wife through the window of the room; but is never prefent when she is vifited by ftrangers: this affected politenefs is carried to fuch an extent, that the hufband is even difpleafed to hear others speak of his wife and children, and confiders it as an infult if inquiries be made after the welfare of his fpoufe. The father does not give his daughter her full marriage portion, till after the birth of her first child; on this occafion he pays her a vifit, takes off the cap fhe wore when a virgin, and with his own hands covers her with a veil, which from that period becomes her conftant head-drefs.

"The education of the children of the Circaffian Princes is of fuch a nature as to fupprefs, from the earliest infancy, every feeling peculiar to confanguinity. Their fons and daughters are, in nediately after birth, intrufted to the care of a nobleman, who is frequently none of the most wealthy; and the parents, especially the father, has no defire to fee his fon till he is an adult and capable of bearing arms; while no notice is taken of the girls, till after marriage. The tutor of the Prince is obliged to take upon him the whole charge of his education: he inftructs the youth, during his adolefcence, in all the fchemes of robbery, which are held in great estimation among these equestrian Knights; he provides him with arms, as foon as he is ftrong enough to wield them, and in fuch array he is prefented to his father. The grateful pupil rewards his fofter-father for the pains he has taken to qualify him in the predatory arts, by giving him the greatest share of the booty he is able to obtain.

"The female children are nourished in the most fparing and wretched manner, that they may acquire a flender and elegant form; becaufe fuch a ftature is confidered as an effential requifite to a Circaffian Princess. They are trained to all ornamental work in the domeftic economy of females, efpecially to embroidery, weaving of fringe, fewing of dreffes, as well as the plaiting of ftraw mats and baskets. The Nobleman intrusted with their education is also obliged to procure for his princely fofter-daughter a husband of an equal rank, in default of which he is punifhed with the lofs of his head.

"The fingular cuftoms prevailing among the higher claffes of the Circaffians, who behave with fuch referve towards their wives, live as it were feparate from them, and fuffer their children to be educated by ftrangers, all bear an obvious analogy to thofe related by Strabo, in his fecond book, refpetting the community that fubfifted between theGargarenfes and the Amazons. His account of the laft-mentioned people cannot be applied to any nation of the Caucafus, more aptly than to the Cir. caffions; provided it could only be proved, that they were the original inhabitants of these mountains, or that they had in later times e n mixed with the nations alluded to by Strabo. It is evident that the river Terek formerly flowed in a northerly direction, and emptied itfelf into that part of the Cafpian Sea, which was then connected with the Sea of Azof, and that its mouth must have been in the vicinity of Befhtamak, about those regions where the five rivers, Urukh, Tiherek, Thegem, Bakfan. and Malk, fucceflively join the Terek: as, farther, the latt-mentioned river, in the higher parts of the country, receives the rivulet Mermedik, we may rationally conje&ture that this is the Mermodas, or Mermodalis of Strabo, which feparated the ancient

Ddz

Amazons

66

Amazons from the people called Geles, perhaps Galgai, as well as the Leges, or Lefges. It might alfo be conjectured, with fome degree of probability, that the Amazons, after having been conquered by the wandering Circaffian Knights, had preferved fome of their original cuftoms. The latter were unquestionably such a horde of knightérrants, as had by the force of their arms primarily acquired a nation of vaffals, who gradually adopted the language of their conquerors: an illuftration, tending to confirm this opinion, occurs in the conqueft of the Livonians by their German mafters, whofe language was confequently introduced into that country. Nay, it is probable, that the Circaffian bears no affinity to any other language, and that it has originally been a fpecies of gibberish; for it is reported that their Princes and Ufdens fpeak a peculiar dialect, which is kept fecret from the common people, and ufed chiefly in their predatory expeditions. During our ftay in the camp, on the banks of the Bak fan, I had an opportunity of feeing the national dance of the Circaffians performed with much agility, by one of their young Princes. Several natives placed themselves in a row, and beat the time, by clapping their hands, and inceffantly repeating the fyllables A-ri-ra-ri-ra, the two laft of which were chanted a tone deeper, and continually in two divifions of time. The dancer fico in an oppofite direction, but his motions were confined to the fpot; holding up his long garment behind with both hands, and frequently bending his body rather low, in order to watch the movements of his feet: with thefe he made every possible inflexion and figure, according to mufical time, much refembling the national dance of the Scotch, while he kipped about in a triangle, with his toes almost perpendicular; a performance which must have been the more difficult, as the flippers he wore were not provided with ftiff foles. The juvenile dancer, at the fame time, fhouted in a plaintive voice, as if he underwent fevere flagellation." P. 405.

