koosp:yelt
124
ROQUE
theology. In 1784 lie was aiipointed to the prelature of | Anhausen, which gave him a seat in the district gov- ernment, and in 1787 he was promoted to a place in the national diet, which diverted his attention largely to- wards political affairs. He preached his last sermon to liis people ou Christmas-day, 1802, aud died March 19, 1803.
Koos was emphatically a man of one book — the Bible. He was not the representative of any scientific idea in theology, nor a rhetorician who attached importance to the elegancies of style. His theology was contained in the sentences of the Bible, so that nothing is left for the theologian to perform beyond condensing what is there expanded, collecting what is scattered, and converting the whole directly into faith and life. As a dogmatist he simply brought together the doctrines of Scripture, liolding tliat thej' require no elaboration in order to ap- pear as a faultless whole. As an expositor and polemic he displayed an utter incapacity to appreciate difficul- ties, and accepted all the statements of the Bible with imi|uestioniug faith ; and in that one of his works which ])artakes most largely of a scientific character, the Fun- damenta Psychologic Sacrm (Tiibingen, 17G9; Stutt- gart, 1857), he simply gathered from the Scriptures every passage in which a psychological term occurs, and given the specific and general meaning of the terms and phrases so obtained. He held that the truth was fidly and appropriately given in the Bible, and therefore did not attempt a thorough system of psychology. He also gave attention to the times in which he lived aud to the impending future, taking the Apocalypse for his guide and following the interpretations of Bengel (q.v.), though without accepting the dates of that scholar for the end of the world (e. g. 1836), and without placing implicit reliance on the results of his investigations.
The writings of Roos were very numerous, and have no importance for our times. The principal ones are the Fuiidam. Psychol. Sacr., already cited: — a devotion- al manual entitled Haushuch (1790, 2d ed.), which was largely used, and a practical work entitled ChrisUiche Geddnken v. d. Verschiedenheit u. Einiykeit d. Kinder Got/es (1st ed. 1764; new [3d] ed. 1850). — Herzog, Ileal- Encyklop. s. v.
Roosevelt, James Henry, Hon., a distinguished philanthropist, was born in New York city, Nov. 10, 1800. He was a descendant of the well-known aud wide-spread family of that name. His father, James C. Roosevelt, was an attorney of the New York bar, educated at Columbia College. James Henry was left a large property by his father, and in early life manifested his benevolence by taking an interest in charitable institutions, particular- ly the Leake and Watts Orphan Asylum, of which he was for twenty-three years the treasurer. He never married, aud lived a quiet and frugal life. As his nat- ural heirs were wealthy and did not need his property, he determined on devoting it to benevolent objects. In March, 1854, he made his will, and after certain be- quests, gave the residue of his estate to five incorpora- tions in the city of New York, known as the Society of the New York Hospital, the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the New York Eye Infirmary, the Demilt Dispensary, and the New York Institution f(ir the Blind. It also provided for the establishment in the city of New York of a hospital for the reception and relief of sick and diseased persons, and for its permanent endow- ment. The charity was to extend to all sick, without limit or restriction of any kind, and without distinction as to race, sex, color, or religion. Tlie hospital, which occupies an entire block between Ninth and 'i'eiith av- enues, was in due time erected, and was formally opened Nov. 2, 1871. The generous foiunler died Nov. 30, 1863. He was "a man upright in his aims, simple in his hab- its, sublime in his benefaction." (\V. 1*. S.)
Root (—"IT, sh6resh, piZa), that part of a plant which extends downwards and fastens itself in the earth. The rocky ground of Palestine is in some places
covered with a very thin soil, so that the plants grow- ing in these spots cannot strike deep roots, and are therefore easily uptorn by the winds or withered by the scorching sun — a circumstance to which a beautiful al- lusion is made in the parable of the sower (Matt, xiii, 21). The root of a famih' is the progenitor from whom the race derives its name; thus, '"Out of the serpent's root shall come forth a cockatrice" (Isa. xiv, 29), mean- ing Hezekiah, who was descended from David, and was, like him, a scourge to the oppressors of Israel. The word is used in this sense in a very remarkable proph- ecy, " k\v\ in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek, and his rest shall be glorious" (xi, 10). The Jlessiah, elsewhere called " the branch," is here described as " the root," for though David's son in his human character, yet in his divine capacity he is David's " root," as being his Lord and God. A similar passage occurs in Revelation, '• The lion of the tribe of Judaii, the root of David, hath prevailed" (v, 5), So " covetousness is the root of all evil" (1 Tim. vi, 10) ; that is, the origin, the cause, the occasion ; " Lest any root of bitterness trouble j'ou" (Heb. xii, 15). In Job xix, 28, " root of the matter" signities a ground or cause of controversy. The root may also denote the race, the posterity : Prov. xii, 3, " The root of the righteous shall not be moved," i. e. shall not fail ; Jer. xii, 2, " Whence do the wicked prosper in all things V thou hast planted them, and they have taken root." In Daniel and in the Maccabees, Antiochus Epiphanes, the persecutor of the Jews, is represented as a young sprout or sucker, or root of iniquity, proceeding from the kings, the succes- sors of Alexander the Great. Jesus Christ, in his hu- miliation, is described as a root ill nourished, growing in a drj' and barren soil (Isa. liii, 2). In the contrary sense, Paul says (Rom. xi, 10-18) that the Jews are, as it were, the root that bears the tree into which the Gen- tiles are grafted ; and that the patriarchs are the pure and holj' root of which the Jews are, as it were, the branches. Jesus Christ is the root on which Christians depend, and from which they derive life and subsistence (Col. ii, 7).