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All the verses of the fecond begin with; and the stanza is therefore intitled beth. In like manner, every verfe of the third ftanza begins with; the ftanza is accordingly styled gimel; and so on, through the alphabet. It is farther remarkable, that in every one of these verses, which amount to 176, there is fame word or other, which fignifies the law of God, excepting only in the 12zd verfe. The author has used ten different words for this purpofe, which we tranflate law, way, teftimony, commandments, precepts, word, judgments, righteoufnefs, ftatutes,, truth. This pfalm contains a number of pious reflections, and excellent rules for the conduct of life. But no perfon, except a fanatic, will pretend to infist, that the author was under the influence of divine inspiration, while he ftudied this elaborate feries of acrostics. Pfal. xxv. is likewife acroftical; the verfes, in the original, beginning with the letters of the alphabet in their order: only two or three are difarranged, probably by the negligence of tranfcribers. The xxxiv, xxxvii, cxi, cxii, cxlv, are of the fame caft; every verfe, or half verfe, beginning with a different letter of the alphabet.

In compofitions, formed upon these rabbinical principles, we may indeed meet with piety and devotion; but we can hardly expect evangelical predictions.

The fathers, as we have already intimated, ran into ab. furdities, by converting the plaineft expreffions into types, figures, and prophecies. And this, we will venture to affert, will be the fate of every one, who attempts to annex a fpiritual or myfiical application to the Palms indifcriminately. The pious and learned Dr. Hammond, knowing the temerity of fuch a proceeding, confined himself to the investigation of the literal fenfe; and very feldom went beyond it, unless where he had the authority of the facred writers, of the New Teftament.

I have made ufe of that, fays he, as oft as it was to be met with, and then advanced with confidence beyond what the let-ter, in its firft or immediate fenfe, fuggefted. But for all other paffages, which by fome kind of accommodation, or anagogy, or figure, or moral, or fpiritual fenfe, were capable of being thus applied, either to Chrift or his church, I have not frequently chofen to be thus adventurous; both because I knew this was for the most part the product of fancy, wherein all men are willing to referve their liberty, and neither needed to be directed, nor liked to be anticipated; and because I was unwilling to affix any fenfe to fcripture, which I had not fome degree of affurance, that the Holy Ghost in the inspired writer had refpect unto; who though he may have defigned whatever

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the words are capable of, yet cannot be proved to have dones whatever he might have done."

In the work before us, which is a work of piety, learning, and labour, they, who are fond of spiritual applications, will meet with ample satisfaction.

II. A Tour in Scotland. MDCCLXXII. Part II. 4to. 17. 11. 6d. in boards. White.

IN the preceding volume of Mr. Pennant's Travels in Scotland, he intimated a defign of publishing additional obfervations to those which he had made on his first Tour in that country. With these therefore we are gratified in the part now under confideration, from which there is no doubt of receiving the fame degree of pleasure experienced on two former occafions, when we traced the progrefs of this agreeable traveller through the interefting narrative of both his journeys t.

The volume begins with Additions to the Tour in Scotland in 1769, and likewise to the Voyage to the Hebrides in 1772. Paffing over thefe, however, we fhall proceed to the Tour in Scotland in the year laft mentioned, where we join company with Mr. Pennant on the 15th of August, at Ard-maddie, in Argylefhire. The house, we are told, commands a beautiful view of the bay, and of the isle of Suil, where the parish church and the manfe of the minifter of the parish are placed, acceffible at all times, by reafon of the narrowness of the channel of Clachan. This tract is hilly, finely wooded near the house, and on the adjacent part of the fhore; contains about eleven hundred examinable perfons, and abounds with cattle. On the weft fide of the bay is a quarry of white marble, veined with dull red.

Leaving Ard-maddie, the traveller rides along a fine road, for fome time by the fide of an arm of the fea, called, from the plenty of fhells, Loch-fuchan, and paffes by a heap of ftones, called Cairn-Alpin; because from hence the bodies of the Alpiniades, or fucceffors of that ancient Scottish monarch, were embarked for interment in the facred ground of Jona. Mr. Pennant foon afterwards reaches the town and castle of Inverary, feated on a small but beautiful plain, on the fide of Loch-Fine. This place has been for fome centuries the refidence of the family of Argyle. Among the few portraits which our author mentions to have feen in this castle, is a

Pref. to his Paraphrafe of the Pfalms.

Crit. Rey. vol. xxxiii. p. 14. and vol. xxxviii. p. 17,

head

head of the earl of Argyle, who was executed in the reign of James II.

On the day of execution, fays Mr. Pennant, he eat his dinner, and took his afternoon's nap with his usual compofure, falling with a calmnefs and conftancy fuitable to the goodness of his life.

A little before his death he compofed his epitaph, I think fill to be feen in the Grey-friars church-yard, Edinburgh. The verses are rather to be admired, as they fhewed the ferenity of his mind, at that awful period, than for the fmoothess of the numbers but the tranflation, by the rev. Mr. Jamifon, of Glasgow, cannot but be acceptable to every reader of taste.

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Audi, Hofpes, quicunque venis, tumulque revifis,

Et rogitas quali crimine tinctus eram.

Non me crimen habet, non me malus abftulit error,
Et vitium nullum, me pepulit patria.
Solus amor patriæ, verique immenfa cupido
Diffuetas juffit fumere tela manus.

Opprimor, en! rediens, vi fola et fraude meorum,
Hoftibus et fævis victima terna cado.

Sit licet hic nofter labor irritus, haud Deus æquus
Defpiciet populum fæcula cun&a fuum.
Namque alius veniet fatis melioribus ortus
Qui toties ruptum fine beabit opus.

Sat mihi credo datum (quamvis caput enfe fecetur)
Hinc petor ætherei Lucida templa poli.

