their dead in fields, over whom the opulent and families of distinction raised superb and ostentatious monuments, on which they lavished great splendour and magnificence, and which they so religiously maintained from time to time in their pristine beauty and glory." To this custom our Saviour alludes in the following apt comparison : Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous to men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. (Matt. xxiii. 27.) But though the sepulchres of the rich were thus beautified, the graves of the poor were oftentimes so neglected, that if the stones by which they were marked happened to fall, they were not set up again, by which means the graves themselves did not appear; they were admλa, that is, not obvious to the sight, so that men might tread on them inadvertently. (Luke xi. 44.)3 From Jer. xxvi. 23. we may collect that the populace of the lowest order (Heb. sons or children of the people) were buried in a public cemetery having no distinct sepulchre to themselves, as all persons of rank and character, and especially of so honourable an order as that of the prophets, used to have."

After the deceased had been committed to the tomb, it was customary among the Greeks and Romans, to put the tears shed by the surviving relatives and friends into lachrymatory urns, and place these on the sepulchres, as a memorial of their distress and affection. From Psal. lvi. 8. it should seem that this custom was still more anciently in use among the eastern nations, especially the Hebrews. These vessels were of different materials, and were moulded into different forms. Some were of glass, and some were of earthenware 5, being diminutive in size and of delicate workmanship.

' Harwood's Introduction, vol. ii. pp. 139. 141, 142. The Sepulchres, described and delineated by Mr. Emerson, completely elucidate the form of the Jewish tombs. Letters from the Egean, vol. ii. pp. 55-59.

2 The following passage from Dr. Shaw's Travels affords a striking illustration of Matt. xxiii. 27. "If we except a few persons, who are buried within the precincts of the sanctuaries of their marabutts, the rest are carried out at a small distance from their cities and villages, where a great extent of ground is allotted for the purpose. Each family has a particular part of it walled in, like a garden, where the bones of their ancestors have remained for many generations. For in these inclosures the graves are all distinct and separated, each of them having a stone placed upright both at the head and feet, inscribed with the name and title of the deceased; while the intermediate space is either planted with flowers, bordered round with stones, or paved with tiles. The graves of the principal citizens are further distinguished, by having cupolas or vaulted chambers of three, four, or more square yards built over them; and as these very frequently lie open, and occasionally shelter us from the inclemency of the weather, the demoniac (Mark v. 5.) might with propriety enough have had his dwelling among the tombs and others are said (Isa. lxv. 4.) to remain among the graves and to lodge in the monuments (mountains). And as all these different sorts of tombs and sepulchres, with the very walls likewise of their respective cupolas and inclosures, are constantly kept clean, whitewashed, and beautified, they continue to illustrate those expressions of our Saviour where he mentions the garnishing of sepulchres, and compares the scribes, Pharisees, and hypocrites to whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but within were full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness." Shaw's Travels, vol. i. pp. 395, 396.

Macknight's Harmony, sect. 87. vol. ii. p. 473.

Dr. Blayney's Jeremiah, p. 349.

Dr. Chandler's Life of David, vol. i. p. 106. Among the valuable remains of ancient art collected by Dr. E. D. Clarke among the ruins of Sicyon, in the Peloponnesus, were

