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it grows in Arabia and around mount Lebanon. Incisions are made in it, in the dog-days, to procure the gum. Male incense is the best; it is round, white, fat, and kindles on being put to the fire. It is also called oliba- || пит. Female incense is described as soft, more gummy, and less agreeable in smell than the other. That of Saba was the best, and most esteemed by the ancients, who speak of it with great approbation.

The proper incense burnt in the sanctuary, was a mixture of sweet spices. Ex. 30:34, &c. To offer incense among the Hebrews was an office peculiar to the priests; for which purpose they entered into the holy apartment of the temple, every morning and evening. On the great day of expiation, the high-priest burnt incense in his censer as he entered the sanctuary, that the smoke which arose from it might prevent his looking with too much curiosity on the ark and mercy-seat. Lev. 16:13. The Levites were not permitted to touch the censers; and Korah, Dathan and Abiram suffered a terrible punishment for violating this prohibition. "Incense" sometimes signifies the sacrifices and fat of victims; as no other kind of incense was offered on the altar of burnt-offerings. Ps. 66:15. For a description of the altar of incense, see the article ALTAR.

INCHANTMENTS. The law of God condemns all who practise magic and inchantments. Such persons are known by the names of inchanters, magicians, || jugglers, sorcerers, wizards, necromancers, &c. Scripture speaks of all these kinds, and they are all forbidden. See SORCERER.

It was common for magicians, sorcerers and inchanters, to speak in a low voice or whisper. Hence one kind is called in Hebrew whisperers, or mutterers. They may be called, perhaps, ventriloquists, because they spake, as one would suppose, from the bottom of their stomachs. They affected secrecy and mysterious ways, to conceal the vanity, folly or infamy of their pernicious art; though their pretended magic often consisted in cunning tricks only, as sleight-ofhand, or some natural secrets unknown to the ignorant. They affected obscurity and night, or would show their skill only be fore the uninformed, and feared nothing so much as serious examination, broad daylight, and the inspection of the intelligent.

But the inchantment practised upon serpents in the East, partly by the aid of music, is one of the most singular things we know of. The accounts given by travellers in the East and in Egypt, of their power, are very remarkable; although no solution of the appearances has yet been given. The facts, however, seem too well attested to admit of doubt, and are often alluded to by ancient writers.

Mr. Brown says, "The charmers of serpents are worthy of remark; their powers seem extraordinary. The serpent most common at Kahira, [Cairo,] is of the viper class, and undoubtedly poisonous. If one of them enter a house, the charmer is sent for, who uses a certain form of words. I have seen three serpents enticed out of the cabin of a ship lying near the shore. The operator handled them, and then put them into a bag. At other times I have seen the serpents twist around the bodies of

these persons in all directions, without having had their fangs extracted or broken, and without doing them any injury."

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Niebuhr, in speaking of the puppet-shows and sleight-of-hand tricks exhibited for the amusement of the populace in Cairo, remarks: " Others exhibit serpents dancing. This may appear incredible to those who are unacquainted with the natural propensities of these animals but certain kinds of serpents seem to be agreeably affected by music. They raise their heads, when they hear a drum, and this, their instinctive propensity to elevate the head and part of the body and to make some motions and turns, is called dancing."

In Forbes's Oriental Memoirs, we find an account of the cobra de capello, or hooded snake, called also the spectacle snake; it is a large and beautiful serpent, but one of the most poisonous known; its bite occasions death usually in less than an hour. Of this kind are the dancing serpents, which are carried about in baskets throughout all Hindostan by a certain class of persons, who get their living in this way. They give certain tones upon a flute, which appear to produce an agreeable effect upon the serpents; since they seem to beat time, as it were, to the flute, by a graceful motion of the head. They raise the upper part of their body from the ground, and follow the music in graceful curves, like the undulating movements of a swan's neck. It is a fact sufficiently well attested, that when any of these or of other kinds of vipers have got into a house, and make havoc among the poultry or other small domestic animals, it is customary to send for one of

these musicians, who, by tones upon his flute or flageolet, finds out the hiding-places of the serpents, and allures them to their destruction; indeed, so soon as the serpents hear the music, they creep quietly out of their holes, and are easily taken. This may serve to illustrate Ps. 58:4,5. In regard to the dancing serpents, the music seems essential to their motions; for as soon as it ceases, the serpent lies motionless; and unless it is immediately replaced in its basket, the spectators are in great danger.

