4160. [Ezek. i. 4.] Amber, whose virtue may be excited by friction to such a degree as to appear lucid, and sparkle like fire in a dark room, is indued with the property of attracting light bodies, which, from its Latin name Electrum, is called Electricity. The same property is also found in jet, glass, sealing-wax, most kinds of precious stones, and in all resinous and bituminous substances. Mr. Martin observes, that the uses of this wondrous virtue of electricity have not yet been discovered; but Mr. Gray, a little before his death, hit upon an experiment which seemed to indicate, that the attractive power which regulates the motions of the heavenly bodies, is of the electric kind. (Abr. Phil. Trans. vol. viii. pp. 65, 110, 316.) — The experiment was this: He fixed a large iron ball upon a cake of resin and wax, and exciting the virtue strongly in the cake, a fine feather suspended by a thread, and held near the iron ball, was carried round it by this effluvia in a circular manner, and performed several revolutions. It moved from west to east, as the planets do; and its motion, like theirs, was not quite circular, but a little eliptical.

See No. 5.

SMITH'S Wonders of Nature and Art.

4161. The Loadstone possesses four peculiar properties. 1. It attracts iron. 2. It turns one and the same point, when at liberty, constantly towards the north. 3. It declines some degrees from the true meridian line of the sun's shade at noon. 4. It inclines its northern point towards the

earth.

Though the knowledge of this inclination or dip has hitherto been fruitless, it is to be hoped that in time some advantage may be discovered by its regularity.

See Nat. Delin. vol. iv. pp. 199,- 201.

Refer to what the Hon. Emanuel Swedenborg has said of the Magnetic or Rain-bow Heaven: that is, the New Christian Heaven of the Intermediate state, where JESUS CHRIST rules all nations with a rod of iron; the spiritual Sun of Righteousness being the centre towards which the Magnetic Needle continually points. See No. 361.

We see the axis of the earth always turned towards a point in the heavens, that is two degrees and some minutes distant from the Polar Star.

See Nat. Delin. vol. iv. p. 239.

At the above period, the Indians wrote also on a kind of paper wove of cotton, which was drawn through rice-water, and then pressed smooth. The Thibetians still write on cotton or silk cloth. Ibid. p. 396.

4170. [Ezek. iii. 3.] The custom of chewing betel prevails almost universally among the eastern nations. Phil. Trans. vol. xiv. p. 320.

The betel bears some resemblance to the pepper-tree. It grows like ivy, and twists round other trees. Its leaves are long and sharp-pointed, but broad towards the stalk, and of a pale green color. They are like those of ivy, only softer, and full of red juice, which, among the Orientals, is reputed of wonderful virtue for fortifying the teeth, and rendering the breath sweet. The Indians are continually chewing these leaves: no body, rich or poor, being without their box of betel, which they present to each other by way of civility, as we do snuff. REES' Cyclopædia. The Asiatics have a custom of perfuming their letters, which they tie up in little bags of satin or damask. Sir W. JONES' Works, vol. v. p. 579.

4171. [————————— 14, 15.] E. SWEDENBORG, from his own experience, describes the state of a person thus carried away by the Spirit, as similar to that of a somnambulist. "Walking," says he, "through the streets of a city, and through the open country, and being at the same time in discourse with spirits, I knew no other than that I was awake and seeing as at other times, consequently that I was walking without wandering. In the mean time I was in vision, seeing groves, rivers, palaces, houses, men, and several other objects. But, after walking thus for some hours, on a sudden I was in bodily vision, and observed that I was in another place. On this being greatly amazed, I perceived that I had been in such a state as they were, of whom it is said, that they were conveyed by the spirit into another place: for, during the continuance of this state, there is no reflection on the length of the way, even if it were many miles; nor on the time, if it were many hours or days; nor is any fatigue perceived. The person is also led on such occasions through ways of which he himself is ignorant, until he comes to the place intended. This was done in order to convince me that a man may be led by the Lord, without his knowing whence or whither.

Arcana, n. 1884.

4172. [Ezek. iv. 1.] The Indians do not print their cotton stuffs with wooden blocks, but paint them with a brush made

4175.

TOURNEFORT, vol. iii. pp. 95, 137.

Wood and coals are so dear in some parts of Persia, that they are obliged to make use of a turf made of camel's dung, cow-dung, sheep's dung, horse-dung, and ass-dung; or else the fire would cost more than the victuals. This turf they use more particularly for heating of ovens, in which they bake most of their mea's without trouble, and at a small expense. They even apply human dung this way.

Le BRUYN, p. 228. They make in their tents or houses a hole about a foot and a half deep, wherein they put their earthen pipkins or pots, with the meat in them, closed up, so that they are in the hole above the middle. Three-fourth parts thereof they lay about with stones, and the fourth part is left open, through which they fling in their dried dung, which burns immediately, and gives so great a heat that the pot grows as hot as if it had stood in the midst of a lighted coal-heap; so that they boil their meat with a little fire, quicker than we do ours with a great one on our hearths.

