CAIUS ASINIUS, a celebrated Latin poet and orator, was of consular dignity, and composed some tragedies which were esteemed, but are now lost. He was the first who opened at Rome a library for the use of the public. He was the friend of Mark Antony; which prevented his complying with the solicitations of Augustus, who pressed him to embrace his party. At length Augustus having wrote some verses against Pollio, he was urged to answer them; on which he said, "I shall take care of writing against a man who has the power of proscribing us." He is praised by Virgil and Horace, whose patron he was.

There was another Pollio, a friend of Augustus, who used to feed his fishes with human flesh. This cruelty was discovered when one of his servants broke a glass in the presence of Augustus, who had been invited to a feast. The master ordered the servant to be seized, but he threw himself at the feet of the emperor, and begged him to interfere, and not to suffer him to be devoured by fishes. Upon this the causes of his apprehension were examined; and Augustus, affronted at the barbarity of his favourite, caused the servant to be dismissed, all the fish ponds to be filled up, and the crystal glases of Pollio to be broken to pieces.

**Pollution**, in general signifies defilement, or the rendering a person or place unclean or unholy. For the Jewish pollutions, see the article **Impurity**.

The Romans hold a church to be polluted by the effusion of blood or of seed therein; and that it must be consecrated anew. And the Indians are so superstitious on this head, that they break all the vessels which those of another religion have drank out of, or even only touched; and drain all the water out of a pond in which a stranger has bathed.

**Pollution**, in Medicine, a disease which consists in an involuntary emission of the seed in time of sleep. This, in different persons, is very different in degree; some being affected with it only once in a week, a fortnight, three weeks, or a month, and others being subject to it almost every night. The persons most subject to it, are young men of a languid temperament, who feed high and lead a sedentary life. When this happens to a person but once in a fortnight or a month, it is of no great consequence; but when it happens almost every night, it greatly injures the health; the patient looks pale and sickly; in some the eyes become weak and inflamed, are sometimes affected with violent fluxions, and are usually at last encircled with a livid appearance of the skin. This distemper is to be cured rather by a change of life than by medicines. When it has taken its rise from a high diet and a sedentary life, a coarser food and the use of exercise will generally cure it. Persons subject to this disease should never take any stimulating purges, and must avoid as much as possible all violent passions of the mind; and though exercise is recommended in moderation, yet if this be too violent, it will rather increase the disorder than contribute to its cure.

**Self-Pollution.** See **Onanism**.

**Pollux**, Julius, a Greek writer of antiquity, flourished in the reign of the emperor Commodus, and was born at Naucrates, a town in Egypt. He was educated under the sophists, and made great progress in grammatical and critical learning. He taught rhetoric at Athens, and became so famous that he was made preceptor of the emperor Commodus. He drew up for his wife, and inscribed to him, while his father Marcus Antoninus was living, an **Onomasticon** or Greek vocabulary, divided into ten books. It is extant, and contains a vast variety of synonymous words and phrases, agreeable to the copiousness of the Greek tongue, ranged under the general classes of things. It was intended to facilitate the knowledge of the Greek language to the young prince; and it is still very useful to all who have a mind to be perfect in it. The first edition of it was printed at Venice by Aldus in 1502, and a Latin version was afterwards made and published with it: but there was no correct and handsome edition of it till that of Amsterdam, 1706, in folio, by Lederlinus and Hemsterhusius. Lederlinus went through the first seven books, corrected the text and version, and subjoining his own, with the notes of Salmatus, If. Volfius, Valentinus, and of Kuhnus, whose scholar he had been, and whom he succeeded in the professorship of the oriental languages in the university of Stralburg. Hemsterhusius continued the same method through the three last books: this learned man has since distinguished himself by an excellent edition of Lucian, and other monuments of solid and profound literature.

Pollux wrote many other things, none of which remain. He lived to the age of 58. Philostratus and Lucian have treated him with much contempt and ridicule. *Philostrat. de vit. Sophy.*, lib. ii. and *Lucian in Rhetorum praecipue*.

