knowledge has enabled us to find the very | In their very rejoicing it was not absent, groundwork of the Egyptian religion, and even if the story of the mummy at the feast the result is this paradox for the Germans. be not true. Hence it is quite clear, that the They derive the law from a system alto- Israelites, living among the Egyptians, themgether opposite to it. The law taught the selves Egyptians in every thing but race, doctrine of rewards and punishments during must have known that there was a future life, the Egyptian religion held out rewards state of rewards and punishments. The and punishments after death. Yet the very Mosaic law did not take this doctrine as a people who maintain the Egyptian origin of basis of teaching, but we nowhere find it the law, have alleged the absence in it of a denied. Like other points of patriarchal clear mention of a future state, as proving belief, it was retained by the people in genthat Moses was not acquainted with that eral, and, if almost lost in the troublous and great truth; which truth we now positively ignorant days of the Judges, it afterwards know to have been the primary doctrine of gained greater and greater hold on the bethe Egyptian religion. lief of the nation, until it was clearly proclaimed under the new and more distinct revelation of the gospel. It may be remarked that the knowledge we now have of the current belief of the Egyptians clears up what was certainly a The illustration of details of Biblical hisgreat difficulty. Formerly, we held that the tory which the Egyptian monuments afford, learned among them had some dim idea of a is a subject of great importance, from its future state, but we had not evidence to show bearing upon the accuracy of the Bible. It that even they believed in it universally, or has been very much neglected, in consewhether it was a religious doctrine, or merely quence of the extravagant expectations of the result of philosophic speculation. Now many, who, in the early days of Egyptian we know that the whole nation believed in archæology, looked for an exact account of life after death and future rewards and pun- Israel in Egypt from the monuments. They ishments; that these doctrines were the basis never perceived, what is clear enough, though of the moral system of the priests; and that few are willing to admit it, that we have no the architecture, the literature, and the very consecutive chain of historical monuments life of the Egyptians had more regard to the stretching through many centuries. In the future, than to the present state. Each king remotest past there is the group of tombs occupied years, if not his whole reign, in around the greatest pyramids of Memphis, making his tomb. So important was the which tell us, in their sculptures and inscripwork, that he generally began it at his ac- tions, of the life of the Egyptians of that cession, sometimes even before. All the time, about four thousand years ago. This ceremonies of burial, the embalming and group may extend over two centuries. Then preservation of the body, had reference to there is a great blank, with here and there the after-life of the soul. If the tomb were a doubtful and shifting stepping-stone in a rock-hewn, its walls were decorated with dark stream of historical oblivion, until we sculptures or paintings relating to the future reach the monuments of the Twelfth Dynasstate; representing the terrible judgment-ty, lasting for about a century and a half, scene, the happiness of the blessed, and the misery of the lost. So, too, with the subjects, though their tombs, in the earlier ages of the monarchy, bear representations referring to their occupations during life. The ancient Egyptian's card represented him as a dead man, "the Osiris" "justified," and he never "left it" except on such occasions as the funerals of the bulls Apis. If a young Egyptian chose a scarabæus with a device to give to a friend, he would wish "a perfect life," or more distinctly, a happy resurrection, "May your name remain, and your being be renewed." Thus the idea of the future state and man's condition as depending upon his works done in this life, was always present to the whole nation, from the king, who superintended the making of his tomb, to the priestly sculptor and the common workman. *This term "justified," literally "truth-spoken" or "justice-spoken," is sometimes replaced by "a second time living." ...... The from Abraham's time. Then there is another and the exodus early in that dynasty. If we tion that was coming upon his land and peotake the reckoning of Hales, which many ple. (VIII. 8; IX. 5.) I have never seen any are disposed to consider the best Bible thing that so completely brought before me chronology, both sojourn and exodus would the idea of a destroying flood as the inundafall in the time before this dynasty. In tion of the Nile. The river bursts through either case we could scarcely expect any re- its banks and covers the whole valley; in ference to the Israelites. But setting this the midst rushes a broad turbid stream agiaside, although Joseph's administration tated by the strong north wind blowing might have been recorded, the disasters of against its current; on either side landmarks the exodus would have found no place in the are