THE DEATH OF THE CHRISTIAN. (From the German of Lavater.) DEATH suddenly presented himself before a Christian.

"Welcome! thou messenger of immortality; thrice welcome!" was the salutation of the good man.

"How is this," said Death,-"Son of sin, dost thou not fear my approach ?” "No: he who is a Christian indeed, may view thee undismayed."

"Canst thou behold me attended by sickness and disease,-canst thou observe the cold sweat distilling from my wings,without shuddering?"

"Even so," replied the believer in Jesus. "And, wherefore is it that thou tremblest not?"

"Because it is by them I am assured of thy speedy approach."

"And who art thou, O mortal? that my presence hath no power to terrify?"

"I am a Christian!" smiling with benignity on his stern visitor.

Death then breathed upon him,-and in an instant they both disappeared. A grave had opened beneath their feet; and I could observe something lying therein. I wept. Suddenly the sound of celestial voices attracted my attention, and, looking towards heaven, I saw the Christian in the clouds; his countenance was irradiated with the same smile that I had before observed upon it, and his hands were clasped together. Glittering angels then approached him, shouting, and the Christian shone resplendent as themselves. Again I wept. I now looked into the grave, and at once perceived what it contained ;-it was the Christian, having disrobed himself for his flight.

Preston Brook.

AUTUMN.

The withered frame-the ruin'd mind, The wreck by passion left behind; The shrivell'd scroll-the scatter'd leaf, Sear'd by the Autumn's blast of grief.

S. S.

NOTWITHSTANDING the great temporal preparations against winter, made by man, and even insects; yet it is to be lamented that the principal object is too much neg

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lected, namely, a preparation for death. We forget that life is soon to cease; and are too indifferent about providing for the winter of the grave. We perceive the blast of time quenching our glories; but we listen not to its warning voice, although we know not how soon this cumbrous coil of mortality may be laid in the dust.

Death is a grand secret; we know not beforehand when, how, or by what means, we, or our friends, shall be brought under its dominion; we know not what disease or disaster will be the door to let us into the road whence no one returns; we cannot describe how the knot between body and soul is untied; we know not how the spirit of man leaves the tenement of clay, and goes, "To be, we know not what; and live, we know not how."

Assured, therefore, that we must all die, sooner or later, it behoveth us to be ready, that our last end may be the best. Let us not delay one moment, for we know not how soon God may call us to give an account of our stewardship. Preston Brook.

RELIGIOUS PRODIGALITY.

S.S.

A religious prodigal may appear an anomalous term; but it is presumed a few considerations will convince all of its justice, as applied to many characters of the present age.

There are indeed but few, comparatively, among the class we would denominate as prodigal of wealth, since none can return more than they have received from the Parent of all good; nor can we ever do more than our duty requires, toward the amelioration of the distressed. But we

may be prodigal in the extent of our donations to public objects, so as to paralyze our exertions in private benevolence towards those with whose wants we are well acquainted, and who, in the course of providence, appear to require assistance at our hands. This prodigality either inflates the mind with public applause, or wounds our kindly feelings in denying aid to the wretched, and betrays us to neglect our duty to God and man.

He is a religious prodigal, whose ostentatious beneficence gilds the lists of subscriptions; but who, in a few years or months, informs the world that he has been lavish of his creditors' just demands. Such characters are dangerous to Christian society; they bring reproach upon the cross of Christ.

But the prodigals most baneful in their example, are those who engage in t

management or operation of divers societies which may be within their sphere, but all of which are, either virtually neglected, or the leisure and talent employed, when divided, becomes of little importance to any. Committees are swelled with many such persons, who are like weights rather than wheels in the machinery of communities. In vain do they lament they have no time to discharge this or that duty. The hours required to fulfil conscientiously the engagements of a local benevolent society, are absorbed in the attendance upon meetings for distant objects: and their zeal, time, and talents, evaporate in words; they are ever occupied in the employment of five talents; which do not produce the proper interest of one.