In order to do honour to the memory of the dead, their sepulchres were sometimes distinguished by monuments. The custom of erecting these seems to have obtained even from the patriarchal age. Thus, Jacob erected a pillar upon the grave of his beloved wife Rachel. (Gen. xxxv. 20.) This is the earliest monument mentioned in the Scriptures: it is evident from that passage that it was standing when Moses wrote; and its site seems to have been known in the time of Samuel and Saul. (1 Sam. x. 2.) The monument now shown in the vicinity of Bethlehem, as Rachel's tomb, is a modern and Turkish structure, which may, perhaps, be the true place of her interment.' In later times, inscriptions appear to have been placed on tombstones, denoting the persons who were there interred. Such was the title or inscription discovered by Josiah, which proved to be the burial-place of the prophet who was sent from Judah to denounce the divine judgments against the altar which Jeroboam had erected more than three centuries before. Simon Maccabæus built a splendid monument at Modin in honour of his father and his brethren. (1 Macc. xiii. 25-30.) In the time of Jesus Christ, it appears that the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees repaired and adorned the tombs of the prophets whom their ancestors had murdered for their faithfulness, under a sanctimonious appearance of respect for their memory. The ancient Arabs raised a heap of stones over the body of the dead (Job. xxi. 32. marginal rendering), which was guarded. In the year 1820, Mr. Rae Wilson observed on the plain of Zebulun, not far from Cana, piles of stones covering over or marking the place of graves. Similar cairns, also the remains of remote antiquity, exist both in England and in Scotland.2 Among the Hebrews, great heaps of stones were raised over those whose death was either infamous, or attended with some very remarkable circumstances. Such were the heaps raised over the grave of Achan (Josh. vii. 26.), over that of the king of Ai (viii. 29.), and over that of Absalom (2 Sam. xviii. 17.); all which were sepulchral monuments to perpetuate the place of their interment.

VI. A FUNERAL FEAST commonly succeeded the Jewish burials. Thus, after Abner's funeral was solemnised, the people came to David to eat meat with him, though they could not persuade him to do so. (2 Sam iii. 35.) He was the chief mourner, and probably had invited

lachrymatories of more ancient form and materials than any thing he had ever before observed of the same kind; "the lachrymatory phials, in which the Sicyonians treasured up their tears, deserve rather the name of bottles; they are nine inches long, two inches in diameter, and contain as much fluid as would fill a phial of three ounces; consisting of the coarsest materials, a heavy blue clay or marle.... Sometimes the vessels found in ancient sepulchres are of such diminutive size, that they are only capable of holding a few drops of fluid in these instances there seems to be no other use for which they were fitted. Small lachrymal phials of glass have been found in the tombs of the Romans in Great Britain; and the evident allusion to this practice in the Sacred Scriptures - Put thou my tears into thy bottle (Psal. lvi. 8.)- seems decisive as to the purpose for which these vessels were designed." Travels in various Countries of Europe, &c., vol. vi. pp. 541, 542.

Maundrell's Journey from Aleppo, p. 117. "It has all the appearance of one of those tombs often erected to the memory of a Turkish Santon." Carne's Letters, p. 277. 2 Rae Wilson's Travels in the Holy Land, vol. ii. p. 5. third edition.

them to this banquet. Of this Jeremiah speaks (xvi. 7.), where he calls it the cup of consolation, which they drank for their father or their mother; and accordingly the place where this funeral entertainment was made, is called in the next verse the house of feasting. Hosea calls it the bread of mourners. (Hos. ix. 4.) Funeral banquets are still in use among the oriental Christians.1

The usual tokens of mourning by which the Jews expressed their grief and concern for the death of their friends and relations, were by rending their garments, and putting on sackcloth (Gen. xxxvii. 34.), sprinkling dust on their heads, wearing of mourning apparel (2 Sam. xiv. 2.), and covering the face and the head. (2 Sam. xix. 4.) They were accustomed also in times of public mourning to go up to the roofs or platforms of their houses, there to bewail their misfortunes, which practice is mentioned in Isa. xv. 3. and xxii. 1. Anciently, there was a peculiar space of time allotted for lamenting the deceased, which they called the days of mourning. (Gen. xxvii. 41. and 1. 4.) Thus the Egyptians, who had a great regard for the patriarch Jacob, lamented his death threescore and ten days. (Gen. 1. 3.) The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. (Deut. xxxiv. 8.) Afterwards, among the Jews, the funeral mourning was generally confined to seven days. Hence, besides the mourning for Jacob in Egypt, Joseph and his company set apart seven days to mourn for his father, when they approached the Jordan with his corpse. (Gen. 1. 10.) In the time of Christ, it was customary for the nearest relative to visit the grave of the deceased, and to weep there. The Jews, who had come to condole with Mary, on the death of her brother Lazarus, on seeing her go out of the house, concluded that she was going to the grave to weep there. (John xi. 31.) The Syrian women are still accustomed, either alone?, or accompanied by some attendants, to visit the tombs of their relatives, and mourn their loss: and the same usage obtains almost throughout the East, among Jews as well as Christians and Mohammedans; and in Persia, Egypt, Greece, Dalmatia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Servia, Wallachia, and Illyria.

