OPHIR was a place celebrated for its fine gold. It must have been visited long before the time of Solomon, since the gold of Ophir is mentioned in the book of Job: "Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust, and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brooks:" 45th Psalm: "Upon thy right hand did stand the queen in gold of Ophir."

Concerning the part of the world in which Ophir was situated, there have been many and various opinions and conjectures. Almost all interpreters of the passages in scripture relating to this place, have differed in their conclusions. Josephus places it in the Indies, and says it is called the gold country, by which he is thought to mean Chersonesus Aurea, now known as Malacca, a peninsula opposite to the island of Sumatra. Lucus Holstenius thinks we must fix on India generally, or on the city of Supor in the island of Celebes. Others place it in the kingdom of Malabar, or in Ceylon; that is the island of Taprobana, so famous among the ancients, an opinion which Bochart has labored to support. Lipemus places it beyond the Ganges, at Malacca, Java, Sumatra, Siam, Bengal, Peru, &c. Others, as Huit and Bruce, have placed it at Sofala, in South Africa, where mines of gold and silver have been found, which appear to have been anciently and extensively worked, and to this hypothesis Gesenius inclines. Rosenmüller and others suppose it to be Southern Arabia.

The most that we know about Ophir is, that

it was the place from which Solomon procured the gold and other precious articles with which he enriched himself, and adorned the temple of Jerusalem. For this purpose he made a navy of ships in " Ezion-geber, which is beside Eloth, on the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom."

And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon."

"And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to king Solomon."

"And the navy also of Hiram, that brought gold from Ophir, brought in from Ophir great plenty of almung-trees, and precious stones."

"For the king had at sea a navy of Tarshish with the navy of Hiram; once in three years came the navy of Tarshish, bringing gold and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks.”

In the life of David Brainerd by Jonathan Edwards, is recorded a wonderful illustration of the power of natural religion, showing the near approach which the Pagan, unaided by the light of a written revelation, may make towards the just comprehension of his own relation and duty to God.

The story, told in the simplicity for which Brainerd was so distinguished, is itself most touching, almost painful, as we see the poor Indian, feeling after God, if haply he might find him; but glorious, when in the solitude of the forest, having never heard of the Christian religion, praying to God, his heart is comforted, peace comes into his soul, and he loves God and everybody, "so as he never did before." He was a wild Indian, who came to Brainerd, shortly after his settlement-but let us read the missionary's story.

"I discoursed with him about Christianity. Some of my discourse he seemed to like, but some of it he disliked extremely. He told me that God had taught him his religion, and that he never would turn from it; but wanted to find some who would join heartily with him in it. For the Indians, he said, were grown very degenerate and corrupt. He had thoughts, he said, of leaving all his friends and travelling abroad in order to find some who would join with him; for he believed that God had some good people somewhere, who felt as he did. He had not always, he said, felt as he now did, but had formerly been like the rest of the Indians, until about four or five years before that time. Then, he said, his heart was very much distressed, so that he could not live among the Indians, but got away into the woods and lived alone, for some months. At length, he says, God comforted his heart, and showed him what he should do; and since that time, he had known God, and tried to serve him, and loved all men, be they who they would, so as he never did before. He treated me with uncommon courtesy, and seemed to be hearty in it. I was told by the Indians that he opposed their drinking strong liquor, with all his power, and that if at any time he could not dissuade them from it by all he could say, he would leave them and go crying into the woods. It was manifest that he had a set of religious notions, which he had examined for himself, and not taken for granted upon bare tradition, and he relished or disrelished whatever was spoken of a religious nature, as it either agreed or disagreed with his standard. While I was discoursing, he would sometimes say, now that I like, so God has taught me, &c., and some of his sentiments seemed very just. Yet he utterly denied the existence of a devil, and declared there

was no such creature known among the Indians of old times, whose religion he supposed he was attempting to revive. He likewise told me that departed souls all went southward, and that the difference between the good and the bad was this -that the former were admitted into a beautiful town with spiritual walls, and that the latter would for ever hover around these walls, in vain attempts to get in. He seemed to be sincere, honest, and conscientious in his own way, and according to his own religious notions, which was more than I ever saw in any other pagan. I perceived that he was looked upon and derided among most of the Indians as a precise zealot, who made a needless noise about religious matters, but I must say there was something in his temper and disposition which looked more like true religion than anything I ever observed amongst other heathens."

I confess there is something in this lone Indian's story, that draws deeply on the fountains of my soul's sympathy. I love him, not merely as my fellow man, and as I would love all men whom God made, and for whom I pray; but I love him as one who had the same longings after truth that have filled my own soul, the same desires after something purer and nobler than this world offers; who longed after God, and in the silence of a wilderness which the sound of the gospel had never broken, and where the voice of prayer was never heard, even there, this Indian sought after God and found him to the comfort of his soul. I love him, then, as one, perhaps the only one, among the pagans, following the law that was written in his own conscience, and "doing things contained" in the written word. I love him as one who knew God, and according to the light that was in him did God's will, striving against sin, resisting the corruptions within and around him, weeping over vices that he could not reform, and loving the world that hated him.

If I should add that I love him as a child of God, a renewed sinner, I should exceed the limits of the evidence. But this story does not seem to be appreciated by every one. It is in the edition of Brainerd's life by Edwards, but in Austin's edition, though he affirms that nothing material has been omitted, this wonderful fact, certainly as wonderful as the annals of Paganism has furnished, is suppressed. later editions of the Memoirs of Brainerd, the

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