prey, are slow, firm, and majestic. Among the Arabian writers, the man who moves with a proud and solemn step is said to walk as a lion. The wise man, who was deeply skilled in natural history, makes an observation of the same kind: "There be three things which go well, yea, four are comely in going. A lion, which is strongest among beasts, and turneth not away from any; a grey-hound; an he-goat also; and a king, against whom there is no rising up."a The roaring of a lion in quest of his prey, resembles the sound of distant thunder; and being re-echoed by the rocks and mountains, appals the whole race of animals, and puts them instantly to flight; but he frequently varies his voice into a hideous scream or yell.b "When the lion roars," says Sparman, "the beasts of the forest can do nothing but quake; they are afraid to lie still in their dens, lest he spring upon them. and equally afraid to run, lest, in attempting to escape, they should take the direction in which he is prowling, and throw themselves into the jaws of their adversary." No book is more accurate than the Scriptures, even on subjects of natural history, so far as their sublime design admits. The universal terror which the roaring of a lion produces, is noticed by the prophet Amos: "The lion has roared, who will not fear? the Lord God has spoken, who will not prophesy?" Hence the terror which the thunder of his voice inspires, is not confined to a few of the weaker animals; the fellest savage that ranges the forest, according to the prophet, is as unable с z Buffon's Nat. Hist. vol. v, p. 84. Bochart. Hieroz. vol. ii, lib. ii, cap. 2, p. 728. C b Buffon's Nat. Hist. vol. v, p. 83. a Prov. xxx, 29, 30. Bochart. Hieroz. lib. ii, c. 2, p. 729. Voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, vol. ii, chap. 11, p. 39. to resist its influence, as the seer is, the voice of Jehovah. Even the variation of his appalling voice into the hideous scream or yell, is recorded by Jeremiah: "The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his land waste."d e The lion, it is said, never roars but when he is in sight of his prey, or in the act of striking it down with his paw. His voice is, therefore, the signal of attack, and commonly of inevitable destruction; a circumstance which must greatly increase the general terror and dismay. "Will a lion roar in the forest," said Amos, "when he hath no prey? Will a young lion cry out of his den if he have taken nothing?" The invariable connection between the roaring of the lion and the seizing of his prey, is also referred to by the holy Psalmist: "The young lions roar after their prey, and seek their meat from God ;" and by the prophet," For thus hath the Lord spoken unto me, Like as the lion, and the young lion roaring on his prey so shall the Lord of hosts come down to fight for mount Zion, and for the hill thereof." "The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his land waste.”i There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey: they have devoured souls." The same allusion occurs in Ezekiel's parable of the lion's whelps: "He became a young lion, and learned to catch the prey, and devoured men. And he knew their desolate palaces, and laid waste their cities; and the land was desolate, and the fulness thereof, by the noise of his roaring." In this passage the antecedent is put for the consequent; for, the lion, strictly speaking, does not waste a country by his roaring, but by what invariably follows, the miserable destruction of men, and flocks, and herds. The deep and terrific intonations of the lion's voice furnish the sacred writers with many beautiful and striking figures, with which they have adorned their magnificent descriptions. So great are the terror and dismay which his roaring produces, that many animals, that by their swiftness might escape from his fury, astonished and petrified by the sound of his voice, are rendered incapable of exertion. This allusion is involved in these words of Elihu to Job: "After it a voice roareth: he thundereth with the voice of his excellency; and he will not stay them when his voice is heard."m A very fearful denunciation of divine wrath, is ushered in by the prophet in these words: “The Lord shall roar from on high, and utter his voice from his holy habitation; he shall mightily roar upon his habitation; he shall give a shout as they that tread the grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth." The prophet Joel uses the same figure, with a slight variation: "The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake." The tumultuous noise of conflicting warriors, is, with great beauty and effect, compared by the Psalmist to the roaring of a lion: "Thine enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations, they set up their ensign for signs."P The strong cries of the Saviour, in the hour of his most poignant sufferings for the sins of his people, are represented under the same figure: "Why art thou so far from the words of my roaring ?" And the sorrows of David 1 Bochart. Hieroz. lib. ii, cap. 2, p. 729. n m Job xxxvii, 4. n Jer. xxv, 30. • Joel iii, 16. P Ps. lxxiv, 4. himself: "When I kept silence, my bones waxed old, through my roaring all the day long." In the same manner, the term is used by the Greeks to signify the voice of lamentation: "The man who drinks poison," says an ancient Greek writer, "roars, that is, laments with a loud voice." The prophet Jeremiah, by a catachresis rather unusual, makes the young lion bray like an ass. lion bray like an ass. They shall roar together as lions; they shall yell, or as the word properly signifies, bray as lions' whelps. But the bold figure of the prophet, is vindicated by the prince of Latin poets: “iræque leonum · Vincula recusantum et sera sub nocte rudentum." En. lib. vii, 1. 16. "The rage of lions reluctant to the chains, and braying at the late midnight hour." When the lion has seized his prey, he calls his whelps to the feast, by uttering a sound which resembles the bellowing of a calf. The assertion of Plutarch is verified in the lines of Theocritus, where he compares the lamentations of Agave, the mother of Pentheus, over her dead son, to the bellowing of a lioness: Όσσον περ τοκάδος τελέθει μυκημα λεαίνης. In the book of Revelation, the apostle John uses the same figure: "And the angel cried with a loud vioce, as when a lion belloweth (for so the original term signifies), and when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices."t The tremendous roar which the lion utters in the act of seizing his prey, softens, the moment he has killed it, into 4 Psa. xxii, 2, and xxxii, 3. Plutarch de Terrestribus et Aquaticis Animalibus. + Rev. X, a deep and hollow murmur. Thus, when Hippomene and Malanta were metamorphosed into lions, instead of words they uttered a low murmuring sound : "Iram vultus habet, pro verbis murmura reddunt." Ovid. Equally minute and exact as the poetical fabulist, is the prophet of Jehovah: "For thus hath the Lord spoken unto me, like as the lion, and the young lion roaring, or (as the word signifies) murmuring on his prey," when he is tearing it to pieces, and drinking its blood. It is the same word which the Spirit of God employs to express the muttering sounds emitted by the wizards of ancient times, of which the following example is quoted from the prophecies of Isaiah: "And when they shall say unto you, seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter."v The manner in which the inspired writers speak of the lion's mouth, would naturally lead to the conclusion, that it is formed to strike a beholder with terror. "Deliver me from the mouth of the lion," was the earnest prayer of David's Son and Lord, in the day of his calamity. The prophet Daniel replied with peculiar emphasis, to the mournful inquiries of Darius: "My God hath sent his angel, and hath shut the lions' mouths that they have not hurt me." The pointed allusion of Paul is not less remarkable: "I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion;" and in the estimation of the same writer, to stop "the mouths of lions," was one of the noblest achievements of ancient martyrs." Nor is it an accidental circumstance in the description of the beast, which John beheld in vision rise up out of the sea, that he had a "mouth as |