Where is the great Alcidês of the field,
Valiant lord Talbot, earl of Shrewsbury?
Shakespeare, 1 Henry VI. act. iv. sc. 7 (1589).
Alci'na, Carnal Pleasure personified. In Bojardo's Orlando Innamorato she is a fairy, who carries off Astolfo. In Ariosto's Orlando Furioso she is a kind of Circê, whose garden is a scene of enchantment. Alcina enjoys her lovers for a season, and then converts them into trees, stones, wild beasts, and so on, as her fancy dictates.
Al'ciphron, or The Minute Philosopher, the title of a work by bishop Berkeley, so called from the name of the chief speaker, a freethinker. The object of this work is to expose the weakness of infidelity.
Al'ciphron, "the epicurean," the hero of T. Moore's romance entitled The Epicurean.
Like Aleiphron, we swing in air and darkness,
and know not whither the wind blows us.
—Putnam's Magazine.
Alcme'na (in Molière, Alcmène), the wife of Amphitryon, general of the Theban army. While her husband is absent warring against the Telebo'ans, Jupiter assumes the form of Amphitryon; but Amphitryon himself returns home the next day, and great confusion arises between the false and true Amphitryon, which is augmented by Mercury, who personates Sos'ia, the slave of Amphitryon. By this amour of Jupiter, Alcmena becomes the mother of Her'culês. Plautus, Molière, and Dryden have all taken this plot for a comedy entitled Amphitryon.