carried away, and the villages stand like annals of a nation that was especially averse islands connected by dykes, which the water to chronicling defeat. The kind of illustra- threatens to break. Until custom has used tion we have a right to expect does not re- one to the scene, it is a terrible realization late to the main facts of the history, but to of the calamities of a flood. I have dwelt such matters as the details of manners. upon these less-known topics in preference to the histories of Joseph and Moses which have been more carefully studied. Yet both these will gain a fresh interest with those who will read them with the Egyptian monuments for illustration. There they may see the investiture of a Joseph with his badges of office, the robe of fine linen, and collar of gold; there they may see the corn carefully stored in granaries, as though for the years of famine. Such boats as the papyrus-ark of Moses are there shown, and there are foreign brickmakers under hard taskmasters. The whole series of sculptures is an unintended commentary upon, and an impartial witness to, the truth of the Bible history. In these matters the accuracy of the Bible is strikingly shown. The Greek writers, some of whom, and especially Herodotus, were not inaccurate observers, have been cited to set right the Biblical account. In every case the monuments have proved that the sacred historian was correct, and the profane historian in error. The most interesting illustrations are, however, those which show a perfect knowledge of the country. These are quite as frequent in the Prophets as in the Pentateuch. Thus we read in Exodus, that when the Israelites saw Pharaoh in pursuit of them "they said unto Moses, because [there were] no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness." I may here mention a modern illustration. (XIV. 11.) The prophet Hosea declared of the It is well-known that many ancient Egypfugitives of Ephraim, "Egypt shall gather tian customs are yet observed. Among them up, Memphis shall bury them." (IX. 6.) these one of the most prominent is the wailEgypt is, above all countries, a land of an- ing for the dead by the women of the housecient tombs. The rocky ridge that shuts in hold, as well as those hired to mourn. In the plain and valley is honeycombed in its the great cholera of 1848 I was at Cairo. face with sepulchral grottos; in the edge This pestilence frequently follows the course of the desert are countless mummy-pits; on of rivers. Thus, on that occasion, it ascended its surface are many built tombs. Scarcely the Nile, and showed itself in great strength a day's journey passes but the voyager up at Boolák, the port of Cairo, distant from the the Nile sees some of these; first, the great city a mile and a half to the westward. For chains of the Pyramids; then, when the some days it did not traverse this space. mountain approaches, the entrances of grot- Every evening at sunset, it was our custom tos along its face, sometimes a field of sep- to go up to the terrace on the roof of our ulchres. Numerous as are the modern tombs, house. There, in that calm still time, I they are insignificant by the side of their heard each night the wail of the women of truly innumerable predecessors. But of all Boolák for their dead borne along in a great the ancient sites, Memphis has the greatest wave of sound a distance of two miles, the necropolis. For about fifteen miles this city lamentation of a city stricken with pestiof the dead extends along the edge of the lence. So, when the first-born were smitten, Great Desert, marked from afar by the pyra-"there was a great cry in Egypt; for [there mids rising regally above the smaller mon- was] not a house where [there was] not one uments. Wherever excavations have been dead." (Exodus XIII. 30.) made, it seems as though there had been an economy of space, for there is frequently but a narrow passage between the lines of tombs. No other graveyard in Egypt rivals this. Therefore the prophet spoke of it instead of Thebes the seat of empire, or any other great town better known in Palestine. Amos again uses the inundation of the Nile," the flood of Egypt," as a symbol of the destruc Perhaps the most important use of Egyptian archæology in reference to the Bible is the manner in which it illustrates the fulfilment of phrophecy. Here, again, I know that many, wearied by the rash and presumptuous interpretations of prophecy which have of late years abounded, will object to the very discussion of the subject. Yet if they acknowledge the truth of the Bible, they must be prepared to give a reverent consid- tion of her old monuments in the time of eration to the prophecies it contains. The desolation that followed the capture by Tibelief in the inspiration of these prophecies is a necessary consequence of a belief in the truth of the Bible. There is no middle course -a prophecy must either be authoritative or an imposture. In consequence of the uncritical mode in which prophecy has been studied, this branch of Biblical inquiry has been neglected by many who have not felt any doubt as to the authenticity of the Scriptures, and others have adopted views of the nature of sacred prophecy in some degree tending to lower its dignity, and to weaken the evidence of its