David's soul: that is, IDOLS shall not come, IMAGES are hated, &c. The pagan founders of cities and castles practised judicial astrology, and laid the first stone under a lucky position of the heavens. The blind and the lame here were constellated images of brass, to which, as to idol-gods, the safety of the fort was entrusted. If these fail to protect us, say the Jebusites, they shall be put up in our houses more. They will fail, saith David, they are blind, they have eyes, and see not, they are idols." -Wall, in Robinson's Claude.

2 Samuel, v. 21. And there they left their images, and David and his men burnt them.-Psalm, lxxxiv. 11. For the Lord God is a Sun and Shield..

To me there appears the utmost probability, that the worship of the visible heavens by the Phoenicians, bore a strong resemblance to the system which prevails at this day among the Cingalese. Though the same hands are engaged as in demon-worship, the system appears to be different. Planet influence is styled, bal-le-yah, which may bear an affinity with Baal. Figures in relief, sometimes as large as the human form, representing the planets, whose influence is to be propitiated or averted, are neatly formed with clay on a frame of split bamboo; and when painted, have an imposing appearance-particularly when lighted up at night. Such frames may be frequently seen, especially in time of sickness, with the worshippers and dancers before them, accompanied by chaunting and the beat of tong-tongs. The largest I remember seeing, was about 18 feet by 12. After the ceremonies are over, the frame is partly broken up, or left to be destroyed by the rain, or in any way. Now, supposing the worship similar, the Philistines might make an extraordinary effort at propitiation, to secure the defeat of a man of David's power; and their images not being of metal, but of

materials like those I have described, on leaving them behind, they might be easily consumed. As the 84th Psalm is considered as written just after this defeat of the Philistines, it has struck me whether David, in setting fire to their instruments of worship, did not display the utmost contempt of their adoration of the sun in particular as the source of fire; and that from an emblem of the material sun, his superior theology led him to extol Jehovah, under the character of a sun as well as a shield.

2 Samuel, xi. 9. But Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his Lord, and went not down to his house.

Throughout Hindoostan, servants sleep in the piazzas of the house.

2 Samuel, xiv. 26. And when he polled his head, (for it was at every year's end that he polled it; because the hair was heavy on him, therefore he polled it,) he weighed the hair of his head at two hundred shekels, after the king's weight.

Of all the conjectures offered to solve the difficulty presented by the enormous weight of Absalom's hair, that of Dr. Clarke strikes me as most probable. He supposes a mistake has crept into the numeral letters, and that lamed, 30, supposed to have been first written, became changed in course of time for

resh, 200, which might easily have happened from the similarity of the letters. This reduces it to 71⁄2 oz. in the course of a year; and if this be thought too little (which, with the Doctor, I think it is not,) the sacred text, it should be observed, rather denotes at proper or convenient times, that is to say, when it grew too long or weighty, which might be several times a year. The quantity polled may be supposed to answer the conjectured weight very well.-The

hair of an adult Cingalese, I should suppose more than 7 ounces in weight. It is kept oiled, and fastened in a bunch behind the head.

2 Samuel, xvii. 13. Moreover, if he be gotten into a city, then shall all Israel bring ropes to that city, and we will draw it into the river, until there be not one small stone found there. Ezekiel, xxi. 22. To appoint battering-rams against the gates, to cast a mount, and to build a fort.

The battering-ram was a beam of enormous size, or many beams bound together, having an iron head; and was swung from a house containing it, with such violence as to make a breach in the wall of a fortress. In the former passage there seems an allusion to the crow-bar, worked the same way, which must have been a formidable engine when the walls were unfinished, or the stones loose.

2 Samuel, xxii. 6. The snares of death prevented me.-1 Thessalonians, iv. 15.—We which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them which are asleep.

This application of the word prevent, meaning, (not to obstruct, as it generally means now,) but to go before, precede, is so obsolete as to occasion perplexity to an uneducated reader in various pas

sages.

1 Kings, xiv. 3. And take with thee ten loaves, and cracknels, and a cruse of honey, and go to him: he shall tell thee what shall become of the child.

On Mr. Harmer's allusion to an officer posted at the door to receive presents and register them, an ingenious gentleman, long resident in Ceylon, wrote this note: "Such an officer sits at the door of a wedding-house, in the family of a modliar, and registers the gifts and the name of the donor. Some of these gifts are immediately sold at another door

for ready money, and are again brought to the first door by another donor. I. F. L."

1 Kings, xv. 10. And forty and one years reigned he in Jernsalem: and his mother's name was Maachah, the daughter of Abishalom.-1 Chronicles, xv. 16. And also concerning Maachah, the mother of Asa the king, he removed her from being queen, because she had made an idol in a grove: and Asa cut down her idol, and stamped it, and burnt it at the brook Kidron.

The difficulties arising from the different names applied to the person styled king's or queen's mother, and the phrase, "and his mother's name was — are solved, by ascertaining that this personage was one of the royal family, possessing that title of honour and dignity-the first in rank, chief sultana, or queen dowager.

1

1 Kings, xviii. 27. And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud; for he is a god: either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is on a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked.

Of

Homer's deities are represented travelling, disputing, fighting, feasting, and sleeping. According to Lucian, there are certain chinks in heaven through which Jupiter at certain times only hears prayer. The Cretan Jupiter was painted without ears. Diana, the priests said, that being present at Alexander's birth, she could not be present at Ephesus, to preserve her temple, which was then set on fire and burnt down. In Hindoo and Budhuist legends, all manner of exploits are ascribed to the gods. They are considered also as consuming much of their time in sleep. According to some, the great Brahma exists consciously but half his time; and Budhu in most of the temples is not only represented standing and teaching, as well as sitting, but in a recumbent posture asleep.

1 Kings, xviii. 28. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner, with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out.

The Turks in particular, play frantic pranks in the violence of their feelings.

! Kings, xviii. 42. And Elijah went up to the top of Carmel; and he cast himself down upon the earth, and put his face between his knees.-1 Chronicles, xvii. 16. And David the king came and sat before the Lord, and said, Who am I, O Lord God, and what is mine house, that thou hast brought me hitherto?

David's posture in all probability was not unlike that of Elijah, which was one of most earnest supplication. I remember being present in the Supreme Court at Matura, when the prisoners were brought up to receive their sentences; and when a Cingalese woman on hearing her son's condemnation to suffer death, rushed through the crowd, and presenting herself before the bench, in the very posture ascribed to Elijah, entreated, in the most heart-rending manner, that his life might be spared.

1 Kings, xviii. 44. And he said, Go up, say unto Ahab, Prepare thy chariot, [margin, tie or bind,] and get thee down, that the rain stop thee not.

The Cingalese, speaking of harnessing a horse, use the same expression. The root of the word in Cingalese, by the way, nearly corresponds in sound with the English bend or bind,

1 Kings, xix. 4. But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree, and he requested for himself that he might die.--Genesis, xxxi. 40. Thus I was; in the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night; and my sleep departed from mine eyes.