Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 354, April 1845

"In the first few lines of the first table it appears, that, although these divisions generally include perfect syllables and words, yet the same words are differently divided. In the fifth line, the second division contains JUBEBATREBUMPERACNE, and in the fourth division PERAKNE stands alone. The first division of this fifth line contains SAKRE: – in the next line it is worded thus, UNUERIETUSAKRE; this same variation of division pervades all the tables, and indeed almost every line of each table; the same may be observed on the Perugian inscription. The hypercriticism of the learned committee was therefore altogether erroneous, and their observations not borne out.[9 - It appears that the Royal Irish Academy had refused to publish these speculations in its Transactions. We are surprised they should have admitted some others of the same stamp, to which reference is made further on.] These marks are evidently not intended as divisions of words, but of sentences, and they are not sufficiently precise even in that respect to constitute an accurate guide. The syllabic division, however, is governed by rule, is precise, uniform, fixed, and consistent, and may therefore be acted on with some degree of certainty. Instances occur where three or four consonants follow each other, and vowels are altogether omitted; but a little exertion of sagacity, after some practice and study, enables us to judge of this and supply the omissions." – (Vol. i. p. 369.)

And again, in the passage referred to at p. 53,

"Whether I was arbitrary and unauthorized in the division of the words, will now appear by comparison, as the columns stand in juxtaposition, and all are able to judge. The division is merely made into syllables, which, so far from being an unnatural or arbitrary division, is the only division which could be reasonably and fairly adopted."

That is to say Hibernicè, or rather Bethamicè—The ti fis e on is mear i lu om a do an do is i la bil se i i ac is o bar bro om be en go (⁂ we only "add a letter here and there in the Irish, when, by the genius and character of that language, it is justifiable, as when the addition of a vowel is required to make sense, and when in the original the sound does not require it to be explained,") an en na tur al ur ar bi tre re ti fis i en is the an lu ti fis si an i i ac co al do be re as a ra be lu an do fa i ar lu a taob tuait.

But are these singular-looking syllables Irish? They certainly are neither sense nor grammar; but we take them all as they appear, with their alleged meanings in English, from that copious store of ungrammatical nonsense called Irish, collected in those pretended versions of the tables of Gubbio; and the reader has already seen what a characteristic jargon they make when rendered by their English equivalents.

His fatuity and presumption appear almost incredible. Knowing but a single Etruscan word, and that a word of two syllables, and finding it, as he alleges, identical with an Irish word also of two syllables, he concludes that the Etruscan and Irish languages are the same, and both monosyllabic. Had he known all that men of ordinary learning know upon the subject, he would have known that of the remaining two or three-and-thirty ascertained Etruscan words, some are of two – some of three – some of four syllables – but not one of them all a monosyllable. Yet thus ignorant even of the commonest rudiments of learning on his subject, he takes it upon him to talk of men of real learning in the following strain —

"That the language of Etruria has hitherto defied the laborious investigations of the learned of Italy, is now on all hands admitted. Passavi, Gori, and Landsi, have done something to obscure, but little if any thing towards its elucidation. Nor have the German investigators been more successful. Dr Lepsius has lately given an account of the Eugubian tables, and Dr Grotefend a work on the rudiments of the Umbrian tongue, and still the subject is as much at sea as ever. These profound scholars have made no real impression – no light has been elicited – the meaning of a single word has not been obtained with any certainty. The solemn, learned, trifling, and absurd speculations of Passavi, Gori, and Landsi, and their followers, are now treated with deserved contempt. This is an age of critical enquiry; commonplace twaddling, inane generalities, and magniloquent essays and lectures, even if delivered by professors who enjoy the happiness of presiding over Roman colleges, only excite derision. Learned savans must now put forth reasonable and intelligible postulates, and opinions must be supported by facts, or they will only expose themselves to deserved contempt." – (Vol. i. p. 22.)

