had been stolen away in the night by his disciples, for the linen, he supposes, could not have been taken from the body and head, in the manner in which it was found in the sepulchre, on account of its clinging so fast from the viscous nature of these drugs, had they been so foolish as to attempt it.

The modern Eastern method, the modern Egyptian method, of applying odours to the dead, certainly differs from that which was anciently made use of in that country. The present way in Egypt, according to Maillet," is to wash the body divers times with rosewater, which he elsewhere observes, is there much more fragrant than with us; they afterwards perfume it with incense, aloes, and a quantity of other odours, of which they are by no means sparing; they after this bury the body in a winding-sheet, made partly of silk, and partly of cotton, and moistened (as I imagine with some sweet-scented water, or liquid perfume, though Maillet only uses the simple term moistened); this. they cover with another cloth of unmixed cotton; to which they add one of the richest suits of clothes of the deceased. The expence, he says, on these occasions, is very great, though nothing like what the genuine embalmings of former times

cost.

The modern Egyptian way of embalming then, if it may be called by that name, differs very much from the ancient; whether the Jew

Lett. 10, p. 88.

ish method in the time of our LORD differed as much, or how far, I know not. To pass by the difference Dr. War! has remarked between their drugs, the Egypti ans using myrrh and cassia, and the Jews myrrh and aloes, which might be only in appear: ince, since more than two sorts might be used by both nations, though these only happened to be distinctly mentioned, it does not appear so plain to me as to the Doctor, that the Jews were not wont to embowel their dead in embalming. Their hope of a resurrection did not necessarily prevent this. And as all other nations seem to have embalmed exactly according to the Egyptian manner, the same causes that induced them to do so, probably occasioned the Jews not to vary from them in this respect. So the accurate editor of the Ruins of Palmyra tells us, they discovered that the inhabitants of that city used to embalm their dead; and that upon comparing the linen, the manner of swathing, the balsam, and other parts of the Mummies of Egypt, (in which country they had been a few months before,) with those of Palmyra, they found their method of embalming exactly the Zenobia, whose seat of government was Palmyra, was originally a native of Egypt, this writer observes; but then he remarks, that these bodies were embalmed before her time. So that passage which the Doctor cites from Tacitus, concerning Poppaa, the wife of Nero, supposes it was the common ancient custom to * P. 142.

same.

i P. 22.

k

fill the body with drugs, and not merely apply them externally, Corpus non igni abolitum, ut Romanus mos; sed Regum exterorum consuetudine DIFFERTUM odoribus conditur. i. e. "Her body was not consumed by fire according to the Roman manner, but was buried, after having been stuffed with odours, after the way of foreign princes;" not merely of the Egyptians, but of those that practised burying in general, it seems.

It does not however follow from hence, that our LORD was embowelled, though St. John says, he was buried with spices, as the manner of the Jews was to bury; for these words do not necessarily signify, that all was done that was wont to be done in those cases among the Jews. The contrary appears to be fact from the farther preparations the women made, who were not, I imagine, unacquainted with what had been done, though Dr. Ward supposes the contrary; since St. Luke expressly tells us, that the women, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how his body was laid.”.

If indeed this be admitted, the Doctor's thought concerning the difficulty of taking off the bandages, besmeared with very glutinous drugs, will appear to be ill-founded, for in that case the women could have done nothing more as to the embalming him. That thought indeed seems to have made all the impression on the Doctor's mind, that the force of no1 John xix. 40. Luke xxiii. 55.

velty, it might be expected, should give it; but aloes and myrrh do not appear to have that very glutinous quality the Doctor supposed, so a much more obvious account may be given of St. John's making mention of a circumstance about which the other Evangelists are silentHe appears to have published his history for the use of persons less acquainted with the customs of the East, than those for whose information the others immediately wrote. The Doctor himself has remarked, in the 32d Dissertation, that in giving an account of the circumstances of the death of our LORD, St. John has reckoned the hours after the manner of the Romans, whereas the other Evangelists speak according to the Jewish method of computation; the same reason that induced him to do that, naturally led him to say to those who were wont to burn their dead, that our LORD was buried with spices, which was in general the Jewish method of disposing of their dead, which he might very well do, though the straitness of the time did occasion some deviation from what they commonly practised.

The shortness of time, we may believe, prevented them also from swathing him with that accuracy and length of bandage they would otherwise have used: the Egyptians, we are told, have used above a thousand ells of filletting about a body, besides what was wrapped about the head. Thevenot found it so, he informs us, in a mummy which he examined. A Part 1, p. 137.

The Jews, it is reasonable to believe, swathed them in something of the same forn, which could not have been nicely performed in such a hurry as the disciples were then in, though not exactly after the Egyptian manner for the head not only of our LORD, but of Lazarus, was simply bound about with a napkin ; which Chardin tells us, in his MS. is used by the Mohammedans at this very time.

And as the Jewish manner of covering the head of a corpse, more resembled the present Eastern managements than the ancient Egyptian, perhaps the rest of their grave-clothes did so too. They now, Dr. Perry tells us, wrap up the body in two, three, or more different sorts of stuff, according to the circumstances of the deceased: if the Jews did so too, the spices those good women prepared, might be designed to be placed between the outer and inner wrappers; the ointment for the head.

What Joseph and Nicodemus did with the mixture of myrrh and aloes, does not appear. Dr. Lardner supposes they might form a bed of spices. But with respect to the quantity, which he tells us, from Bishop Kidder, a modern Jew has made an objection against the history of the New Testament, affirming that it was enough for two hundred dead bodies,

John xi. 44.

P P. 247.

9 Matt. xxvi. (7, 12,) intimates, that the anoi iting the head with ointment, was one thing attending as Jewish

burial.

Cred. of the Gosp. Hist. book 1. chap. 7. § 1;7.