of her sterity, her vows, and her gratitude.-Our own era, dating its origin in the reign of Louis XV., or Louis XVI.-exhibiting its incomparable superiority above those already mentioned, no where, more than in this city. The Pantheon, situated in the Place St. Genevieve, on one of the highest summits embraced within the walls of Paris, is, after St. Peter's at Rome, and St. Paul's at London, (and hardly after the latter)-probably the noblest structure of the kind that exists. The exquisite building devoted to St. Mary Magdalene,-now nearly completed, at the end of the Rue Royale, is perfect in its proportions, and in the incomparable finish of its parts. The sum of moneys spent on these two last buildings,are incredible. Afrer the restoration of religion in France, a hundred and twenty millions of francs were expended by the government, in restoring the churches, from the injuries inflicted during the revolution.

I would conduct the reader to the interior of a few of these buildings, that we be instructed by the observances to which they are devoted or perhaps by the recollections which consecrate them. The first of them I visited was the Cathedral, of Notre Dame. It is situated at the upper end of the Ile de la Cite-and stands on the spot once occupied by a temple of Jupiter. As you approach its main front, you enter upon the large, open Pavris (or square) de Notre Dame: having upon your right the immense Hospital of the Hotel Dieu; on two other sides, rows of lofty irregular, and antiquated houses-and before you, this ancient edifice, built in the form of a Latin cross,-four hundred and fifteen feet long, by one hundred and fifty wide. You stand in front of one end, which presents three lofty stories; the first divided by three great pointed arches, through which the interior of the house is reached from this direction; the second profusely ornamented with carvings, and arches, and circles of massive stone work; and the third, divided into two great square towers of open work, with flat tops. You enter a vast hall, divided by rows of pillars, with an arched roof of stone, the whole length of the building, and far above your head. Around the entire compass of the house are numerous small appartments, each constituting a separate chapel, having its own altar, its peculiar pointings or statues-its appropriated worship, its particular object of invocation, and its own votaries. These are found in almost every church: I counted thirty one of them here: In some and before others, persons were engaged at their devotions. People came and went:and the area of the room towards the common entrance, was well supplied with plain rush-bottomed chairs. Upon the backs of these, some bowed themselves before a picture or altar; in others, persons more devout kneeled on one or both knees. At the same time many came and went, as mere spectators;-while not a few were engaged in the various employments, that conscience or convenience dictated the performance of in a church. Many were there, to beg the more conveniently, and more successfully; for it is surely not easy to steel the heart to objects of distress, when we are in the act of deploring our own weakness, and soliciting the fulfillment of our own desires. I believe the command of Chirst, to give to them that ask of us,is more literal than this accute generation

allows; and it is besides less painful to suppose we have done a well intentioned act, to one that did not deserve it, or that even made an ill use of it, than to pursue those investigations whose issue might ́exonerate us from benevolence-or to assume their general issue as true, and therefore steadily refuse all. I confess it did not awaken a pang of self-reproach, when I left the church, and found a gang of haridons in a high quarrel in the Parvis-to discover in the ringleader an old hag, I had given two sous to, an hour before. It is her fault if she obtains by false pretences, or applies to evil objects, the trifle which it were my shame, and my woe, if I withheld, to her undoing. And oh if we could realize the just proportion between what we receive, and what we either deserve or use aright,-we should scan with a less searching eye the sins, to which want is prone, and relieve its sorrows with a more open hand.

As we sauntered around the room, a decently dressed woman of the lower sort, came up in great anxiety to our carrier, and hastily asked a few questions; which were positively-but with some embarrassment, answered by two or three no's. "What did she want?" said I. "That I would act as a witness in a marriage ceremony". was the reply. "Call her back, we will do it with great pleasure,"and our party was conducted into one of the side chapels, in which all was in readiness-but at a stand for the want of the required number of witnesses. A priest stood on the step in front of the altar, dressed in white petticoats with long sleeves, and with a red coloured sort of yoke with long ends over his neck, and dropping down before. He held a small book in his hand; and at his right side stood a lad of ten or twelve years, dressed like himself except the yoke, and holding a small whisk, with a handle about a foot long the scanty hairs in the end of which was wet with holy water. In front were the parties,-and between them a pretty little boy two or three years old. It might have been the son of a former marriage; but perhaps they should have been sooner married. One of the greatest evils society has to bear from the church of Rome, lies in her assumption of a divine right to make such children legitimate,and the crimes that too often find an easy excuse in the tardy exercise of this strange claim. The ceremony commenced. A few questions were asked and answered: the hands of the parties united; a plate was handed to them in which two small silver coins were placed; a ring was taken from the finger of the man, and drawn on that of the woman: they both knelt down, and two men held a long piece of cloth over them so as to conceal both. This constituted their part of the ceremony. In the mean time, the priest read, ever and anon out of his little book-in a tone of voice so low as to be almost inaudible, so rapid as to be quite indistinct—and in a manner so incoherent by skipping about from passage to passage, that it was a mere impossibility to comprehend what he said. Sometimes he turned towards the altar; then again towards the people-and then towards the altar again. Several times he put his fingers to the hair of the whisk which the boy held by his side; and several times took it and made motions in the air, like a conjurer. Once he fingered the candles that sat behind him on the altar: but I did not see for what end. In the intervals a saturnine looking fellow, dressed in a

