father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it." The eye, it is well known, is a favourite morsel with the birds of prey, and by consequence, the first part of the body upon which they fasten; now, if Solomon is so correct in one part of his description, we have good reason to think he is equally so in the other. In this, as in other particulars, the Arabian historians, who were well acquainted with the eagle, support the credit of the sacred writers. Damir says, the eagle discovers his prey at the distance of four hundred parasangs; and when he lights upon a carcase, of which the ossifrage has eaten, he retires, and refuses to eat what the other has left. Again, when he finds a carcase, and has gorged himself with the flesh, he is unable to fly, till, bounding for some time along the surface of the ground, he raise himself by degrees into the air. Thus, the general rule of the natural historian, that the golden and common eagle never feed upon carrion, certainly admits of exception; and indeed, seems to have no real foundation. b Like every bird of prey, the eagle sheds his feathers in the beginning of spring; a circumstance to which the prophet refers in the following charge to his people: " Enlarge thy baldness as the eage." Baldness is a defect properly ascribed to the human species: but we find it is also imputed by some ancient writers to the feathered race. Pliny remarks, that some animals are naturally bald, as the ostrich and the aquatic raven, which among the Greeks received its name paxaxgoxoga from that circumstance. Thus it appears, that both the Greeks and the VOL. II. a Quoted by Bochart, lib. ii, cap. 2, p. 175. b Micah i, 6. Plin. Hist. Natur. lib. xi, cap. 32. Hebrews ascribed baldness to the feathered race, but with this difference, that the former confined it to the head, while the latter extended it to the whole body; among the former, it was a permanent feature, among the latter, an annual defeet. When the moulting season is over, and the eagle appears with renovated plumage, vigour, and activity, he is said, in the language of ancient prophecy, to be "full of feathers." In allusion to this annual restoration, the Psalmist sings in the beautiful address to his soul, with which he begins the hundred third Psalm, "Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagles." The prophet Isaiah has the same allusion, in describing the perseverance of genuine saints: “But they that wait upon the Lord, shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings as eagles; and they shall run and not weary, they shall walk and not faint." As the eagle, when his feathers are renewed, looks younger and more beautiful, and is stron ger and livelier than before; so, the people of God, restored by the communication of divine favour, feel every grace invigorated, and every exercise of religion easy and pleasant. d 3 The tender affection which the female cherishes for her young, is described by Moses in these memorable terms; "As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings; so, the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him." It is indeed pretended by some writers, that when the eaglets are somewhat grown, the mother kills the weakest or the most voracious of them; but were the fact admitted, it is no satisfactory proof that she is without natural affection. It is well known that several animals of the mildest dispositions forsake their young, when they find it impossible to provide for their subsistence. The parent eagles, says Buffon, not having sufficient for themselves, seek to reduce their family; and as soon as the young ones are strong enough to fly and provide for themselves, they chase them from the nest, and never permit them to return. The account of this celebrated naturalist so far agrees with the statement of the sacred writer; according to whom, the eagle stireth up her nest, that is, rouses her young from their sloth and inactivity, and provokes them to try their wings by fluttering about her nest. When she sees them indifferent to her admonitions, or afraid to follow her example, "she spreadeth abroad her wings; taketh them, and beareth them upon her wings." The remarkable circumstance of bearing them upon her wings, is alluded to in another part of Scripture: "Ye have seen," said Jehovah to Israel, ❝ what I did unto Egypt, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself." Many passages in the writings of ancient authors countenance the idea, that the eagle actually takes up her timid young ones, and bears them on her wings till they venture to fly. Elian says, that when Tilgamus, a Babylonian boy, fell from the top of a tower, before he reached the ground, an eagle received and bore him up on her back. A similar story is recorded in the writings of Pausanias, who tells us, that an eagle flew under Aristimenes, who was cast by the Lacedæmonians from the • Exod. xix, 4. Nat. Hist. vol. i, p. 51. a De Nat. Animal. lib. xii, cap. 21. top of a tower, and carried him on her wings till he reached the ground in safety. These stories, although the mere creatures of imagination, shew that the idea of the eagle bearing a considerable weight on her wings, was familiar to the ancients. It is not to be supposed, that she wafts her unfledged young through the voids of heaven, or to distant places; the meaning probably is, that she aids with her wings their feeble and imperfect attempts to fly, till, emboldened by her example, and their own success, they fearlessly commit themselves to the air.j So did Jehovah for his chosen people: When they were slumbering in Goshen, or groaning in despair of recovering their freedom, he sent his servant Moses to rouse them from their inglorious sloth, to assert their liberty, and to break their chains upon the heads of their oppressors. He carried them out of Egypt, and led them through the wilderness into their promised inheritance. He taught them to know their strength; he instructed them in the art of war; he led them to battle, and by his almighty arm routed their enemies. So admirable are the qualities of the eagle, that whatever is sublime in heaven, or excellent on the earth, is likened by the sacred writers to that bird. The Most High does not consider it unbecoming his dignity to compare, in more instances than one, his providential vigilance, his support and protection, to the wings of an eagle, and to the various methods she employs to supply the wants of her young, and to instruct them how to provide for themselves. Under the same comparison, the pro Bochart. Hieroz. lib. ii, cap. 3, p. 179. J Buffon mentions the same fact in reference to the stork. Nat. Hist vol. viii, p. 250. phet Ezekiel endeavours to give his people some faint idea of the powerful intelligence, the unwearied activity, and amazing swiftness of holy angels; "The four living creatures had each the face of an eagle; and their wings were stretched upward; two wings of every one were joined one to another, and two covered their bodies.” In the tenth chapter, the prophet was favoured with the same vision; and in his description, he expressly calls the four living creatures the cherubim, one of the names by which the angels are distinguished; in the fourteenth verse, he repeats the remark: “ every one had the face of an eagle ;" and observes in the twentieth 66 This is the living creature that I saw under the God of Israel, by the river of Chebar; and I knew that they were the cherubim." In another part of his prophecy, the eagle, with admirable propriety, symbolizes the kings and princes of the earth, by whose murderous expeditions the fairest regions are depopulated. The king of Babylon, the greatest potentate of those times, is fitly represented in the parable of the two eagles and the vine, by "a great eagle with great wings, long winged, full of feathers which had divers colours, which came unto Lebanon, and took the highest branch of the cedar." The meaning of this pa rable is explained by the prophet himself, in the twelfth verse: "Say, now, to the rebellious house, Know ye not what these things mean? Tell them, Behold, the king of Babylon is come to Jerusalem, and has taken the king thereof, and the princes thereof, and led them with him to Babylon." The second eagle is the king of Egypt, as we learn by comparing the seventh and fifteenth verses: * Ezek. i, 10, 11: 1 Ch. xvii, 8. |