ness, like a living stream of beauty and fertility. Be- | its magnitude, that, compared with most other works tween it and its desert boundary there was not contrast merely, but contrast so violent as to produce a painful sense of the incongruous or unnatural. The inquiry was forced upon us, How came fields of such emerald green to be so fringed and inwoven with the waste howling wilderness, that between fertility the most charming, and sterility the most frightful, there is not any where the measurable fraction of a single footstep? In other lands, the rich verdure of the mead, and noble majesty of the forest, are imperceptibly succeeded by the more stunted yet not unpleasant copse and herbage of the upland moor or rising acclivity,and these again by the ferns, and the lichens, and the mosses which delight to feather the brow of the mountain, before it is surmounted by its naked cloud-capp'd peak. But here, between loveliness the most exuberant and deformity the most barren, there is no transition at all. The feeling excited by so singular a juxtaposition was somewhat akin-comparing small things with great, to that which must be experienced were one to behold the still gorgeous heart of the richest Cashmerian shawl in close contact and inseparable union with a broad and ample border, now all tawdry and tattered, discoloured and bespattered with mud!

of man, is incontestible. But then, even in this respect, is it not rivalled by the great wall of China, which, with its massy towers, stretches uninterruptedly across valleys, and rivers, and mountains to the extent of fifteen hundred miles! or, by the great Canal of China, which, for six hundred miles, has been forced through the mightiest obstacles, often considerably raised by the most stupendous walls and embankments above the level of lakes and marshes which it is made to traverse, and finally opening into the Yellow Sea with a breadth of a thousand feet! And if, in point of mere magnitude, it is rivalled, if not out-rivalled by other products of human power, how utterly poor and insignificant, compared with the works of God! Compare in point of magnitude, this greatest of the Pyramids with Ben Nevis of the Grampians, Mount Blanc of the Alps, Chimborazo of the Andes, Dhwalagiri of the Himalaya!—with the terrestrial globe itself!-with sun, moon, and stars! In the comparison, or rather contrast, surely man's vauntful pride ought for once to be changed into adoring humility. And then, what is man's power at best, but the communicated ability of piling up a heap of stones from pre-existing matter? Contrast this with the underived creative power which summoned into being man himself, and the matter on which he operates, out of the barren womb of nothing!-and surely, on the topmost height of the greatest of the Pyramids, where infidelity has often found an argument to exalt man at the expense of the Creator; surely there, beyond all other spots, may new and decisive and cumulative arguments be found for exalting the Creator over the prostrated pretensions of his vain, and feeble, and sinful creature-man!

Again, is this, thought we, the very pile which has been often pronounced one of the mightiest monuments of "mechanical genius and architectural skill?" Why, as a manifestation of those attributes of superior intel

As to the Pryamid itself, after having walked round it, surveyed it from every point of view, explored the interior, and stood on the summit, the only impression which we could derive from it, was that of magnitude -mere magnitude--the magnitude of so vast an artificial accumulation of inert matter. Stationed on that proud summit on which, doubtless, once stood Herodotus, the father of History, and Alexander, the Conqueror of the world, and many a sage and hero since, some of whose names are roughly graven on the uppermost flags, in order to immortalize their arduous visit -the spontaneous musings of our inner man could not but run in a somewhat moralizing channel. Is this, thought we, the very pile which has been often pro-ligence, it no more admits of being compared with the nounced the greatest and most indestructible monument of human power?" As to its alleged indestructibility, whether relative or absolute, that is an idle and fallacious boast. Some of the more ancient Pyramids to the south have now been actually turned into masses of dust and rubbish. And this one, perhaps the most modern of them all, exhibits the most indubitable symptoms of gradual decay. The steps, of a foot or a foot and a half wide, formed by the receding tiers or layers of calcareous stone in the upward ascent, are every where mouldering into decay;—and this too, in a climate like that of Egypt, where there is neither rain nor frost! so that, from the steps being partly worn away, and partly blocked up with the crumbling materials from above, the ascent, except along one or two tracks which are kept clear of loosened fragments, is no longer practicable. What then becomes of man's vain boast of indestructibility? Even when favoured with the most unvarying climate in the world, the great Pyramid proves by its scarred and shattered sides, that it is no more proof against ultimate dissolution than frail man himself. And if it had been reared either in India, with its deluges of rain and subsequent burning heat; or in Britain, with its melting snows and subsequent hardening frost, it would assuredly have been rent into pieces, or turned into a pile of ruins, ages ago! As to