RAUWOLF, p. 192.

The common fuel used by the inhabitants of Egypt is prepared from camel's dung, mud, and straw: these ingredients they mix as a paste, and form into circular cakes; from the ashes of which the muriat of ammonia is obtained, and sent into Europe.

CLARKE'S Trav. in Greece, Egypt, and the Holy Land.

4176. [ 15.] In places (of India) where wood is

4177. [Ezek. iv. 15.] Of dourra, or Indian millet, the Egyptian peasants make a bread without leaven, which is baked, through want of fire-wood, with the dried dung of buffaloes and cows. This, tasteless when cold, is, with water and raw onions, their only food throughout the year.

VOLNEY's Travels, vol. i. p. 189.

4178. [Ezek. viii. 7 10.] The prophet here evidently alludes to the particular idolatry of Egypt, where dark secluded recesses, ornamented with every form of creeping things and abominable beasts, where called Mystic Cells; and in them were represented by the animals. &c., the secret mysteries sacred to or hieroglyphical of Isis and Osiris.

MAURICE.

In after ages, when the Egyptians began to worship in temples, the custom of adorning them with paintings, &c. still continued. M. RIPAUD, in his Report of the Antiquities of Upper Egypt, says of them, "If the first aspect of a temple creates an animating surprize in the mind, the paintings which adorn every part of its surface, prolong and extend it. They represent offerings and sacrifices, as well as subjects connected with astronomy and agriculture, in a style of drawing frequently approaching to perfection."

4179.

See Bib. Research. vol. ii. p. 188.

St. Ephrem, in his commentary on the thirty-third Chapter of Isaiah, makes mention of the two obelisks, so much celebrated, called the needles of Pharaoh : "This house of the Sun," says he, "is the city of Heliopolis in Egypt, where the worship of demons, and the adoration of Idols were most sedulously observed. In this place were some enormous columns worthy of admiration. Each of them was sixty cubits bigh, and the base on which they stood ten cubits. The cap on the head of every column was of white copper, and weighed a thousand pounds and upwards. On these columus were the figures of men and animals, wont to be adored by the idolaters of those days: the columns were likewise loaded with inscriptions in the characters of the priests, which inscriptions related the mysteries of paganism."

ABD. ALLATIF'S Relation respecting Egypt.
Pinkerton's Coll. part Ixiv. p. 827.

4180. [12.] Not far from the city of Assuan, the

antient Syen described by Strabo, on the confines of Ethiopia, the rocks on the western banks of the Nile are hewn into grottoes, with places of worship, columns, pilasters, and hieroglyphics, as particularly mentioned by modern travellers. Strabo also describes the adjacent island of Elephantina, with its surrounding rocks in the Nile; from whence were hewn those enormous masses used in the magnificent structures of Egypt, and especially of that amazing cube, each side measuring sixty feet, in which the sanctuary of Butis The island of Elephantiua in the time of Strabo contained a small town, with the temple of Cneph, and a celebrated Nilometer.

was cut.

FORBES' Oriental Memoirs, vol. i. p. 448.

4181. [Ezek. viii. 12.] Behind the Blue Mountains of North America, in Maddison's Cave, where petrifactions are formed into pillars of different heights, if you retire to a distance, and leave a person with a lighted torch moving about among the pillars, a thousand multiplications of his figure present themselves in various forms, and you might almost fancy yourself in the infernal regions, with spectres and monsters on every side.

WELD's Travels in N. America, vol. i. p. 229.

4182. [14.] An account of the ceremonies, used by the women of different nations, in weeping for Thammuz, or Adonis, may be seen in Dr. W. ALEXANDER's Hist. of Women, from p. 341 to 345 of vol. i.

It is a remarkable property of the river Adonis in Phenicia, that, at certain seasons when it is swelled to unusual heights, it appears bloody from a kind of minium, or red earth, periodically mixing with its floods. Hence arose that extraordinary superstition of weeping for Thammuz, or Adonis, yearly wounded. (Univer. Hist. vol. ii. p. 300.) We saw, says MAUNDRELL, the water of Adonis stained to a surprising redness; and observed, that it had discoloured the sea a great way into a reddish hue.

Maundr. Journ. from Alep, to Jerus. p. 34. Adonis, or Thammuz, was the Osiris and Thamas of Egypt.

BRYANT.

petitioner his paper torn, and dismisses him. (See D' ARVIEUX, Voy dans la Pal. pp. 61, 154.) The custom of placing the inkhorn by the side, Olearius says, continues in the East to this day.

See HARMER, vol. ii. p. 458.

