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sy to conceive how their passage through so rare a fluid as the atmosphere could have generated any great degree of heat, with whatever rapidity they may have moved. Viewing as we do, the hypothesis of their lunar origin as by far the most probable in every other respect, we will acknowledge that this circumstance prevents us from adopting it with entire satisfaction. And while we see so many invincible objections to all the other theories which have been offered for the solution of the difficulty, we must admit that the supposition least liable to contradiction from the facts, is nevertheless sufficient ly exceptionable, on a single ground, to warrant us in concluding with the philosophical remark of Vauquelin, Le parti le plus sage qui nous reste á prendre dans cet etat des choses, c'est d'avouer

franchement, que nous ignorons entierement l'origine de ces pierres, et les causes qui ont pu les produire.'

If, however, a more extensive collection of accurate observations, and a greater variety of specimens, shall enable us to reconcile the discrepancy, and to push still farther our inquiries into the nature of the new substance, a knowledge of the internal structure of the Moon may be the splendid reward of our investigations. And while the labours of the Astronomer and Optician are introducing new worlds to our notice, Chemistry may, during the nineteenth century, as wonderfully augment our acquaintance with their productions and arrangement, as she has already, within a much shorter period, enlarged our ideas of the planet which we inhabit.

For the Anthology.

NOTICE OF GRIESBACH'S EDITION OF THE NEW-TESTAMENT, NOW PRINTING AT CAMBRIDGE.

We are extremely glad to find that proposals are issued for printing at the University press, Gries bach's edition of the Greek Testament, with a selection of the most important various readings. The edition from which the American is to be exactly copied, was published at Leipsick in the year 1805, under the inspection, we understand, of Dr. Griesbach himself, and by its size is intended for common use. His large critical edition in two thick vols. royal octavo (commonly called the duke of Grafton's edition) is not so convenient for academies and schools, or for the daily reading of theological students, as it is for reference on the shelves of the library.

This large edition is also extremely scarce, and cannot now be procured even in England, except at a price which few of our clergy can easily afford. After the theologi. cal world had waited impatiently for the second volume of this standard edition, as soon as it appears, it is found that first volumes cannot be obtained; so that a complete set of this valuable Testament is hardly within the reach even of the few, who know how to prize so laborious a work. We consider the publishers of this small edition as rendering a great service to the studious and pious portion of the community, by placing within the reach of every student and especially of ministers, a pure text and

1808.]

select reading, of the Greek Testa- Symbola Critica and other works of Dr. Griesbach.

ment.

Dr. Griesbach's accuracy, fidelity, and industry are well known to the learned in every part of EuHe is a Lutheran by prorope. fession, and orthodox it is said in his religious opinions; but he has no where discovered in his few alterations of the received text the slightest bias, or want of impartiality. Marsh, the learned commentator on Michaelis, and now Margaret professor of divinity at Cambridge, loses no opportunity of praising his unwearied labours of more than thirty years in this kind of criticism, his scrupulous exactness, and above all the fairness with which he has quoted authorities, and the unbiassed judgment he has discovered in his decisions on the relative value of readings. His principles of criticism are to be found stated and justified in the Prolegomena to his critical edition, which we have mentioned above, & are very nearly the same with those adopted by Wetstein his great predecessor. But Dr. Griesbach's edition derives a value superiour to every other, from the more accurate collation, which has been made in late years of some of the most important manuscripts, from the discovery and examination of many others unknown to Mill and Wetstein, from the aids which biblical criticism has received from the various labours of the learned in the last half century, and more especially from the great discovery, which Dr. Griesbach has sufficiently substantiated, of the division of MSS. in families, or as he Those who terms it recensiones. wish for full satisfaction on all these subjects, may consult Michaelis's introduction, as it is enriched with the notes of Marsh, and the

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It is also proposed, if this commodious edition should meet with the expected encouragement, to publish a supplementary volume, which shall contain an English translation of Griesbach's Prolegomena to his large critical edition, and the authorities, extracted from this, for every departure which he has made from the received text, and for

Per

every reading, which,
tho' he has not ventured to insert it
in the text, he considers of equal
authority to the received.
haps also some other treatise or
extracts may be added, calculated
to awaken a curiosity, diffuse a
taste, or promote a knowledge in
biblical criticism.

