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owes to the labour and genius of others, still he has endeavoured, often to the reader's loss, to avoid transcription from popular manuals, from a sense that to increase the bulk of a volume by such methods is not quite honest, and even if it were, would savour too strongly of inglorious ease.

SOLOMON.

WHO hath not heard the trumpet of thy fame ?
Or is there that sequestered dismal spot
Where thy far-echoed glory soundeth not?-
The tented Arab still among his mates
In wondrous story chaunts thy mighty name;
Thy marvels yet the fakir celebrates,

Yea, and for Solomon's unearthly power

The sorcerer yells amid his deeds of shame, Rifling the dead at midnight's fearful hour:

Not such thy praise; these savour of a fall Which penitence should banish from the mind; We gladlier on thy sainted wisdom call, And greet thee with the homage of mankind Wisest, and mightiest, and first, of all.

Concerning Solomon so much is commonly known, that there is little excuse here to repeat the lessons of our childhood. We assuredly have distinct traces of his apostacy, and of the dreadful manner by which it was manifested, namely sorcery and other ramifications of the black art, in the fact that even now among the mysteries of Egyptian, Chinese, and Asiatic magic, the name of Solyman, or Zuleyman, is still prominent, as a ruler of the spirits: see, in exemplification, the eighth and ninth of the Arabian Nights. There can be little doubt that with all the bold ambition of a towering mind, permitted for wise purposes to break into brief rebellion, Solomon practised those evil arts; and the writer at least feels as little doubt that witchcraft and its like were in those ages of the world possible and real crimes; that in fact, a league could be entered into with wicked spirits, and, if such guilt be now set out of the pale of Christendom, there is no telling how far it may actually exist within the bounds of Paynimrie: consult Mr. Lane's account of Egyptian magic, and that of other writers from the East.

It occurs forcibly to the mind, how different

from the better choice of Solomon, would have been that of every Mr. Worldly-Wiseman of the age. There is a certain class of men among us, and it is to be lamented a class very large and very spreading, in whose estimation money and money's-worth constitute the only riches; they are, in the words of Young,

"Bit by the rage canine of dying rich;"

the scales of their judgment, Aladdin-like, weigh nothing but gold; they throw in no make-weight, as Brennus did; (see Plutarch's Life of Camillus ;) their rule of life is-" facias rem, Si possis, recté, si non, quocunque modo rem;" mental gifts, and spiritual privileges are viewed by minds so grovelling, merely as lucrative means to that all-absorbing end; they hold religiously that "money makes the man;" they consider not what inward wealth may be the very beggar's portion; they heed not what heart-poverty may gnaw the vitals of a Croesus. There are many poor rich men, and there are many rich poor men: the age needs to be converted from idolatry in this matter, for the image of Nebuchadnezzar still has its million devotees. The wise man will feel richer in home happiness, in the love of nearest and dearest, in the power of religion, the peace of his conscience, the strength of his mind, and the luxuriance of his imagination, than" in thousands of gold and silver:" to use the "in beautiful language of Transatlantic Willis,

"He from the eyrie of his eagle thought
Looks down on monarchs ;"

whereas the mere idolater of gold, the Gallio caring for none of these things, who is incapable of great hopes, and generous sentiments, heaps up only unsatisfying treasure, and has just mind enough to make him miserable.

"Wisdom is the principal thing: get wisdom, and with all thy getting get understanding." The choice of Hercules, virtue in preference to pleasure, handed down to us by Xenophon, is as well known among the Greeks, as that of Solomon, wisdom before riches, among the Jews: and it is impossible to say how far the profane hero is indebted for the creditable anecdote to the sacred king. The habit of Greece, one more useful than honest, was to appropriate to her own shores every thing in history or fable which should have more rightfully redounded to the honour of her neighbours.

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