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and well known at His court: his name is Prayer. He can silently make his way into the secret places of Jerusalem by unknown paths. He is able to penetrate even the Presence chamber of the King, and is wont to obtain, by his moving supplication, help for those who are in distress. Let him now go, for he is ready." All expressed a wish that he should go forthwith. Prudence then instructed him what to say to the King. Righteousness charged him to be faithful, and not to return empty; and the rest (especially Fear) urged him to make all possible speed; and they sent him out by a private way through the walls. He passed safely through the enemy's troops, and in the twinkling of an eye arrived at the gates of Jerusalem. Finding the gates shut, he knocked unceasingly, and cried out to the keepers, "Open to me the gates of Righteousness, that I may enter in, and confess unto my LORD our King the multitude of the sorrows which are in my heart. Righteousness hath sent me, that I may see the King, to Whom I bear secret tidings."

The King, knowing him to be a messenger from Righteousness, ordered him to be admitted. Prayer being admitted to the Royal Presence, made obeisance and said, "O King, live for ever!" The King asked him, "Is all well with thy master, and with his house?" "By Thy grace all is well," answered Prayer, "but one thing is needful. Thy servant, who hath been delivered from the horns of the unicorn, hath come to Thy soldier, my master; and, my LORD, that land is barren, and without food. Let my LORD give His blessing, and our land shall yield her increase. Behold the enemies are gathered in great numbers, that they may fight against us: give us help, LORD, in trouble, for there is none other that fighteth for us, but only Thou, O GOD!"

The King, Who is good and full of compassion, moved by his entreaties, exclaimed, "Whom shall we send?" Then said Charity, "Here am I, LORD, send me!" The King asked him who were his companions; Charity answered that his own family would be sufficient. He went forth, therefore, attended by his noble company,-Joy, Peace, Patience, Long-suffering, Gentleness, Goodness, Meekness. Charity, thus attended, marched forward, confident of victory; and having raised his triumphant standard, he passed the first and second watch of the enemy, and reached the gate, which opened to him of its own accord. entering the castle there was a great rejoicing, and the shouts of the people reached the camp of the besiegers; and they said one to another, "What is this? The voice of triumph has reached our ears from the camp of Israel! Peradventure, help hath come unto them, and they will make a sally upon us.

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fly from the face of Israel, for the LORD fighteth for them against us." In the meantime, Charity, impatient of delay, ordered the army to be drawn up to attack the enemy, declaring, "I will go forth against the gates of Hell." The gates were then thrown open, and the whole force of Charity rushed out with a sudden impulse. The Babylonians, unable to resist, attempted in vain to fly; and Fear slew his thousands, and Charity his tens of thousands.

MOSQUES.

I SHALL venture upon an extract or two descriptive of our visit to the three principal mosques in Constantinople, into which a few years ago it was a rare event for any European to enter, though now a common one enough. We had for several days passed by these really beautiful buildings with much longing to see the interior; the utmost of which we could obtain a glimpse being a few glass lamps containing oil, with little tapers swimming in them; a figure or two, seated cross-legged upon matting apparently very clean, but no more. To our great delight, as we were conning over the expenses of a firman, the news spread over the different inns that a firman was granted, and that the mosques would be open some time the next morning. The Aia-Sophia being the principal mosque, we accordingly made it our rendezvous at the early hour of six, that we might not run the least risk of being too late; and were rewarded by the pleasure of studying the habits of the passing and loitering population for four hours and a half, during which each of us for the first time made use of the sheesha or water-pipe, and found it a rather cumbrous method of smoking. At last, there were symptoms of a bustle; and the party seemed to be busy buying slippers. Some acknowledgment of the sanctity of the mosque was most justly required from us, in the manners customary with them, viz., the taking off our shoes; but a Frank dress hardly permitting this, the substitute of covering them with the inner leather slipper was allowed instead. This custom of acknowledging the house and temple of GOD, by putting off the shoe, is one from early times. Moses and Joshua were commanded, "Put off thy shoes from off thy feet; for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." It is the invariable practice among eastern religions.

We entered S. Sophia, and found ourselves within a large, spacious dome, from whence were suspended innumerable lights, or rather glasses for oil, not unlike those used in Europe for the bedrooms of invalids and nervous people, as a protection against the terrors of darkness. I cannot give you a full description: I

was too much perplexed by the novelty of the scene. The high altar (the altar where S. Chrysostom once stood) is clean gone; it faced the main entrance from the west. There is still a small pulpit, to which a straight row of stairs leads, whence an harangue is made every Friday.

We wandered about for some time; but the three French officers to whom the firman had been granted, apparently anxious to have done with the business, hurried us to the cloisters, (as I shall term them, from want of knowing better) up some steps; and from thence to the outside, where we were at last able to climb to the top, and to enter a little gallery surrounding the interior of the dome, that resembles the whispering gallery of S. Paul's Cathedral in London, and commands an admirable view of all that is going on below. The depredations which travellers and others have here made upon the mosaic-work of the ceiling of the dome are but too plain. In some places the mosaic is stripped off for several feet and such appears to be the ravenous collectorship of the Frank visitors, that even the little boys in the streets are assiduously on the watch for their opportunity clandestinely to offer for sale the plunder of this ancient edifice, wrapped up in pieces of paper; and now and then positive fragments of the plaister, with the mosaic-work imbedded in it. The material consists of square bits of glass, with a gold enamel over the surface exposed to view. The roof is so blackened that it is not possible to see clearly what the design is, which appears, as far as one can judge, to be that of the dove descending. The groundplan of the Church resembles a Greek cross. The length of the nave from east to west, is about 270 feet; its breadth 150; from the floor to the span of the dome, about 185 feet. There is something remarkable in the dome, which has barely more than a concavity of twenty-two feet from its span.

