fed by Count ’Lilly in lt>22. One of the most complete libra-, l(? s in £ ur ope, was said to be that erected at Florence by Cosmoe Medi -is, over the gale whereof is written, unoa absque ea-k °RE; though it was ufler.vaids exceeded by that of the French lri g> begun bv Francis I. augmented by Cardinal Richelieu ,°nrplcted bv M. Colbert, and now the national library. Thettiperor’s library at Vienna, according to Lambecius , consists of^ )000 volumes, and 13,940 carious medals. The Bodleian li-J dr y at Oxford , built on the loundatinn of that of Duke llmn-r H exceeds that of anv university in Europe , and evena j Se of all Hie sovereigns of Europe , except the emperor’sQ the French one, which are each of them older by a hundreddrs - It was first opened in 1602, and ha- since found a greatSi'ei °f benefactors; particularly Sir Robert Colton, Sir II.V Archbishop Laud, Sir Kenelm Digby , Mr. Allen, Dr Po-t! V ( e> Air. Bolden, and others. The Vatican , the Medicean,°f Bessarion at Venice, and those just mentioned, exceed theAs i 111 ' n Greek MSS. but in oriental MSS. it excels them all.Ijuttl printed books, the Ambrosian at Milan, and that of Wolft-n-^orll ■ are two of the most famous, and yet both inferior to thetoll e, sn. There are also many public libraries belongi.ng to ther ies^ W ’'*■ Gxford and Cambridge. 'Fhe principal public librn-leg, 111 London , besides that of the Museum, are those of tliecol-h'oii Heralds, of the College'of Physicians, of Doctors Com-6i' e. S ’ t(> "’AiGt every bishop, at the time of bis consecration,of ,j S dt: 'east 20 1. sometimes 50/. for the purchase of books; those'J’ 0 , d ' Gray’s Inn, Lincoln’s Inn, Inner Temple; and MiddleLambeth, founded by Archbishop Bancrolt inCr e;i ’ >°i' *' p, ~ use of succeeding archbishops of Canterbury , ami in-Ty n , -y P'e benefactions ot Archbishops Abbot, Sheldon, and«17 vT”* a ' K ' s '"d to eonsiit of at least 15,000 printed books, and

\V es '' n ’ Beat of Red-cross Street, founded by Dr.

bi'-ln-v . d'iams, a Presbvterian divine, and since enriched byAru,j ( i' 1 p Vate benefactions; that of the lloyal Society, called (liea, ’ r or Norfolk Lbrarv, because the principal part of thegiven t'oii ’’’t'ir.eriy belonged to the family' of Arundel, and wasfolk society by Henry Howard , afterwards Duke of Nor-

^'mion-nR- ^'tinU library has b, vn increased by the valuablefhe * rancis Aston,'Esq. in 1715, and is still increasing by

jttid nther'- Ui | benefa - ct ' ,ons ol ' l 'ie works of its learned members,, fary „ r d\’. , ' S'- Paul’s, of Sion College ; the queen’s li-

brary* l, ' V t- ”y Queen Caroline in 1737 ; and the suraeon’s li-p ' la t!ie!r in the Old Bailey, ixc, In Edinburgh

there is a good library belonging to the university, well furnishedwith books; which are kept in good order. There is also a noblelibrary of books and MSS. belonging to the faculty of advocates.There are likewise several valuable public libraries in the differentcolleges belonging to the universities of Glasgow , Aberdeen, andSt. Andrews, wherein are many curious and beautifully illuminat-ed ancient MSS. The Cottonian library originally consisted of958 volumes of original charters, grants, instruments, letters of so-vereign princes, transactions between this and other kingdoms andstates, genealogies, histories, registers of monasteries, remains ofSaxon laws, the book of Genesis, thought to be the most ancientGreek copy extant, and said to have been written by Origen inthe second century, and the curious Alexandrian MS. copy, inGreek capitals. This library is kept in the British Museum , withthe large and valuable library of Sir Hans Sloane , amounting toupwards of 42,000 volumes, &c.

L1BRATION, [ libratio , Lat.] in astronomy, an apparent ir-regularity' of the moon’s motion, whereby she seems to librateabout her axis, sometimes from the east to the west, and now andthen from the west to the east; so that the parts in the westernlimb or margin of the moon sometimes recede from the centre ofthe disk, and sometimes move towards it, by which means theybecome alternately visible and invisible to the inhabitants of theearth. See Astronomy.

L1BURNA, or LIBURNICA, a kind of light and swift skiff,used by the Libmnians in their piracies, for which thev were rioted.

LIBURN1A, in ancient geography, a district of Iilyricmn, ex-tending towards the Adriatic, between Istria on the W . Dalmatia on the E. and mount Albius on the N.

LIBURNUS, an ancient port of Tuscany, now called Livorno ,or Leghorn .

LI BY A, in a general sense, among the Greeks, denoted Africa ,a name derived from hib, thirst, being a dry and thirsty country.See Africa .

Libya, in a more restrained sense, was the middle part of Afri-ca, extending N. and \V. according to Pliny ; between the Medi-terranean on the N. and Ethiopia on the K. and was divided intothe Hither or Exterior Libya; and the Fartl.er or Interior. Theformer lay between the Mediterranean on the N. and the FartherLibya, and Ethiopia bey aid Egypt on the S. (Ptoiemy). 'TheFarther or Interior Libya, was a v,el country, lyum between theHither Libva on the. N. the Atlantic Ocean on toe YV. tiie Ethio-pic on the S. and Ethiopia beyon.i Egypt outlie E. 1’toi.emy.

Libya , in a still more restrained sense, called, for distinction’*sake, Libya Propria, was a northern distr-ct of Anna, and a partof tiie Hither Libya; situated between Egypt on the E. the Me-diterranean on the N. the S rlis Major and the Regie Tripolitanaon the YV. tiie Garamautes and Ethiopia beyond Egypt on the S.now the kingdom and desart of Barca.

LIBYCLM MARE, ihe Libyan Sea, a part of the Mediter-ranean on the coast of Gyrene.

LiBYSSA, a town and river of Bithynia , where the tomb ofllann bal the Great wa> visible in Piinv’s tune.

LICENCE, [ liccntia , Lai.] in law, an authority given to a per-son to do some lawful aid. A licence is a personal power, andtherefore cannot lie transferred to another. It the person licensed,.bii -e the power given him. in that case lie becomei a trespasser.

LICENTIATE , [ Ucentiiitwt , low Lat.] in England, usuallymeans a physician who has a .licence to practise, granted by theCollege of Physicians.

Licentiate, a degree in Spanish universities. The greatestnumber of tiie officers of justice in Spain are distinguished bv noother title than that of licentiate. To pass licentiate in commonlaw, civil law, and physic, they must have studied seven years,and in divin.t v ti n.

LICHEN^ Liver-wort: in botany, a genus of the cryploga-mia alga- class and order. Male (lowers; vesicles conglomerated,extremely small, crowded or scattered on the disk, margin, orbps of the irends: female ilowers on tha same, or on a distinctplant ; receptacle roundish, tialtisb, convex, concave, sub-revo-lute affixed, to the margin, often differing from the frond in colour,within containing the seeds disposed in rows. This is a very nu-merous genus; many of Hie species are of considerable use, parti-cularly in the art of dyeing.

L. Careratus, or Wrinkled Liverwort, abounds on the

surface