Divine origin. Thus Professor Stanley, avoiding the rocks on which Keith ran his vessel, steers into very doubtful shallows. He thus writes in the preface to his Sinai and Palestine : "Those who visit or describe the scenes of sacred history, expressly for the sake of finding confirmations of Scripture, are often tempted to mislead themselves and others by involuntary exaggeration or invention. But this danger ought not to prevent us from thankfully welcoming any such evidences as can truly be found to the faithfulness of the sacred records. One such aid is sometimes sought in the supposed fulfilment of ancient prophecies by the ap pearance which some of the sites of Syrian or Arabian cities present to the modern traveller. But, as a general rule, these attempts are only mischievous to the cause which they intend to uphold. The present aspect of these sites may rather, for the most part, be hailed as a convincing proof that the spirit of prophecy is not so to be bound down. The continuous existence of Damascus and Sidon, the existing ruins of Ascalon, Petra, and Tyre, showing the revival of those cities long after the extinction of the powers which they once represented, are standing monuments of a most important truth, namely, that the warnings delivered by 'holy men of old,' were aimed not against stocks and stones, but then, as always, against living souls and sins, whether of men or of nations."-P. xvi. tus? The cases of Damascus and Sidon are, I frankly acknowledge, more difficult of explanation. Yet if we admit the veracity of what sacred history relates as to the fall of the one, and profane history as to that of the other, there seems to be a sufficient answer to the requirements of the case. Very often the dissociation of people and city might be reasonably supposed to relieve the latter from the curse that fell on it for the punishment of its inhabitants. Damascus, be it remembered, was Syrian, and for centuries has been Arab. Who rebuilt it we know not, after the Assyrians had destroyed it; but in St. Paul's time it was ruled by an Arab prince; and from the earlier days of Mohammedanism it has been a seat of Arab power. The case of Petra is well worth looking into. There the full measure of punishment came surely, if it tarried long. First the Idumæans were driven into their rocky fastnesses, there for a while to resist the power of Greece and Rome. Even then, however, the dominant race, that of the Nabathæans, appears to have been not Edomite but Arab. But for centuries past, probably for full eighteen hundred years, the Edomite race has disappeared, and the only population of its mountain and valley has been a colony descended from its hereditary enemies. Some have cavilled at there being now a scanty peasant-population of the valley of Petra. But these very peasants are called "the children of Israel," Benee-Israeel, and I find in their existence a confirmation of the truth of the Bible-narrative which relates the settling of a band of Simeonites, in Hezekiah's time, in Mount Seir (1 Chron. iv. 42, 43), no less than a fulfilment of the prophecy that Israelites, apparently the most southern, should hold "the Mount of Esau." (Obadiah 19. I think that here we have witnesses enough The principle put forth in this passage to justify our maintaining those rules of inwould, I think, reduce all seemingly literal terpretation which a long series of great prophecy to a tropical sense. The obvious divines has upheld. Let Egypt supply a answer is, How could men's souls be punished | fresh test, Egypt of which each site has been if their bodies did not suffer? how could na- well explored, and of which the post-biblical tions be punished except by the wasting of history presents few gaps. As I travelled their fields and cities? Professor Stanley's through the country I was very much struck reply is a citation of the restoration of certain by the utter ruin of some cities and towns, cities, some yet standing, which were once and the long continuance of others, when all denounced as to be utterly destroyed. The the advantages of position and ancient improphecies, however, either did not speak of portance have been in favor of the former. their final ruin, or else did not declare the im- I have unriddled this difficulty by the prophpending calamities to be the last that should ecies relating to them. For instance, it is fall upon them. Ascalon, Petra, and Tyre, said of Memphis, "Noph shall be waste and if not at once destroyed, certainly virtually desolate, without an inhabitant" (Jer. xlvi. perished many centuries ago. Jerusalem is 19); and "Thus saith the Lord God, I will still a city; but where has prophecy been also destroy the idols, and I will cause [their] more literally fulfilled than in the oblitera-images to cease out of Noph.” (Ezek. xxx. should be smitten "into seven streams." In any case, the Nile in the Delta has so failed, that now the only navigable branches are the two that were formerly artificial canals, so that the seven streams are fordable. Not less definite are the prophecies of the failure of the papyrus and other reeds, and the flax, the destruction of the fisheries, and the consequent ruin of the main branches of Egyptian industry. (Isaiah xix.) Not less remarkable is the