Classical Theology.—Lxxx.

CLASSICAL THEOLOGY . —LXXX .

LONDON , SATURDAY , MAZRCIC 25 , 1805 .

JUNO AND JANUAKY . It maybea matter of interest to consider whether or not spirit-manifestation may be a new signification of divination or magic . We are told that the eastern division of the world was always

peculiarly illustrative of the ars macjica . When Moses compiled his laws , this profession had longbeen held in high estimation and important practice in Egypt and the adjacent countries . Under severe penalties , the Israelites were forbidden to

consult wizards , diviners , and the like . They were to be stoned who professed to having a familiar spirit , or a spirit of divination , by which is meant a voice of an invisible thing—in fact , a ghost , speaking in the ear or from the breast , called a prophesying demon ; that is to say , those persons were Aaip . ovo \ irrrToi ( Daimovoleploi ) , possessed with

demons ; or JZyyatrTp . f _ . v 6 o . ( Eggastrimuthoi ) , & c , which names also appertained to demons . Thus we read ( Lev . xix . 81 ) , " Regard not them that hath familiar spirits , neither seek after wizards , to be defiled by them ; I am the Lord your God . "

And the true Spirit of prophecy , infinitely greater , was promised . Thus , for instance ( Dent , xviii . 9 , 10 , & c ) , " When thou hast come into the . land which the Lord thy God giveth thee , thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of

those nations . There shall not be found among you anyone that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire , or that useth divination , or an observer of times , or an enchanter , or a witch , or a charmer , or a consulter with familiar spirits , or a wizard , or a necromancer . . For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord :

and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee . Thou shall be perfect with the Lord thy God . For these nations , which thou shalt possess , hearkened unto observers of times , and unto diviners ; but as for

thee the Lord thy God hath not suffered thee to do so . The Lord thy Grod will raise up unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee ; of thy brethren , like unto me ; unto him ye shall hearken , according to all that thou desiredst of the Lord thy God in

Horeb . . . Andwill put my wordsin his mouth . . . And it shall come to pass , that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name , I will require of him , But the prophet

which shall presume to speak a word in my name , which I have not commanded him to speak , or that shall speak in the name of other gods , even that prophet shall die . And if thou say in thine heart , How shall we know the word which the

Lord hath not spoken ? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord , if the thing follows not ,, nor come to pass , that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken , but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously : thou shalt not be afraid of him . "

Herein it is observable , that this injunction appertained exclusively to the Hebrews . Ancient history proves that the oracles of the heathens often predicted coming events and tidences of

the future that did afterwards occur . With respect to the tripus placed at the mouth of the Parnassian Cavern , there are various opinions , as we have elsewhere stated . Some say it was a brazen pot , or , more likely as called , o ^ ws

( Olmus ) , a mortar of stone filled with pebbles , or containing a serpent , through which the divining or prophetic afflatus passed into the virgin Pythia , and thence in words out of her lips . But there was an old certain diviner named Olmus ; and

Zenoclotus , among others , refers to an extremely ancient superstitious custom of persons sleeping in the Olmoi when desirous of obtaining prophetic dreams . Be these things as they may , it has . been asserted that the damsel we read of in

the-Holy Acts , c . xvi . j was temulented with gasie vapours , cr with nocive drugs , by her masters , to whom she brought " much gain by her soothsaying . " This is untrue . Both the Pythia and the damsel were possessed of the spirit of divination ,

or , in other words and phrase , were fortune-tellers or future-tellers of the familiar spirit-kind , as of each it may be written , vatinaniium mulierum antestis , namely , in its heathenish sense , "the principal of the prophetesses . " This subject

meaning , subjoined to such Greek words as the following , may , we think , go far to elucidate and solve ¦ the prophetic mysteries which the Holy Scriptures will not admit to sanction , or allow to be reliable ,, for the expressed ordinance they have established ,,

as exemplified in the verse above ( Deut . xviii . ) : — Neicponavreia , { Necromanteia ) was a divination in which the manes , the shades of the dead , or the ghost of a deceased person , gave answers . ' A-npofiavTela (/ Eromanteia ) was a divination in which

certain spectres or spirits of the air were evoked . rpao / xarTeia ( Psaomanteia ) was another system of invocation by which the serial forms of the dead