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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.”

“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.

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.”

It appears that, in most languages, the term employed for an angel means also a messenger. Firischteh, the Persian word for angel, is derived (says D'Herbelot) from the verb Firischtin, to send. The Hebrew term, too, Melak, has the same signification.

The name given by the Mahometans to the infernal regions, over which, they say, the angel Tabhek presides.

By the seven gates of hell, mentioned in the Koran, the commentators understand seven different departments or wards, in which seven different sorts of sinners are to be punished. The first, called Gehennem, is for sinful Mussulmans; the second, Ladha, for Christian offenders; the third, Hothama, is appointed for Jews; and the fourth and fifth, called Sair and Sacar, are destined to receive the Sabæans and the worshippers of fire: in the sixth, named Gehim, those pagans and idolaters who admit a plurality of gods are placed; while into the abyss of the seventh, called Derk Asfal, or the Deepest, the hypocritical canters of all religions are thrown.

I have already mentioned that some of the circumstances of this story were suggested to me by the eastern legend of the two angels, Harut and Marut, as given by Mariti, who says that the author of the Taalim founds upon it the Mahometan prohibition of wine. I have since found that Mariti's version of the tale (which differs also from that of Dr. Prideaux, in his Life of Mahomet,) is taken from the French Encyclopédie, in which work, under the head “Arot et Marot,” the reader will find it.

The Bahardanush tells the fable differently.

The Kerubiim, as the Mussulmans call them, are often joined indiscriminately with the Asrafil or Seraphim, under one common name of Azazil, by which all spirits who approach near the throne of Alla are designated.

“C'est un fait indubitable que la plupart des anciens philosophes, soit Chaldéens, soit Grecs, nous ont donné les astres comme animés, et ont soutenu que les astres, qui nous éclairent n'étoient que, ou les chars, ou même les navires des Intelligences qui les conduisoient. Pour les Chars, cela se lit partout; on n'a qu'ouvrir Pline, St. Clément,” &c. &c.— Mémoire Historique, sur le Sabiisme, par M. Fourmont.

A belief that the stars are either spirits or the vehicles of spirits, was common to all the religions and heresies of the East. Kircher has given the names and stations of the seven archangels, who were by the Cabala of the Jews distributed through the planets.

According to the cosmogony of the ancient Persians, there were four stars set as sentinels in the four quarters of the heavens, to watch over the other fixed stars, and superintend the planets in their course. The names of these four centinel stars are, according to the Boundesh, Taschter, for the east; Satevis, for the west; Venand, for the south; and Haftorang, for the north.

Chavah, or, as it is in Arabic, Havah (the name by which Adam called the woman after their transgression), means “Life.”

Called by the Mussulmans Al Araf—a sort of wall or partition which, according to the 7th chapter of the Koran, separates hell from paradise, and where they, who have not merits sufficient to gain them immediate admittance into heaven, are supposed to stand for a certain period, alternately tantalized and tormented by the sights that are on either side presented to them.

Manes, who borrowed in many instances from the Platonists, placed his purgatories, or places of purification, in the Sun and Moon. —Beausobre, liv. iii. chap. 8.

“Quelques gnomes désireux de devenir immortels, avoient voulu gagner les bonnes graces des nos filles, et leur avoient apporté des pierreries dont ils sont gardiens naturels: et ces auteurs ont crû, s'appuyans sur le livre d'Enoch mal-entendu, que c'étoient des pièges que les anges amoureux,” &c. &c. —Comte de Gabalis.

As the fiction of the loves of angels with women gave birth to the fanciful world of sylphs and gnomes, so we owe to it also the invention of those beautiful Genii and Peris, which embellish so much the mythology of the East; for in the fabulous histories of Caiöumarath, of Thamurath, &c., these spiritual creatures are always represented as the descendants of Seth, and called the Bani Algiann, or children of Giann.

I am aware that this happy saying of Lord Albemarle's loses much of its grace and playfulness, by being put into the mouth of any but a human lover.

According to Whitehurst's theory, the mention of rainbows by an antediluvian angel is an anachronism; as he says, “There was no rain before the flood, and consequently no rainbow, which accounts for the novelty of this sight after the Deluge.”