There are those, who, prodigal in the business of public associations, leave themselves no time to dispense religious knowledge in their own families; who, whilst they correct the vices of the depraved, expose their own children to the pestilential influence of neglect: who train the young of another flock, to the injury of their own lambs, whom the wolf ofttimes devours: who soothe the afflicted stranger, whilst their partners in life bear their domestic sorrows alone, or their relations languish in affliction.

There are others, who, in the cultivation of other men's hearts, neglect their own; such persons resemble those who helped to build Noah's ark, but entered not into it. These can descant upon the love of God, and talk of communion with him, but they have no time to enjoy these blessings. Frequent in public devotional engagements, the closet is neglected, and the sacrifice made of their own peace for the benefit of others. Such often fall away, because they have no root; always sowing, but they neither plough nor weed their own hardening hearts.

From the extent of these charges, some may be ready to ask, "Who then shall assist in forwarding the mighty objects which Missionary, Bible, and other societies, contemplate?" The answer is obvious. Let the love of Christ constrain us in every good work; let every man give according as he hath, let him that hath little give his mite; and he that hath much give plenteously: every man according as he purposeth in his heart;""always remembering we should provide things honest, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of all men.' Again, let us take heed that our good be not evil spoken of. Let us estimate our talents by a knowledge of ourselves. Judgment and ability, of

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moderate order, may be wearied and weakened by constant engagements, which might have proved a blessing, if well directed and concentrated.

We ought not to forget that the mountain torrent is noisy, and ever varying its course, whilst the little stream fertilizes the soil; that whilst meteors dance on the sky, the glimmering taper diffuses useful light; and that the glowing comet, in an extended course, is of little benefit to mankind, whilst the moon's calm light dispels the midnight darkness. E. J. J.

POVERTY AND MISFORTUNE FAVOURABLE TO LETTERS.

OF this truth the ingenious volumes of the Family Library, which detail the pursuit of knowledge under difficulties, afford numerous illustrations.-Erasmus, Kepler, and Schæffer laboured under the most disheartening poverty. Wolfgang Masculus sang ballads through the country, and begged his way from door to door, in order to purchase the means of commencing study; and William Postellus, on his road to Paris, was in such a destitute condition, that he assisted at harvest, in order to raise the means of proceeding; yet these two have obtained extraordinary characters as learned men. Sebastian Castalio, author of an elegant Latin version of the Scriptures, was for many years so poor that he laboured whole days in the fields, in order to obtain the means of subsistence. Pope Adrian VI. was the son of a humble bargeman, and, when at school, had such a scanty allowance as to be unable to purchase candles whereby to study at night.

Claude Lorraine was an apprentice to a pastry-cook. Salvator Rosa was, in the early part of his life, so poor, from the circumstance of his being obliged to support his mother and family, that, after finishing a picture, he was scarcely able to purchase the canvass for another. "It is related of the painter, Joseph Ribera, commonly called Lo Spagnoletto, that, after having for some time pursued his art at Rome in great indigence, he was patronized by one of the cardinals, who, giving him apartments in his palace, enabled him to live at his ease; but that, after a while, finding himself growing indolent amidst his new comforts and luxuries, he actually withdrew himself from their corrupting influence, and voluntarily returned to poverty and labour

thus exhibiting the choice of Hercules in real life, and verifying the beautiful fiction of Xenophon."

Miles Davies, a writer on antiquities, is said to have hawked his productions himself from door to door. The Rev. William Davy affords an extraordinary instance of perseverance. Wishing to publish his System of Divinity," but finding that it would cost two thousand pounds, a sum beyond his means, he actually turned printer himself, and, with a quantity of castoff type the, after thirteen years' of unremitting toil, finished the publication of his work, which extended to twenty-six vols. 8vo, of nearly 500 pages each.