dome of St Paul's, than the latter with the spangled vault of heaven! Here, there is nothing whatever to show that aught was to be solved, save the simple problem: In what form may the largest possible aggregate of square stones be piled up in one nearly solid mass, so as to prove most stable-resisting alike the encroachments of man and the inroads of the elements? Such, all but demonstrably, having been the sole problem, the conception of some species of the Pyramidal form was inevitable. Set a child to raise the highest and most stable pile with its wooden bricks, and it stumbles almost instinctively on the general form of a Pyramid. Compare, then, in point of expansive reach and power, the mind of the architect which conceived the form of the great Pyramid and its few dark narrow passages and dungeon-like chambers, with the mind of him who conceived the ideal model of St Paul's, including an almost boundless multiplicity and yet noble harmony in the adaptations, proportions, and uses of all its parts! Compare the mechanical genius necessary for the execution of the one and of the other. In constructing the dome of St Paul's, the raising of the solid materials to so great a height, was that part of the operation which demanded by far the least display of the requisite architectural or designing skill. In constructing a pyramid, the raising of stones, of from two to four feet square,

along the solid and immovable side of the inclined plane supplied on every side by the portion previously fabricated, demanded not merely the highest, but almost the only display of the requisite architectural and de- | signing skill. In the former case, mere brute force could achieve little or nothing:-in the latter case, mere brute force, assisted by the simplest and the rudest of mechanical agencies;-the lever, the inclined plane, and the pulley, was really all which could be required. But why attempt to reduce the Pyramids to their proper level, by a comparison with transcendently nobler monuments of man's designing intelligence? Behold at their very base, how they are confronted and outrivalled by the instinct of an insect. There, rise the hillocky nests of the lion-ant, which, after careful examination, led a celebrated naturalist to exclaim, "All the architecture, magnificence and expense that shine in the excellent pyramids, cannot give a contemplator | of nature such high ideas as are excited by the art of these little creatures." And if even in one of the minutest of dumb irrationals the great Creator can plant so admirable an instinct-out-rivalling the topmost flower of human invention-oh, how ought vain man to shrink into his own inherent nothingness, in view of the inexhaustible resources of creative intelligence!

or, like the fabled genii of the middle ages, could consociate, as on the point of a needle, these peaks were physically unfitted for any of their operations! Whence, then, the origin of such fanciful bypotheses at all? One of the chief reasons for supposing them to have been fire-temples is, their pyramidal form, which somewhat resembles that of burning flame! By indulgence in such or similar fancies, how many strange ends have these Pyramids been made to serve! We have read of their having been designed to represent the soul, which is of "a fiery nature, and adhereth to the body as a Pyramid doth to the basis, or as fire doth to the fuel;" —or, the great cycle of thirty-six thousand years; since a Pyramid, "the top of it standing fixed, and the base being moved about, would describe a circle, and the whole body of it a cone;"-or, the nature of things; because, "as a Pyramid, having its beginning from a point at the top, is by degrees dilated on all parts, so the nature of all things proceeding from one fountain and beginning, viz., from God the chief workmaster, is diffused into various kinds and species, all which it conjoins to that beginning and point, from whence every thing issues and flows;"- -or the "first and most simple of mathematical bodies;"—or "the mysteries of pyramidal numbers ;"-or "the emission of rays from luminous bodies ;"- -or "the emanation of sensible species from their objects!" But where are such frivolous far-fetched fancies to terminate ? The truth is, that the pyramidal form must have been chosen, for the simplest and best of all reasons, viz., that, owing to its gradual contraction from the very bottom towards the top, and consequent decrease of its own down-bearing weight, as well as diminished liability to cracks and rents, this form is by far the most stable and permanent. As to the supposed astronomical design, one of the principal reasons for the opinion is founded on the didisguised fort-rection of the sides, which happen to be turned towards the four cardinal points! If a ground of argument so utterly futile be admitted, there is not an illiterate mountaineer in the Highlands of Scotland who might not be proved an accomplished astronomer, and his cottage an astronomical observatory-since, if he has a freedom of choice, he is sure to erect his hut fronting the sun at right angles, when on the meridian of noon

Once more, Is this, thought we, the greatest of those very piles which have for ages filled the world with learned dissertations respecting their origin and design? Who, then, could well escape the gregarious tendency to follow the leaders in the realm of literature? But yesterday our mind was brimful of theories on the subject. Where are these now? Alas, for the Ithuriel touch of experience! they are wholly vanished. What fanciful chimeras have not ingenious imaginative men been led to substitute for sober realities? At one time, have these been represented as resses" for the concealment of treasure; or "oracular shrines," for the exhibition of "acoustic phenomena" and other priestly jugglery. At another, they have risen into magnificent fire-temples or astronomical observatories. Then followed the elaborated dissertation on the wealth, the hierophancy, the mythology, or the science of the ancient world. What laborious trifling! That these were ever treasure-citadels or caverns for priestly trickeries, is utterly unfounded in history, and wholly contradicted by the form and structure of the fabrics themselves. That they could ever have been designed for fire-altars or astronomical edifices, involves a visible physical impossibility. On either of these latter suppositions, the summits must have been uniformly flat and uniformly accessible. Now, the direct contrary of this is the real fact. When finished, all the Pyramids terminated in a sharp culminating point or apex; and some of them so terminate to this day. And those which do not, such as the Great Pyramid, bear evidence that their tops have been violently dislocated and thrown down. Moreover, when finished, the entire surface of the receding steps was covered over with a smooth casing of flat stone-flags. The casing of some of them, in whole or in part, such as that of the upper quarter of the Second Pyramid, close at hand, is still perfectly entire, and its apex sharppointed. So that unless the fire-worshippers and the astronomers of those days could climb up like lizards;

