and cold. At one point, we had first the small lovely lake of Chède at our feet; then its banks, gently rising and presenting themselves above; next the verdant mountains; and lastly, Mont Blanc, of which the vast snowy summits were beautifully reflected in the clear surface of the lake. Before, however, we came within view of this astonishing Alp, we stopped to visit a fine cascade at Chède village. The torrent falls altogether above one hundred feet; but it is divided into five different branches or beds, which the stream has worked for itself. It was very curious to see a beautiful rainbow, as early as nine in the morning, formed by the spray, and which, from the point where we stood, was nearly an entire circle, beginning in the rain upon the grass on one side, continuing over the torrent, and then returning to the grass almost under our feet on the other. But I can think of nothing but Mont Blanc; it so much surpasses all my expectations. When our good friend was here four years ago, the day was wet, and he saw nothing; the weather to-day is superb, and we see every thing. The very village where we now are is romantic beyond description. I am sitting at the door of the inn, writing on a rough wooden table, which shakes at every movement of my hand-the village church just in view-a few scattered houses around itthree noble mountains guarding it behind, on which some fine clouds are just resting-fruitfulness apparent all around-whilst company are driving up to the village, on the same errand with ourselves; and the sun from behind the mountains is casting the prospect into alternate light and shade. Astonishing indeed are the works of the great God-impressed with the footsteps of his majesty, power, and grace. We only want a heart constantly raised up to him in gratitude, and seeing him in all the operations of his hands, to complete the duty, and enhance the pleasure of such a scene of wonders! Chamouny, seven o'clock, Thursday evening, 24 miles from St. Martin's.-After leaving Servoz, we soon entered the valley of Chamouny, which, as late as 1741, was almost entirely unknown. Two Englishmen then explored it. In 1760, M. de Saussure undertook his first journey to it. The ascent of Mont Blanc by that enterprising traveller, in 1787, brought it at length into notice; and nearly one thousand strangers soon visited it annually. The reputation of the valley, and the conveniences prepared for travellers, have been increasing ever since; so that we have found here one of the very best inns in Switzerland. Chamouny is separated from all the great roads, and seems quite cut off from the rest of the world. It is about twelve miles long, and a mile broad, At the entrance of the valley is a monument erected to a naturalist, who fell down a fissure a few years since, by neglecting his guide, and was lost. Such warnings perpetually occur. A lad with a trumpet astonished us, at a particular part of the road, with the echo which the Alps returned at every blast. About a league from Chamouny, we came to the small village of Bossons, above which is a most noble glacier, so situated, that travellers are able to cross over it. We ascended the contiguous mountain, excessively steep, about two thousand five hundred feet. We then passed over the heap of loose stones, cast up by the last eboulement, which lay between us and the gla cier, and thus came on the solid mass of ice and frozen snow. There was one great fissure in it which it was terrible to look down; and at the bottom of which roared a torrent of water; all the surface of the glacier was slippery, from the heat of the sun upon it. It was cold as December. The scene was very fine. After making our way across, we had a much more difficult heap, or rather ruin of stones and loose rocks, first to ascend and then to descend, before we could find the path which led again to Bossons. Part of the road which we took was that by which De Saussure, with his eighteen guides, ascended, in 1787. Indeed we may be said to have been at the foot of Mont Blanc all the afternoon. I see one of its summits (fifteen thousand five hundred feet, the highest ridge in the old world) at this moment from my chamberwindow. On a ridge of the Alp, perhaps two thousand feet above me, a fire is just now lighted, as a sign of rejoicing that no animal has been lost during the day in driving down the cattle for the winter. Almost the first person I saw in the inn here was a gentleman from England, who three years ago ascended Mont Blanc, in a company of sixteen. They reached the grand plateau of the Alp, (thirteen thousand five hundred feet) the fourth day, after incredible fatigues, from rain, snow, cold, and the hard rocks, with only a covering of leather to protect them during the night.