half military, half clerical costume who stood off-cried, amen. And after about thirty minutes dumb show of the kind I have describeda general movement showed that the affair was complete. If I had not known it was to be a marriage ceremony-I should have been exceedingly puzzled to tell what it was.-I should certainly never have guessed it to be a sacrament.

About one third of the church was separated from the remainder, by a screen of antique railing-behind which was the grand altar,and around the walls, successive chappels, separated, by another circular screen of solid construction, from the area in front of the altar. The paintings in these chapels are finer than those, in the chapels, in the more exposed part of the church: and those in the choir itself are of an order still superior. There are eight of them of large proportions, representing the birth of the Virgin, by Chompagne-the visitation of the Virgin by Louvenet,-the anunciation to the Virgin, by Halle, the assumption of the Virgin, by de la Hyre-the presentation of the Virgin by Chompagne &c. &c. In the religion of the modern Romans-the name of Juno, is changed to that of Mary,—but in other respects the worship of their ancestors, is marvelously preserved.

Our guide, a respectable looking female-suddenly stopped in front of the great altar, and pointing to a spot, indicated by a large star wrought of the costly marble of which the pavement is composed; on this spot said she was Napolean crowned Emperor of the French! And there-and there-pointing on either side, to the two thrones that termited the rows of richly carved stalls,-sat the venerable archbishop of Paris, then advanced to the extreme verge of life, and his holiness Pope Pius VII. who came to Paris to consecrate the new dynasty, which had already been baptized in the blood of Europe! This imposing ceremony took place on the 2nd of December, 1804. At that door entered the emperor-escorted by his enthusiastic guard-and accompanied by the unhappy Josephene. Here stood the Pope, the Cardinals, the great ecclesiasticks-the grand officers of state, and all the elite of France-to receive him, who came to offer up the revolution, upon the altar of his own intense egotism." "Almighty God" exclaimed the pope, as at the foot of the altar, he anointed with a triple unction the head and both the hands of Napoleon, "Thou, who didst establish Hazael, to be ruler of Syria; and Jehu, to be king of Israel-manifesting thy will to them, by the prophet Elias, thou who didst also shed the holy unction of kings, upon the head of Saul and of David -by the hands of thy prophet Samuel; bestow, by our hands, the treasures of thy grace and benediction, upon thy servant Napoleon, -who notwithstanding, our own personal unworthiness, we consecrate this day emperor in thy name!" Even in this scene, the conduct of the emperor, was perfectly characteristic. Before,-all sovreigns had been crowned. He crowned himself: taking the diadem in his hands and placing it upon his head; then placing another upon the head of Josephene.

There are few acts in the history of the human race,-more replete with overwhelming interest. My whole frame trembled with emotion, as the actors in it lived again before me; and my heart was wrung with anguish at the recollection of all that it crushed

and destroyed. This amazing man, had found a mighty nation torn with horrible passions, and on the brink of ruin: and he had tranquilized them-restored order and prosperity, and forced Europe, three times conquered to recognize, the revolution as a part of its existing system, Victory, peace, prosperity, had been assured to the republic, and still liberty was safe. What a moment in which to have made himself the impersonation of a glorious age! To have consecrated to history a second man, capable like Washington of forgetting himself, to secure to the world a just equality, a wise liberty, a highly developed civilization-a noble system of human happiness and greatness. The nation, adds one of their most philosophic historians-was in the hands of a great man, or of a despot. It depended on him, to preserve it free-or to enslave it. He prefered his own selfish ends. He loved himself more, than the hu

man race.