Even exile and imprisonment, depressing as they are to the spirits, have not damped the literary and scientific ardour of some individuals. Ovid spent the last years of his life in banishment among barbarians, after being stripped of his possessions, yet

some of the finest of his works were written at that period. Boethius's "Consolations of Philosophy," a work deservedly admired, was written while its author was confined, and under sentence of death. Buchanan commenced his Latin version of the Psalms whilst lying in prison. Cervantes wrote his "Don Quixote," in confinement. Tasso produced several of his ablest pieces whilst shut up in a monastery, under the imputation of being deranged. The French translation of the Scriptures was commenced by the author, Le Maistre, in the Bastile. The celebrated Madame Roland, who perished during the Revolution, wrote her "Memoires" during the two months she spent in prison previous to her execution. Sir Walter Raleigh's extraordinary work, the "History of the World," was written in the Tower, whilst Sir Walter was expecting that death which he eventually received. Lady Jane Grey, and Queen Mary, of Scotland, both solaced the hours of their imprisonment by literary labours; and James the First of Scotland, whilst a captive in England, wrote his beautiful allegory, "The King's Quhair," which is considered the finest poem that had then been produced, with the exception of the poems of Chaucer.

THE DEAD SEA.

THE celebrated lake which occupies the site of Sodom and Gomorrah, is called in Scripture, the Dead Sea. Among the Greeks and Latins it is known by the name of Asphaltites, the Arabs denote it Bahar Loth, or sea of Lot. M. de Chateaubriand does not agree with those who conclude it to be the crater of a volcano: for, having seen Vesuvius, Solfatara, the Peake of the Azores, and the extinguished volcanoes of

Auvergne, he remarked in all of them the same characters: that is to say, mountains excavated in the form of a tunnel, lava and ashes, which exhibited incontestable proof of the agency of fire. The Salt Sea, on the contrary, is a lake of great length, curved like a bow, placed between two ranges of mountains, which have no mutual coherence of form, no similarity of composition. They do not meet at the two extremities of the lake; but while the one continues to bound the Valley of Jordan, and to run northward as far as Tiberias, the other stretches away to the south till it loses itself in the sands of Yemen. There are, it is true, hot springs, quantities of bitumen, sulphur, and asphaltus; but these of themselves are not sufficient to attest the previous existence of a volcano.-With respect indeed to the engulfed cities; if we adopt the idea of Michaelis and of Busching, physics may be admitted to explain the catastrophe, without offence to religion. According to their views, Sodom was built upon a mine of bitumen; a fact which is ascertained by the testimony of Moses and Josephus, who spake of the wells of naphtha in the valley of Siddim. Lightning kindled the combustible mass, and the guilty cities sank in the subterraneous conflagration. Malte Brun ingeniously suggested that Sodom and Gomorrah themselves may have been built of bituminous stones, and thus have been set in flames by the fire from heaven.

According to Strabo, there were thirteen towns swallowed up in the Lake Asphaltites; Stephen of Byzantium reckons eight; the book of Genesis, while it names five, as situated in the Vale of Siddim, relates the destruction of two only; four are mentioned in Deuteronomy, and five are mentioned by the author of Ecclesiasticus.

The marvellous properties usually assigned to the Dead Sea by the earlier travellers have vanished, upon a more rigid investigation. It is known that bodies sink, or float upon it, in proportion to their specific gravity, and that, although the water is so dense as to be favourable to swimmers, no security is to be found against the common accident of drowning. Josephus, indeed, asserts that Vespasian, in order to ascertain the fact now mentioned, commanded a number of his slaves to be bound hand and foot, and thrown into the deepest part of the lake; and that so far from any of them sinking, they all maintained their places on the surface until it pleased the Emperor to have them taken out.-But this anecdote, although perfectly consistent with truth, does not justify all the infe

rences which have been drawn from it. "Being willing to make an experiment," says Maundrell, "I went into it, and found that it bore up my body, in swimming, with an uncommon force; but as for that relation of some authors, that men wading into it were buoyed up to the top as soon as they got as deep as the middle, I found it, upon trial, not true.”—Edinburgh Cabinet Library.