Swift himself could not hit the style of the literary quack more perfectly. "I have considered the gross abuse of astrology in this kingdom," says Mr Bickerstaff, "and upon debating the matter with myself, I could not possibly lay the fault upon the art, but upon those gross impostors who have set up to be the artists. I know several learned men have contended that the whole is a cheat; and whoever hath not bent his studies that way, may be excused for thinking so, when he sees in how wretched a manner that noble art is treated by a few mean illiterate traders between us and the stars; who import a yearly stock of nonsense, lies, folly, and impertinence, which they offer to the world as genuine from the planets, though they descend from no greater height than their own brains. I intend in a short time to publish a large and rational defence of this art; and therefore shall say no more in its justification at present." But here, indeed, the comparison falls; for while Bickerstaff postpones his proofs for another occasion, Betham proudly displays his "reasonable and intelligible postulate," in his one fact, that the dissyllable Aesar is God alike in Etruscan and in Irish. Whence he concludes that Etruscan and Irish are, therefore, the same language, and that both consist of words of one syllable each. "The discovery," he says, (Vol. ii. page 286,) "if 'wonderful' was also accidental, at least the first clue to it was the solitary fact mentioned in Vol. i. p. 33, of the passage in Suetonius' life of Augustus, where Aesar is said to mean, in the Etruscan language, God. So small a spark lighted up the large fire." We are irresistibly reminded of Goropius and his "consequenter fatendum est antiquissimâ hoc Psammetichi sententiâ."

The translation of the Eugubian tablets, however, is but a part of the huge mass of absurdity piled up on these two little syllables, Ae-sar. There is a second volume, in which all the topographical extravagances of Scrieck are played over again, præconis ad fastidium, with this difference, however, that where Scrieck, in his interpretations, gave genuine Dutch, Betham, in his, gives spurious Irish; for he owns himself, that "if a sentence be formed of these obsolete monosyllabic words, the translation in English making good sense, the original, if read to the best Irish scholar of the day, will appear to him an unknown tongue." He begins first with Sanconiathan, which he makes the name of the book, not of the author, sean cead na than; i. e. "the old beginning of time," when the gods spoke in monosyllabic Irish, and called chaos cead-os, "the first intelligence." And here it must be admitted that the Dutchmen are outdone: for neither Becan nor Scrieck went above Adam. But Betham is as much at home on Olympus as either of the Dutchmen was in Paradise; and with the aid of his monosyllabic glossary, transmutes the celestials into Teagues and Oonahs as fast as his sybilline syllables can be put together. Apollo is ab ol lo, "the mighty lord of the waters;" (this is hardly as good as the off-hole-loose of Goropius:) Minerva is Ma na er ar fad, (a terribly long recipe for a name this,) or "the good, the illustrious guiding wisdom." Hermes is tur-mees, "the messenger of the wind." Hercules is er cu lais, "the illustrious hero of light;" but he seems to be sadly at sea for a derivation for Neptune, whom he is obliged to turn into a Tyrrhenian catamaran or Irish currow, Naebh tonn "the ship of the sea." Jupiter (not being an Etruscan, he is not here allowed the pas) iudh bit er, "day being great," (which is a very dark saying.) Bacchus, bac aois, "the sustainer of time." Mercury, meer cu re, "the swift champion of the moon" – really this is mere lunacy. Any one might, with equal plausibility, derive the whole Pantheon from the English, as Apollo, "aye follow," because day always follows night, and Apollo always followed pretty girls, Daphne in particular; Mercury, "mirk hurry," because Mercury hurried the ghosts down through the mirk or murky darkness to the Styx. Hercules, "he reckless," because Hercules was a great daredevil. Venus, "vain is," because a pretty woman is too often vain of her good looks. Juno, "do now," because people were in the habit of making their requests to her, or, perhaps, because Jupiter used to say so when he wished her to give him a kiss. Jupiter, "stupider," because it was natural that Juno should say he was the stupider of the two when they happened to differ; or, pace viri tanti, "you pitier," when poor mortals raised their sorrowful supplications to him.

Scrieck's foundation for all his extravagant topographical derivations was the passage from Plato. Doctor Johnson seems to have been the Plato of these new etymological rambles; but we apprehend that neither the Greek nor the British philosopher would be much edified by the philological excursions of the Irish disciple. Nothing can be more perfect in its way than the dogmatic audacity with which he assigns his derivations; it is in the true vein of Bickerstaff, and a model to quacks of all classes.

