[Lipsius, Justus], an erudite Belgian scholar, with fast and loose religious principles; was the author of numerous learned works (1547-1579).
[Lipsius, Richard Adelbert], distinguished German theologian, born in Gera; professor in succession at Vienna, Kiel, and Jena; wrote on dogmatics, the philosophy of religion, and New Testament criticism (1830-1892).
[Lisbon] (301), the capital of Portugal, a magnificent town, built on the N. bank of the Tagus, 9 m. from its mouth, extends along the banks of the river 9 m. and inland 5 m.; it boasts of an array of fine buildings and squares, a number of literary and scientific institutions, and a spacious harbour; is remarkable for a marble aqueduct which brings water more than 10 m. across the valley of Alcantara; the manufactures include tobacco, soap, wool, and chemicals, and the exports wine, oil, and fruits; it suffered from an earthquake of great violence in 1755, by which the greater part of the city was destroyed, and from 30,000 to 40,000 of the inhabitants were killed.
[Lister, Joseph, Lord], eminent surgeon, born at Upton, Essex; the founder of modern antiseptic surgery, and is as such reckoned among the world's greatest benefactors; was President of the British Association in 1896, and is surgeon-extraordinary to the Queen; b. 1827.
[Liston, John], an English actor of low comedy, and long famous on the London stage, to which he was introduced by Charles Kemble; d. 1846.
[Liston, Robert], a celebrated surgeon, born in Linlithgowshire; studied in Edinburgh and London; was distinguished as an operator; was professor of Clinical Surgery in University College, London, and author of "Elements of Surgery" and "Practical Surgery" (1794-1847).
[Liszt, Abbé Franz], famous pianist, a Hungarian by birth; born with a genius for music, his first efforts at composition were not successful, and it was not till he heard what Paganini made of the violin that he thought what might be made of the piano, and that he devoted himself to the culture of piano music, with the result that he not only became the first pianist himself, but produced a set of compositions that had the effect of raising the art to the highest pitch of perfection; he was a zealous Catholic, and took holy orders, but this did not damp his ardour or weaken his power as a musician; he spent the greater part of his life at Weimar, but he practised his art far and wide, and his last visit to England in 1886, the year on which he died, created quite a flutter in musical circles (1811-1886).
[Litany], a form of supplication in connection with some impending calamity in which the prayer of the priest or officiating clergyman is responded to by the congregation.
[Literature], defined by Carlyle "as an 'apocalypse of nature,' a revealing of the 'open secret,' a 'continuous revelation' of the God-like in the terrestrial and common, which ever endures there, and is brought out now in this dialect, now in that, with various degrees of clearness ... there being touches of it (i. e. the God-like) in the dark stormful indignation of a Byron, nay, in the withered mockery of a French sceptic, his mockery of the false, a love and worship of the true ... how much more in the sphere harmony of a Shakespeare, the cathedral music of a Milton; something of it too in those humble, genuine, lark-notes of a Burns, skylark starting from the humble furrow far overhead into the blue depths, and singing to us so genuinely there."
[Lithuania], formerly a grand-duchy occupying portions of the valleys of the Dwina, Niemen, Dnieper, and Bug; for centuries connected with Poland; passed to Russia in 1814. The Lithuanians are a distinct race of the Indo-European stock, fair and handsome, with a language of their own, and a literature rich in folk-lore and songs. Of a strong religious temperament, they embraced Christianity late (13th century), and still retain many pagan superstitions; formerly serfs, they are now a humble peasantry engaged in agriculture, cattle-breeding, and bee-keeping.