in Law, is the forcible or fraudulent removal of a person. Custom has limited its general application to the case where a woman is the victim, with the view of her marriage or seduction. The forcible carrying off a woman constituted the crimen raptus of the Roman law, and was a capital offence, though unattended with violation of the person of the woman. In the case of men or children, it has been usual to substitute the term kidnapping. There are many old severe laws against abduction, generally contemplating its object as the possession of an heiress and her fortune. The offence was frequent at a comparatively late period in Scotland and in Ireland, an account of the feebleness of the law and the geographical facilities of these countries, and severe laws were directed against it in vain. So late as the Act of 10 Geo. IV. c. 34, in Ireland it was made punishable with death; but by 5 and 6 Vict. c. 28, § 16, this is reduced to transportation, the punishment which had been assigned to it in England fourteen years earlier, by Sir Robert Peel's Consolidation Act, 9 Geo. IV. c. 31. In Scotland, Abduction where there is no statutory adjustment, a similar punishment has been awarded by practice.

**Abelard.**

**Abduction,** in Logic, a kind of argumentation, by the Greeks called *apagogé*, wherein the greater extreme is evidently contained in the medium, but the medium not so evidently in the lesser extreme as not to require some farther medium or proof to make it appear. It is called *abduction*, because, from the conclusion, it draws us on to prove the proposition assumed.

**ABDUCTOR,** or **ABDUCENT,** in Anatomy, a name given to several of the muscles, on account of their serving to withdraw, open, or pull back the parts to which they belong.

**ABEDNEGO,** i.e. servant of Nego or Nebo, the Chaldee name imposed by the king of Babylon's officer upon Azariah, one of the three companions of Daniel.

**ABEL,** properly **Hiram,** which means grief, the second son of Adam, who was slain by Cain his elder brother, (Gen. iv. 1-16,) while engaged in offering sacrifice, God having testified his acceptance of that of Abel, and his rejection of Cain's. Abel, it appears, brought two offerings, the one an oblation, the other a sacrifice. Cain brought but the former, a mere acknowledgment, it is supposed, of the sovereignty of God, neglecting to offer the sacrifice which would have been a confession of fallen nature, and typically an atonement for sin; it was not therefore the mere difference of feeling with which the two offerings were brought, which constituted the virtue of the one or the guilt of the other. God's righteous indignation against sin had been plainly revealed, and there can be no doubt that the means of safety, of reconciliation and atonement, were as plainly made known to Adam and his offspring; the refusal therefore of the sacrifice was a virtual denial of God's right to condemn the sinner, and at the same time a proud rejection of the proffered means of grace.

In ancient times heretics existed who represented Cain and Abel as embodying two spiritual powers, of which the mightier was that of Cain, and to which they accordingly rendered divine homage.

An obscure sect arose in the early church under the title of Abelites, which inculcated certain fanatical notions respecting marriage; but it was speedily lost amidst a host of more popular parties. See **ABELIANS.**

**Abel** is likewise employed as a prefix to the names of places, seemingly indicating their verdant appearance; thus in Scripture we read of Abel-Beth-Maacah, Abel-Carmaim, Abel-Shittim, &c.

**Abel, Carl Friedrich,** a celebrated German musician, a pupil of Sebastian Bach, and highly praised by Burney for his adagio compositions in the age preceding Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven. He died in 1787.

**Abel, Niels Henri,** an eminent mathematician of Norway, who was born at Christiania in 1802, and died of consumption in 1829. His works, which were published by the Norwegian government in two 4to volumes in 1839, give the unfortunate author a high place among the mathematicians of his age.

**Abel, Thomas.** See **ABLE.**