it. Upon the two ends of this lid, and of the same matter with it, that is, solid gold, were placed two figures of cherubim which looked towards each other, and whose outstretched wings, meeting over the centre of the ark, overshadowed it completely. It was here that the Shekinah or special emblem of the Divine Presence was represented as resting, and as giving forth oracles to the consulting High Priests. Hence the Lord is sometimes mentioned as he that" dwelleth" or "sitteth between the cherubim." In its removals the ark was covered with a veil, Num. iv. 6, and might only be carried on the shoulders of the priests or Levites. The Rabbins think, with some reason, that it was only carried by the priests on extraordinary occasions, being ordinarily borne by the Levites. No other form of conveyance was allowed, nor were any other persons permitted to interfere with it. The fate of Uzzah, 2 Sam. vi. 3, admonished the Israelites, in a very solemn manner, of the consequences of even a well-meant officiousness in a matter where the Divine will had been so clearly expressed to the contrary.

After the Israelites had passed the Jordan, the ark generally occupied its proper place in the Tabernacle, and was afterwards placed in. the Temple built by Solomon. From the direction given by Josiah to the Levites, 2 Chron. xxxv. 3, to restore the ark to its place, it would seem to have been previously removed, but it is not known whether this was done by the priests, to preserve it from profanation, or by the idolatrous kings Manasseh or Amon, to make room for their idols. It seems that the ark, with the other precious things of the Temple, became the spoil of Nebuchadnezzar, and was taken to Babylon; and it does not appear that it was restored at the end of the captivity, or that any new one was made. What became of the ark after the captivity cannot be ascertained. Some of the Rabbins think that it was concealed, to preserve it from the Chaldeans, and that it could not again be discovered, nor will be till the Messiah comés and reveals it. Others say that it was indeed taken by the Chaldeans, but was afterwards restored, and occupied its place in the second Temple: but the Talmud and some of the Jewish writers confess, that the want of the ark was one of the points in which the second Temple was inferior to that of Solomon: to which we may add that neither Ezra, Nehemiah, the Maccabees, nor Josephus mention the ark as extant in the second Temple, and the last authority expressly says that there was nothing in the sanctuary when the Temple was taken by Titus. It certainly does not appear in the Arch erected at Rome in honor of that conqueror, and in which the spoils of the Temple are displayed: although some writers have attempted to identify it with the table of shew-bread which is there represented.

The following is a view of the Ark and the Cherubim in combination, derived from a collation of all the different passages in which they are mentioned or described. As we are compelled th and upon conjecture more or less in regard to the form of these various structures, we can propose our pictorial designs only as approxiznations to the truth.

It is well known to those versed in the sacred antiquities of the different nations of the earth, that similar arks or chests containing the mysteries of their religions, were common among them, and derived their origin from the rites and institutes of the Ancient Church. The Egyptians, for instance, carried in solemn processions a sacred chest, containing their secret things and the mysteries of their religion, of which the following cut, from the hieroglyphic remains of that country, shows a very remarkable conformity to the Hebrew model.

The Trojans also had their sacred chest; and the palladium of the Greeks and Romans was something not very unlike. It is remarkable

too, that as the Hebrew Tabernacle and Temple had a holy of holies, in which the ark was deposited, so had the heathen, in the inmost part of their temples, an adytum or penetrale, which none but the priests might enter. Something very similar may also be traced among the barbarous and savage nations. Thus, Tacitus, speaking of the nations of Northern Germany, of whom our Saxon ancestors were a branch, says that they generally worshiped Hertham, or the Mother Earth (Terram matrem); believing her to interpose in the affairs of men, and to visit nations; and that to her, within a grove in a certain island, was consecrated a vehicle covered with a vestment, and which none but the priests were allowed to touch. The same thing has been frequently noticed in connexion with the religious systems of other heathen nations, and among the inhabitants of Mexico and the South Sea Islands, very curious analogies with the Mosaic ark have been discovered, of which the reader will find an account in Parkhurst's Heb. Lex. Art. 7.

"Make upon it a crown of gold round about." The Heb. has "a golden border round about ;" the Greek, "golden wreathed waves round about." What is here termed "crown," was an ornamental cornice, moulding, or border, which went round the top, as a kind of enclosure serving to make firm the propitiatory in its place, and called a crown" from its encompassing the whole outer extremities of the upper side of the ark somewhat as a crown encircles the temples of the head. The term is only employed in reference to the rims or crowns of gold made round the ark of the covenant, the table of shewbread, and the altar of incense. From the rendering of the Greek it would appear that the work of this cornice was somehow exquisitely wrought in graceful flexures or undulations, resembling the waves of the sea.

"Thou shalt cast four rings of gold," &c. Doubtless of solid gold, as they were to sustain a very considerable weight when the staves were inserted and the ark borne by the priests. Whether these rings were placed lengthwise or breadthwise of the ark is not clear. We infer the latter, however, as otherwise, when carried, the front part of the ark with its cherubim would be sideways, which is not likely. Besides we are told, 1 Kings viii. 8, that in the Temple "the ends of the staves were seen out in the holy place, before the oracle;" consequently, as the ark fronted the entrance, the staves must have run along the extremity of its breadth instead of its length.

"And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee." That is the two tables of stone on which the Law of the Ten Commandments was written; called "the testimony," for reasons which will be stated as we proceed.