At p. 445 commences the narrative of a journey from Georgiefsk to the metropolis of the Don Coffacks; in which are interfperfed pleafing reprefentations of the Kozak women, of the city Taganrof, with philofophical remarks on the calcareous and marly flrata on the northern coast of the sea of Azof.

The lafl part of the volume contains a journey from Taganrof to Taurida. The colonies on the banks of the Kolmics, the fepulchral monuments of granite, the wandering Nagays, the Kinghis Tartars, are feverally vifited and defcribed, till we finally and reluctantly take our leave of the learned traveller at Perekop.

From the analyfis we have given, and the fpecimens we have exhibited, of this work, any more particular commendation feems to be fuperfluous. We fhall anxiously expect the completion of a work which communicates fo much and fuch interefting information. A great number of coloured plates

and

and vignettes are introduced, which, though flightly executed, fufficiently reprefent the places and perfons defcribed in the pages which accompany them.

There is no map of the author's route in this volume, but three are promised in the next, namely, one of the country of the lower Volga, with part of the Cafpian; a fecond, of the mountains of Caucafus between the Cafpian and Black Sea; and a third, of Taurida, with the adjacent plains, which furround the sea of Azof and the Black Sea on their northern coafts. The whole are promifed to be fo arranged as to form one connected feries.

ART. IX. Sermons by William Laurence Brown, D. D. Principal of Marifchall College and Univerfity; Professor of Divinity, and Minifter of Grey-Friars' Church, Aberdeen; One of his Majefty's Chaplains in Ordinary, in Scotland; and Member of the Provincial Societies of Arts and Sciences of Utrecht and Holland. 8vo. 491 pp. 7s. Conflable and Whyte, Edinburgh; Longman and Rees, London. 1803.

THERE is hardly any fpecies of compofition more difficult than that of a fermon, which fhall be at once fit for the pulpit and the prefs. The topics to be difcuffed are all more or lefs practical; and, having already been difcuffed a thousand times, they are, of course, devoid of novelty; and the preacher can avail himfelf of little, except on temporary occafions, which has not been employed by fome of his predeceffors in this department of literature, to illuftrate the fame truth, or to inculcate the fame duty. Temporary and local occurrences may indeed fometimes be employed to good purpose in the pulpit; but they would appear ridiculous in a published fermon, unless they fhould be of fuch magnitude as to affect the interefts of nations, and of our holy religion at large. In the pulpit, too, the preacher, who is animated by a fpark of the poet's fire, may paint in glowing colours the oppofite confequences of virtue and vice; and, by a forcible addrefs to the paffions, roufe the attention of his lumbering audience; but a pathetic fermon read in the clofet, unless it be the work of a truly great mafler, is apt to excite emotions very different from. thiofe of hope and terror. The good fenfe of Englishmen looks for information, rather than for tropes, and figures, and fancy fcenes, in works published on ferious fubjects; but what information can be given in a practical fermon?

Thefe

Thefe difficulties muft feem formidable to him, who be comes a candidate for fame by fuch publications as that before us; and they would be almost infuperable, were not the perverfity of men extremely ingenious in devifing new arguments in fupport of error. The faving truths of the gofpel are of themselves fo very plain, that he who runs may read them; though, connected with thefe, are other truths of difficult comprehenfion; but the precepts of the gospel are pure, and enforced by the moft awful fanctions. The man of corrupt heart, therefore, who is confcious of difobeying thofe precepts, is under very ftrong temptations to pervert the doctrines which p.efcribe the terms of falvation; and this he is in fome. measure enabled to do, by keeping out of fight the opinions and cuftoms, to which the evangelical writers more particularly allude, when they treat of fuch topics as election, juftification, and the faving influence of grace, &c. Hence the dangerous fophifms of ancient and modern heretics, which, being adopted by ignorant fanaticifm, have found their way from the fchools to the cottage, and led aftray great multitudes in every age of the church.

