a clause or condition of a contract, treaty, &c. It is also a small part or division of a discourse, book, or writing.

ARTICLE of Death, the last pangs or agony of one just expiring.

ARTICLE of Faith, is by some defined a point of Christian doctrine, which we are obliged to believe, as having been revealed by God himself, and allowed and established as such by the church.

The thirty-nine articles were founded, for the most part, upon a body of articles compiled and published in the reign of Edward VI. They were first passed in the convocation, and confirmed by royal authority in the year 1562. They were afterwards ratified anew in the year 1571, and again by Charles I. The law requires a subscription to these articles of all persons ordained to be deacons or priests, 13 Eliz. cap. 12.; of all clergymen inducted to any ecclesiastical living, by the same statute; and of licensed lecturers and curates, 13 Eliz. cap. 12. and 13 and 14 Ch. II. cap. 4. of the heads of colleges, of chancellors, officials, and commissaries, and of schoolmasters. By 1 Will. III. cap. 12. dissenting teachers are to subscribe all, except the 34th, 35th, and 36th, and part of the 39th (and in the case of Anabaptists, except also part of the 27th); otherwise they are exempted from the benefits of the act of toleration.

in Grammar, denotes a particle used in most languages for the declining of nouns, and denoting the several cases and genders thereof.

The use of articles arises chiefly hence, that in languages which have no different terminations, to express the different states and circumstances of nouns, there is something required to supply that office.

The Latins have no articles; but the Greeks, and most of the modern languages, have had recourse to them, for fixing and ascertaining the vague signification of common and appellative names.

The Greeks have their ἐν, the eastern tongues their ἐν, the emphaticum; the Italians their il, lo, and la; the French their le, la, and les; the Germans their der, das, dat.

The English also have two articles, a and the; which being prefixed to substantives, apply their general signification to some particular things.

Some grammarians make the article a distinct part of speech; others will have it a pronoun, and others a noun adjective. See Grammar.