other description of it or allusion to it is given besides this, we are left to infer that its criminality consisted, not so much in some reverence being paid to the image, as in the circumstance of that reverence overstepping its due degree, and encroaching on that which belongs to God alone. It excited the jealousy of Jehovah by coming in competition with his worship, and only on that account was sinful. Now such would be the exact state of things, if some shrine like the Argos, or Bari, in which the Philistines deposited their propitiatory offerings, maintained the post, with which it was then honoured, close to the Ark of the Covenant, and therefore was placed upon the altar. In itself it was doubly sacred; for, 1. It was an offering to the God of Israel, and a tribute to his omnipotence: and 2. It was, like the Ark of the Covenant itself, a monument of his mercy to the patriarchs. But if it was at length equally honoured with that Ark, which was of divine appointment, it was enough to provoke him to jealousy; for it raised a mere human device to the same level of honour with God's own express institution. But the second and graver abomination of which Ezekiel complains tended still more to idolatry. By digging, as he was commanded, he discovered a secret subterraneous chamber; the walls of which were covered with paintings of animals, and all the idols of the house of Israel. The question is, what those idols were; and it is obvious that they could not be worshipped as gods: for otherwise, how could they be reckoned only third in the scale of abominations? The word in the original signifies something filthy. Perhaps they were obscenities; perhaps Lingams. In the 18th chapter it scarcely admits of any other interpretation, as the context shows. But all the idols of the house of Israel implies something more; and it is not unlikely that they were all the Arkite symbols, whether corrupted by sensuality or not. The root from which the Hebrew word is derived, is the same as that of Gilgal, where it has been shown that there was a circle of pillars, which in this country would have been called a Druidical temple, and which seems to have been the occasion of a great defection from the worship prescribed by the law. For there the people "multiplied transgression,' and there was "all their wickedness"," and therefore the place specially marked out for captivity was Gilgal. The offending altars are described as heaps in the furrows of the fields, and the term expressing those heaps, or tumuli, is nearly the same as that which is used for the idols, and it sometimes has the signification of waves. If the imagery in that chamber consisted of so many objects of direct worship, it is clear that it would have been the most abominable of all the abominations. But why then were those figures introduced? If any similitude to Noah's Ark was designed, it was surely an excellent method of conveying that notion; and 1 Amos, iv. 4. 3 Amos, v. 5. 5 such a conjecture is 2 Hosea, ix. 15. 4 Hosea, xii. 11. - .acervi, fuctus יָלִים ,circuli גְלִילִי,idola גְלוּלֵי Passionei Lex. in perfect harmony with the sentiments which they who sought that asylum are supposed to utter. "The Lord seeth us not," i. e. regardeth not his creatures: "the Lord hath forsaken the earth," as he did at the time of the Deluge. Warburton observes, that "the paintings and imagery on the walls of this subterraneous apartment answer exactly to the descriptions which the ancients have given us of the mystic cells of the Egyptians';" those cells in which the mysteries of Isis and Osiris were celebrated, and in which none were initiated but the most eminent men; for so, in this instance, the seventy ancients of the house of Israel, the members of the Sanhedrim, were there assembled. Now it has been sufficiently shown, that the mysteries were Arkite ceremonies, and the Egyptians an Arkite people. If it be asked why this was a smaller abomination than the weeping for Tammuz, which was an allusion to the same event, though little information is given us to decide the question, yet thus much may be reasonably conjectured. It has been shown, that the weeping was occasioned by the death, which the image or person representing the Patriarchs was supposed to undergo, when buried in the mystic cell, that represented the Ark. Hence the initiated being thus transferred as it were to Hades, had the credit of ob taining a degree of supernatural knowledge, and a closer communion with the gods2; for which rea 1 Divine Legation of Moses. 2 Sub nocte silenti VOL. II. F F son, when Isaiah complains of the people provoking the Lord by remaining among the graves, and lodging in the monuments, and saying, "Stand by thyself, come not near to me, for I am holier than thou," Lowth very justly observes, that they dwelled in the sepulchres, and lodged in the caverns, for the purposes of necromancy and divination to obtain dreams and revelations. For thus the Augilæ, a people of Africa, who thought there were no gods but the Manes of their ancestors, were accustomed to repair to Tumuli, when they wanted to consult the oracle2; and the dreams of those who slept there were deemed a divine answer and at the present day a similar seclusion from the world for a short period is practised by those who pretend to be magicians in Syria. Madan informs us, on the authority of Lady Esther Stanhope, whose long residence in that country has made her quite familiar with the habits of the natives, that thirty days fasting and silence is considered necessary to prepare a man for intercourse with spirits. An Italian doctor underwent this first trial in a cave, and at the expiration of that term, he was visited by a spirit in dark attire, which terrified him so much that he had not courage to venture on the second step of initiation. Multa modis simulacra videt volitantia miris, 1 Lowth on Isaiah, lxv. 3, 4, 5. Virg. Æn. viii. 76. 2 Pomponius Mela, de Situ Orbis, lib. i. c. 8. 3 Madan's Travels, ii. 283. POSTELLA.-CAVES OF PURIFICATION IN GREECE.-CROMLECHS OR ARTIFICIAL CAVES IN IRELAND -WALES GLESEY SCOTLAND FRANCE NOT ALTARS. AN THE Cave of Trophonius near Lebadea in Boeotia was a remarkable oracle of this description; and notwithstanding the total ignorance of its real origin, which like the ivy on a ruin conceals the form of truth in the writers who have mentioned it, yet on a closer inspection we can easily detect the various members of a genuine Arkite monument. It was discovered by bees; that is, Melissæ, or priestesses. It was the residence of serpents, who were to be disarmed of their fury by those who entered it. It was the sepulchre of Trophonius; concerning whose history the reports are so very contradictory, and destitute of evidence, that we may conclude they were all fictions. In Hebrew the etymology of his name will be Toreph Ani, The Mighty Ship.' It was on the top of a mountain, in a circle formed of white stones. Its shape was like an oven; beneath which through a narrow passage there was another cavern, where the consulter of the oracle heard or saw things which the priests afterward interpreted; no difficult |