PROVOOST. 485 PRUDENTIUS. account of holding views regarding tlie approach- ing struggle -with the mother country at variance with those entertained by the majority of the ]iarishioners. He declined to serve as dele- gate to the Continental Congress, though his patriotic impulses led him to join his neighbors in their pursuit of the British after the burning of the town of Esopus. He did not resimie the active ministry until the close of the war, when, in 1784, he became rector of Trinity Church, New York, and shortly thereafter a member of the Board of Regents of the University, The follow- ing year he became chaplain of the Continental Congress, then meeting in New York, In 1786 he was elected first Bishop of New Y'ork at the Diocesan Convention, and in company with Will- iam White, Bishop-elect of Pennsylvania, sailed for England, where they were consecrated at Lambeth by the archbishops of Canterbury and Y'ork and the bishops of Bath and Wells and Peterborough. As a preacher Bishop Provoost was learned and polished, but without warmth and fervor. In 1800 he resigned the rectorship of Trinity and the following year sought to relin- quish his episcopal office, but the House of Bishops, declining to accept his resignation, ap- pointed instead an assistant bishop. Consult: The Centennial History of the Protestant Episco- pal Church in the Diocese of yew York, 17SS- 1SS5, edited by James Grant Wilson (New Y'ork, 1886) ; and The History of the American Episco- pal Church. lo87-18S3, bv William Stevens Perry (Boston, 1885), PROVOST (OF. provost, prevost, Ft. pr4v6t, from Lat. piwpositus, principal, provost, p.p. of prwponere, to set before, from prw, before + ponere, to place). The title of various academic, ecclesiastical, and civil otficials. In England the heads of certain colleges, as of Oriel. Queen's, and Worcester at Oxford, of King's College, Cam- bridge, and of Eton College, are called provosts. In the United States this title is given to the heads of some institutions, as, for example, the University of Penn.sylvania. It is applied as an ecclesiastical title to the head of a cathedral or collegiate chapter, especially in Germany. The title is also given to the superiors of certain re- ligious houses of lesser rank which bear a rela- tion to the mother house analogous to that which a priory bears to an abbey. In the Protestant churches of Germany the title of provost is some- times used as synonymous with that of dean or arch-priest; and occasionally, where several minor churches or chapels are attached to one cliief church, the minister in charge of the latter is called provost. The civil use of the title is found chiefly in Scotland, where the chief muni- cipal magistrate of a burgh or city is styled provost. The provost presides in the civil courts together with the bailies, who are his assistants. The chief magistrates of the cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow are styled Lord Provost, and the claims of the provosts of Aberdeen and Perth to the desifi^iation of lord, although at one time con- tested, are now held to be fully established. PROVOST-MARSHAL. A military official in charge of the military police of a camp, garri- son, or in the field. In the United States Army he is required to accept all prisoners handed over to him by an officer belonging to the army or
- na-, and has also within his province the duty
of arresting soldiers guilty of offenses of a gen- ei-al nature. In the British Army the provost- marshal .has a captain's rank, and authority to punish any ofl^ender taken fUiyrante delicto on the spot, according to the provisions and penalties laid down in the JIutiny Act. In the navy the provost-marshal is an officer attached to a naval court-martial who is re- sponsible for the safe keeping of prisoners under trial before the court ; also for the serving of notices to witnesses and executing the processes of the court. He is usually an officer of the navy (not above the rank of lieutenant) or of the marine corps (not above the rank of captain), but in case of the trial of enlisted men a petty or non-commissioned officer may act as provost- marshal. PROXY (contraction of procuracy, from ]IL. procuraciu, procuratia, charge, care, from pro- curare, to take care of, from pro, before, for -{• curare, to^care, from cura, care). The agency of one person who acts as substitute for another, usually in public assemblies, conventions, and other bodies. It is now rarely permitted in legislative bodies, though formerly it was the privilege of English peers. A result of this privi- lege was the somewhat notorious non-attendance of the Lords upon the sessions of Parliament, In the United States voting by proxy is quite com- mon in political conventions. PRTJDDEN, prud'den, Theophil Mitchell ( 184!) — ) . An American physician, teacher, and author, born at Middlebury, Conn. He was edu- cated at the Y'ale Medical School, the New Y'ork College of Physicians and Surgeons, and at the universities of Heidelberg, Berlin, and Vienna. In 1879 he was appointed assistant in histology and pathology in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, of Columbia University, and in 1892 was given the chair of patliology there. His technical publications include a Manual of yor- mal Bistoloyy (1881), a Handbook of Pathologi- cal Anatomy and Histology (with F. Delafield, 1885), Utory of the Bacteria (1889), Dust and Its Danaers (1891), and Drinking Water and Ice Supplies (1891). PRTJDENTIUS, proo-den'shi-iis (Atjkeutjs Clemens Prudentius) (348-405?). The greatest poet of the early Latin Church and one of the leading literary figures of the fourth centurj'. He was born in Spain (probably in Saragossa). He received a liberal education, was admitted to the bar. practiced as a pleader, discharged the func- tions of a Roman magistrate, and received ap- pointment to a high position at Court. His early life was gay and dissipated, but after his con- version he devoted himself to the service of the Church. He lived in an age of great Christian lead- ers, among them Ambrose, Jerome. and Augustine, and from Ambrose he derived his impulse toward poetic composition. Among his poems the Cathe- merinon. or 'Daily Round.' includes twelve hymns, of considerable length, designed for devotional use. The Psychomachia. or 'Soul's Conflict,' pictures the battle which virtue and vice wage over the soul of a Christian. This is the earliest type of pure religious allegory in the Western Church, and may almost be said to mark an epoch in literary "history. In the Peri Slephanon, or 'The Crowns,' we have a collection of fourteen hymns in praise of martyrs and martyrdom, about half of them dealing with Spanish subjects. The two books Against Symmachus carry on the battle,
