Part 251 (1/2)

ICONIUM, the capital of Lycaonia, in Asia Minor, a flouris.h.i.+ng city in St. Paul's time, who planted a church there, and of importance in the time of the Crusades; is now named Konieh.

ICONOCLASTS (i. e. breakers of images), the name given to a sect who, in the 8th century, opposed to the presence of images in churches and the wors.h.i.+p paid to them, set about the demolition of them as savouring of idolatry, and even in 730 obtained a papal decree or condemnation of the practice; the enthusiasm died out in the next century, but the effect of it was felt in a controversy, which led to the separation of the Church of the East from that of the West.

ICTINUS, great Greek architect of the 5th century B.C., a contemporary of Pericles, designer of temples at Bussae and Eleusis, and joint-designer with Callicrates of the world's one perfect building, the Parthenon, at Athens (437 B.C.).

IDA, the name of two mountains in the East, one in Crete, on which Zeus was brought up in a cave near it, and one in Asia Minor, near Troy, ”Woody Ida,” the scene of the rape of Ganymedes and of the judgment of Paris, also a seat of Cybele wors.h.i.+p.

IDAHO (88), one of the north-western States of the American Union, surrounded by Was.h.i.+ngton and Oregon in the W., Nevada and Utah in the S., Wyoming in the E., and Montana, from which it is separated by a branch of the Rocky Mountains, in the NE., the short northern boundary touches Canada; the country is traversed by lofty mountain ranges cut up into deep river valleys and canons, is extremely rugged in its northern parts, and chiefly useful for cattle-raising; there is a plateau in the centre, some arid prairie land in the S., and lake districts in the N. and in the SE.; grain farming is restricted to fringes along the river banks; the Snake River flows through the whole S.; silver, lead, gold, and copper mines are wrought successfully, and coal is found; the State was admitted to the Union in 1890; a fifth of the population are Mormons; there are still 4000 Indians. Boise City (2) is the capital.

IDDESLEIGH, EARL OF, Sir Stafford Northcote, Conservative financier and statesman, born in London of old Devons.h.i.+re stock; educated at Oxford; became private secretary to Mr. Gladstone in 1842, and five years later was called to the bar; entering Parliament in 1885, he sat in succession for Dudley, for Stamford, and for North Devon; under Lord Derby he was Financial Secretary to the Treasury in 1859, and President of the Board of Trade in 1866; under Disraeli he was at the India Office in 1868, and Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1874; he succeeded Disraeli in the leaders.h.i.+p of the Commons, and was raised to the peerage in 1885; was successively First Lord of the Treasury and Foreign Secretary under Lord Salisbury; in 1871 Mr. Gladstone appointed him Commissioner in the settlement of the _Alabama_ claim, and he was elected Lord Hector of Edinburgh University in 1883; resigning from the Foreign Office in January 1887, he died suddenly a few days later at the Prime Minister's residence (1818-1887).

IDEALISM, that view of the universe which, in opposition to MATERIALISM (q. v.), refers everything to and derives everything from a spiritual root; is Subjective if traced no further back than the _ego_, and Objective if traced back to the _non-ego_ likewise, its counterpart, or other, in the objective world. Idealism in art is art more or less at work in the region of the ideal in comparative disregard of the actual.

IDELER, CHRISTIAN LUDWIG, a German astronomer, born in Prussia; an authority on chronology, on which he wrote a handbook, as also a work on the reckoning of time among the Chinese (1766-1846).

IDENTICAL NOTE, a term in diplomacy to denote terms agreed upon by two Powers to coerce a third.

IDES, the name given in the Roman calendar to certain days that _divide_ the month; in March, May, July, and October they fall on the 15th, in the rest on the 13th.

IDOLATRY, wors.h.i.+p paid to a mere symbol of the divine while the heart is dead to all sense of that which it symbolises; a species of offence against the Most High, of which many are flagrantly guilty who affect to regard with pity the wors.h.i.+pper of idols of wood or stone.

”Idolatry,” says Buskin, _apropos_ of Carlyle's well-known doctrine, ”is summed up in the one broad wickedness of refusing to wors.h.i.+p Force and resolving to wors.h.i.+p No-Force; denying the Almighty, and bowing down to four-and-twopence with a stamp on it.”

IDOMENEUS, king of Crete, grandson of Minos, and a hero of the Greeks in the war with Troy.

IDRIS, a giant, prince, and astronomer of Welsh tradition, whose rock-hewn chair on the summit of Cader Idris was supposed to mete out to the bard who spent a night upon it death, madness, or poetic inspiration.

IDUMaeA. See EDOM.

IDUNA, a Scandinavian G.o.ddess who kept a box of golden apples which the G.o.ds tasted when they wished to renew their youth; she was carried off one day, but being sent for by the G.o.ds, came back changed into a falcon.

IDYLL, a poem in celebration of everyday life or life in everyday costume amid natural, often pastoral and even romantic, and at times tragic surroundings.

IF, an islet in the Gulf of Ma.r.s.eilles, with a castle built by Francis I., and afterwards used as a State prison.

IGGDRASIL the _Tree_ of Existence, as conceived of by the Norse, and reflecting the Norse idea of the universe, ”has its roots deep down in the kingdoms of Hela, or Death; its trunk reaches up heaven-high, and spreads its boughs over the whole universe. At the foot of it, in the Death-Kingdom, sit the THREE NORNAS (q. v.) watering its roots from the sacred Well.”