As thefe fophifms are daily varying their form, there is conflantly room for the employment both of crudition and of genius in fermons that fhall be adapted as well to the pulpit as to the preis; but this erudition fhould not appear in verbal criticifm, nor this genius in the language of metaphyfics. The preacher may indeed have occafion for much critical fkill when inveftigating the meaning of the facred text, and for much metaphyfical acumen when tracing to their object fome of St. Paul's reafonings; but the object of that Apoitle, and indeed of all the facred writers, will be most certainly difcovered, by afcertaining the circumftances in which they wrote. This can be done only by him who has made himself acquainted with the prevailing opinions of the Jewifh feets, and the Greek philofophers, at the æra of our Saviour's appearance on earth. A thorough knowledge of thefe would throw a blaze of light on the obfcureft pallages of the apololic writings; and he who has moft of this knowledge, united with an ardent love of truth, muft always be the fateft interpreter of holy fcripture.

It would indeed be unpardonable in the pulpit to proceed through all the feps by which the preacher arrived at the truth which he withes to eftablifh; for through fuch a progrefs a mixed audience could not follow him: but, if he ftate explicitly the error which it was the facred writer's immediate object to confute, the illiterate part of his audience will admit the truth of the fatement on his authority; and, attending

to the explanation which he is thence enabled to give of the text under confideration, will perceive its juftnefs, liften to the inferences drawn from it, as to fo much practical inftruction, and feel themselves armed against the fophiftry which was ready to lead them into the bye-paths of herefy and vice.

Of late years, we have had many valuable fermons compofed on this plan, and equally fuited to the church and the clofet. Whether the volume before us has added to their number, or poffeffes excellencies of a different kind, it is our bufinefs to enquire, and to lay the refult of our enquiries before our readers. The author is known in the republic of letters as a man of diftinguished abilities*; and, from the friends of true religion and virtue, he has an additional claim to respect, arifing from the part which he acted, and the dangers which he incurred, when the French, under the command of Dumourier, drove the Stadtholder from Holland, and fubverted the conftitution of the United Provinces. It is not, however, as a loyal fubject or a moral philofopher, that he now appears before the tribunal of criticism, but as a writer of fermons; and in that character alone are his merits to be tried.

The volume, which, in a handfome ftyle of grateful panegyric, is dedicated to his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, contains eighteen Sermons, on the following fubjects

and texts.

Sermon 1. On the Duty and Character of a Chriflian Preacher; 2 Cor. iv. 6. II. On the Love of God; Pfalm xxxi. 23. III. On the Joy and Peace of Believing and Practising the Gofpel; Philip. iv. 4. IV. On the Nature, the Caufes, and the Effects of Indifference with Regard to Religion; St. Matthew, xxiv. 12. v. On the Folly of Procraftination with Regard to the Concerns of Religion; Ecclef. xii. 2. VI. On the Vanity of Religion, unless confidered as the Chief Good, and accompanied with Zeal and Perfeverance; St. Matth. vii. 7. VII. On the Nature, the Effects, and the Rewards of Conftancy and Perfeverance in Religion; 1 Cor. xv. 58. VIII. On the progreffive Nature of Religion in the Soul; Prov. iv. 18. x. On the fpecific Qualities of Prudence and Simplicity of Character; St.

His excellent Essay on the Natural Equality of Men" fully met the original objects of our defign, and received therefore our mak cordial approbation, in our first volume, p. 394 His Effay on Scepticism and Dogmatifm was noticed vol. x. p. 56, and fingle Sermons at different periods.

Matth.