an individual subsistence of a rational intelligent nature. Thus we say, an ambassador represents the person of his prince; and that, in law, the father and son are reputed the same person.

The word person, persona, is thought to be borrowed a personando, from personating or counterfeiting; and is supposed to have first signified a mask: because, as Boethius informs us, in larva concavae fons volvatur: and hence the actors who appeared masked on the stage were sometimes called larvali and sometimes personati. He likewise says, that as the several actors represented each a single individual person, viz. Edipus, or Chremes, or Hecuba, or Medea; for this reason, other people, who were at the same time distinguished by something in their form, character, &c. whereby they might be known, came likewise to be called by the Latins persona, and by the Greeks ἰδιωτής. Again, as actors rarely represented any but great and illustrious characters, the word came at length to import the mind, as being that whose dispositions constitute the character. And thus men, angels, and even God himself, were called persons. Things merely corporeal, as a stone, a plant, or a horse, were called hypoplasies or supposita, but never persons. Hence the learned suppose, that the same name persona came to be used to signify some dignity, whereby a person is distinguished from another; as a father, husband, judge, magistrate, &c. In this sense we are to understand that of Cicero: "Caesar never speaks of Pompey but in terms of honour and respect: he does many hard and injurious things, however, against his person."

Person we have already defined to mean an individual subsistence of a reasonable nature. Now a thing may be individual two ways: 1. Logically, because it cannot be predicated of any other; as Cicero, Plato, &c. 2. Physically; in which sense a drop of water, separated from the ocean, may be called an individual. Person is an individual nature in each of these senses: logically, according to Boethius, because persona is not spoken of universals, but only of singulars and individuals; we do not say the persona of an animal or a man, but of Cicero and Plato: and physically, since Socrates's hand or foot are never considered as persons. This last kind of individual is denominated two ways: positively, when the person is said to be the whole principle of acting; for to whatever thing action is attributed, that the philosophers call a persona: and negatively, as when we say, with the Thomists, &c. that a person consists in this, that it does not exist in another as a more perfect being. Thus a man, though he consists of two different things, viz. body and spirit, is not two persons; because neither part of itself is a complete principle of action, but one person, since the manner of his consisting of body and spirit is such as constitutes one whole principle of action; nor does he exist in any other as a more perfect being; as, for example, example, Socrates's foot does in Socrates, or a drop of water in the ocean.

in grammar, a term applied to such nouns or pronouns as, being either prefixed or underlaid, are the nominatives in all inflections of a verb; or it is the agent or patient in all finite or personal verbs. See GRAMMAR.