Lord," faid fhe, bursting into a flood of tears, but difcord a wife, who is no longer worthy of your chafte embraces: an audacious wretch has defiled your bed, and the Queen his fifter was not afhamed to betray me to him. I fhould already have punished myfelf for this wickedness, had not Religion forbid me to attempt my life. But this prohibition of Heaven does not extend to an injured husband: I am too criminal, as I am difhonoured. I fue for death, as for a favour, and to prevent me from furviving my fhame and difgrace."

The Regent, though overwhelmed with grief, told her, that an involuntary fault was rather a misfortune than a crime, and that the violence which had been committed, altered not the purity of her mind: he defired her to be comforted, or at leaft carefully to conceal the cause of her affliction: "One common intereft," added he, obliges us both to take no notice of this cruel outrage, till we shall find an opportunity for vengeance, proportioned to the enormity of the offence."

He intended that the Count should feel the firft effects of his refentment; but having heard that he had secretly retired into his own country, the Regent, in defpair that his victim had escaped, turned all his fury against the Queen herfelf. He went to the palace, and having engaged that princels to go into her clofet, under pretence of communicating fome letters, that, he said, he had juft received from the King, he no fooner faw himfelf alone with her, than, after having reproached her for her criminal confederaey with the Count, and with her treachery to his wife, the furious Palatine plunged a dagger in her heart; and then going from the clofet in a rage, he publifhed before the whole court, his fhame and his revenge, Either from furprise, or from refpect, no one attempted to ftop him; he mount ed his horfe without any obftacle; and being accompanied by fome nobles who were witnelles of this dreadful cataftrophe, he fet out for Conftantinople, and arrived at that city before the King had left it. He immediately repaired to the palace which this prince inhabited; and prefenting himself before him, with an intrepidity that can fcarce be parallelled, Sir," faid he, when I received your faft orders, on your leaving Hungary, it was your particular command, that, without any regard to birth or station, I fonld render to all your fubjects the moft

impartial juftice. I have done fo to my felf. I have killed the Queen your wife, who had prostituted mine: and, far from confulting my fafety by an unworthy flight, I offer you my head. Difpofe of my life as you pleafe; but remember, that, by my life or by my death, your people will form their judgment of your equity, and whether I am innocent or guilty."

The King liftened to a difcourfe thus furprifing, without interrupting him, and at the fame time without changing countenance; and when the Regent had concluded, "If your reprefentation," replied that prince, "be true, return to Hungary; continue to adminifter justice to my fubjects with the fame exactnefs and feverity that you have fhewn to yourself. I fhall make a fhort ftay in the Holy Land, and at my return I fhall examine on the fpot whether your behaviour is worthy of praife or punishment."

In fhort, the King of Hungary, before he quitted Paleftine, bathed himself, with all his army, in the river Jordan, on the eve of St Martin; a religious ceremony practifed by pilgrims, when they were not prevented by the Turks and Saracens. At length that prince, after having paffed three months in Palestine, in purfuance of a vow, and being haftened by confidering the misfortunes that had befallen his kingdom in his abfence, fet out on his return. Not all the preffing inftances of the patriarch of Jerufalem, nor even the excommunications which he thundered against him, could detain him longer in the Holy Land; and after a long and dangerous voyage, he arrived fafely in his own dominions. His firft care at his return, was to bring on, in his own prefence, the trial of Bancbannus; and having heard the witnelles, and examined into all the circumstances of that unhappy affair, he had fo much juflice as to acquit the Regent of the Queen's death. Thus far the Hiftorian.