"Before we commence our examination into the geographical divisions of Italy, it is necessary to say something of that portion of the world with which the Phœnicians became for the first time acquainted after their settlements in Syria, since called Europe, by an accident as trivial and unlikely to happen as that by which the new world in modern times was denominated America, that is, by a blunder of the Greeks. The fable of the rape of Europa, &c., was a mere national allegory, of which the following is the substance. When the Phœnician Homeritæ had discovered the Mediterranean, &c. – they sent out vessels to explore it, e, 'it,' u, 'from,' ro, 'to go,' ba, 'was,' tur, 'voyage,' ros, 'to the promontory;' I. E. it was to go from a voyage to (Italy) the promontory. This was, as usual of the Greeks taking sound for sense, made into a lady and a bull—tur ros must be the Greek ταῦρος, and the Lady Europa was to ride the bull to Crete, which was one of the first discoveries and settlements. Of the children or results, Minos has been already explained as mian, 'minis,' nos, 'knowledge,' or 'the art of mining.' Rhadamanthus means nothing more than that the voyage to Crete was the first great result of discoveries on this sea: ra, 'going,' ad, 'illustrious,' am, 'great sea,' en, 'the,' tus, 'first.' So simple is the explanation! – (Vol. ii. p. 244.)

Scrieck had some remains of the modesty of learning, which prevent his becoming a complete master of this style. The Peloponnesus might perhaps possibly, he owned, have been derived from Pelops; though 'twas more likely it should come from Pfel-op-on, &c. &c. That admission was ill-judged: he ought to have denied that Pelops ever existed, and laughed at the blundering Greeks. But the Irishman is a deacon of his craft, and settles the point like an adept. "Peloponnesus, according to the Greek, the island of Pelops. But the name was of much greater antiquity than Greek civilization, and was, like all others, given by the Phœnicians. Pelops was an imaginary character. The meaning of the word is, the promontory of the courteous people; bel, 'mouth,' aiobh, 'courteous,' a, 'the', neas, 'promontory,' aos, 'community, race of people.'" – (Vol. ii. p. 254.)

When Partridge, the almanack-maker, had overlived the fatal day assigned for his decease by Bickerstaff, he intimated as much to his friends and the public, assuring them that he was not only then alive, but had also been alive on the very 29th March, when the wise astrologer had foretold he should die.

"Now," says Bickerstaff in reply, "I will plainly prove him to be dead out of his own almanack for this year, and from the very passage which he produceth to make us think him alive. He says, he is not only now alive, but was alive upon that very 29th of March which I foretold he should die on; by this he declares his opinion that a man may be alive now who was not alive a twelvemonth ago. And, indeed, there lies the sophistry of his argument. He dares not assert that he was alive ever since that 29th of March, but that he is now alive, and was so on that day. I grant the latter, for he did not die till night, as appears by the printed account of his death in a letter to a lord, and whether he since revived I leave the world to judge. This, indeed, is perfect cavilling; and I am ashamed to dwell any longer upon it."

So if the shade of Pelops will receive our counsel, we advise him to abstain from vouching any of the family of Tantalus to testify to the reality of his existence; for he has to deal with a Bickerstaff, by whom it has been demonstrated that Tantalus is nothing but tain tal ais, "water receding backwards," or an incarnation of those fabulous times when water was supposed to run uphill, whence it appears that the whole race of Atreus is a mere series of non-existences. It is true we take this latter derivation from an extract from another of this judicious discriminator's labours, in the Transactions of his Academy, where, among other etymological curiosities, we have that very Irish youth Narcissus, a beautiful youth, who, seeing his own image reflected in a stream, became enamoured of it, thinking it the nymph of the water. Naobh ceas as– "the sight of a nymph in the stream." Pythia, "the priestess of Apollo at Delphos. She always delivered her oracles in hexameter verses, and with musical intonation —pitead, 'music,' from whence the name."[10 - "Now, as Serapio was about to have added something of the same nature, the stranger, taking the words out of his mouth – I am wonderfully pleased, said he, to hear discourses upon such subjects as these; but am constrained to claim your first promise, to tell the reason wherefore now the Pythian prophetess no longer delivers her oracles in poetic numbers and measures. Upon which Theo interposing – It cannot be denied, said he, but that there have been great changes and innovations in reference to poetry and the sciences, yet it is as certain that from all antiquity oracles have been delivered in prose. For we find in Thucydides that the Lacedæmonians, desirous to know the issue of the war then entered into against the Athenians, were answered in prose." * * * "And so of Dinomenes the Sicilian, Procles, tyrant of Epidaurus and Timarchus; and, which is more, the oracular answers, according to which Lycurgus conferred the form of the Lacedæmonian commonwealth, were also so given." —Plutarch. Moral.]