Dr. Hasselquist also says: "The Egyptian jugglers can perform some feats, which those of Europe are not able to imitate. They take the most poisonous vipers in their naked hands, play with them, place them in their bosom, and make them perform all sorts of tricks. All this I have often seen. I examined in order to see whether the serpents had been deprived of their poisonous fangs; and convinced myself, by actual observation, that this was not the case. On the third of July, I received at once, four different species of serpents, which I described and preserved in spirits. They were brought me by a female, who excited the astonishment of all of us Europeans, by the manner in which she handled these most poisonous and dangerous animals, without receiving the least injury. As she put them into the bottle in which I intended to preserve them, she managed them just as one of our ladies would handle their ribands or lacings. The others gave her no difficulty, but the vipers did not seem to like their intended dwelling; they slipped out, before the bottle could be covered. They sprang upon and over her hands and naked

money; and those that follow the profession of writing out books, their ink-horn, their penknife, their whetstone, to sharpen it, their letters, &c."

INN, see CARAVANSERAI. INSPIRATION, in the highest sense, is the immediate communication of knowledge to the human mind by the Spirit of God; but it is commonly used by divines, in a less strict and proper sense, to denote such a degree of divine influence, as

arms; but she betrayed no symp- || tom of fear. She took them quite tranquilly from her body, and placed them in the vessel that was to be their grave. She had caught them, as our Arab assured us, without difficulty in the fields. Without doubt she must possess some secret art or skill; but I could not get her to open her mouth upon the subject. This art is a secret even among the Egyptians. The ancient Marsi and Psylli in Africa, who daily exhibited specimens of thesistance, or guidance, as enabled same art in Rome, afford evidence of its antiquity in Africa; and it is a very remarkable circumstance, that such a thing should remain a secret above two thousand years, and be retained only by a certain class of persons."

INDIA, the appellation which || the ancients appear to have given to that vast region of Asia, || stretching east of Persia and Bactria, as far as the country of the Since; its northern boundary being the Scythian desert, and its southern limit the ocean. The name is generally supposed to have been derived from the river Indus, which bounds it on the west. It is mentioned in Scripture only in Esther 1:1.

the authors of the Scriptures to communicate knowledge to others, without error or mistake, whether the subjects of such communications were things then immediately revealed to those who declared them, or things with which they were before acquainted. Hence it usually divided into three kinds, revelation, suggestion, and superintendence.

INTERCESSION, an entreaty used by one person toward another; whether this person solicit on his own account, or on account of one for whom

he is agent. Man intercedes with man, sometimes to procure an advantage to himself, sometimes as a mediator to benefit another; he may be said to intercede for another, when he puts words into the suppliant's mouth, and directs and prompts him to say what otherwise he would be unable to say; or to say in a more persuasive manner what he might intend to say. The intercession of Christ on behalf of sinners, Rom. 8:34. 1 John 2:1, and the intercession of the Holy Spirit, Rom. 8:26, are easily illustrated by this adaptation of the term. See COMFORTER.

INK-HORN. The prophet Ezekiel speaks of six men clothed in linen, each with a writer's ink-horn by his side, 9:2. In the East, even at the present day, all artisans carry most of the implements of their profession in the girdle; the soldier carries his sword; the butcher his knife; and the carpenter his hammer and his saw. So also the writers; and Olearius observes of the Persians, that they carry about with them, by means of their girdles, a dagger, a IRON. Moses forbids the knife, a handkerchief, and their Hebrews to use any stones to

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-20:19; and indeed c. 37 of Isaiah is almost word for word the same with 2 K. c. 19. The remainder of the book of Isaiah, c. 40-66, contains a series of oracles referring chiefly to the future times of temporal exile and deliverance, and expanding at the same time into glorious views of the spiritual deliverance to be wrought by the Messiah.

form the altar of the Lord, which || parallel to that in 2 K. 18:13. had been in any manner wrought with iron; as if iron communicated pollution. He says the stones of Palestine are of iron, Deut. 8:9, that is, of hardness equal to iron; or that, being smelted, they yielded iron. "Iron sharpeneth iron," says the wise man, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend;" i. e. the presence of a friend gives us more confidence and assurance. God threatens his ungrateful and perfidious people with making the heaven iron, and the earth brass; that is, to make the earth barren, and the air to produce no rain. Chariots of iron are chariots armed with iron, with spikes, and scythes. See CHARIOTS.