Full of these sad thoughts, we emerged from the choir, and encountered a procession in the great area not unsuited to them. From a side chapel near to that in which we had a short time before been witnesses of what this church calls the sacrament of marriage,then came forth a funeral procession. Here at least we are equal, -all alike nothing. And I stood reverently as they bore along their dead-respecting even the weaknesses of a sacred grief. There came first two officers, with their battoons;-then the body apparently of a man, borne by four others;-then a company of twenty or thirty other men;-and behind, the priest I had before seen marshalled by the same attendants. The hearse was set down not far fromthe door: the men formed two rows facing each other, before it-between which the priest passed slowly, muttering out of the same little book, the same incoherent gibberish-and in the same perfectly careless manner. As he approached the foot of the coffin, he took the same little whisk from the lad, at his elbow, and made the same motions in the air-as if scattering about holy water; and then retired. Each of the attendants, approached, and after all the company had successively made these signals, whether to heaven, to earth, to the dead, or to the spiritual world, I know not,-they took up the body,-and bore it from the church. It is one of the most extraordinary features of the papal system of worship-that its ministers profess to exercise a power over the destinies of the souls, which death itself does not weaken. And to make the folly consummate, they pretend to secure blessings in the dread and unknown future, to one man's disembodied spirit, by idolatrous worship of another man's decayed bones!

Some days after the one on which I first visited Notre Dame, I was in the neighbourhood of the Place de Greve, and came rather accidentally, upon the church of St. Gervais,-whose admirable architecture, is the more striking, as you would never expect to find such a work; in the midst of the filthy, narrow, and irregular streets which surround it. The churches of Paris are always open-always accessable to the public. I stepped into this out of a shower of rain, and select it almost at random, as one of the few, of which it is possible to make special mention. I have never been in one, in which there were not persons at worship,-persons to beg-persons at confession-officials,-and priests, There sat at the en

trance amongst others, a man, whose statue like stillness, attracted my notice. "I am blind; and the father of a family;" was the simple announcement, in his own tongue, written on a placard, affixed to his person. There was an air of reserve, almost of dignity, in this; coupled with a certain calm submission to inevitable destiny -and a sort of taking for granted, that the human heart was not all stone-and that the simple fact was enough. I have observed this sort of gracefulness, in the moral of things, very often amongst the French, and its effect is never lost on their quicksighted and impulsive countrymen. Indeed I have remarked as one of their most pleasing national traits, the readiness and the tenderness, with which the very humblest of the people-admit and contribute to the claims of wretchedness.

There was a large, and very handsome man, who was attendant at the place and ready to do its honours. He commenced with great gravity, and many marks of reverence to show us the chapels-the altars, the paintings, especially some statuary which he pronounced to be unrivalled in Paris, if not under the sun,-and some exceedingly curious painted glass in the windows, of great antiquity and beauty. We were shown a picture of God the Father; and passed on in silence. Presently another. Then one of the Holy Ghost. I said I was a Protestant-and disapproved of such attempts. His whole manner changed at once; and putting aside his saints and legends, and revolting representation of the Almighty, he took me to the opposite side of the church, and exhibited a painting by Albert Durei, which was the first of this great master I then had seen. The picture, represented in the centre the crucifixion; and in eight compartments, four on either side,-as many scenes immediately preceeding and following it. It had been painted nearly three hundred and forty years;-and yet it was as fresh, as if brought yesterday from the case. It is a most exquisite relic; and though he showed us, afterwards, a bone of St. Gervais the patron of the church, -another of St. Laurent, the patron of that quarter of Paris, and a third of St. Denis, the patron of all the clergy of the city,-all set in gold in my poor heretical estimation, that relic of Albert Durei, were worth all the bones of saints, be they of men, pigs, or fowls, (and which they are, I am not comparative anatomist enough to decide in a satisfactory manner)-which all the superstition of earth hath heaped together. I was also allowed, as I had before been at Notre Dame, as you can be any where for a franc, to see the rich and extensive wardrobe-which most of the churches possess. The possession of relics, is not only universal, but is considered indispensable; and amongst these, there is almost universally found, a portion of the true cross. This was shown to me on the present occasion-set in the silver crucifix-in the centre of which, in the midst of a golden sun,-the consecrated wafer is borne aloft on great occasions. Or in other words, if the priests tell true-here is a little circle about as large as a dollar, in the middle of which "the soul, body, blood and divinity of Jesus Christ"-is carried, and worshipped as God-under the species of a bit of bread;-in every particle of which, he exists whole, and entire!-Think of that, a hundred millions of Gods,-as there are that many particles of the bread-in a space as large as a dollar! And these all swallowed by a priest at