Page images
PDF
EPUB

represented with the upper parts of a man, and the lower of a fish. Their goddess Dirceto had the head and body of a woman, which terminated below in a fish ; but on the Grecian and Phoenician coins now extant, the personage is of the other sex. The above description of Dirceto, given by Lucian, induced Selden (de Diis Syris, Synt. 11. c. iii.) to consider Dirceto and Dagon the same divinity. But Mr. Bryant, with greater probability, says that Dagon was only a different name for the Osiris of Egypt; and the president Goguet agrees with Herodotus, in saying, that Dagon was called the son of Heaven."

On an Indian Zodiac which will be noticed hereafter, a fish is represented in the same sign with Capricorn. Many Greek and Roman monuments exhibit Pan with a man's face, and the horns, ears, and feet of a goat. Among the sculptures on the Egyptian temples, Osiris is sometimes seen with the narrow goat's beard, as the god Mendes, which word, Herodotus informs us, signified, in the Egyptian language, both Pan and a goat. In the temple of Herment, among the sacred animals sculptured on the walls, is a kind of fish with a bull's head, which Mr. Hamilton conjectures was meant for that of a goat. In short, Capricorn will be found to be the Dagon and Dirceto of Phoenicia, the Vishnu of India, and the Oannus, or man of the sea at Berosus.

REMARKS, BIBLICAL AND CLASSICAL.

PART 1.

I BELIEVE I do not err in asserting that the Apostles' creed, the Aquileian, and the Athanasian, are the only three existing in which the death and burial of Christ are followed by his descent into hell, as a separate article of faith. It is not so in the form of the creed found in Irenæus, the creeds in Tertullian, that of Gregory Thaumaturgus, that of Lucian, that of Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, composed about the year 350, the Nicene or Constantinopolitan, the creed of Pelagius, whose words are particularly cautious-The Son of God died, according to the

[blocks in formation]

Scriptures, in respect of that which was capable of dying—or in the Oriental or the Roman forms of the Apostles' creed. The words of St. Paul (Col. ii. 15. compared with Eph. iv. 8, 9.) especially the latter text—κατέβη πρῶτον εἰς τὰ κατώτερα μέρη τῆς ys-on which, chiefly, the doctrine of Christ's descent into hell has been founded, cannot surely, without a forced latitude of interpretation, be considered to mean any thing more than that our Saviour was actually sepulchred in the bosom of the earth, which was necessary in order to prove the reality of his death, his having actually fulfilled the last condition of mortality. As a minister of the word of God, and an humble but sincere inquirer after divine truth, I cannot refrain from expressing a wish that our Church, for the genuineness of whose pure and apostolical doctrines no one entertains a higher respect than myself, had not admitted into her creed an article which is hardly deducible from Scripture, and of which Bishop Pearson, in his admirable exposition the creed, p. 227. declares that we cannot find any one place in which the Holy Ghost hath said in express and plain terms that Christ, as he died and was buried, so he descended into hell. If these latter words are to be understood as a mere gloss or explanation of our Saviour's burial, they are at best but an unnecessary pleonasm-if they were intended to signify a real or virtual descent into the region of departed spirits, or the place of infernal torments, as in all probability they were, I greatly doubt whether such a doctrine can be proved on the certain warrant of holy writ. The sentiments of any of your correspondents on this head will be greatly esteemed by me.

Might not the words of Malachi (iii. 20. in the Hebrew, iv. 2. in the LXX and our Bible version) py wow be more cor

TT:

rectly rendered minister than Sun of righteousness, in reference to Matt. xx. 28. where our Saviour declares that he came not to be ministered unto, but to minister?

A remarkable error, although but little observed in general, occurs in the 17th article of our Church on Predestination, where we read that "the devil doth thrust them into wretchlessness of most unclean living, no less perilous than desperation." The Latin is-"eos Diabolus protrudit in æque perniciosam impurissimæ vitæ securitatem"-from which it is plain that we should read recklessness, i. e. carelessness, fatal security, and not wretchlessness, which I believe to be a word absolutely without meaning.

It is curious, and by no means unprofitable or uninstructive,

to observe the comparative analogies that are sometimes found to exist between words in the languages of countries very remote from each other. To instance a very few out of a great number that might be noticed :

A remarkable similarity of idea may be traced between the Hebrew, young children (Gen. xliii. 8.) a derivative from

T:

, to move gently, whence in Isaiah (iii. 16.) i ti, i. e. says Buxtorf, eundo et parvulando (ut sic dicam) and the Scotch or old English word todlin or todlen, used by Burns, &c. which in the glossary to Ritson's Scotish Songs is interpreted todling, walking with a rolling, short step, like a child, rocking, tottering. The idea conveyed by the word baby (Ital. bambino, French bambin, from Baußalvw, balbutio, to stammer) is beautifully illustrated by Minucius Felix (Octavius i. 1.)-"quod est in liberis anabilius, adhuc aunis innocentibus, et adhuc, dimidiata verba tentantibus, loquelam, ipso offensantis linguæ fragmine dulciorem"-This word Lemon, in his Etymological Dictionary, most unaccountably deduces from Baßai-papa! The word, is oddly rendered in the LXX version by άoσxeυn ὑμῶν.