Sanconiathon, no longer the "old beginning of time," appears here as san, "holy," con, "understanding, sense, or wise men," niod, "real," tain, "of the country" – "the sacred writer or wise recorder of the events of his country." Pygmalion, big, "little," mallein, "mule," the little mule, or person of a low stature and obstinate disposition. This is hardly so good as Swift's pigmy lion. "Pasiphæ, ba sabas, 'the propensity, fancy, or disposition of a cow;' and, proh pudor, Venus, 'herself,' bhean, 'the woman,' aois, 'of the community' – pronounced vanus, 'the – or woman of the town!'"

But to come back to the geographical division of the Levant, to which e u ro ba tur ros, which the foolish Greeks construed Europa and the bull, were only preparatory, we have another luculent example of the Bickerstaff style in Gallia Togata.

"It is said the country was called Togata by the Romans, because they wore the Roman toga or gown. This seems doubtful, for when a country became a Roman province, the same reason for the name should apply universally. We must therefore seek a more satisfactory derivation for that name, to be found in the circumstances of the country. Gallia Togata consists of the plain country intersected by the Po and its numerous tributaries, and surrounded on the north and west by the high ranges of the Alps, on the south by the Apennines, and on the east by the Adriatic. It is, perhaps, the best-watered and most fertile country in Europe, enjoying a delightful climate. Its name, Togata, says all this, togh, it is the chosen land, or, to use an English idiom, choice land, the most desirable and delightful country; togh a ta, literally the chosen spot or place. Sound, not sense, suggested the Roman derivation."

Of course Gallia Braccata and Gallia Comata had just as little to say to "long hair," or a "pair of breeches," as Gallia Togata to a Roman gown, and the application of gens togata to the inhabitants of Italy, as contradistinguished from the transalpine and other provinces, was altogether a blunder of the ancients.

"We have before us again Creta, the largest of the Greek islands. Its name is derived by some from the Curetes, who are said to have been its first inhabitants; by others from the nymph Crete, daughter of Hesperus; and by others from Creos, a son of Jupiter, and the nymph Idœa. These are private conceits. It derives its name from its shape and external appearance from the sea; and had such an island been discovered in modern times by English navigators, it would have been called the ridge island, the precise meaning of its name in Celtic creit a, "the ridge," putting the article last, in conformity to idiom."

Cythera, "one of the Ionian Islands. Like all the other names for which the Greeks had no known origin, they derived it from an individual called Cytherus. It is subject to heavy showers, from which the name cith, showers, er, great, a, the, – that is, the island of heavy showers."

Zacynthus. – "A small island to the south of Cephalonia, (ce fal ia; i. e. the fruitful plains country.) The Greeks say the island was named from a companion of Hercules, who, dying from the bite of a serpent, was buried there. It was so called, because a strong current is there first felt by the mariner coming from the east, za cing thus, current, strong, first."

We really find some difficulty in believing that it is not Swift's Essay on the Antiquity of the English Language that we have before us.

"My present attempt is to assert the antiquity of our English tongue, which, as I shall undertake to prove by invincible arguments, hath varied very little for these two thousand six hundred and thirty-four years past. And my proof shall be drawn from etymology, wherein I shall use my matter much better than Skinner, Verstegan, Cambden, and many other superficial pretenders have done; for I will put no force upon the words, nor desire any more favour than to allow for the usual accidents of composition, or the avoiding a cacophonia.