Thou, paffenger, who fhalt have fo much time,
As view my grave, and ask what was my crime;
No ftain of error, no black vices' brand,
Did me compel to leave my native land.
Love to my country, truth condemn'd to die,
Did force my hands forgotten arms to try.
More from friends' fraud my fall proceeded hath,
Than foes, tho' thrice they did attempt my death.
On my defign, tho' Providence did frown,
Yet God at laft will furely raise his own.
Another hand, with more fuccefsful speed,

Shall raise the remnant, bruise the ferpent's head.'

We are informed that the tunny frequents this and several other branches of the fea, on the western coaft during the feafon of herrings the Scots call it the mackrel-fture, or ftor, from its enormous fize, it being the largest of the genus. One that was taken off Inverary, when Mr. Pennant was there in 1769, weighed between four and five hundred pounds.

From Inverary the traveller proceeds to Cladich, a village on the banks of Loch-aw, where he met with Mr. Mac

Intyre, minifter of Clachan-difart, in the beautiful vale of Gle nurchie, (Glenorchy) who conducted him to a cairn, in which had been found the ashes, perhaps, as Mr. Pennant supposes, of some ancient hunter, and the head of a deer, probably buried with them, from the opinion that the departed fpirit might still be delighted with its favourite employment during the union with the body. Mr. Pennant obferves, upon the authority of the geographer Mela, that the cuftom of burning the dead was common to the Caledonians as well as the Gauls; and we are told that to this day the Highlanders retain a faying, derived from this very remote practice. If they would exprefs the malice of an enemy, they would tell him, that was it in his power,' he would wish to fee their afhes floating on the water Dhurigè tu mo luath le Uifge."

The traveller afterwards vifits Kilchurn caftle, belonging to the earl of Breadalbane, a magnificent pile, now în ruins, feated on a low ifle near the fouthern border of the Loch-aw. In this parish may be feen a deep circular hollow, in form, and of the fize of a large cauldron. According to tradition, this was one of the vatts frequent in the highland turburies, from which the old natives drew an unctuous fubftance, used by them to dye their cloth black, before the introduction of other materials for that purpose.

Paffing along the vale of Glenurchie, which is reprefented to be a tract of great fertility, embellifhed with little groves, and watered by a fine ftream, Mr. Pennant observed on the road fides, fmall verdant hillocks, ftyled by the common people, hi-an, or the fairy haunt; because here, fay they, the faries, who love not the glare of day, make their retreat, after the celebration of their nocturnal revels.

Continuing his route, Mr. Pennant arrives at Tyendrum, in Perthshire. On his road to this place in 1769, he paffed near the mountains of Bendoran, one of which is celebrated for the hollow found it fends forth about twenty-four hours before any heavy rain. To entertain our readers with more than an abridged detail of Mr. Pennant's Tour, we shall now have recourfe to a fhort extract from the narrative.

Enter Strath-fillan, or the vale of St. Fillan, an abbot? who lived in the year 703, and retired here the latter end of his days. He is pleafed to take under his protection the difordered in mind; and works wonderful cures, fay his votaries, even to this day. The unhappy lunatics are brought here by their friends, who firft perform the ceremony of the deaffl, thrice round a neighbouring cairn; afterwards offer on it their rags, or a little bunch of heath tied with worsted; then thrice immerge the patient in a holy pool of the river, a fécond Be

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thefda; and, to conclude, leave him faft bound in the neighbouring chapel. If in the morning he is found loose, the faint is fuppofed to be propitious; for if he continues in bonds, his cure remains doubtful; but it often happens that death proves the angel that releases the afflicted, before the morrow, from all the troubles of this life,

The deafil, or turning from eaft to weft, according to the course of the fun, is a custom of high antiquity in religious ceremonies. The Romans practifed the motion in the manner now performed in Scotland. The Gaulish druids made their circum-volution in a manner directly reverfe: but the druids of Gaul and Britain had probably the fame reafon for thefe circum-ambulations; for as they held the omniprefence of their God, it might be to inftruct their difciples, that wherefoever they turned their face, they were fure to meet the afpect of the Deity. The number of turns was alfo religiously observed in very ancient days; thus the arch enchantrefs, Medea, in all her Charms attends to the facred three:

• Ter fe convertit, ter fumtis flumine crinem

Irroravit aquis; ternis ululatibus ora

Solvit, et in dura fubmiffo poplite terra,

Nox, ait, &c.

She turn'd her thrice around, and thrice fhe threw

On her long treffes the nocturnal dew;

Then yelling thrice a moft terrific found,

Her bare knee bended on the flinty ground.

The faint, the object of the veneration in queftion, was of moft fingular fervice to Robert Bruce, infpiring his foldiery with uncommon courage at the battle of Bannock bourne, by a miracle wrought the day before in his favour. His majesty's chaplain was directed to bring with him into the field, the arm of the faint, lodged in a filver fhrine. The good man, fearing, in cafe of a defeat, that the English might become matters of the precious limb, brought only the empty cover: but, while the king was invoking the aid of St. Fillan, the lid of the fhrine, placed before him on the altar, opened and fhut of its own accord on infpection, to the wonder of the whole army, the arm was found reftored to its place; the foldiers accepted the omen, and, affured of victory, fought with an enthusiasm that enfured fuccefs. In gratitude for the affiftance he received that day from the faint, he founded here, in 1314, a priory of canons regular, and confecrated it to him. At the diffolution, this houfe, with all the revenues and fuperiorities, were granted to an ancestor of the prefent poffeffor the earl of Breadalbane.

This part of the country is in the parish of Killin, very remote from the church. As the chapel here is deftitute of a refident minifter, lady Glenurchy, with diftinguished piety, has

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