There can be no doubt, that eve-
ry man who feels a due respect for
the sacred oracles, and especially
every clergyman who must take
them for the ground of his publick
instructions, will be solicitous to
have them in the purest form, in
which they can be obtained by the
aid of sober and accurate criticism.
Enthusiasts in classical literature
spare no labour or expense to ob-
tain correct texts of the immortal
authors of Greece and Rome; and
shall the most valuable of all an
tient writings, the books of the
New Testament, be more incor-
No man
rectly edited than the works of
Homer and Virgil ?
would read his Homer or his Vir-
gil in a common sixpenny edition
picked up at a stall, if he could use
the standard edition of Heyne;
and is it of less importance that
the word of God should be studied
in its most correct state?*

The following extract from Gries" Cætetiment eloquently expressed. bach's Prolegomena, contains this senrum quidquid ad sacri codicis integritatem tuendam, puritatemque textui sacre

For the Anthology.

ORIGINAL LETTERS

From an American Traveller in Europe to his Friends in this Country.

MY DEAR SISTER,

LETTER THIRTEENTH.

Naples, Dec. 31, 1804. der of the illustrious house of Borghese. This family possesses an extensive palace and two villas, which on the whole may be considered as the most interesting at Rome. An Italian palace or villa, in point of dimensions, architecture, and ornaments, is an object of admiration; but there is a want of neatness, comfort, and taste in some parts of them, which renders them infinitely less pleasing than those of the English no

Ir has been observed with great justice, that the modern Italians, though they fall very far short of their ancestors in the nobler qualifications and traits of character, yet have many points in which they still strongly resemble them. These particulars, very interesting in the history of the human character, as they serve to shew the permanent and irresistibility. The Palais Borghese is ble force of habit, shall be hereafter the special subject of a letter. In no one trait do they more strongly resemble their ancestors than in their extravagant fondness for extensive palaces and magnificent villas. Rome, its environs, and indeed all Italy, were filled an ciently with palaces and villas. We do not recollect a single great man, who had not, in the later periods of the Roman history, his country seats, his baths, and often his private theatre. The same rage still prevails among the Italian nobility, though undoubtedly more limited in consequence of their poverty. Almost every pope has ennobled, enriched, and aggrandised his family. Every great palace or villa belongs to some noble family, which traces a pope in its line of ancestry. These villas and palaces are in many points superiour to those of any other nobility, or even of any monarchs in Europe. Paul V. was the foun

situated on a fine street, leading
from the Piazza d'Espagna to St.
Peters. It is, like almost every
Italian palace, a large quadrangular
building, each of whose several
sides cannot be less than 200 feet
in length. You enter under an
arch, made through one façade of
the palace, into a vast court yard
of perhaps 100 feet square. This
court yard is surrounded with cor-
ridors, under which you pass, se-
cured from the weather, to the
different parts of the building.
The whole lower floor is usually
devoted to stables, coach-houses,
and other offices, and is, as you
would conceive from the habits of
a filthy people, in a state extreme-
ly offensive to the senses.
Palais Borghese is, however, an
exception to this rule; it is more
neat, and its lower rooms are de-
voted to the gallery of paintings.

The

There are in this palace about fifteen or twenty apartments, kept always open to the visits of stran

gers, and regularly attended by a concierge, to whom you pay a trifling compensation. In each room you find a printed catalogue of the paintings, which are all numbered, and you pass round and admire or censure at your leisure. Your catalogue is your companion; your taste your guide. I do not know the number of original paintings in this palace, almost all of which are however by the first masters; but, as I recollect no room with less than forty in it, there must be at least one thousand fine originals.

Every body enjoys these luxuries more than the owner. His habitation is aërial, perhaps in the third or fourth story; and I have little doubt, that, though surrounded with this rich banquet of genius and talent, which his pride will not let him dispose of, he often dines on soup meagre for want of funds. I do not mean that he literally wants bread, but I am assured that these princes are often in want of a guinea to pay their debts.

The house of Borghese, however, will probably be provided for. The young prince has lately married the widow of general LeClerc, the sister of the emperour Napoleon. To the Bonaparte family he brought rank, palaces, and the richest treasures of painting and sculpture; and he only demands in return a little Spanish or Neapolitan gold, which twenty thousand French troops can at any time command.