"I will begin with the Grecians, among whom the most ancient are the Greek leaders on both sides at the siege of Troy. For it is plain, from Homer, that the Trojans spoke Greek, as well as the Grecians. Of these latter Achilles was the most valiant. This hero was of a restless, unquiet nature, and therefore, as Guy of Warwick was called a Kill-care, and another terrible man a Kill-Devil, so this general was called a Kill-Ease, or destroyer of ease, and at length by corruption Achilles.

"Hector, on the other side, was the bravest among the Trojans. He had destroyed so many of the Greeks by hacking and tearing them, that his soldiers, when they saw him fighting, would cry out, 'Now the enemy will be hackt– now he will be tore.' At last, by putting both words together, the appellation was given to their leader under the name of Hack-tore, and, for the more commodious sounding, Hector.

"The next I shall mention is Andromache, the famous wife of Hector. Her father was a Scottish gentleman of a noble family still subsisting in that ancient kingdom; but being a foreigner in Troy, to which city he led some of his countrymen in the defence of Priam, as Dictys Cretensis learnedly observes, Hector fell in love with his daughter, and the father's name was Andrew Mackay. The young lady was called by the same name, only a little softened to the Greek accent."

And now, and as no Irish antiquary can be well supposed to write a complete book without giving his own theory of the round towers of that country, we come to the chapter on these singular structures, in which, of course, all former enquirers are proved to have been egregiously wrong, and a new theory established on incontrovertible evidence; viz. that the round towers were monuments erected over different incarnations of the god Buddho. As usual, there is the alleged mistake of sound for sense to account for the reason why their common appellation of clogteach, or "bell house," should not truly express their use.

"I shall remark upon a vulgar error which has had great currency among Irish antiquarians, who have asserted that they were called clogteach, 'steeples, belfries.' Bells are of comparatively recent introduction into Ireland, and clock, from which the word has evidently been derived, still more modern. The blunder has arisen from ignorance of the language. I have a memorandum in an Irish MS., that they were called by the people leactaidh, that is, monuments of the dead, the sound of which has been mistaken by those who but imperfectly knew the language. Many writers have been mistaken by this."

The memorandum in the Irish MS. looks very like Bickerstaff's Letter to a Lord. We could wager our crutch against the baton of the Ulster king, that the memorandum is in his own or his scribe's handwriting, and the language in which it is imagined, a variety of that new dialect in which Mr Silk Buckingham declares that his Irish friends converse with the Phœnician aborigines of Mount Atlas. But the proof of the pudding is the eating of it, and it seems that under one of the towers they have found Buddho himself, body and bones, which puts the matter beyond controversy; for if Buddho be buried under the tower, the tower itself must needs be Buddho's monument. At p. 210, (Vol. ii.,) we have a representation of the Indian divinity (how comes it that Buddho is not made an Etruscan?) lying buried in the basement of the tower at a place called Ardmore. There seems to be no question that a skeleton was got in the bottom of this tower, and another in another; and the discoverers of the fact deserve credit for their addition to the slight stock of knowledge that the Irish antiquarians seem to possess of those which are perhaps the most singular monuments in their country; but that the bones are those of a Buddho! really this exceeds our largest estimate of human fatuity.

But for the communications announcing these discoveries, the two volumes would be altogether destitute of a single fact, or even useful hint, bearing on the diversified subjects which their prodigiously ignorant and audacious author has presumed to handle. How far the fact of these skeletons being found in such a situation, may affect the rational investigation of the question, we do not pretend to judge. We would merely observe, that human interments are found under most ecclesiastical foundations, and that their occurrence under the "turres ecclesiasticæ" of Cambrensis, seems at present no more wonderful than their occurrence in the vaults of an ordinary church.