In endeavoring to present, under the illuminated guidance which we have all along followed, the internal of this most sacred portion of the Tabernacle furniture, it may be proper, in the outset, to remind the reader that the Tabernacle as a whole represented the three heavens ; the outer court, the ultimate or first heaven; the outer room, the middle or second heaven, and the inner room or the Holy of Holies, the inmost or third heaven, which last is also represented by the Ark of the

Covenant, being, as it were, the inmost of the inmost. There is no ground for the charge of inconsistency in the fact that Swedenborg sometimes affirms that the Most Holy Place signifies the inmost heaven, and sometimes that the Ark of the Covenant does. It is not unlike the phraseology by which the term "law," is sometimes appropriated to the Pentateuch, and sometimes to the Decalogue contained in the Pentateuch. To a more exact specification of the internal purport of the Ark it may be proper to observe that the law deposited in the sacred coffer represented the Lord as to Divine Truth or the Word; and as conjunction with the Lord is by means of the Word, the Ark was therefore called the Ark of the Covenant, inasmuch as covenant signifies conjunction. On this subject the following remarks of our author will be seen to throw important light. "The place within the veil, where the ark was, which contained the law or testimony, represented the third heaven: the reason why this place represented this heaven was, because there was the law, by which is understood the Lord as to divine truth or as to the Word (for such is the signification of that law in an extensive sense), and the divine truth proceeding from the Lord is what forms the heavens: this is received in the greatest purity by the angels of the third heaven, because they are in conjunction with the Lord by virtue of love to him; for all the angels in that heaven are principled in love to the Lord, wherefore they see divine truth as it were implanted in themselves, although it continually flows-in from the Lord, and hence it is, that that heaven above the rest, is said to be in the Lord because in the Divine [principle] which proceeds from Him: this heaven was represented by the ark in which was the law, that is, the Lord: this was the reason that the ark was overlaid with gold, within and without, and that the propitiatory was over the ark, and over the propitiatory and from it two cherubs, which were of pure gold; for gold, from correspondence, signifies the good of love, in which the angels of the third heaven are principled; by the propitiatory was signified the hearing and reception of all things appertaining to worship, which originates in the good of love from the Lord; and by the cherubs was signified the Lord's providence and guard, that He may not be approached except by the good of love, and that heaven, with the angels thereof, is protection lest anything should be elevated to the Lord Himself except what proceeds from the good of love to Him derived from Him; for all worship of God passes through the heavens even unto the Lord, and is purified in the way, even till it is elevated to the third heaven, and is there heard and received by the Lord, all impurities being wiped off in the way; hence it is that the cherubs of gold were placed over the propitiatory, which was over the ark, and hence that place was called the sanctuary, and also the Holy of Holies, and was distinguished from the exterior part of the tabernacle by the veil." —A. E. 700.

The designations applied to the ark, in various connexions in the Word, are worthy of notice, and more especially from the fact that the evidence is incontrovertible of its being in several instances distinguished by the title of Jehovah himself. Thus, 2 Sam. vi. 2, " And David arose and went with all the people that were with him from

Baale of Judah, to bring up from thence the ark of God, whose name is called by the name of the Lord of Hosts that dwelleth between the cherubims." So also Josh. vi. 11, "Behold the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth (Heb. the ark of the covenant, even the Lord of all the earth) passeth even before you into Jordan." like manner, v. 13, " And it shall come to pass, as soon as the soles of the feet of the priests that bear the ark of the Lord, (even) the Lord of all the earth, shall rest in the waters of Jordan, that the waters of Jordan shall be cut off from the waters that come down from above."

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The same import is to be recognized under the expression "before the Lord," in all such passages as the following, Ex. xvi. 33, 34, “ And Moses said unto Aaron, take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord, to be kept for your generations. As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the testimony, to be kept." Here the two forms of expression explain each other. Laying up the pot of manna "before the Lord" was laying it up "before the Testimony," i. e. before the Ark of the Testimony. The meaning of the phrase is doubtless the same throughout the general tenor of the history recorded in the Old Testament. Thus, Josh. iv. 13, "About forty thousand prepared for war, passed over before the Lord, unto battle, to the plains of Jericho ;" i. e. before the Ark. Of like construction are the following: Num. x. 35, 36, “ And it came to pass, when the ark set forward, that Moses said, Rise up, Lord, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thee. And when it rested, he said, Return, O Lord, unto the many thousands of Israel." Ps. lxviii. 1, 2, "Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered: let them also that hate him flee before him. As smoke is driven away, so drive them away as wax melteth before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God." This Psalm is entitled "A prayer at the removing of the ark," it being supposed to have been written on the occasion of David's conveying the Ark to Mount Zion. Ps. cxxxii. 8, "Arise, O Lord, into thy rest; thou and (or, even) the ark of thy strength."

Such then is the paramount denomination given to the Ark of the Covenant. It is called by the high and holy name of the Lord, because the Lord by his law, that is, by his Word, that is, by his Truth, that is, by Himself, was in it, just as the theophanic angel is called Jehovah, because He was in him, and was manifested by him. "That by the ark," says Swedenborg, "was represented the Lord as to the divine truth, and that it consequently signified the divine truth which is from the Lord, and thus the Word may appear also from this consideration, that the Lord spake thence with Moses, for it is said, Ex. xxv. 21, 22, 'Thou shalt give the testimony into the ark, and I will meet thee there, and I will speak with thee from between the two cherubs, which are over the ark of the testimony, all that I shall command thee for the sons of Israel;" and elsewhere, Num. vii. 89, 'When Moses entered into the tent of the assembly to speak with Him, he heard the voice of one speaking unto him from over the propitiatory, which was over the ark of the testimony, from between the two