exact fulfilment of these predictions. The papyrus is unknown in Egypt, the reeds are no longer a feature of its vegetation, English cotton is sold in its streets in the place of its once famous fine linen, and its fisheries can scarcely support the half-savage population of a small district. In the political history, the one prophecy that "There shall be no more a prince of the "land of Egypt" (Ezek. xxx. 13), has been literally fulfilled in the stranger rule that has been the curse of the country since the second Persian conquest, more than two thousand years ago. 13.) Except Saïs, Memphis, the greatest Egyptian archæology has had the reputation of being a narrow and fruitless pursuit. I have endeavored to show that, if rightly prosecuted, it has the highest human interest. In these days of contest, so important a province should not be left to those who are indifferent or hostile to the best purpose of honest and earnest inquiry. glancing shadows viewed under one sun by one pair of eyes, are blended into a harmonious whole. There is complete life and thorough repose. CROPSEY'S VIEW ON THE HUDSON. One of which goes dancing from the steamer's funnel, the most beautiful pictures of the season is not in and by the endless change of tint which prevades the exhibition of the Royal Academy. It is a the entire scene. Still, as in nature, the varylarge landscape painting, by Jasper Cropsey,ing forms and countless tints of innumerable representing a view on the Hudson river, from the heights above one of the small towns upon its banks. The spectator stands high up, and somewhat back, upon a wooded hill with an opening before him, through which is a broad view of the river; the land descending from the foreground to the nearest bank, which is, however, quite in the distance. The time is autumn, and the foliage of the tall trees and tangled underwood, intermingles a brilliant green with colors of red and yellow that vie in richness and intensity with the hue of flowers. Every one who has visited America knows how glowing is the scenery, how it altogether surpasses the experience of Europe, and would seem to those who have seen no more than the picture exaggerated. In the painting before us, however, it is generally agreed that the painter has rather subdued these brilliant tones than otherwise. The country is scen under a vivid sun. The subject is treated with great skill. With a sharp eye and a firm hand, Mr. Cropsey is enabled to seize the precise forms of organic life, or the broken ground, in all their variety and force; and the effect of air is conveyed by the movement in the atmosphere above, by the smoke One little trait will illustrate the completeness with which the work is done; it is a test which we have often applied to pictures, and very seldom found them answer to it. In nature, the forms of the foliage, the position of the treetrunks, the leaves and the flower-stems, will be found to present an endless variety of direction. The landscape painter too often suffers his hand to fall into a pattern: if any variety be introduced, the variations are repeated at certain intervals; and an inorganic mechanism may be detected at a glance. There is nothing of the kind in Mr. Cropsey's picture. It is this, as well as the force and freedom of the coloring, which makes you feel that placed before the canvas, you stand upon the wooded height, looking over the vast expanse of the Hudson valley, breaththe very air of that magnificent region. The painter's magic makes the room wall open, and the possessor of the picture becomes owner of one of the loveliest and grandest estates in which eye can revel.—Spectator. THE ELDER'S DAUGHTER. CAST her forth in her shame; All of our house and line; She is dead to me evermore :- There is no shame in dying: I did not curse her, did I? I meant not that, O Lord! I do not blame you for weeping; And she had our hearts a-keeping; And oh the love that we bore her! I thought that she was like you; I thought that the light in her face Dark without and within.- Did we not bless them both? There by the side of him, I wot not what ails me to-night; I cannot lay hold on a text. O Jesus! guide me aright, For my soul is sore perplexed, And the Cook seems dark as the night. And the night is stormy and dark; And dark is the way of sin; Her bed so pure and white! How often I've thought and said Was a whited sepulchre; And I've buried my heart in her; We will go altogether, She, and you, and I; There's the black peat-hag 'mong the heather, Any foul place will do For a grave to us now in our shame :- But she shall not sleep with them, Is it sin, you say, I have spoken? Lord, is it the coming change? I scarce know what I have said; Was I hard on her for her fall? One by one as they died, The love that was owing to them And then she brought us to shame, Oh, might I but look on her That I was in Abraham's bosom, Like some pale, withered blossom, Do not say, when I am gone, That she brought my gray hairs to the grave She'll have sorrow enough to brave; And the stream will be swollen too; and hark, Is that her hand in mine? How the water roars in the Lynn ! It's an ugly ford in the dark. Now, give me thine, sweet wife : I thank thee, Lord, for this grace of thine, -Macmillan's Magazine. ORWELL. |