1 Harmer's Observations, vol. iii. p. 19.

2 "A female, with part of her robe drawn over her head, or veiled, was seen seated by the tombs of her relatives on the summit of Mount Moriah, or along its sides, just beneath the walls of Jerusalem." Carne's Letters, p. 332.

"We arrived" (at one of the villages of Elephantina, an island in the Nile,) "just in time to witness a coronagh, or wailing for the dead. A poor woman of the village had that morning received the melancholy intelligence that her husband had been drowned in the Nile. He had been interred without her knowledge, near the spot where the body was found; and she, along with several of her female friends, was paying the unavailing tribute of lamentation to his departed shade." (Richardson's Travels, vol. i. p. 355.) "One morning," says the same intelligent traveller, "when standing among the ruins of the ancient Syene, on the rocky promontory above the ferry, I saw a party of thirteen females cross the Nile to perform the lugubrious dirge at the mansions of the dead. They set up a piteous wail on entering the boat, after which they all cowered up together, wrapt in their dirty robes of beteen. On landing, they wound their way slowly and silently along the outside of the walls of the ancient town, till they arrived at their place of destination, when some of them placed a sprig of flowers on the grave, and sat down silently beside it; others cast themselves on the ground, and threw dust over their heads, uttering mournful lamentations, which they continued to repeat at intervals, during the short time that I witnessed their procedure." (Ibid. vol. i. p. 360.) Mr. Jowett witnessed a similar scene at Manfclout, a more remote town of Upper Egypt. Christian Researches in the Mediter

It does not appear that there was any general mourning for Saul and his sons, who died in battle: but the national troubles, which followed upon his death, might have prevented it. David, indeed, and his men, on hearing the news of their death, mourned and wept for them until even. (2 Sam. i. 12.) And the men of Jabesh-Gilead fasted for them seven days (1 Sam. xxxi. 13.), which must not be understood in a strict sense, as if they took no food during that time, but that they lived very abstemiously, ate little, and that seldom, using a low and spare diet, and drinking water only.

How long widows mourned for their husbands is nowhere told us in Scripture. It is recorded, indeed, of Bathsheba, that when she heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for him (2 Sam. xi. 26.) ; but this could neither be long nor very sincere.

ranean, p. 162. Alber, Inst. Herm. Vet. Test. tom. i. pp. 311-319. Calmet, Dissertation sur les Funérailles des Hébreux. Dissert. tom. i. pp. 290-309. Pareau, Antiquitas Hebraica, pp. 472-477. Jahn, Archæol. Bibl. §§ 204-211. Stosch, Compendium Archæologia Economica Novi Testamenti, pp. 121-132. Brünings, Compendium Antiquitatum Græcarum, pp. 388-400.; and his Compendium Antiquitatum Hebræarum, pp. 257-264. The subject of Hebrew sepulchres is very fully discussed by Nicolai, in his treatise De Sepulchris Hebræorum (Lugd. Bat. 1706), which is illustrated with several curious plates, some of which, however, it must be confessed, are rather fanciful.

APPENDIX.

I. TABLE OF WEIGHTS, MEASURES, AND MONEY MENTIONED IN THE SCRIPTURES.

II. A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS RECORDED IN THE SCRIPTURES.

III. A CONCISE DICTIONARY OF THE SYMBOLICAL LANGUAGE OF THE SCRIPTURES.

IV. A BIOGRAPHICAL, HISTORICAL, AND GEOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF THE PRINCIPAL PERSONS, NATIONS, AND COUNTRIES MENTIONED IN THE SCRIPTURES.