version renders the passage, but the Septuagint, more correctly, ενευροκόπησαν ΤΑΥΡΟΝ. This Tauron was one of the sacred towers, sometimes called Tursis, whose origin must be sought for in paradisaic traditions. In after In after ages, when Shechem had been rebuilt, and their idolatry restored, we read that the men of Shechem made Abimelech, the spurious son of Gideon, king over them, and entered, of course, into a covenant with him concerning the kingdom,*

"under the oak in Shechem." Our translators have rendered it "a pillar," which was indeed sometimes made use of as a substitute for the tree in the centre of these sacred enclosures; but the word in the Hebrew is the same as is elsewhere translated "an oak," and the

often compounded with On; and hence the title Sar-On was conferred upon any high-place, where there was a grove of ancient oaks, as being sacred to the Deity so called. Sometimes the particle ws As, was added, denoting fire. Est et regio Saronas, sive pvpoc. Reland. Palest. p. 188. These rocks and high-places were not only called Saronides, from the consecrated groves of oaks which grew upon them; but what is yet more remarkable, the Druids were so styled, by whom these particular trees were held so sacred. Bryant's Anal., vol. i. pp. 90-94.

*

Judges ix. 6. Perhaps this was the same idolatrous grove which still remained, even in the days of Elisha. 2 Kings xiii. 6.

Septuagint have also rightly expressed it προς TnBalavo.-Connected with this consecrated tree, we hear of the temple or tower of the god BaalBerith. This tower was of the same nature as the Tauron, overthrown by the sons of Israel, and alluded to by their father in his prophecy. It was sacred to Baal-Berith. Now Baal here certainly means the hallowed fire, whose emblem was a compound idol, representing the form of a bull in union with a man. Thus we recognize the vestiges of that cherubic guard, with the fiery sword, which protected the garden of Eden; and, from the figure of the bull, the appellation of Tauron, from Taupos Tauros, might in part have risen; or rather more probably the name of the animal itself was derived from its consecration in the fire tower, called Tavpov Tauron, from the Chaldeen Tur, or Taur, and the radical On, as has been before observed. The latter title of the Shechemitish deity was Berith, an appellation literally signifying " a purifier, or a purification sacrifice," and impliedly denoting, "a covenant," with the sacrificial rite usual on such an occasion, which was both among believers and heathens, either cutting the victim in twain, or in pieces; thereby demonstrating that, at these solemn leagues, they had a view to that one great Sacrifice expected to

be offered up for the sins of men, and, that altogether it was an emblematical expression of the parties staking their hopes of purification by that great Sacrifice, on their performing their respective conditions of the covenant, on which the n Berith was offered. The Shechemites, as well as other heathens, probably must have derived their notions of all this, from traditions of that blessed covenant of grace first offered to mankind in paradise, when the great Berith, or Purifier, was promised, as the seed of the woman who was to bruise the serpent's head; and therefore it was, that here they connected the fire-tower Taupov, of the god Baal-Berith, with the traditionary traces yet extant among them of the garden of Eden. Before we leave Shechem, one may remark the exquisite propriety of Jotham in his parable delivered on Mount Gerizim;* he, as well as those who heard him, had before their eyes a view of the traditionary representation of paradise in the sacred grove of Shechem, with one tree in the midst, as it were, like the king of the garden. All, therefore, must have powerfully understood the force of his address, and the correctness of so beautiful an allegory.

*Judges ix, 7-15.

D

Beside other places in the land of Canaan consecrated to the celebration of paradisaic memorials, there were some which had the appellation of Cades, or Kadesh, which in fact is only Hades, written or pronounced with a guttural, after the oriental manner. They were also frequent in many other parts of the world, as will be shewn hereafter. They will always be found to exhibit more or less of the traces of those traditions, from which their original is to be looked for. Some sacred symbol or symbols, consisting of one or more peculiar tree or trees, or one or two remarkable fountains, will be generally discovered in the centre; or perhaps all these, and yet more singular vestiges of Eden, will be seen connected together, while the garden or grove itself is considered often as the future state of existence for the soul of man, into which he enters upon his dissolution, by means of sacrifice and lustration. Indeed, the whole Hades, or invisible world of the ancients, appears made up of scenical representations of those ideas which tradition afforded them of the happy and blissful garden, from which the first pair of mankind were expelled for their transgression, after, it had been the scene of their shameful fall, through the wiles of the serpent; and after it had witnessed the delivery of the

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promise that "the seed of the woman should "bruise the serpent's head." This will appear more especially, when we come to consider the view of Hades, which the poets and philosophers have given us, and particularly Homer, Virgil, and Plato. For the present, it may be sufficient to remark, that here, as well as elsewhere, the reader will perceive one tree in the midst, with some vestiges of a river or lake parting into four heads, and not a few traces of the Cherubim who guarded Eden, among which may be mentioned, as an example, the well known three-headed dog Cerberus, who kept the door of death and hell, and who was to be appeased alone by the rites and offerings hereafter to be considered.

There seems to have been more than one Cades, even in Palestine:* One is mentioned

Gen. xiv. 7. Numbers xx. 1, 14, 16. Psalm xxix. 8. Two of these, at all events, were different places, and, like many others, were probably the sacred enclosures before alluded to, containing many vestiges of paradisaic tradition. The Targum of Onkelos paraphrases the title Kades, in Genesis and Numbers, and the Targum of Ben Uzziel in the Psalms, by the word op Rekem, which signifies "bro"cade or embroidery, variegated with a number of figures." Possibly this might allude to the figures of compounded and winged animals, (traces of the Cherubim,) with which the idolaters frequently surrounded their consecrated gardens or