But we really were surprised, after our long familiarity with "the holy illustrious guiding one of the sea" – "the mighty lord of the waters" – "the swift champion of the moon," and the other moonstruck pseudo deities of the Eugubian tables, to find the chief place and honour in the island of their own discovery and adoption taken from them, and bestowed on the Indian Buddho. The "swift champion of the moon" seems to have been sensible of the affront, and to have made his indignation perceptible in the suggestion of an argument that can hardly have descended from any but the lunar sphere; viz. that because the Buddhists of the east raise monumental dagobas over the relics of their deity, and the Irish round towers, as is alleged, (by a nameless interpolation in a nameless Irish MS.,) have been called by a name arguing monumental purposes, that therefore the Irish towers are dagobas, and any bones that may be found in or about their foundations are relics of Buddho. The dagobas of Ceylon and India are buildings of a totally different character from these towers; they do strongly resemble the pyramidal structures of Yucatan, but bear not the remotest likeness to any round tower either in Ireland or elsewhere. Such facts might furnish grounds for arguing an identity between Buddho and Quaccalcoatle, (and such an identity appears by no means improbable;) but thence to attempt the deduction of any argument applicable to the round towers in Ireland or Great Britain, only shows the illogical constitution of the arguer's mind.

We have given the book and the subject more space than we intended, and certainly much more than the former, by itself, is worth; but the subject is one that, whether magnified into an undue importance by having been repeatedly treated by men of note and learning or not, does, in the present state of European literature, stand high among the loftiest marks aimed at by human intellect; and any one singling himself from the crowd of lookers-on, and addressing himself to hit it, makes himself, for the moment, the observed of the whole learned world, and by his success or his failure acquires honour, or brings down reproach upon his country. We cannot permit British literature to be scandalized by the failure of one from our ranks who is manifestly inadequate to the task even of handling his piece, much less of bringing down the popinjay, without condemning the rashness of the attempt, and exonerating ourselves from any charge of participating in it.

SUSPIRIA DE PROFUNDIS: BEING A SEQUEL TO THE CONFESSIONS OF AN ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER

Part I. – (Continued from last Number.)

"But you forgot her," says the Cynic; "you happened one day to forget this sister of yours?" – Why not? To cite the beautiful words of Wallenstein,

"What pang
Is permanent with man? From the highest
As from the vilest thing of every day
He learns to wean himself. For the strong hours
Conquer him."[11 - Death of Wallenstein, Act v. Scene 1, (Coleridge's Translation,) relating to his remembrances of the younger Piccolomini.]

Yes, there lies the fountain of human oblivions. It is TIME, the great conqueror, it is the "strong hours" whose batteries storm every passion of men. For, in the fine expression of Schiller, "Was verschmerzte nicht der mensch?" What sorrow is it in man that will not finally fret itself to sleep? Conquering, at last, gates of brass, or pyramids of granite, why should it be a marvel to us, or a triumph to Time, that he is able to conquer a frail human heart?

However, for this once my Cynic must submit to be told – that he is wrong. Doubtless, it is presumption in me to suggest that his sneers can ever go awry, any more than the shafts of Apollo. But still, however impossible such a thing is, in this one case it happens that they have. And when it happens that they do not, I will tell you, reader, why in my opinion it is; and you will see that it warrants no exultation in the Cynic. Repeatedly I have heard a mother reproaching herself, when the birthday revolved of the little daughter whom so suddenly she had lost, with her own insensibility that could so soon need a remembrancer of the day. But, besides, that the majority of people in this world (as being people called to labour) have no time left for cherishing grief by solitude and meditation, always it is proper to ask whether the memory of the lost person were chiefly dependent upon a visual image. No death is usually half so affecting as the death of a young child from two to five years old.

But yet for the same reason which makes the grief more exquisite, generally for such a loss it is likely to be more perishable. Wherever the image, visually or audibly, of the lost person is more essential to the life of the grief, there the grief will be more transitory.

Faces begin soon (in Shakspeare's fine expression) to "dislimn: " features fluctuate: combinations of feature unsettle. Even the expression becomes a mere idea that you can describe to another, but not an image that you can reproduce for yourself. Therefore it is that the faces of infants, though they are divine as flowers in a savanna of Texas, or as the carolling of birds in a forest, are, like flowers in Texas, and the carolling of birds in a forest, soon overtaken by the pursuing darkness that swallows up all things human. All glories of flesh vanish; and this, the glory of infantine beauty seen in the mirror of the memory, soonest of all. But when the departed person worked upon yourself by powers that were intellectual and moral – powers in the flesh, though not of the flesh – the memorials in your own heart become more steadfast, if less affecting at the first. Now, in my sister were combined for me both graces – the graces of childhood, and the graces of expanding thought. Besides that, as regards merely the personal image, always the smooth rotundity of baby features must vanish sooner, as being less individual than the features in a child of eight, touched with a pensive tenderness, and exalted into a characteristic expression by a premature intellect.