**Pollux.** See **Castor** and **Pollux**.

**Pollux**, in Astronomy, a fixed star of the second magnitude in the constellation Gemini, or the Twins. See Castor.

**Pollux and Castor**, a fiery meteor. See **Castor** and **Pollux**.

**Polocski**, a palatinate in the duchy of Lithuania, partly in Poland, and partly in Russia, and under the government of Russia since 1773; bounded on the north by the palatinate of Weytepski, on the south by the Dwina, on the north by Mulcovy, and on the west by Livonia. It is a desert country, full of wood, and had formerly its own dukes.

**Polocski**, a town of Lithuania, and capital of a palatinate of the same name, with two castles to defend it. It was taken by the Muscovites in 1563, and retaken the same year. It is seated on the river Dwina, 50 miles south-west of Weytepski, and 80 east of Breslaw. E. Long. 29. N. Lat. 56.4.

**Poltroon**, or Poltron, a coward or dastard, wanting courage to perform any thing great or noble. The word is borrowed from the French, who according to Salmatus, derived it from *pollice truncato*; because anciently those who would avoid going to the wars cut off their thumb. But Menage, with more probability, derives it from the Italian *poltrone* and that from *poltro* a "bed," because timorous, pusillanimous people take pleasure in lying a-bed. Others derive the word from the Italian *poltro*, a "colt;" because of that creature's readiness to run away.

**Polverine**, the calcined ashes of a plant; of a similar nature with our pot-ashes or pearl-ashes. It is brought from the Levant and Syria; and in the glass-trade it is always to be preferred to any other ashes. The barilla, or pot-ashes of Spain, yield more pure salt than the polverine of the Levant, but the glass made with it has always some blue tinge: that made with the polverine is perfectly white, which ought always to be used for the finest crystal.

**Polyadelphia** (from *πολύς*, many, and *ἀδελφός*, brotherhood), many brotherhoods; the name of the 18th class of Linnaeus's sexual system, consisting of plants with hermaphrodite flowers, in which several stamina or male organs are united by their filaments into three or more distinct bundles. See Classification under Botany.

**Polyænus**, the name of many famous men recorded in ancient writers. Among them was Julius Polyænus, of whom we have some Greek epigrams extant. tant in the first book of the Anthologia. The Polyænus whom it most concerns us to know about, is the author of the eight books of the Stratagems of Illustrious Commanders in War. He was probably a Macedonian, and perhaps a soldier in the early part of his life; but of this there is no certainty. He was undoubtedly a rhetorician and a pleader of causes; and appears, from the dedication of his work to the emperors Antoninus and Verus, to have lived towards the latter part of the second century. The Stratagemata were published in Greek by Isaac Cafaubon, with notes, in 1589, 12mo; but no good edition of them appeared till that of Leyden, 1692, in 8vo. The title page runs thus: Polyæni Stratagematum libri octo, Jusio Vulterio interprete, Pancratius Maasvicius recensuit, Isaacii Cafauboni nec non suas notas adjectit.

We have in this work the various stratagems of above 300 captains and generals of armies, chiefly Greeks and barbarians; for the Romans seldom used such finesse; and Polyænus has shown further, that he was not well versed in Roman affairs. A great number of these stratagems appear to us to be ridiculous or impracticable; and neither the generals, or even common soldiers of our days, would be found simple enough to be caught by them. Few of this order are capable of reading Polyænus's Stratagems; and if they were, they would reap little benefit from it. The book is useful to such as study the Greek language and antiquity; for many things will be found in it, illustrating the customs and opinions of ancient times. The fifth and seventh books are imperfect.

Polyænus composed other works besides the Stratagema. Stobæus has produced some passages out of a book De Republica Macedonum; and Suidas mentions a piece concerning the Thebans, and three books of Tacitus. If death had not prevented, he would have written Memorabilia of the Emperors Antoninus and Verus; for he makes a promise of this in the preface to his fifth book of Stratagems. Cafaubon, in the dedication of Polyænus to Moræus, calls him an elegant, acute, and learned writer.