HABITS AND CUSTOMS OF THE

ABYSSINIANS.

THEIR manner of dancing consists rather in the motion of the shoulders and head than in that of the legs or feet. When several dance at a time, they move round in a ring. The men jump a great height at times, while the women sink down by degrees, making motions with the head, shoulders, and breast, until they nearly squat on the ground. They afterwards spring up in a lively manner, and go round as before.

The Abyssinians, while they profess to be rigid followers of the Christian faith, are yet ignorant of the greater part of its precepts; which arises chiefly from the want of a good example being shewn to them by those of the superior class. The heads of their clergy are in general the greatest drinkers in the whole country, and at feasts, the quantity of raw meat which they consume, and the ravenous manner in which they devour it, exceeds all belief; indeed, they behave more like drunken beasts, when in company, than civilized beings.

Notwithstanding the libertine conduct of the Abyssinians, they strictly keep all their fasts, which are very numerous, and on those days never eat or drink till about three o'clock in the afternoon, which time they compute by measuring so many lengths of the foot given by the shade of the body on level ground. This, indeed, is the only way in which they keep time in Abyssinia. Their great Lent, which commences in February, lasts fifty-six days. Their years are called after the four Evangelists-that of John is the leapyear. They reckon the number of years from the creation of the world to the birth of Christ, five thousand five hundred; and from the birth of Christ to the present time, one thousand eight hundred and five; the latter being about nine years short of our time. The administering of the holy sacrament is quite a public ceremony. After receiving it, they place their hands to their mouths, and go their way; nor will they on any consideration spit that day, even if a fly by chance be drawn into the mouth by their breath, which at other times would occasion them to vomit, as they detest a fly; and

many will not even eat or drink what a fly has been found in.

On passing a church mounted, they alight from their horse or mule, and kiss the gateway or tree in front, according to the distance they are at when passing; and if at a distance, they take up a stone, and throw it upon a heap, which is always found on the road opposite to the church. In Abyssinia, a traveller, who sees in the wildest deserts large piles of stones, might be led to attribute the custom to the same motive which occasions similar piles to be found in Arabia, where some one has been killed and buried, and all who knew him, as they pass, throw a stone on his grave; but this is not the case here, those stones being thrown there by Christians, who know that the nearest church lies opposite to the spot: and on this account an Abyssinian traveller, when he sees such a pile of stones, knows that he is opposite to a church, and, in consequence, kisses the pile, and adds another stone to the heap. The priests are numerous beyond belief.

There are priests and deacons, who go about to the different towns, or residences of chiefs, where they find employment in teaching children to read. Their school is held generally in a churchyard or in some open place near it, sometimes before the residence of the master, and in that case, during the rains, they are all crowded up in a small dark hut, learning prayers by word of mouth from the master, instead of from a book. When a boy is somewhat advanced in learning, he is made to teach the younger ones. However few the scholars, the master has in general great trouble with them, and, in addition to the ordinary punishments, numbers are constantly obliged to be kept in irons. The common way of punishing scholars is as follows: the schoolmaster stands over them with a wax taper, which cuts as severely as a whip, while five or six boys pinch the offender's legs and thighs; and, if they spare him, the master gives them a stroke with the taper; but the correction considered most effective for these young Abyssinian rogues, is that of having irons put upon their legs for many months together, which, in one instance I knew, proved fatal. It was a grown Agow boy, about thirteen years of age, who had more than once contrived to get his irons off, and desert from the school; for which the master, by desire of the parents, put so heavy a pair of irons upon his ankles, that he found it impossible to get them off: and this enraged him so much, that he drew his large knife, cut his own throat, and soon afterwards expired.