Such, at this day in the East, is the costume of literary persons: The Hierogrammateus, when he goes abroad, has a pen in his hair, and in his hand a book and a ruler, with a vessel by his side containing ink, and the reed used for writing. It is his province in the intermediate class of the Egyptian priests, says CLEMENS Alexandrinus, to understand the hieroglyphics, as they are called, cosmography, and geography, with the course of the sun, the moon, and the five planets; and in a more particular manner, the special geography of Egypt, and the description of the Nile. He must also be acquainted with the description of the sacred vessels, and the places consecrated to them, and the measures and all other things used in sacred transactions.

See Smith's MICHAELIS, vol. iii.

p. 383.

4184. [Ezek. ix. 11.] The girdles, used by the Turks, are usually of worsted, very artfully woven into a variety of figures, such as the rich girdies of the virtuous virgins may be supposed to have been, Prov. xxxi. 24.- They are made to fold several times about the body; one end of which being doubled back, and sewn along the edges, serves them for a purse; whilst the hojias, i. e. the writers and secretaries, suspend in the same their inkhorus; a custom as old as the clothed prophet Ezekiel who (ch. ix. 11) mentions a person in white linen, and an inkhorn upon his loins.

SHAW's Trav. in Barbary.- Pinkerton's
Coll. part Ixiii. p. 659.

4183. [Ezek. ix. 2.] The Arabs of the desert, when they want a favor of their emir, get his secretary to write an order agreeable to their desire, as if the favor were granted: this they carry to the prince, who, after having read it, sets his seal to it with ink, if he grant it; if not, he returns the

4186. [Ezek. xi. 1, &c.] Such visions as appeared to Prophets, cannot happen to any man when his body is awake. See ch. iii. 14, 15. Swedenborg, on Divine Providence, n. 134.

4 K

4187. [Ezek. xii. 3.] This is as they do in the caravans, they carry out their baggage in the day-time, and the caravan loads in the evening; for in the morning it is too hot to set out on a journey for that day, and they cannot well see in the night.

CHARDIN MS.

4191. [Ezek. xiv. 9.] Have I the LORD deceived that prophet? Nay, I have stretched out my hand against him, and will remove him from the midst of my people Israel. Bib. Research. vol. i. p. 319.

4188. [18, 19.] Water is the liquor of the universe; it is the life of animals and plants, and should be of men; and is the only true digester: All sublunary things are water and earth; we are so ourselves. It is a great error to imagine that strong liquors support and comfort us; the comfort is false, being but for a time, and leaving a poison behind. GODFREY'S Miscellanea, p. 42.

See No. 345, &c.

4189. [Ezek. xiii. 10.] The mortar in Persia (used by builders) is made of plaster, earth, and chopped straw, all well wrought and incorporated together: but this is not the material with which they cast, or coat over, their walls. For casting they make a mixture of plaster and yellowish earth: this earth, which is rather of a cinnamon color, they obtain from river sides, and work it in a great earthen vessel; but they put so little earth in proportion to water, that it remains liquid like muddy water, or at most like strained juice; and it is altogether of the color of that earth. They make use of it to work the plaster in another earthen vessel, where they mingle this water with plaster in such a quantity, that it retains the color of the earth. Their walls being cast with this mixture, at first look grayish; but when fully dry, they grow so white, that they look almost as if they were plastered over with pure plaster. This mixture is used not only for saving plaster, but also because it holds better than plaster alone.

THEVENOT'S Trav. part ii. p. 86.

At Calcutta, they make a mortar called Puckah, which is a composition of brick-dust, lime, molasses, and cut hemp or oakum. This, when thoroughly dry, is as hard, firm, and strong, as any stone, closely adhering to the bricks.

Modern Univer. Hist. vol. x. p. 248.

4190. [ 18. Pillows to arm-holes] In Eastern houses, along the sides of their chamber-walls, on the floor, a range of narrow beds or mattresses, is often placed on rich carpets; and for the luxurious ease of the family, several damask or velvet bolsters are placed on these carpets or mattresses; an indulgence here and elsewhere stigmatized by the prophets. Dr. SHAW,

--

4192. [Ezek. xv. 2.] From the following quotations it will appear, that all the interrogatives in this Chapter, respecting PLINY (Lib. the Vine, should be turned into affirmatives. xiv. chap. i) speaking of the Vine, says, the Antients very justly reckoned Vines among trees, on account of their magnitude, and because no wood is of a more lasting nature. At present, it is found, that the great doors of the cathedral at Ravenna are made of vine-tree planks, some of which are twelve feet long, and fifteen inches broad, (EVELYN'S Silon.) There are, on the Barbary coast, Vines of surprising dimensions, some of them, it is said, have trunks eight or nine feet in circumference.

SPEECHLY, on the Vine, p. 251.