— They were obliged to send down two guides, the second day, for food. On this vast plateau, or ledge, they found an immense quantity of fresh fallen snow, not frozen; it was extremely laborious to walk on, the snow was so deep;_still none of the guides apprehended danger. But on a sudden the whole field of snow on which they were treading gave way, and overwhelmed the unfortunate travellers; their footing sunk; and they were covered, rolled along, borne away, by the enormous avalanche. The snow lodged in the next fissure, or crevasse, which it met in its descent. Three guides unhappily perished; the other thirteen persons extricated themselves with infinite difficulty-or rather were preserved by the mercy of God. Still persons are frequently ascending; or attempting to ascend, for they seldom reach the real summit. Six guides went up with a single Englishman the day before yesterday; and some friends have been all to-day watching them from the inn, with a telescope: they are expected down to-night. The first persons who ever reached the summit of Mont Blanc were James Balma and Dr. Paccard, in 1786. The following year M. De Saussure, with eighteen guides, attained the same eminence. He spent five hours there. The rarity of the air was such, that his pulse was above 100; he had no appetite, and suffered much from intolerable thirst. The winding path is between fifty and sixty miles altogether, of steep ascent. We have met here an Italian gentleman, with whom we had made a slight acquaintance at Basle; a quick, ready, sensible man-talking French and English tolerably well-one who has for above twenty years spent his summers in travelling-neat in his person-about forty years of age equipped with all the smaller conveniences which so long an experience could not fail to give him-he has read a good deal of history and politics, and is very communicative. He has one very good practice; he never sets out on a tour till he has devoted six months to a thorough study of all the best writers on the country he is about to visit. A turn to satire gives a point to his remarks. His admiration of England is extreme; but I can observe, that he takes a pleasure in relating little anecdotes to the disadvantage of individual Englishmen. He has collected five stories in his present tour. I suppose he calls himself a Catholic; but he has clearly no just impression of the importance of religion. He speaks on the subject with levity, and even indecorum; mingling the tenets of his church with the essential truths of Christianity, and laughing at both. He was just now telling one of the guides, who he heard would not eat flesh on Fridays, that the Pope being dead, (as I mentioned in my last) he was at liberty to eat meat whenever he liked; but that if he had any fears, he would give him a billet to Jesus Christ. I could not help remonstrating with him for the latter part of this sentence; observing, that though I was a Protestant, and of course did not hold the Catholic Fasts, I still agreed with the Catholics in the great truths of our common Christianity, and especially in adoration and love to our divine Saviour. He received the hint with perfect politeness, and dropped the subject. I remember the Italian nobleman at the Grimsel said something, in the same ironical way, of the Holy Ghost choosing a new Pope. Secret infidelity is widely spreading in Italy. Friday morning, half-past 6, chalet on Montancert, 3,150 feet above Chamouny.-We were called this morning at half-past three, and started at halfpast four, for the Jardin on the Mer de Glace, in a party of thirteen; a guide and mule for each, with boys, &c. We have been ascending two hours in fearful cold and wind, on a road steep beyond description, three leagues long, amidst the ruins of fallen trees and rocks. am Twelve o'clock, Couvercle, Mer de Glace.-I an now writing on a spot, where, perhaps, never man wrote before, and whence I can scarcely look around me without terror. We have been walking and climbing, for five hours, ten or fifteen miles up hills and mountains of ice, snow, and impenetrable rocks, amidst chasms and torrents hundreds of feet deep. I am now on the heights of the Mer de Glace, nine thousand two hundred feet above the sea, seated on the ground, with my letter and pocket ink-horn before me, a rock for my writingtable, and my small pocket-book placed under my paper, to keep it a little steady. We have been surmounting immense fatigue and danger, ever since we left the chalet at seven. All other difficulties are nothing compared with those which surround us; and we have a descent of seven hours, not a little dangerous, to make, before we reach our inn. Still the extraordinary magnificence of the scene above, below, around us, when one can calmly look at it, seems to recompense us for every thing. If we get back alive, however, one thing I can venture to assure you of, that the fatigue and terror are such as to prevent our ever coming up again. Chamouny, 8 in the evening.