For the terms of this compact, of which the angels were supposed to be witnesses, see the chapter of the Koran, entitled Al Araf, and the article “Adam” in D'Herbelot.

In acknowledging the authority of the great Prophets who had preceded him, Mahomet represented his own mission as the final “Seal,” or consummation of them all.

The Zodiacal Light.

Pococke, however, gives it as the opinion of the Mahometan doctors, that all souls, not only of men and of animals, living either on land or in the sea, but of the angels also, must necessarily taste of death.

The Dove, or pigeon which attended Mahomet as his Familiar, and was frequently seen to whisper into his ear, was, if I recollect right, one of that select number of animals (including also the ant of Solomon, the dog of the Seven Sleepers, &c.) which were thought by the Prophet worthy of admission into Paradise.

“The Moslems have a tradition that Mahomet was saved (when he hid himself in a cave in Mount Shur) by his pursuers finding the mouth of the cave covered by a spider's web, and a nest built by two pigeons at the entrance, with two eggs unbroken in it, which made them think no one could have entered it. In consequence of this, they say, Mahomet enjoined his followers to look upon pigeons as sacred, and never to kill a spider.” —Modern Universal History, vol. i.

“Mohammed (says Sale), though a prophet, was not able to bear the sight of Gabriel, when he appeared in his proper form, much less would others be able to support it.”

Seth is a favourite personage among the Orientals, and acts a conspicuous part in many of their most extravagant romances. The Syrians pretended to have a Testament of this Patriarch in their possession, in which was explained the whole theology of angels, their different orders, &c. &c. The Curds, too (as Hyde mentions in his Appendix), have a book, which contains all the rites of their religion, and which they call Sohuph Sheit, or the Book of Seth.

In the same manner that Seth and Cham are supposed to have preserved these memorials of antediluvian knowledge, Xixuthrus is said in Chaldæan fable to have deposited in Siparis, the city of the Sun, those monuments of science which he had saved out of the waters of a deluge.—See Jablonski's learned remarks upon these columns or tablets of Seth, which he supposes to be the same with the pillars of Mercury, or the Egyptian Thoth. —Pantheon. Egypt. lib. v. cap. 5.

The Mussulmans, says D'Herbelot, apply the general name, Mocarreboun, to all those Spirits “qui approchent le plus près le Trône.” Of this number are Mikail and Gebrail.

The Seraphim, or Spirits of Divine Love.

There appears to be, among writers on the East, as well as among the Orientals themselves, considerable indecision with regard to the respective claims of Seraphim and Cherubim to the highest rank in the celestial hierarchy. The derivation which Hyde assigns to the word Cherub seems to determine the precedence in favour of that order of spirits:— “Cherubim, i. e. Propinqui Angeli, qui sc. Deo proprius quam alii accedunt; nam Charab est i. q. Karab, appropinquare.” (P. 263.) Al Beidawi, too, one of the commentators of the Koran, on that passage, “the angels, who bear the throne, and those who stand about it,” (chap. xl.) says, “These are the Cherubim, the highest order of angels.” On the other hand, we have seen, in a preceding note, that the Syrians place the sphere in which the Seraphs dwell at the very summit of all the celestial systems; and even, among Mahometans, the word Azazil and Mocarreboun (which mean the spirits that stand nearest to the throne of Alla) are indiscriminately applied to both Seraphim and Cherubim.

“Les Egyptiens disent que la Musique est Sœur de la Religion.” —Voyages de Pythagore, tom. i. p. 422.

Sara.

An allusion to the Sephiroths or Splendors of the Jewish Cabbala, represented as a tree, of which God is the crown or summit.

The Sephiroths are the higher orders of emanative being in the strange and incomprehensible system of the Jewish Cabala. They are called by various names, Pity, Beauty, &c. &c.; and their influences are supposed to act through certain canals, which communicate with each other.

