AFFIRMATION is also used for the ratifying or confirming of the sentence or decree of some inferior court. Thus we
Affirmative say, the house of lords affirmed the decree of the chancellor, or the decree of the lords of session.
Affirmative, in Grammar. Authors distinguish affirmative particles, such as yes. The term affirmative is sometimes also used substantively. Thus we say, the affirmative is the more probable side of the question: there were so many votes, or voices, for the affirmative.
Affix, in Grammar, a particle added at the close of a word, either to diversify its form or alter its signification. We meet with affixes in the Saxon, the German, and other northern languages, but more especially in the Hebrew, and other oriental tongues. The Hebrew affixes are single syllables, frequently single letters, subjoined to nouns and verbs, and contribute not a little to the brevity of that language. The oriental languages are much the same as to the radicals, and differ chiefly from each other as to affixes and prefixes.
Afflatus literally denotes a blast of wind, breath, or vapour, striking with force against another body. The word is Latin, formed from ad, to, and flare, to blow. Naturalists sometimes speak of the afflatus of serpents. Cicero uses the word figuratively, for a divine inspiration; in which sense he ascribes all great and eminent accomplishments to a divine afflatus. The Pythian priestess being placed on a tripod or perforated stool, over a holy cave, received the divine afflatus, as a late author expresses it, in her belly; and being thus inspired, fell into agitations, like a phrenetic; during which she pronounced, in hollow groans and broken sentences, the will of the Deity. This afflatus is supposed by some to have been a subterranean fume or exhalation,
wherewith the priestess was literally inspired. Accordingly, it had the effects of a real physical disease, the paroxysm of which was so vehement that, as Plutarch observes, it sometimes proved mortal. Van Dale supposes the pretended enthusiasm of the Pythia to have arisen from the fumes of aromatics.
Afforesting, Afforestation, the turning of ground into forest. The Conqueror and his successors continued afforesting the lands of the subject for many reigns, till the grievance became so notorious, that the people of all degrees and denominations were brought to sue for relief; which was at length obtained, and commissions were granted to survey and perambulate the forest, and separate all the new-afforested lands, and reconvert them to the uses of their proprietors, under the name and quality of partieu or pour-alle land.
Affray, or Affrayment, in Law, formerly signified the crime of affrighting other persons, by appearing in unusual armour, brandishing a weapon, &c.; but at present affray denotes a skirmish or fight between two or more.
Affrontee, in Heraldry, an appellation given to animals facing one another on an escutcheon; a kind of bearing which is otherwise called confrontee, and stands opposed to adverse.
Affusion, the act of pouring some fluid substance on another body. Dr Grew gives several experiments of the luctation arising from the affusion of divers menstrua on all sorts of bodies. Divines and church historians speak of baptism by affusion, which amounts to much the same with what we now call sprinkling.