There is a peculiarity remarked by architects in these buildings which belong to a school termed the Byzantine, almost extinct as a form of modern architecture; that the principal dome, which is their leading characteristic, unlike that of S. Paul's or S. Peter's at Rome, is supported by four huge columns. Those in this church are said to have been part of the temple of the sun at Baalbec. They are of porphyry; but the fact of their coming from Baalbec rests upon no very good authority, as you will hereafter see; and hence when the circular wall is raised upon the pillar that has to bear the dome, its tendency is to bulge outwards. This has been corrected in the dome of S. Paul's by several strata of chains imbedded into the work. In S. Sophia the architect has been compelled to raise immense solid buttresses on the outside, which grievously disfigure its external symmetry. Indeed the simple truth must be confessed, that its exterior is extremely plain, ugly, and shapeless. The emperor Justinian is said to have caused a

picture of king Solomon to be painted and placed on an adjoining fountain, looking in an attitude of deep astonishment towards the Church of S. Sophia. On the consecration of the Church, as if in rivalry of Solomon, 1000 oxen, 1800 sheep, 600 deer, 1000 pigs, 10,000 fowls, were slaughtered for the poor, 30,000 measures of corn distributed, and several hundredweight of gold divided amongst them. It is also said, that during the consecration service, as the emperor stood before the high altar, and repeated the words, "I thank thee, GOD, that Thou hast permitted me to complete this work ;" and hardly were the words uttered than, almost in the same breath, he added, “Solomon, I have outdone thee!"

Leaving this ancient venerable building, now for the sins of its former people, a mosque of the same GOD, but in servitude to a spurious law and revelation, we come to the mosque of Sultan Achmet, which is really beautiful. It has been built, as indeed have all the Turkish mosques, after the form and pattern of S. Sophia, but with a design suited to the beautiful minarets, which here are true and natural parts of the building, and not forcible additions contrary to the spirit and character of the design, as in the case of S. Sophia. The exceeding cleanliness, elegance, simplicity, and beauty of its interior corresponded with the fascinating symmetry of its many domes and minarets peeping out from the trees. This mosque looks down upon the Almeidan or Hippodrome; and in its presence was accomplished that romantic tragedy of Ottoman history, the murder of the young Sultan, Osman, by an insurrection of the well-known lawless janissaries. How little did they foresee that the blood of their prince was to be the signal forerunner of their own, at the hands of the lineal descendant of their murdered monarch! This very Hippodrome was literally strewed with the limbs and corpses of massacred janissaries, in the savage but necessary (?) extermination of them, in 1826, by sultan Mahmoud.

The Suliemanieh was but a répetition of the preceding. To an architect there may have been many interesting points of difference; but its general appearance is much the same. The eye, and I may say the heart, sadly misses the high altar of the Christian Church in these oriental temples. The mitraal or Mahometan altar is but a niche, on which to preserve the Koran, in such part of the edifice where it may be nearest Mecca: it is a mere mark or magnet indicating Mecca, wherever it is found. On the walls are written in gold letters, on blue ground, several sentences of the Koran, and other expressions of piety. They are for the most part unexceptionable, as may be seen from the full description J. Von Hanner's work contains; as, for instance, that in the Suliemanieh, "I have lifted up my eyes to Him Who sustaineth heaven and earth." Indeed on this, and I may now add, on many

subsequent occasions, how much I have been impressed with the truth, that no Christian can or ought to return from among a Mahometan people without the deepest humiliation at having witnessed how greatly they surpass himself in fear and reverence for the name, the house, the worship, and the laws of Almighty GOD. Were we not too proud, we have, as a Christian people, the opportunity of taking a lesson in the honour due to our Christian faith and profession from observing the devotion of the Mahometans.-Formby's Visit to the East.

THE KNIGHTS TEMPLARS.

AMONGST the religious and military orders that sprung into existence during the middle ages, there were scarcely any of more importance than that of the Knights Templars. It was originally founded by nine knights, who, seeing the many perils to which the pilgrims to the Holy Land were exposed, united themselves together for their defence and protection. Their intentions and devotion met with the warm approbation of the Patriarch, in the presence of whom they took the three vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience; and also a fourth, to war incessantly in the cause of the Holy Land and the pilgrims. The patronage of King Baldwin the Second was also secured for them, and he gave them a portion of his own palace for their residence. As this was contiguous to the Temple, they styled themselves" Soldiers of the Temple," or Templars. During the first nine years which elapsed after the institution of their order, the knights of the temple lived in poverty, religiously devoting all the money which was sent to them from Europe to the advantage of the Holy Land, and the service of the pilgrims. They had no peculiar habit; their raiment was such as the charity of the faithful bestowed upon them; and though knights, and engaged in constant warfare against the infidels, their poverty and moderation were such, that Hugh des Payens, and his companion Godfrey of S. Omer, had but one war-horse between them; "a circumstance which they afterwards, in their brilliant period, commemorated by their seal, which represented two knights mounted on one horse,-a device chosen with a view of inculcating humility on the brethren, now beginning to wax haughty and insoJent."

Baldwin the Second, resolved to further the cause to his utmost ability, by obtaining the confirmation of the Pope, despatched two of the order to Rome, in 1127, for this purpose; giving them at the same time letters of introduction to S. Bernard, the celebrated Abbot of Clairvaux. He had for some time taken a deep interest

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