The reader may judge of the rationality of this Jewish system by the following explanation of part of the machinery: —“Les canaux qui sortent de la Miséricorde et de la Force, et qui vont aboutir à la Beauté, sont chargés d'un grand nombre d'Anges. Il y en a trente-cinq sur le canal de la Miséricorde, qui recompensent et qui couronnent la vertu des Saints,” &c. &c.—For a concise account of the Cabalistic Philosophy, see Enfield's very useful compendium of Brucker.

“On les représente quelquefois sous la figure d'un arbre ------ l'Ensoph qu'on met au-dessus de l'arbre Sephirotique ou des Splendeurs divins, est l'Infini.” —L'Histoire des Juifs, liv. ix. 11.

A wine-merchant.

An old English Country Dance.

It appears, however, that Ovid was a friend to the resumption of payment in specie:—

Met. l. 15. v. 743.

Honourable Frederick R*b*ns*n.

So called, to distinguish her from the “Aurea” or Golden Venus.

See the proceedings of the Lords, Wednesday, March 1. 1826, when Lord King was severely reproved by several of the noble Peers, for making so many speeches against the Corn Laws.

This noble Earl said, that “when he heard the petition came from ladies' boot and shoemakers, he thought it must be against the ‘corns’ which they inflicted on the fair sex.”

The Duke of Athol said, that “at a former period, when these weavers were in great distress, the landed interest of Perth had supported 1500 of them. It was a poor return for these very men now to petition against the persons who had fed them.”

An improvement, we flatter ourselves, on Lord L.'s joke.

In 1824, when the Sinking Fund was raised by the imposition of new taxes to the sum of five millions.

A sort of “breakfast-powder,” composed of roasted corn, was about this time introduced by Mr. Hunt, as a substitute for coffee.

The venerable Jeremy's phrase for his after-dinner walk.

A phrase in one of Sir T---m*s's last speeches.

Great efforts were, at that time, making for the exclusion of foreign silk.

“Road to Ruin.”

This is meant not so much for a pun, as in allusion to the natural history of the Unicorn, which is supposed to be something between the Bos and the Asinus, and, as Rees's Cyclopædia assures us, has a particular liking for every thing “chaste.”

An item of expense which Mr. Hume in vain endeavoured to get rid of:—trumpeters, it appears, like the men of All-Souls, must be “bene vestiti.”

The gentleman, lately before the public, who kept his Joint-Stock Tea Company all to himself, singing “Te solo adoro.”

Sir John Newport.

This charge of two pipes of port for the sacramental wine is a precious specimen of the sort of rates levied upon their Catholic fellow-parishioners by the Irish Protestants.

“Another objection to a metallic currency was, that it produced a greater number of highway robberies.” —Debate in the Lords.

Mr. Abercromby's statement of the enormous tavern bills of the Commissioners of Bankrupts.

Con fuoco—a music-book direction.

This reverend gentleman distinguished himself at the Reading election.

“A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny.” —Rev. vi.

See the oration of this reverend gentleman, where he describes the connubial joys of Paradise, and paints the angels hovering round “each happy fair.”

When Whiston presented to Prince Eugene the Essay in which he attempted to connect his victories over the Turks with Revelation, the Prince is said to have replied, that “he was not aware he had ever had the honour of being known to St. John.”

Mr. Dobbs was a member of the Irish Parliament, and, on all other subjects but the Millennium, a very sensible person: he chose Armagh as the scene of his Millennium, on account of the name Armageddon, mentioned in Revelation.

The editor of the Morning Herald, so nick-named.

Alluding to the display of this doctor's name, in chalk, on all the walls round the metropolis.

This seraphic doctor, in the preface to his last work (Vindiciæ Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ), is pleased to anathematize not only all Catholics, but all advocates of Catholics:—“They have for their immediate allies (he says) every faction that is banded against the State, every demagogue, every irreligious and seditious journalist, every open and every insidious enemy to Monarchy and to Christianity.”

See the late accounts in the newspapers of the appearance of this gentleman at one of the Police-offices, in consequence of an alleged assault on his “maid-of-all-work.”

A crown granted as a reward among the Romans to persons who performed any extraordinary exploits upon walls, such as scaling them, battering them, &c.—No doubt, writing upon them, to the extent Dr. Eady does, would equally establish a claim to the honour.