the sides of his humble abode being thus as exactly turned towards the four cardinal points, as the Pyramids of Egypt! Besides, is it not one main object of the astronomer to secure, if possible, a clear unobstructed horizon? Now here, on the top of the Great Pyramid, a considerable portion of the sky is most gratuitously shut out of view by the second and other smaller ones. How much more must large portions of the heavens be concealed from the summits of the smaller, even if accessible, by the needless intervention of the larger? Altogether, there is not only no probable evidence in favour, but very positive evidence in disproof, of the Hierophantic, Sabian, Astronomical, and other similar supposed origin and ends of the Pyramids.

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THE

SCOTTISH CHRISTIAN HERALD,

CONDUCTED UNDER THE SUPERINTENDENCE OF MINISTERS AND MEMBERS OF THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH.

A TRADITION OF THE TIMES OF THE MARTYRS.
BY THE LATE REV. EDWARD IRVING, A. M.

THERE is nothing, my dear friend, for which I envy former times more than for this, that their information was conveyed from one to another so much by word of mouth, and so little by written letters and printed books. For though the report might chance to take a fashion and a mould from the character of the reporter, still it was the fashion and the mould of a living, feeling, acting man; a friend, haply a father, haply a venerable ancestor, haply the living chronicler of the country round. The information thus acquired lives embalmed in the most precious associations which bind youth to age-inexperienced ignorant youth -to wise and narrative old age. And to my heart, much exercised in early years with such traditionary memorials of the pious fathers of our brave and religious land, I know not whether it be more pleasant to look back upon the ready good-will, the heartfelt gladness, with which the venerable sires and mothers of our dales consented to open the mystery of past times-the story of ruined halls, the fates of decayed families, the hardships and mortal trials of persecuted saints and martyrs; or to remember the deep hold which their words took, and the awful impression which they made, upon us whom they favoured with their tale. Of the many traditions which I have thus received, I select for your use one of the most pious and instructive, as well as the most romantic and poetical. For that, while I prize you as a poet, I esteem you as an upright and worthy man.* Now, I have such a reverence for the traditions of past times, that you may depend upon my faith as a Christian man and a minister, that I have invented nothing, and altered nothing, in what I am about to relate, whether as to the manner of my receiving the story, or as to the story itself.

A branch of my mother's family who lived in Nithsdale, and whom you knew well as distinguished amongst the clergy of that district for faithfulness, had cultivated the most intimate brotherhood with another family, likewise of the Scottish clergy, who, when the father died, betook themselves to Glasgow, where the blessing of God continued to rest upon the widow and the fatherless. When about to repair to that city, to serve our distinguished countryman, my dear and honoured master, Dr Chalmers, I received a charge from my mother's aunt, now with the Lord, not to fail to pay my respects to the old lady and her children, of whom I had seen the only daughter, when on a visit to our part of the country. Thus intrusted with the precious charge of an old and faithful family friendship, and with this also for my only introduction, I proceeded to the house of the old lady, and inquired for her daughter. The servant who admitted me, mistaking my inquiry as if it had been for the old lady herself, showed me into a large apartment; and deeming, I suppose, that I was well acquainted with her inistress, she shut the door and went away. When I looked around, expecting some one to come forward to receive me, I saw no one but a venerable old woman, seated at the further end of the room, who neither spoke nor removed from her seat, but sat still looking at her work, as if the door had not opened, and no one had entered; of which, indeed, I afterwards found she was not conscious, from her great infirmity of deafness. I had, therefore, time to observe and contemplate the very picturesque and touching figure which was before me. She sat at her spinning-wheel, all dressed in black velvet, with a pure white cap upon her head, an ancient plaited ruff about her neck, and white ruffles round her wrists, from under which appeared her withered published in “The Anniversary" for 1829, of which he was Editor. hands, busily employed in drawing the thread, No. 116. MARCH 20, 1841.-1fd.]