-Thank God we have all returned safe. Let me now give you some notion of the day's journey. We were fourteen hours and a half on the road, and went forty miles; ten miles on mules, and thirty on foot; which thirty were in a perpetual course of ascents, descents, sliding and jumping. After leaving the chalet on Montanvert, in the morning at seven, we descended and crossed the éboulement or vast heap of granite and sand, which intervened between that and the glacier. The path was frequently on the surface of a shelving rock of slate, three inches wide, with a precipice at our feet.When we came to the glacier, or Mer de Glace itself, we had new difficulties of every kind to surmount; and in the course of our progress three vast éboulements to climb over. When we reached the summit of the mountain, which is called the Couvercle, about noon, (nine thousand two hundred feet) we were so exhausted with heat and fatigue, that we threw ourselves on the scanty grass growing on the rock, as if we were dead.After an hour and a half's rest, and a dinner on the provisions carried for us by the guides, we set off on our return. Nothing can describe the day's journey; the simple fact of walking thirty miles on ice and rock, with declivities, crevices, gulfs, ice-torrents, &c. seems sufficiently terrific, but can convey to you no adequate idea of the real scene. Enough, however, of our fatigues. Now, to give you some account of the Mer de Glace. It is an enormous glacier, forty-five miles long, and two wide, and rising to an inaccessible height.We only ascended to the point commanding the finest view. It gave me the idea of a sea in a storm suddenly frozen, or choked with snow and ice. We saw nothing but congealed waves or rather mountains of frozen water. The ice is not clear and smooth, but mixed with sand and stones, and on the surface alternately melted and re-frozen every twenty-four hours. In all this sea, changes are continually taking place, from the causes I assigned in a former letter :-a single day's rain or snow alters infallibly a variety of places. The most fearful things are the fentes, crevices, or fissures, some fifty feet wide, others just beginning to form themselves; others like a well, three or four hundred feet deep, with an impetuous torrent pouring down them, and working like a mill at the bottom; together with thousands of rivulets formed by the summer's sun on the surface. As the masses of ice descend, the superincumbent rocks and stones descend with them. These are gradually carried along; some travel five hundred feet down the immense glacier in a single year. The foot of the Mer de Glace is in the valley of Chamouny, whence the river Arveiron flows, which joins itself with the Arve, and pours into the Rhone, near Geneva. To travel on this sea of wonders was in itself dangerous enough-a single inadvertent step might have been fatal-the extraordinary skill and experience of the guides, however, (for each per son has his separate one,) make accidents ex- these horrid words, ônμokpatikos pidav@pwnotaros kat tremely rare. The views which we witnessed a0c05.* Immediately under them this thrilling rewere enchanting. The deep azure of the sky in proof, in allusion to Psalm xiv. 1.† is now inserted, one of the finest days ever seen; the vast region. Ει μεν τ' αληθές λέγει, μωρος ει δε μη, ψεύστης. of ice which the sun gilded with his rays, and the Trient, canton of Valais, Switzerland, three panorama of snow-clad Alps, rising stupendously o'clock, Saturday afternoon. We set off this mornall around, are really beyond my powers of descrip-ing, twenty minutes before nine, and have been tion. They made us forget all our fatigues. The six hours and ten minutes coming eighteen miles. union and contrast of the scenes in nature appa- We have passed through the valleys of Chamourently the most irreconcilable-and all beheld for ny, Val Valorsine, Chatelet, where Switzerland the first time, and under the most favorable cir- and Savoy divide, and Trient, where we now are. cumstances-produced an impression in which Often as I have expressed my astonishment at the what was wonderful and pleasing had an equal variety of Swiss and Savoy scenery, I must repeat share with the sublime and stupendous. In three the same language. Certainly nothing can exspots I sat down, penetrated with admiration, and ceed the surprise we have felt all this morning. made my guide tell me the names of the Alps We have crossed a barrier called Le Tête Noire; around me; I give the names as accurately as my and all the way, especially in passing the mounear could catch them: 1st, Characoux; 2d, Gra- tains, there has been nothing but wonders. Valpon; 3d, Mont Blanc; 4th, Le Geant; 5th, Tamla; leys sowed, as it were, with the fragments of fallen 6th, Grand Jorasse; 7th, Petit Jorasse; 8th, Le rocks; villages of romantic beauty, and of archiSehon; 9th, Les Courts; 10th, Aiguilles Rouges; tecture the most rude; noble firs crowning the 11th, Gemme Verd; 12th, Le Moine; 13th, mountain sides; several glaciers descending in the Aiguille de Dru; 14th, La Flechiere; 15th Le ravines from the common source of the Mer de Breveut. Glace; the path now sinking into the deepest valley, now rising into a frightful precipice, sometimes leading by rude stairs of rocks, at other times by torrents and sand; the whole way diversified with the rnins of falling firs, the effects of the tre mendous storms of the winters, so as at places to obstruct the path; lastly, the torrent of the Trient rolling along to disgorge itself into the Rhone, whilst the alternate succession of barren scenery and cultivated meadows, like mosaic-work, in the valley and up the side of the mountains, completed the picture. I just add that the guides here are