Funeral Ceremonies.-The priests came, and the customary prayers were read, and my poor child was carried away to be buried, his mother following in a distracted manner. After the funeral, the people returned to my house, and, when they had cried for a half an hour, I begged they would leave off, and let me have a little rest, as I found myself unwell. They complied, and left me with only a few friends; but in a few minutes, the people of Antalo, my acquaintances, hearing of my misfortunes, came flocking, and began their cry; and I was obliged to sit and hear the name of my dead boy repeated a thousand times, with cries that are inexpressible, whether feigned or real. Though no one had so much reason to lament as myself, I could never have shown my grief in so affected a manner, though my heart felt much more.

Before the cry was over, the people with devves were standing in crowds about my house, striving who should get in first; and the door was entirely stopped up, till at last my people were obliged to keep the entrance clear by force, and let only one at a time into the house. Some brought twenty or thirty cakes of bread, some a jar of maze, some cooked victuals, fowls and bread, some a sheep, &c.; and in this manner I had my house filled so full, that I was obliged to go out into the yard until things were put in order, and supper was ready. The headpriest came with a jar of maze and a cow. What neighbours and acquaintances bring in the manner above mentioned, is called devves. The bringers are all invited to eat with you; they talk and tell stories, to divert your thoughts from the sorrowful subject; they force you to drink a great deal; but I remarked, that, at these cries, when the relatives of the deceased become a little tranquil in their minds, some old woman, or some person who can find no one to talk to, will make a dismal cry, saying, "Oh, what a fine child! and is he already forgotten?" This puts the company into confusion, and all join in the cry, which perhaps will last half an hour, during which the servants and common people standing about will drink out all the maze, and when well drunk, will form themselves into a gang at the door, and begin their cry; and if their masters want another jar of maze to drink, they must pour it out themselves, their servants being so drunk that they cannot stand. In this manner they pass away a day, without taking rest.

I must say, however, that the first part of the funeral is very affecting: and the only fault I can find is, that they bury the dead the instant they expire. If a grown 2D. SERIES, NO. 24.-VOL. II.

person of either sex, or a priest, is by them when they expire, the moment the breath departs, the cries and shouts which have been kept up for hours before, are recommenced with fury; the priests read prayers of forgiveness while the body is washed, and the hands put across one another upon the lower part of the belly, and tied to keep them in that position, the jaws tied as close as possible, the eyes closed, the two great toes tied together, and the body is wrapped in a clean cloth and sewed up, after which the skin called meet, the only bed an Abyssinian has to lie upon, is tied over the cloth, and the corpse laid upon a couch and carried to the church, the bearers walking at a slow pace. According to the distance of the house from the church, the whole route is divided into seven equal parts; and when they come to the end of every seventh part, the corpse is set down, and prayers of forgiveness offered to the Supreme Being for the deceased. Every neighbour helps to dig the grave, bringing his own materials for the purpose, and all try to outwork one another. Indeed, when a stranger happens to die where he has no acquaintances, numbers always flock to assist in burying him; and many of the townspeople will keep an hour's cry, as if they had been related.

There is no expense for burying, every one assisting his neighbour, as I have above mentioned. But the priests demand an exorbitant sum, from those who have property, for prayers of forgiveness; and I have seen two priests quarrelling over the cloth of a poor dead woman, the only good article she had left. If a man dies and leaves a wife and child, the poor woman is drained of the last article of value she possesses, to purchase meat and drink for those priests, for six months after her misfortune, otherwise they would not bestow a prayer upon her husband, which would disgrace her and render her name odious amongst the populace.

In this manner I have known many families ruined. An Agow servant of Mr. Coffin's, who had been left behind with me on account of ill health, died at Chelicut where he had formerly taken a wife; and the little wages he had saved had enabled him and his wife to keep a yoke of oxen, she having a piece of land of her own. Knowing the man to be very poor, and the great regard he had for his master, I was induced to give a fat cow and a jar of maze to the priests, to pray for the poor man's soul. This they took, and the poor woman made what corn she had into bread and beer for them; after which they refused to keep their weekly fettart (prayers of forgive