Rarely do things perish from my memory that are worth remembering. Rubbish dies instantly. Hence it happens that passages in Latin or English poets which I never could have read but once, (and that thirty years ago,) often begin to blossom anew when I am lying awake, unable to sleep. I become a distinguished compositor in the darkness; and, with my aërial composing-stick, sometimes I "set up" half a page of verses, that would be found tolerably correct if collated with the volume that I never had in my hand but once. I mention this in no spirit of boasting. Far from it; for, on the contrary, amongst my mortifications have been compliments to my memory, when, in fact, any compliment that I had merited was due to the higher faculty of an electric aptitude for seizing analogies, and by means of those aërial pontoons passing over like lightning from one topic to another. Still it is a fact, that this pertinacious life of memory for things that simply touch the ear without touching the consciousness, does in fact beset me. Said but once, said but softly, not marked at all, words revive before me in darkness and solitude; and they arrange themselves gradually into sentences, but through an effort sometimes of a distressing kind, to which I am in a manner forced to become a party. This being so, it was no great instance of that power – that three separate passages in the funeral service, all of which but one had escaped my notice at the time, and even that one as to the part I am going to mention, but all of which must have struck on my ear, restored themselves perfectly when I was lying awake in bed; and though struck by their beauty, I was also incensed by what seemed to be the harsh sentiment expressed in two of these passages. I will cite all the three in an abbreviated form, both for my immediate purpose, and for the indirect purpose of giving to those unacquainted with the English funeral service some specimen of its beauty.

The first passage was this, "Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God, of his great mercy, to take unto himself the soul of our dear sister here departed, we therefore commit her body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life." * * *

I pause to remark that a sublime effect arises at this point through a sudden rapturous interpolation from the Apocalypse, which, according to the rubric, "shall be said or sung;" but always let it be sung, and by the full choir: —

"I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, from henceforth blessed are the dead which die in the Lord; even so saith the Spirit; for they rest from their labours."

The second passage, almost immediately succeeding to this awful burst of heavenly trumpets, and the one which more particularly offended me, though otherwise even then, in my seventh year, I could not but be touched by its beauty, was this: – "Almighty God, with whom do live the spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord, and with whom the souls of the faithful, after they are delivered from the burden of the flesh, are in joy and felicity; We give thee hearty thanks that it hath pleased thee to deliver this our sister out of the miseries of this sinful world; beseeching thee, that it may please thee of thy gracious goodness shortly to accomplish the number of thine elect, and to hasten thy kingdom." * *

In what world was I living when a man (calling himself a man of God) could stand up publicly and give God "hearty thanks" that he had taken away my sister? But, young child, understand – taken her away from the miseries of this sinful world. Oh yes! I hear what you say; I understand that; but that makes no difference at all. She being gone, this world doubtless (as you say) is a world of unhappiness. But for me ubi Cæsar, ibi Roma– where my sister was, there was paradise; no matter whether in heaven above, or on the earth beneath. And he had taken her away, cruel priest! of his "great mercy?" I did not presume, child though I was, to think rebelliously against that. The reason was not any hypocritical or canting submission where my heart yielded none, but because already my deep musing intellect had perceived a mystery and a labyrinth in the economies of this world. God, I saw, moved not as we moved – walked not as we walked – thought not as we think. Still I saw no mercy to myself, a poor frail dependent creature – torn away so suddenly from the prop on which altogether it depended. Oh yes! perhaps there was; and many years after I came to suspect it. Nevertheless it was a benignity that pointed far a-head; such as by a child could not have been perceived, because then the great arch had not come round; could not have been recognized if it had come round; could not have been valued if it had even been dimly recognized.

Finally, as the closing prayer in the whole service stood, this – which I acknowledged then, and now acknowledge, as equally beautiful and consolatory; for in this was no harsh peremptory challenge to the infirmities of human grief as to a thing not meriting notice in a religious rite. On the contrary, there was a gracious condescension from the great apostle to grief, as to a passion that he might perhaps himself have participated.