This paper was addressed to Allan Cuningham, and was first

[SECOND SERIES. VOL. III.

which her eyesight was too feeble to discern. For, | when the Presbyterian clergy of Scotland were as I had now drawn near, I observed that her required to conform to the moderate Episcopacy spinning-wheel was of the upright construction, which he sought to introduce, the faithful minihaving no heck, but a moveable eye which was sters of the Kirk were contented, with their wives carried along the pirn by a heart-motion. She and children, to forego house and hall, and to tear afterwards told me that it had been constructed themselves from their godly people, rather than on purpose to accommodate her blindness, under suffer the civil power to bring guilt upon its own the direction of her son, a gentleman in high office head, and wrath upon the land, by daring, like in London for she had so much difficulty in Uzziah, to enter into the sanctuary of the Church, reading, and was so dull of hearing, that it was a and intermeddle with its government and disgreat relief to her solitude to employ herself with cipline. The first who suffered in this contending a spinning-wheel, which also preserved her habits for Christ's royal office in his house, was James of early industry, and made her feel that she was Guthrie, professor of divinity in the University not altogether useless in the world. I felt too of Edinburgh. He was the first of that time who much reverence for this venerable relic of a former was honoured with the martyr's crown; and having generation that was now before me, to stand by witnessed his good confession unto the death, his curiously perusing, though I was too much im- head, according to the barbarous custom of those pressed immediately to speak, besides feeling a evil days, was placed upon a pole over one of the little embarrassed how I should make my approach ports of the city of Edinburgh, called the West to a stranger for whom I instinctively felt so much Port, which lies immediately under the guns of reverence, and with whom I might find it so difficult the Castle, and looks towards the south and west, to communicate. Having approached close up to the quarter of Scotland where the Church ever her person, which remained still unmoved, I bent rallied her distressed affairs. And, at the same down my head to her ear, and spoke to her in a time, a proclamation was made at the Cross, and loud and slow voice, telling her not to be alarmed other high places of the city, forbidding any one, at the sight of a stranger, of whose presence she under peril of instant destruction from the Castle, seemed to be utterly unconscious, for that I was to remove that head of a rebel and traitor to the friend of one near and dear to her. I know the king. The body was given to his sorrowful not whether it was from her being accustomed to kindred, amongst whom was a youth, his nephew, be thus approached and spoken to, in consequence of great piety and devotedness to the good cause of her infirmity of sight and hearing, but she was of Christ and his Church, of strong, and deep, Jess surprised than I had expected, and relieved and tender affection to his uncle, in whose house me from my embarrassment by desiring me to sit he had lived, and under whose care he had studied down beside her; so I sat down, and told her of until he was now ripe for the ministerial office, her ancient and true friends, whose remembrances and might ere this have been planted in the vineand respects, thus delivered, she seemed highly to yard, but for the high and odious hand with which prize; and as I had touched upon a chord which ungodly power and prelatical pride were carrying was very sweet to her memory, she began to talk it in every quarter of poor suffering Scotland. of her departed husband, and of my departed grand- This youth, his heart big with grief to see his uncle, who had been long co-presbyters and fast uncle's headless trunk, vowed a vow in the prebrethren, and had together fought the battles of sence of God and his own conscience, that he the Kirk. I loved the theme, and love it still; would, in spite of wicked men, take down from and, finding what a clear memory and fine feeling the ignominious gate his uncle's reverend head, of ancient time she was endowed withal, I was and bury it beside his body. Full of this purpose, delighted to follow her narratives, as she ascended and without communicating it to any one, he went from age to age, so far as her memory could his way, at high noon, and climbed the city wall, reach. When she found that I had so much and from beneath the guns of the Castle, in broad pleasure in her recollections of former times, she daylight, he took down his uncle's head, wrapped said that she would tell me a story of a still older it in a linen napkin, and carried it away with him; date, which her father had oft told her, and in whether overawing by his intrepidity the garrison, which he was not a little concerned. So, pushing or by his speed outstripping them, or whether proher wheel a little away from her, and turning her tected by the people, or favoured by the special proface round towards me, for hitherto, for the con- vidence of God, my venerable narrator staid not to venience of my speaking into her ear, she had tell; but as he vowed he was honoured to perform, looked towards her wheel, she began and told me and in the same grave was the martyr's head buried the following history, of which I took a faithful with his body. Soon was it noised abroad what record in my memory, and have oft told it since this devoted and fearless youth had done, who, to pious and well-disposed people, though never regardless of his life, was disposed to walk abroad till this hour have I committed any part of it to and at large as usual, and abide whatever revenge paper. I shall not attempt to recall her manner and violence might be permitted to do against or expressions, but simply recall the very remark- him. But his kindred, and the stedfast friends of able events of Divine Providence which she re- the distressed Church, perceiving from this heroic lated to me. and holy act what such a youth might live to perform, set themselves by all means to conceal him

After the restoration of Charles the Second,