The Nuttall Encyclopædia / Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge

by P. Austin Nuttall

[Understanding, The]. See [Reason].

[Undine], a female spirit of the watery element, naturally without, but capable of receiving, a human soul, particularly after being wedded to a man and after giving birth to a child.

[Undulatory Theory], the theory that light is due to vibrations or undulations in the ether as the medium through which it is transmitted from its source in a luminous body.

[Unearned Increment], increase in the value of land or any property without expenditure of any kind on the part of the proprietor.

[Unicorn], a fabulous animal like a horse, with a cubit and a half long horn on the forehead; was adopted by James I. as the symbol of Scotland on the royal arms; is in Christian art a symbol of the incarnation, and an emblem of female chastity.

[Uniformity, Act Of], an Act passed in England in 1662 regulating the form of public prayers and rites to be observed in all churches, and which had the effect of driving hundreds of clergymen from the Established Church.

[Unigenitus, The Bull], a bull beginning with this word, issued by Pope Clement XI. in 1713 against [Jansenism] (q. v.) in France, and which was in 1730 condemned by the civil authorities in Paris.

[Union, Federal], name given to a union of several States in defence or promotion of the common good, while each State is independent of the rest in local matters.

[Union, The], a name applied in the English history to (1) the Union of England and Scotland in 1603 under one crown, by the accession of James VI. of Scotland to the throne of England on the death of Elizabeth; (2) the Union of England and Scotland in 1707, under one Parliament seated at Westminster, into the United Kingdom of Great Britain; and (3) to the Union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain to Ireland in 1801, when the Irish Parliament was abolished, and was represented, as it still is, in the Imperial.

[Union Jack], originally the flag of Great Britain, on which the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew are blended, with which certain white streaks were blended or fimbriated after the Union with Ireland.