punishments, both from conscience and Divine justice, with which impurity, pride, and presumptuous inquiry into the awful secrets of Heaven are sure to be visited. The beautiful story of Cupid and Psyche owes its chief charm to this sort of "veiled meaning," and it has been my wish (however I may have failed in the attempt) to communicate to the following pages the same moral interest. Among other miraculous interpositions in favor of Mahomet, we find commemorated in the pages of the Koran the appearance of five thousand angels on his side at the battle of Bedr. The ancient Persians supposed that Ormuzd appointed thirty angels to preside successively over the days of the month, and twelve greater ones to assume the government of the months themselves; among whom Bahman (to whom Among the doctrines, or notions, derived by Ormuzd committed the custody of all animals, Plato from the East, one of the most natural and except man) was the greatest. Mihr, the angel sublime is that which inculcates the pre-existence of the 7th month, was also the spirit that watched of the soul, and its gradual descent into this dark over the affairs of friendship and love;-Chûr material world, from that region of spirit and light had the care of the disk of the sun;-Mah was which it is supposed to have once inhabited, and agent for the concerns of the moon ;-Isphanto which, after a long lapse of purification and dârmaz (whom Cazvin calls the Spirit of the trial, it will return. This belief, under various Earth) was the tutelar genius of good and virtuous symbolical forms, may be traced through almost women, &c. &c. &c. For all this the reader may all the Oriental theologies. The Chaldeans repre- consult the 19th and 20th chapters of Hyde de sent the Soul as originally endowed with wings, Relig. Vet. Persarum, where the names and attriwhich fall away when it sinks from its native butes of these daily and monthly angels are with element, and must be reproduced before it can much minuteness and erudition explained. It aphope to return. Some disciples of Zoroaster once pears, from the Zend-avesta, that the Persians had inquired of him, "How the wings of the Soul a certain office or prayer for every day of the might be made to grow again?"—" By sprinkling | month, (addressed to the particular angel who prethem," he replied, "with the Waters of Life."-sided over it,) which they called the Sirouzé. "But where are those Waters to be found?" they asked." In the Garden of God," replied Zoro aster. The mythology of the Persians has allegorized the same doctrine, in the history of those genii of light who strayed from their dwellings in the stars, and obscured their original nature by mixture with this material sphere; while the Egyptians, connecting it with the descent and ascent of the sun in the zodiac, considered Autumn as emblematic of the Soul's decline towɛ ds darkness, and the re-appearance of Spring as its return to life and light. The Celestial Hierarchy of the Syrians, as described by Kircher, appears to be the most regularly graduated of any of these systems. In the sphere of the Moon they placed the angels, in that of Mercury the archangels, Venus and the Sun contained the Principalities and the Powers ;-and so on to the summit of the planetary system, where, in the sphere of Saturn, the Thrones had their station. Above this was the habitation of the Cherubim in the sphere of the fixed stars; and still higher, in the region of those stars which are so distant as to be imperceptible, the Seraphim, we are told, the most perfect of all celestial crea The Sabeans also (as D'Herbelot tells us) had their classes of angels, to whom they prayed as mediators, or intercessors; and the Arabians worshipped female angels, whom they called Benad Hasche, or, Daughters of God. Besides the chief spirits of the Mahometan|tures, dwelt. heaven, such as Gabriel, the angel of Revelation, Israfil, by whom the last trumpet is to be sounded, and Azrael, the angel of death, there were also a number of subaltern intelligences, of which tradition has preserved the names, appointed to preside over the different stages, or ascents, into which the celestial world was supposed to be divided. Thus Kelail governs the fifth heaven; while Sadiel, the presiding spirit of the third, is also employed in steadying the motions of the earth, which would be in a constant state of agitation, if this angel did not keep his foot planted upon its orb. 1 "We adorned the lower heaven with lights, and placed therein a guard of angels."-Koran, chap. xli. 2 See D'Herbelot, passim. THE LOVES OF THE ANGELS. "Twas when the world was in its prime, Rejoicing, men and angels met1 "Twixt man and heav'n her curtain yet! When earth lay nearer to the skies Than in these days of crime and wo, Gazing upon this world below. Alas, that Passion should profane, Ev'n then, the morning of the earth! That, sadder still, the fatal stain Should fall on hearts of heav'nly birth— And that from Woman's love should fall So dark a stain, most sad of all! One ev'ning, in that primal hour, On a hill's side, where hung the ray Of sunset, bright'ning rill and bow'r, Three noble youths conversing lay; And, as they look'd, from time to time, To the far sky, where Daylight furl'd His radiant wing, their brows sublime Bespoke them of that distant world- Of faith and bliss, near ALLA stood, Like motes in sunshine, round the Lord, Of Heaven they spoke, and, still more oft, 1 The Mahometans believe, says D'Herbelot, that in that early period of the world, les hommes n'eurent qu'une seule religion, et furent souvent visités des Anges, qui leur donnoient la main." 2 "To which will be joined the sound of the bells hanging on the trees, which will be put in motion by the wind proceeding from the Throne, so often as the Blessed wish for music." See Sale's Koran, Prelim. Dissert The ancient Persians supposed that this Throne was placed in the Sun, and that through the stars were distributed the various classes of Angels that encircled it. Till, yielding gradual to the soft And balmy evening's influenceThe silent breathing of the flow'rs, The melting light that beam'd above, As on their first, fond, erring hours, Each told the story of his love, The First who spoke was one, with look The prints of earth most yieldingly ; Who, ev'n in heav'n, was not of those Nearest the Throne, but held a place Far off, among those shining rows That circle out through endless space, And o'er whose wings the light from Hir In Heaven's centre falls most dim. Still fair and glorious, he but shone And left their foot-prints as they pass'd Sighing, as back through ages flown, Like a tomb-searcher, Mem'ry ran, Lifting each shroud that Time had thrown O'er buried hopes, he thus began: FIRST ANGEL'S STORY. ""Twas in a land, that far away Into the golden orient lies, Where Nature knows not night's delay, but springs to meet her bridegroom, Day, Upon the threshold of the skies. One morn, on earthly mission sent,* And midway choosing where to light, The Basilidians supposed that there were three hundred and sixty-five orders of angels, "dont la perfection alloit en décroissant, à mesure qu'ils s'éloignoient de la première classe d'esprits placés dans le premier ciel." See Dupui Orig. des Cultes, tom. ii. p. 112. 4 It appears that, in most languages, the term employed for an angel means also a messenger. Firischteh, the Per sian word for angel, is derived (says D'Herbelot) from the verb Firischtin, to send. The Hebrew term, too, Melak has the same signification |