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ISAIAH, the son of Amoz, (not Amos,) one of the most distinguished of the Hebrew prophets. He began to prophesy at Jerusalem, towards the close of the reign of Uzziah, about the year 759 B. C. and exercised the prophetical office under the three following monarchs, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah; c. 1:1. The first twelve chapters of his prophecies refer to the times of Ahaz; then follow c. 13-23, directed against foreign nations, except c. 22, against Jerusalem. In c. 24-35, which would seem to belong to the time of Hezekiah, the prophet appears to look forward in prophetic vision to the times of the exile and of the Messiah. The chapters 36-39 give an historical account of Sennacherib's invasion, and of the advice given by Isaiah to Hezekiah. This account is

Isaiah seems to have lived and prophesied wholly at Jerusalem; and vanishes from history after the accounts contained in c. 39. A tradition among the Talmudists and fathers relates, that he was sawn asunder during the reign of Manasseh; and this tradition is embodied in an apocryphal book, called the Ascension of Isaiah; but it seems to rest on no suffi

cient grounds. It would seem most probable that, in his old age, the prophet withdrew himself from the more active scenes of life, and passed his retirement in writing down, the splendid visions recorded in the last part of his book.

But

Some commentators have proposed to divide the book of Isaiah chronologically into three parts, as if composed under the three kings, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. But this is of very doubtful propriety; since several of the chapters are evidently transposed and inserted out of their chronological order. a very obvious and striking division of the book into two parts, exists; the first part, including the first thirty-nine chapters, and the second, the remainder of the book, or c. 40-66. The first part is made up of those prophecies and historical accounts, which Isaiah wrote during the period of his active exertions

in behalf of the present, when he mingled in the public concerns of the rulers and the people, and acted as the messenger of God to the nation in reference to their internal and external ex

of them appears alone with particular clearness and prominency. Especially is the view of the prophet sometimes so exclusively directed upon the latter object, that, filled with the contemplation of the glory of the spiritual kingdom of God and of its exalted founder, he wholly loses sight for a time of the less distant future. In the description of this spiritual de

isting relations. These are single prophecies, published at different times, and on different occasions; afterwards, indeed, brought together into one collection, but still marked as distinct and single, either by the super-liverance, also, the relations of scriptions, or in some other ob- time are not observed. Somevious and known method. The times the prophet beholds the ausecond part, on the contrary, is thor of this deliverance in his huoccupied wholly with the future. miliation and sorrows; and again, It was apparently written in the the remotest ages of the Messilater years of the prophet, when ah's kingdom present themselves he had probably left all active to his enraptured vision; when exertions in the theocracy to man, so long estranged from his younger associates in the God, will have again returned prophetical office. He himself to him; when every thing oppostransferred his contemplations ed to God shall have been defrom the joyless present, into stroyed, and internal and exterthe future. In this part, there-nal peace universally prevail ; fore, which was not, like the first, occasioned by external circumstances, it is not so easy to distinguish in like manner between the different single prophecies. The whole is more like a single gush of prophecy. The prophecies of the second part refer chiefly to a twofold object. The prophet first consoles his people by announcing their deliverance from the Babylonish exile; he names the monarch whom Jehovah will send to punish the insolence of their oppressors, and lead back the people to their home. But he does not stop at this trifling and inferior deliverance. With the prospect of freedom from the Babylonish exile, the prophet connects the prospect of deliverance from sin and error through the Messiah. Sometimes both objects seem closely interwoven with each other; sometimes one

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and when all the evil introduced by sin into the world, will be for ever done away. Elevated above all space and time, the prophet contemplates from the height on which the Holy Spirit has thus placed him, the whole developement of the Messiah's kingdom, from its smallest beginnings to its glorious completion.

ISHBOSHETH, son of Saul, and also his successor. Abner, Saul's kinsman, and general, so managed, that Ishbosheth was acknowledged king at Mahanaim by the greater part of Israel, while David reigned at Hebron over Judah. He was forty-four years of age when he began to reign, and he reigned two years peaceably; after which he had skirmishes, with loss, against David. 2 Sam. 2:8, &c. Being abandoned by Abner, whom he had provoked, his cause grew more and more feeble; and he

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