respectable, well-informed men; mine is called The Bird, L'Oiseau. He has been thirty-eight years a guide. The most respectable Swiss writers correspond with them. They speak very good French-the language of Chamouny is a patois. There are forty of them at Chamouny, and seventy mules. Every thing is regulated by the government, even to the order in which the guides go out. Chamouny contains near fifty hamlets, three churches, and three thousand souls. It is a Catholic priory; but our guides were intelligent, and seemingly in earnest, on the subject of religion. I talked with my own a good deal. He clearly distinguished between the essentials of religion and morals, and the ceremonies and usages of his own church. He spoke of judgment and eternity, and the sin of man, and the death of our Saviour, with some feeling. There seemed also a conscientiousness governing his mind, which gratified me a good deal. I have not myself met with any Catholics so well informed. Chamouny, I must say, deserves all its popularity; two thousand two hundred and fifty visiters came to it last year; out of whom, about forty only went to the end of the Mer de Glace; which is some commendation of our courage, but, perhaps, not of our prudence, at least so far as I am concerned. The day has been beautiful-not a cloud. But words fail when they are attempting to describe Switzerland. One applies nearly the same terms to the valley of the Reuss, the Hoellenthal, the valley of Moûtiers, the Chède, and the valleys seen to-day; and yet they are all widely different from each other; and each utterly inconceivable, except to one who has visited them for himself. It was by this almost impracticable road of the Tête Noire, that hundreds of French emigrants escaped into the Valais, when the French invaded Savoy, in 1792. Countesses-marchionesses— carrying themselves their infants-officerspriests-in the midst of them the bishop of Nismes, a venerable old man, eighty years of age-formed this long and pitiable caravan. It rends the heart to reflect on the miseries of that period. The rule of the French on the Rhine, was followed, as I have told you, with a mixture of great good amidst the horrors unavoidable on revolutions; but their rule in Switzerland seems to have been one unmixed calamity. Liberty, literature, morals, religion, private and public happiness, wi And now may it please God to fill my heart with praise for his works, adoration of his awful majesty, gratitude for preservation, and a humble desire to see his love, his wisdom, his providence, his power, his glory in all things! I am sure re-thered at their approach, and have only begun to ligious feelings are the appropriate consequences of such a day's excursion. It is most painful to me to say, that one Englishman* has for ever disgraced himself here by attaching to his name, in the strangers' book, an unblushing avowal of atheism. He has not, however, escaped a suitable and most severe and striking retort from one of his countrymen. He had annexed to his name Percy Bysche Shelley. revive since the restoration of the old state of things in that fine country. Bonaparte is, generally speaking, detested here, as much as he is in other places adored. * Democrat, philanthropist, and atheist. + " "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God." If he speaks truth, he is a fool, if not, a liar -See Christian Observer, vol. for 1824. Saturday evening, half-past six.-We are just now at Chamouny is Balma, aged seventy-six, namarrived at Martigny, in the Valais, twenty-sevened by De Saussure, "Mont Blanc." My friend and miles from Chamouny. D. W. LETTER XII. Great St. Bernard, Sept. 6.-Brieg, fellow-traveller's guide was the son of the Syndic, or chief magistrate of the village, which said Syndic we met, with a scythe on his shoulder, in primitive simplicity, going to mow, as we ascended Montanvert. The guides have seven, eight or ten francs a-day; those who go up Mont Blanc thirty or forty francs a day, and sometimes much more. They also rear and keep the ines, which are worth twenty or twenty-four Louis each (from nineteen Jardin of Mer de Glace-Forclaz-Bas Valais-to twenty-three pounds.) In fact, the whole ap- MARTIGNY, Bas Valais, Switzerland, MY DEAR SISTER,-I was quite mortified in sending you my last letter; it was written in such inexpressible hurries, and seemed to me, when I read it over, so sadly unconnected and incomplete. Indeed, this has been more or less the case with all my letters. I know, however, that your love will excuse the defects of my rapid accounts. I believe I did not tell you that the particular points of the Mer de Glace which we went to visit were the Couvercle and the Jardin, or garden. The Couvercle is an immensely high rock, to which you have no access but by crossing the sea of ice, as we did, and which, from its height and position, commands an unbroken view of Mont Blanc and eleven other Alps. From the Couvercle there is a twenty minutes' walk to the Jardin, which is a rock rising above the Mer de Glace. A slight stone enclosure marks out the garden, which is covered, during the brief summer, with vendure and flowers. The contrast with the