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Nor all they loved, revered, or deemed divine,
Found help, or rescue; unredeemed they drank
Their cup of horror to the dregs, and fell
With Heaven's avenging thunders for their knell.

Their city a vast sepulchre — their hearth

A charnel-house! The beautiful and brave, Whose high achievements or whose charms gave birth

To songs and civic wreath, unheeded crave
A pause 'twixt life and death: no hand on earth,

No voice from heaven, replied to close the grave Yawning around them. Still the burning shower Rained down upon them with unslackening power.

'Tis an old tale! Yet gazing thus, it seems
But yesterday the circling wine-cup went
Its joyous round! Here still the pilgrim deems.
New guests arrive the reveller sits intent
At his carousal, quaffing to the themes

Of Thracian Orpheus; lo, the cups indent
The conscious marble, and the amphoræ still
Seem redolent of old Falerno's hill !

It seems but yesterday! Half sculptured there,
On the paved Forum wedged, the marble shaft
Waits but the workman to resume his care,

And reed it by the cunning of his craft.
The chips, struck from his chisel, fresh and fair,
Lie scattered round; the acanthus leaves ingraft
The half-wrought capital; and Isis' shrine
Retains untouched her implements divine.

The streets are hollowed by the rolling car
In sinuous furrows; there the lava stone

Retains, deep grooved, the frequent axle's scar.
Here oft the pageant passed, and triumph shone;
Here warriors bore the glittering spoils of war,
And met the full, fair city, smiling on

With wreath and pæan! — gay as those who drink
The draught of pleasure on destruction's brink.

The frescoed wall, the rich mosaic floor,

Elaborate, fresh, and garlanded with flowers
Of ancient fable:—crypt, and lintelled door

Writ with the name of their last tenant-towers
That still in strength aspire, as when they bore
Their Roman standard

- from the whelming showers

That formed their grave — return, like spectres risen,
To solve the mysteries of their fearful prison !

LESSON CXXIV.

The Holy Land. F. W. P. Greenwood.

THE land which is spoken of by the prophet Ezekiel, as “the glory of all lands," still retains its preëminent character in the eyes of those who thoroughly consider its claims. It may not now flow so plentifully with milk and honey as it then did, though there is no reason to suppose that its natural fertility is impaired; but while its climate probably, and its extraordinary geographical position certainly, remain as they were, spiritual associations of the sublimest character have been added to those which it possessed in the days of the prophet, and a glory encircles it, higher than earthly, towards which the hearts of men are turned in homage, and so will be turned, till the end of the world.

This supremacy is not affected by the character of its

inhabitants, and cannot be overthrown by any future revolutions. The people of God have been driven from the land which he promised and gave them; but still it is the Holy Land. The people of other lands have become civilized and refined, while barbarians have been roaming over Palestine; but Palestine is still, and ever must be, reverenced, as the country in which refinement and civilization had their most copious and effectual source. The wild Arab may lurk for plunder among the ruined cities of Judea, and the Turk may rule on Mount Sion, and give the law in the city of the great king; but they cannot rob Bethlehem of its cradle, or Calvary of its cross, or one hill, or stream, or wilderness, of its sacred story; neither can they interfere with the authority of that divine law which goes forth from Israel, or touch with a finger that spiritual sceptre which is stretched out from the land of patriarchs, prophets, and Christ, over the most enlightened portions of the globe.

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The principal character, however, which seems stamped on the surface of this land, is that of solemnity, as if it were intended from the first to be a Holy Land. Mountains, which are God's altars, mountains, rocky, precipitous, and stern, rise up in all its extent. The majestic sweeps and summits of Lebanon guard its northern border; Tabor, and Hermon, and Carmel, with other hills of holy name, stand on their everlasting foundations among the tribes of Israel; and Jerusalem, built upon hills, is encompassed by them as by a second and heaven-built wall. The beauty of the Lake of Galilee is also made solemn by the mountains which hang over it and shut it in; the stream of Jordan flows through a succession of rich but silent plains, and deep, twilight wildernesses of forest, such as that in which John urged a nation to repent; while the Dead Sea, in which the sacred stream is lost, tells, by its name alone, the story of buried cities, forever hidden in its awful beds, and by the stillness, the weight, and the bitterness of its waters, and the intense

solitariness of its shores, of the abiding judgments of God.

But what a history has this land! What an important portion of man's spiritual history is concentrated within its not extensive borders! Originally settled by the sons of Canaan, from whom it derives one of its appellations, - Canaan, the son of Ham, and the grandson of Noah, it afterwards became the adopted country of Abraham, the father of the Jewish family, to which he emigrated from Chaldea, and in which he obtained possessions. It was the native country of Isaac, of Jacob, and of the sons of Jacob, the patriarchs of the twelve tribes. Here they had their dwellings, their altars, their pastures, their wells, and their tombs.

From this land, when a sore famine was in it, Jacob and his sons, with their families, and their flocks and herds, went down into Egypt. Back again towards this land did their descendants return, under the conduct of Moses and Aaron, and a mightier hand than theirs, -journeying through the intervening wilderness, and sojourning in it for the period of forty years; and, finally, under the captainship of Joshua, did they enter this land, and establish their separate tribes in their ancient home.

Then came the times of the judges; and then the splendid reigns of the shepherd-king and monarch-minstrel David, and of his son Solomon, so wise in his youth, so foolish in his age.

Next we have the decline of morals and of power; the revolt and separation of the ten tribes; those mournful captivities; the country ravaged; Jerusalem overthrown and desolate; the temple profaned, its walls shattered, its altar cold, its courts empty, its music silent. Yet, through this period it is that we hear those wonderful strains of prophecy, modulated according to the demands of the times, now persuading, encouraging, and blessing, in tones of sweetest poetry; now *hreatening and denouncing in Heaven's voice of thunder; w wailing and lamenting like a funeral dirge; and ever and

anon uttering intimations of a happy time to come, when Israel should be redeemed and comforted, and a Prince and Savior should rise up, and establish a sacred kingdom of righteousness, glory, and peace.

The fortunes of the Jewish nation go on unfolding themselves in mingled colors of restless subjection and partial restoration, till they are overshadowed by the Roman sway, in the time of the early Roman empire. And now it is that her star of eternal dominion rises, not red and baleful, but serene and full of light; not seen or acknowledged by herself, but enlightening and healing the world. Now it is that Bethlehem acquires a lustre greater than even the birth of David could confer upon it, for now it becomes the birthplace of a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

The essential features of that land are unchanged, through which Jesus travelled on his divine mission, marking his way with miracles of power, of wisdom, and of love. How has he invested with more than double sanctity every path and spot where patriarch and prophet had already travelled and rested! How full of thrilling interest is the country which every where presents us with names, in its towns, its streams, and its mountains, with which his name is connected! Are not the words of the prophet now most perfectly accomplished, and is not the land of Canaan "the glory of all lands"? If we cannot journey over it in the body, we can make a pilgrimage to it in spirit; and, indeed, we must become acquainted with its localities, if we would gain an accurate knowledge of the journeys and works of our Lord.

The Holy Land lies spread before us. Jordan flows on as it did, and the tall reeds on its banks are shaken by the wind as they were when John stood there, and baptized with water Him who was to baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. It flows out from the beautiful lake or sea, on the shores of which he passed so large a portion of his ministry, and performed so many of his wonderful works. Behold it, as it

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