There also exists a very pleasing analogy between the Hebrew DN, chasidah, which signifies a stork, from TD, chesed, piety or mercy, thus expressing that bird's "remarkable affection to its young, and its kindness or piety in tending and feeding its parents when grown old," (Parkhurst ad verb.) and the English name of the bird, from σropy, natural affection. Leigh, in his Critica Sacra, strangely enough says: "DП per contrarium dicitur avis impia et crudelis, struthiocamelus-" and yet in his note he adds:" the Hebrews call the stork chasidah, it is most merciful." Petronius calls it pietatis cultricem, &c. so Buxtorf ad verb. O, f. ciconia-a beneficentia-na genetricum senectam ciconiæ invicem educant, &c.

חסידה

-nam

We may observe that Cowley, by a beautiful periphrasis, has exactly conveyed the original import of the Hebrew, the morning, from the root, quæsivit, inquisivit.

..

Where never yet did pry

The busy Morning's curious eye. (To his Muse.) This word signifies also a beerve or steer-perhaps from its staring eyes. Whence the Homeric epithet Bows and Plato's

expression applied to Socrates, regarding his executioner with a fixed and stern look-ΤΑΥΡΗΔΟΝ ὑπόβλεψας (in Phædone). The word p occurs both as a noun and a verb in Exod.

xxxiv. 2.

-

It is also worthy of remark that the Hebrew wn, to array, set in order, also denotes the fifth, and is first applied to the fifth day of the creation, when the world was arrayed or set in order for the reception of men and animals. (Gen. iv. 23.) The Greek xóoμos, mundus, bears the same analogy to the verb xooμéw, ordino.

The analogy of the word W, signifying primarily the beginning or chief, and thence applied to denote the sum (as of heads in a capitation tax, &c.) also bears a close resemblance to that of the Latin caput, which is also used in both these senses.

Many words in the English language have, through habit or neglect of analogical consistency, deviated exceedingly from their original meaning, and are now commonly used in a base or disreputable sense: e. g. the word imp, primarily signifying a graft or scion, is now used to signify an evil spirit. Shakspeare applies the term to K. Henry V. in its first meaning: Most royal imp of fame!

2. Knave originally denoted a servant (Cnapa, Sax. Cnape, Du.) though now synonymous with rascal or villain, which latter word implied merely a husbandman's servant or drudge (villanus, Ital. villano.) Our knave at cards is the valet of the French pack, and the funte, or foot-soldier, of the Italian and Spanish, who have likewise il cavaliere, or the horse-soldier.

3. Wench, originally a word of endearment, and applied to females of the highest respectability. Othello addresses Desdemona by this title," Excellent wench!"

It is remarkable that the word let is used in our most correct version of the Bible, in two senses directly contradictory to each other, within the course of four verses (Exod. v. 66 .1-4.) Let my people go," and again at v. 4. "Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their works?" Doubtless the original meaning of the word was to hinder. So in the 31st canon of our Church, "if they shall happen by any lawful cause to be let or hindered;" and in Romans, i. 13. "oftentimes I purposed to come unto you (but was let hitherto.)

4. Crone, an old woman, according to Chaucer and our elder

writers. In the Suffolk dialect, a bent or hooked stick. The analogy is obvious. According to Bailey, its first meaning is an old wether.

5. That the English word lust had originally the same extended signification as the Latin lubido (id quod lubet) appears from an epitaph in Camden's Remains (p. 382.)

Here is Elderton lying in dust,

Or lying Elderton, chuse which you lust.

6. Hamlet (Act iii. Sc. ii.) alluding to the quaint address, For us and for our tragedy, &c. asks, Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? Again, in the Merchant of Venice (Act v. Sc. i.) a paltry ring

That she did give me; whose posy was
For all the world, like cutlers' poetry

Upon a knife-love me, and leave me not.

Cowley has a copy of verses to a lady who made posies (poesies or mottos) for rings-a fashionable gallantry of the times. It is worthy of remark that the word posy was used by old writers to denote not merely little poetical mottos, but in a wider sense to signify mottos or inscriptions in general. Homily against Wilful Rebellion (p. 499. 8vo ed.) "yea, though they paint withal in their flags, hoc signo vinces, by this sign thou shalt get the victory, by a most fond imitation of the posy of Constantius Maximus." It were much to be wished that some bold writer would effect a restoration of these and many other original meanings, by neglecting which, a language always suffers both in strength and in copiousness.

Hughes, in his truly Classical Travels in Sicily, Greece and Albania, (vol. i. p. 382. n.) asserts his belief that the first modern traveller who gives an account of the celebrated Atmeidan, or twisted Delphic pillar in the Hippodrome at Constantinople, mentioned by Herodotus, is Thomas Smith, Fellow of Magd. Coll. Oxford, in a small Latin tract, intitled Constantinopolews brevis notitia, and published in 1674. Peter Gyllius, in his minute but comprehensive work, de Constantinopolews Typographia, the Elzevir edition of which is dated 1532, gives at pp. 130, 131, a far more ample description of this celebrated monument than Smith in the passage quoted by Mr. H. See also Busbeq. de Leg. Turc. ed. Elz. 1660. p. 68. At p. 525. of the same vol. a passage of Menander ('APPHÞOPOIX) is cited by Dr. Butler, in his dissertation on the oracle of Dodona, with Bentley's emendations. This fragment of six lines, as given by

« PreviousContinue »