snowy mantle concealing the face of nature all around, is very striking. This Jardin we did not reach; I really was overcome. suppose, during a good summer of four or five francs, (about thirty-six pounds) besides his food; months, a guide may get eight or nine hundred some much more which is almost a fortune in Savoy. In our journey to-day to Martigny, we observed perpetual fragments of rocks scattered every where in the fields, so that the farmers collect them in great heaps in different spots, in order that the grass may have room to grow at least on some of the land. To overcome or lessen difficulties, is the perpetual task to which man is called by all the various disorders on the face of nature: and in no country so much as in Switzerland and Savoy. When we left Trient, at four o'clock, we began to ascend the mountain Forclaz, from the summit of which, and in the descent, the view of the Valais (an immense valley, about a hundred miles long, reaching from the lake of Geneva to the Grimsel) was most enchanting: the plain with all its varied beauties, as far as Sion-the Rhone rushing through it-the Alps of the Oberland girding it around-and all illuminated with the afternoun's sun-nothing could be more exquisite. Martigny, where I am now writing, is a small town, one thousand four hundred and eighty feet above the sea (Chamouny is three thousand one hundred and fifty.) In the time of the Romans it was called Octodurum. On descending to it, we had to cross the devastations occasioned by the bursting of the river Dranse, which quite sadden my mind when I think of them. The melancholy story resembles that of Goldau, except that the loss of lives was not so considerable. It arose, I understand, from the Dranse, which rushes down the mountains about eighteen miles from Martigny, becoming first obstructed, and then stopped in its course, in the valley of Bagnes, by the falling of masses of ice from the Glacier of Getroz. A most enormous lake was thus formed, thirteen thousand feet long, and from one to seven hundred feet wide; the mean depth being two hundred; and the whole mass of water eight hundred millions of cubic feet! The country was soon alarmed at the tidings of this accumulation of waters; and a tunnel, or gallery, was cut through the barrier of ice, to facilitate the escape of the river by its usual My old guide (who went up with De Saussure in channel. The lake was actually reduced forty1786, and was named by him L'Oiseau) tells me five feet; but this was not sufficient to prevent the accident which occurred on Mont Blanc, as I the calamity. For on the 17th June, 1818, the have already mentioned, in 1820, arose, as he waters burst in a moment, without the least warnthinks very much from the youth and inexperience ing, through the barrier of ice, and rushed forth of the guides: a whole day's rain and snow fell with such fury, that in one hour they had reached whilst the party was ascending, and made the peril Martigny, eighteen miles. The torrent destroyed of an avalanche almost certain. The oldest guide | fifty-two houses at Champsee, and overwhelmed There are eighteen immense glaciers, formed from the Mer de Glace, in different ravines, and thirty smaller ones. The English gentleman, whom I reported as having ascended Mont Blanc returned safely; he accomplished the task in thirtyseven hours; but his fatigue was so great, that he was at last literally obliged to be pushed up by the guides. At the summit, a tremendous storm of snow and wind had nearly carried them all away; he remained there only five minutes, and could scarcely see any thing. His object was not science; but simply pleasure, or curiosity: he had made no preparation, had no instruments with him, and was unaccompanied by a single friend. Such exploits are regarded by every one as hazardous and useless, instead of being entitled to admira tion. a surprising number of fields, houses, barns, manufactories, &c. at Bagnes and Martigny; all was swallowed up in an instant. An entire forest was rooted up by it; and damage done to the amount of one million one hundred and nine thousand seven hundred and sixty francs of Switzerland, about two hundred thousand pounds English. How instantaneous, as well as awful, are the judgments of God! What an uncertain, treacherous scene is this passing world! And what deductions do such events make from the pleasures of a residence in this country, however enchanting in many respects!