ENTADA, in botany, a woody climber belonging to the family Leguminosae and common throughout the tropics. The best-known species is Entada scandens, the sword-bean, so called from its large woody pod, 2 to 4 ft. in length and 3 to 4 in. broad, which contains large flat hard polished chestnut-coloured seeds or “beans.” The seeds are often made into snuff-boxes or match-boxes, and a preparation from the kernel is used as a drug by the natives in India. The seeds will float for a long time in water, and are often thrown up on the north-western coasts of Europe, having been carried by the Gulf-stream from the West Indies; they retain their vitality, and under favourable conditions will germinate. Linnaeus records the germination of a seed on the coast of Norway.
ENTAIL (from Fr. tailler, to cut; the old derivation from tales haeredes is now abandoned), in law, a limited form of succession (q.v.). In architecture, the term “entail” denotes an ornamental device sunk in the ground of stone or brass, and subsequently filled in with marble, mosaic or enamel.
ENTASIS (from Gr. ἐντείνειν, to stretch a line or bend a bow), in architecture, the increment given to the column (q.v.), to correct the optical illusion which produces an apparent hollowness in an extended straight line. It was referred to by Vitruvius (iii. 3), and was first noticed in the columns of the Doric orders in Greek temples by Allason in 1814, and afterwards measured and verified by Penrose. It varies in different temples, and is not found in some: it is most pronounced in the temple of Jupiter Olympius, most delicate in the Erechtheum. The entasis is almost invariably introduced in the spires of English churches.
ENTERITIS (Gr. ἔντερον, intestine), a general medical term for inflammation of the bowels. According to the anatomical part specially attacked, it is subdivided into duodenitis, jejunitis, ileitis, typhlitis, appendicitis, colitis, proctitis. The chief symptom is diarrhoea. The term “enteric fever” has recently come into use instead of “typhoid” for the latter disease; but see [Typhoid Fever].
ENTHUSIASM, a word originally meaning inspiration by a divine afflatus or by the presence of a god. The Gr. ἐνθουσιασμός, from which the word is adapted, is formed from the verb ἐνθουσιάζειν, to be ἔνθεος, possessed by a god θέος. Applied by the Greeks to manifestations of divine “possession,” by Apollo, as in the case of the Pythia, or by Dionysus, as in the case of the Bacchantes and Maenads, it was also used in a transferred or figurative sense; thus Socrates speaks of the inspiration of poets as a form of enthusiasm (Plato, Apol. Soc. 22 C). Its uses, in a religious sense, are confined to an exaggerated or wrongful belief in religious inspiration, or to intense religious fervour or emotion. Thus a Syrian sect of the 4th century was known as “the Enthusiasts”; they believed that by perpetual prayer, ascetic practices and contemplation, man could become inspired by the Holy Spirit, in spite of the ruling evil spirit, which the fall had given to him. From their belief in the efficacy of prayer εὐχή, they were also known as Euchites. In ordinary usage, “enthusiasm” has lost its peculiar religious significance, and means a whole-hearted devotion to an ideal, cause, study or pursuit; sometimes, in a depreciatory sense, it implies a devotion which is partisan and is blind to difficulties and objections. (See further [Inspiration], for a comparison of the religious meanings of “enthusiasm,” “ecstasy” and “fanaticism.”)