It may be remarked, on reading the above tranfaction, that the Regent's wife appears abfurd in feemingly condemning herfelf as criminal, when, according to the hiftorian, her will was unconfenting; and, as her husband juftly told her, her mind was spotless as before. But the behaves rather like a Heathen heroine, a difciple of Lucretia, than like a Chriftian matron, whole foul, illuminated by the clearer light of the golpel, thould

Remarks on the

ec.1762. ave remained fecure in her own inno nce, certain that he was not blameable r what the could not poffibly prevent; ippofing circumftances as related. But furely the hiftory is very deficient, not informing the curious reader of his lady's fate, whether the remainder f her days were fpent in an unneceffary enitence for an imaginary crime; wheher, unable to support her real weight of rief, and her fuppofed difgrace, a bro en heart foon terminated her wretched fe; or whether reason and religion aforded their proper and natural confolaon, and by the perfuafion of her hufand, who we ought to imagine was wife nd just enough to hold her dear as ever, he was restored to that inward calm, and ignation to her fate, which confcious nocence alone could give; and which ehaviour would therefore continue to onfirm the confidence the Regent had in er veracity and virtue.-But our auhor, who has interested us by the relaion of fimple facts, did not intereft himelf enough about the catastrophe of his eroine to give us any further light conerning her; or if he was totally ignorant hat became of her, did not think her fe or death of confequence either to imfelf, or to his readers! And yet this rigid writer has not omitted to fling out wo or three depreciating and trite relections on those errors attributed to the emale fex. However, he has done jutice to the noble conduct of Banc' annus, nd also to the King; and it is their cha acters, and behaviour, particularly that of the Regent, which renders the story, therwife only horrible, both interesting

ind useful.

Mr Lillo has written his tragedy, caled, Elmerick; or, Fulice triumphant, aken from this ftory; which, with his fual fimplicity, and almost unrivalled power of touching the paffions, is too hocking, from the nature of its fubject, or the stage, and the diftrefs is too much or a feeling heart to bear even in the reading; fince that author, who only Follows nature wholly unadorned, and tripped of all the pageantry and pomp that generally accompanies the tragic mufe, addreffes himself to natural fenfibility alone; fo that his readers lofe all ideas of a dramatic performance, and are entirely abforbed in the intereft they feel for the characters they feem to know, to fe, and to hear. Gent. Mag,

655

To the author of the SCOTS MAGAZINE: SIR, Dec. 22. 1762 THE inclofed was written to a young gentleman who intended to ftudy theology. If you think the publication of it will ferve any good purpofe, your inferting it will very much oblige your con ftant reader,

Si quid novifti rectius iftis,

CLER.

Candidus imperti fi non, his utere mecum.
DEAR SIR,

YOU inform me that you intend to pro

fecute the study of divinity, and defire my advice as to the books proper to be read in profecution of that study. I would give me pleasure to be of any fervice to you in this refpect. But I must firft tell you, that there is a general error in the courfe of our education in Scotland. We fpend the ordinary number of years at fchools and college, and then take it for granted that we are fuficiently initiated in the mysteries of languages and philofophy, and fe push on to those important ftudies which we pitch upon for the business of life. This makes the greater part mere fmatterers in the languages and philofophy, which certainly are the proper foundations for the ftudy of divinity.

I would therefore recommend to you to spend fome time in making yourself mafter of the Greek and Latin languages, and this you can never pretend to be until you can read their feveral authors with eafe and pleasure. Along with thele it will be proper to make improvement in French, and in your mother-tongue. The one no scholar should be ignorant of; the other is the language you are to speak publicly in. Revile likewife what you learned at college, and make improvement in the ftudy of philofophy in its fe veral branches. Do all this before you meddle with divinity at all. This you may imagine will confume too much of your time, but I affure you, you will find it well spent, and it will make the study of divinity much easier than it would be otherwife. Perhaps you may think you can acquire futficient knowledge in the languages and of philofophy while you are carrying on the ftudy of divinity. This is the common mistake which I would warn you against. When one engages heartily in the study of divinity, he finds his time fufficiently employed, and can pare little of it for other studies.

Philofophy

Philofophy and the languages, therefore, before one meddles with divinity at all, fhould be made fo familiar as to become rather an amufement than ftudy.