I understand that young Borghese is a very stupid, silly prince; but as his wife has talents, at least for the theatre of love, and fraternal assistance, his want of talents is of no moment.

As the Palazzo Borghese is the most splendid of the Roman palaces, so the Villa Borghese is the

most distinguished of the country seats in the Roman territory. It is a very large and elegant seat, laid out with great taste, in a style between that of the French and English pleasure grounds.

Decorated with fountains and jettes d'eau, in which the Romans excel all the world, ornamented with artificial lakes, temples, and ruins, shaded by groves, and laid out in walks, sheltered by lofty hedges, it boasts more magnificence, and affords more variety than any thing of the sort I have met with in Europe. The Romans indeed have a great superiority over all the rest of the world in this species of decoration. They can erect statues of heathen gods, and of illustrious men; they can distribute temples and ruins, without offending taste, or violating probability.

What an absurdity would it be in our country to erect the ruins of a Roman temple, when our history excludes the possibility of such a fiction! If we would adhere to probabilities, we should confine ourselves to wigwams and beaverdams, instead of ruined palaces or shattered theatres.

The moderate nature of the Italian climate is equally favourable to delicious retreats of this nature. Their hedges are composed of the Laurustinus, now in bloom, of the laurel and the myrtle. The box and myrtle put forth their leaves and flower buds in December, in this climate, and are in flower in January and February.

When you peep through the hedges, you see the orange sinking down under its golden burden, and the citron arrests your attention by its fragrant perfume.

No place in the world unites all these charms in a l:igher degree than the Villa Borghese. It has a

fine carriage road throughout its extent, and it is very liberally thrown open to the publick for a promenade.

The palace of this villa is as superb as its grounds are enchanting. Of an imposing magnitude, richly decorated with antique bas-reliefs in the front, its exteriour gives you some promise of the noble feast within. Nine elegant rooms on the basement story, whose pillars, floors, and even wainscots are of the richest marble, of infinite variety, are laid open for the display of the finest exhibitions of sculpture existing in any private cabinet in the world.

I shall not attempt to describe them; many excellent remarks have been made on them by Dr. Moore, but there are a few, which I cannot refrain from noticing.

There is a Grecian bas-relief, though of a Roman subject; Curtius on his horse, leaping into the chasm to save his country. This is executed in marble. The expressions of terrour in the attitudes and countenance of the horse, and of despair in that of Curtius, are inimitably fine.

There are three pieces of statuary of Bernini, who lived about a century since, and who is therefore classed with the moderns, but whose works are, I think, equal to those of any ancient artist. The first is David with his sling, and his hand drawn back in the attitude of immediate attack; his countenance is severe; anger is inimitably expressed, but I think, with many others, that it is deficient in dignity; it is the anger of a mean mind; it is not the soul of David, commissioned, as he must have felt himself to be, by the God of battles! The anatomical accuracy of this statue, and its attitudes, appear to me fine. The second is

Eneas, in the act of bearing off his father, with the little Iülus by his side. It is a tender, pathetick story, but I do not think that Bernini has rendered it as touching as he might. But his third piece makes ample amends for any triv ial defects in the other two. The subject is one of Ovid's; the flight of Daphne, and the pursuit of Apollo. The sculptor has chosen the moment when the god of musick and of light had overtaken the Nymph, and when she was to spare her disgrace, converted into a tree. The attitudes of both figures are enchanting. Her uplifted hands are already springing into leaves, and the tender feet are striking roots into the earth. Nobody would have conceived that marble could so well have expressed this singular mythological fable. The connoisseurs of our party give this piece a preference, in some respects, to even the Apollo di Belvidere, or the Venus di Medici, at Paris.

A group is undoubtedly more interesting than a single figure, and Bernini has here had it in his power to unite the beauties of both the Apollo and the Venus; in addition to which he has contrived to shew his skill in the representation of the Metamorphosis.

In this admirable villa there are also the celebrated Seneca, dying in the bath, too exquisitely done. Death, with all his horrours, is too accurately described by the faithful chisel. The beautiful Hermaphrodite, lying on a couch; the fighting Gladiator; the Centaur conquered by Cupid, are all chef d'œuvres of Grecian artists. the whole, I can say without enthusiasm, that had there been no other palace at Rome but that of Borghese, I should have thought myself amply repaid for the visit.

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