-But I must conclude for to-night; it is past eleven, and I have been travelling hard for two days. ing pardon for our breaches of this duty; nor a word of the grace of the Holy Spirit, as neces sary to assist us to keep it for the future; nor a word of the necessity of watchfulness over the corruption of the heart, as the spring of all sin and evil. Nay, he plainly said, that good works, that is, the performance of this and other moral duties, would save us, in direct contradiction to the whole tenor of the doctrine of redemption. The sermon was delivered from memory, and interspersed with striking anecdotes. When it was over, I left the church, and was surprised to find that the churchyard was filled with people, kneeling or sitting, apparently very devout, though they could neither hear nor see any thing. But this, bad as it is, is the fairer side of Popery; if you go into the complicated system of its corruptions, you find that superstition every where fills up the place of Scriptural Christianity; and that Jesus Christ is almost unknown in his holy salvation from sin and guilt. Even what is true in Popery is spoiled by the manner in which it is disfigured or curtailed; for instance, the people are not taught the ten commandments as we have them in the Bible; but an abridgment, in which the second, that is, the commandment against idolatry and image-worship, is positively left out, and the tenth divided into two; and to which are appended what are called the com Martigny, Sunday, eleven o'clock.-Again in a Catholic town, with not a single Protestant, as I am told. This, my twelfth Sunday, is distressing to my mind. We have been to the Catholic church, (for there is no other) and heard a sermon in French; for French is the language all through the Valais. As we entered the churchyard, we saw a priest uttering some prayers, and then sprinkling water on the people who were kneeling around. On coming into the church itself, we found it crowded with people. I asked a lady to lend me a Prayer-book; but she could not tell me, nor could I find out, where the priest was reading: one thing I suspect, that but few in the church could understand a word of the prayers-mandments of the church, six, I think, in number, those near me were muttering their allotted Paternosters, without any reference to the public prayers, and, when I asked them, could give me no idea where the priest was-it did not seem to enter their minds indeed, intelligent worship was clearly no part of the object for which the congregation was assembled. The music undoubtedly was beautiful. After half an hour, the priest gave notice that the Pope was dead, and exhorted the people to pray for his soul, and to beg of God to grant him a worthy successor. He then read notices of Saints' days, and of the nativity of the Virgin Mary, which falls to-morrow. which are given in the same form, and with the same solemnity as those of the decalogue; and are infinitely more insisted upon by the priests, and observed by the people. The whole foundation of what the priests inculcate is, moreover, not the authority of the inspired revelation of God, but the authority of the church-they "teach for doctrines the commandments for men." of the cup to the laity, penances, auricular confession, image-worship, celibacy of the clergy, monastic vows, infallibility of general councils, supremacy of the Pope, implicit submission to the church, lost estate of heretics, prayers in an unknown tongue, tyranny over the conscience, virtual prohibition of the Bible. Such, avowedly, is Popery in itself; though many individual Roman Catholics know little about it, and are pious and simple-hearted Christians. Then only consider the many incredible errors and superstitions, which they have by this means contrived to affix on real Christianity-pilgrimages, traditions, prayers for the dead, veneration of relics, intercession of saints, indulgences, disNext, another priest, the prior, I believe, of the pensations, pretended miracles, purgatory, the saparish, ascended the pulpit, and delivered a ser-crifice of the mass, transubstantiation, the denial mon on our Lord's words, "Render unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's, and unto God the things that are God's." His subject was, the duty of restitution. After his introduction, I was surprised to observe, that he not only paused and kneeled solemnly down in the pulpit himself, but that the whole congregation knelt down also in secret prayer, before he entered on his discussion. The pause was peculiarly impressive, I assure you, and what I never saw before; though the intercession of the Virgin, undoubtedly, corrupted it sadly. The sermon was admirable, as an abstract explication of the particular duty of restitution, chiefly drawn from Chrysostom and Augustine. There was a degree of talent, a force, an acumen, a dignity in all the preacher said which arrested attention. The whole made a powerful impression. I saw some countrywomen who stood near me in the aisle, positively quake for fear. There was nothing of Popery, properly speaking, in it-it was a good ordinary discourse on its topic. Still, it was defective, and even unscriptural, as the instruction of a Christian divine -there was not a word as to the way of obtain But amidst all these corruptions nothing seems to me so flagrantly unscriptural as the adoration of the image of the Virgin, and the trust reposed in her by the great mass of the people. I conceive this idolatry to be much more displeasing in the sight of God than the worship of the queen of heaven, so vehemently reprobated by the prophet Jeremiah, or the prostration of the Pagans before their idols, which St. Paul and the other apostles so indignantly condemned.* Indeed, when I think of the peculiar jealousy of the infinitely glorious Jehovah on the subject of any * See Jer. xliv. and Acts of Apostles passim. |