When you have thus prepared yourfelf for the ftudy of theology, it is proper to go on in a regular courie; and not, as is too common, to begin where you should end. You fhould therefore lay the foun dation with natural religion, viz. the be ing and perfections of God, and the immortality of the foul. For this purpose I cannot recommend better books than Woolafton's Religion of nature delineated, Dr Sam. Clarke on the being and attributes of God, Abernethey's fermons on the being and natural perfections of God, Cicero de natura Deorum, and the Sermons at Boyle's lectures on this fubject. For the immateriality and immortality of the foul, I would recommend to you Baxter on immateriality, Cicero's Tufculan questions, Dr Clarke's letters to Dodwel and others, and his Sequel to the attributes. When you are thorough ly convinced of the truths of natural religion, it will be fit to examine the foundations on which revealed ftands. As to the general evidences, Clark's Sequel to the attributes, Butler's Analogy, and SherJock Bishop of London's Sermons, are the best I know. For a more particular proof of our religion, it will be neceffary to read fome of the Deistical writers, and the best anfwers to them; an account of which you will find in Leland's View of the Deiftical writers, a book highly proper for your perufal. You should likewife know the au thenticity of the scripture-cannon. Lard her is the best and fulleft on this fubject, in his book intitled, The credibility of the gofpel hiftory, 17 voll. Octavo. Mr Ri chardfon and Mr Jones have likewife wrote to excellent purpofe on this fubject: un happily Mr Jones died before he had fully executed his plan. But the most rational way of examining this fubject, as well as of understanding the hiftory of the firft ages of Chriflianity, is to read the Fathers, at least of the three first centuries, or fome of the best of them. You will find this no very difficult task, if you can read Greek with eafe. Thefe good men have their faults, but they are the faults of the times rather than of the men; and you will find them equal if not fuperior to their Pagan contemporaries. To reconcile you to this talk, I would recommend to you Warburton's Julian, a book highly ingenious.

When you have thus examined the

foundation on which revealed religion ftands, and find it fure, it will be time feriously to study the fcriptures themfelves. Not that I would have you neglect to read your Bible till then; what I mean is, that it is now proper to begin a more accurate ftudy of the fcriptures. Read the New Teftament in the original Greek; and as foon as you can have an opportunity, learn the Hebrew, which is abfolutely neceflary for a divine. It would be reckoned abfurd in another profeilion, not to understand the original authors which they pretend to explain. Could you, for inftance, explain Horace, and afcertain the meaning of the author, without understanding Latin? It is equally abfurd to explain the Old Teftament without understanding Hebrew. And I may fay the New Teftament cannot be thoroughly understood without it, for a vast number of phrafés and modes of expreffion in the New Teftament are borrowed from the Hebrew, as might be naturally expected from those whofe original language the Hebrew was.

I would recommend to you the careful ftudy of the fcriptures before you meddle with controverfies among Chriftians, or read any fyftem of divinity. If you follow this method, you will be futficiently ca pable of judging for yourself, in an age when that is allowed, and we are happily fet loose from the fetters of bigotry and fuperftition. But if you read controver fies and fyftems before you are fufficiently acquainted with your Bible, your judgment will infallibly be perverted, and you will be bound with the old fetters.

If you follow the plan I have laid down, you may judge for yourself in your fu ture reading. Mean time, do not ima gine I do fo far tie you down as never to read a book but in the order I have pre fcribed. This would be too much preci fion; the lefs however you deviate from it, you will find it the better.

I hall only now put you in mind, that application is abfolutely neceffary if you would with to drink deep in the fountain of knowledge. Quickness of parts, fo as to make application unneceflary, is the privilege of few. I am, &c.

P. S. I fhould have mentioned among the principles of natural religion, our obligations to virtue and religious obedience; but the books I have recom mended will give you all rational convic tion on this important fubject... I need only add to the number, Butler's Sermons, the excellent author of the Analogy.

A