the hope of relief to be obtained through its divine agency, in cases of mortal ailment, make application to the friars of the convent, and by special request cause the figure to be transported to the chamber of a dying member of the family. "I chanced," says Sir George Head, "to meet the Bambino on one such occasion, | on its way to the chamber of the afflicted person, whither it was conveyed in an ordinary hired carriage, covered with a scarlet cloth, and resting on the knees of two Franciscan friars, who sat apart in each corner of the vehicle. "Once, during the Christmas festival, entering into conversation with a welldressed and intelligent-looking Italian of the middle class, whom I met among the crowd, and asking him questions on the subject, he assured me, in the gravest tone and manner possible, that the miraculous cures performed in Rome by the Bambino were more than he could mention." While superstition, and that of the grossest kind, is thus so painfully apparent, it can excite no surprise that skepticism should generally prevail. They have been the twin offsprings of corrupt Christianity from the earliest times. When Luther visited Rome, he was shocked by the infidelity of the priesthood, which they were not ashamed to avow even in the celebration of mass. The same state of thought and feeling has been continued to the present day. The young Romans, and the educated in the middle and upper ranks of all ages, are generally Deists. They go once a year to confession to avoid scandal, but speak with contempt of the mummeries and impostures they daily witness. honor and noblest happiness. Hope proves man deathless; it is the struggle of the soul breaking loose from what is perishable, and attesting her eternity; and when the eye of the mind is turned upon Christ delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification, the unsubstantial and deceitful character is taken away from hope. Hope is one of the prime pieces of that armor of proof in which the believer is arrayed; for Paul tells us to take for a helmet the hope of salvation. It is not good that a man hope for wealth, since riches profit not in the day of wrath; and it is not good that he hope for human honors, since the mean and mighty go down to the same burial. But it is good that he hope for salvation. The meteor then gathers like a golden halo around his head, and, as he presses forward in the battle-time, no weapon of the Evil One can pierce through that helmet. It is good, then, that he hope; it is good, also, that he quietly wait. There is much promised in Scripture to the waiting upon God. Men wish an immediate answer to prayer, and think themselves forgotten unless the reply be instantaneous. It is a great mistake. The delay is often part, and a great part of the answer. It exercises faith, and hope, and patience; and what better thing can be done for us than strengthening those graces to whose growth shall be proportioned the splendors of immortality? It is good, then, that we wait. They that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles they shall run and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint." -H. Melville. 66 Such are a few glimpses of modern ORIGIN OF THE WORD "BLACKGUARDS." Rome. We lift not the vail of still darker-In all great houses, but particularly in moral scenes. Suffice it to say, that while the more ostensible enormities of the ancient heathenism have passed away, the actual every-day morals of the people are little, if anything, above the vices of the ancient city. royal residences, there were a number of mean and dirty dependents, whose office it was to attend the woodyard, sculleries, &c. Of these, (for in the lowest depth there was a lower still,) the most forlorn wretches seem to have been selected to carry coals to the kitchen, halls, &c. To this smutty regiment, who attended the progresses, and rode in the carts with the pots and kettles, which, with every other article of furniture, were then moved from palace to palace, the people, in derision, gave the name of blackguards—a term since become sufficiently familiar, and never before properly explained. THE ALCHEMISTS.* THREE causes have especially excited the discontent of mankind; and, by impelling us to seek for remedies for the irremediable, have bewildered us in a maze of madness and error. These are death, toil, and ignorance of the future-the doom of man upon this sphere, and for which he shows his antipathy by his love of life, his longing for abundance, and his craving curiosity to pierce the secrets of the days to come. The first has led many to imagine that they might find means to avoid death, or, failing in this, that they might, nevertheless, so prolong existence as to reckon it by centuries instead of units. From this sprang the search, so long continued and still pursued, for the elixir vitæ, or water of life, which has led thousands to pretend to it and millions to believe in it. From the second sprang the search for the philosopher's stone, which was to create plenty by changing all metals into gold; and from the third, the sciences of astrology, divination, and their divisions of necromancy, chiromancy, angury, with all their train of signs, portents, and omens. For more than a thousand years the art of alchemy captivated many noble spirits, and was believed in by millions. Its origin is involved in obseurity. Some of its devotees have claimed for it an antiquity coeval with the creation of man himself; others, again, would trace it no further back than the time of Noah. Vincent de Beauvais argues, indeed, that all the antediluvians must have possessed a knowledge of alchemy; and particularly cites Noah as having been acquainted with the elixir vita, or he could not have lived to so prodigious an age, and have begotten children when upward of five hundred. Lenglet du Fresnoy, in his History of the Hermetic Philosophy, says :-" Most of them pretended that Shem, or Chem, the son of Noah, was an adept in the art, and thought it highly probable that the words chemistry and alchemy are both derived from his name." Others say, the art was derived from the Egyptians, amongst whom it was first founded by Hermes Trismegistus. Moses, who is looked upon as a first-rate alchemist, gained his knowledge in Egypt; but he kept it all to himself, and would not instruct the children of Israel in its mysteries. All the writers upon alchemy triumphantly cite the story of the golden calf, in the 32d chapter of Exodus, to prove that this great lawgiver was an adept, and could make or unmake gold at his pleasure. It is recorded that Moses was so wroth with the Israelites for their idolatry, "that he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire, and ground it to powder, and strewed it upon the water, and made the children of Israel drink of it." This, say the alchemists, he never could have done had he not been in possession of the philosopher's stone; by no other means could he have made the powder of gold float upon the water. The Jesuit, Father Martini, in his Historia Sinica, says it was prac The above article is condensed from Mac- ticed by the Chinese two thousand five kay's Memoirs of Delusions. hundred years before the birth of Christ: but his assertion, being unsupported, is worth nothing. It would appear, however, that pretenders to the art of making gold and silver existed in Rome in the first centuries after the Christian era, and that, when discovered, they were liable to punishment as knaves and impostors. At Constantinople, in the fourth century, the transmutation of metals was very generally believed in, and many of the Greek ecclesiastics wrote treatises upon the subject. Their names are preserved, and some notice of their works given, in the third volume of Langlet du Fresnoy's History of the Hermetic Philosophy. Their notion appears to have been, that all metals were composed of two substances: the one, metallic earth; and the other, a red inflammable matter, which they called sulphur. The pure union of these substances formed gold; but other metals were mixed with and contaminated by various foreign ingredients. The object of the philosopher's stone was to dissolve or neutralize all these ingredients, by which iron, lead, copper, and all metals would be transmuted into the original gold. Many learned and clever men wasted their time, their health, and their energies, in this vain pursuit; but for several centuries it took no great hold upon the imagination of the people. The history of the delusion appears, in a manner, lost from this time till the eighth century, when it appeared amongst the Arabians. From this period it becomes easier to trace its progress. A master then appeared, who was long looked upon as the father of the science, and whose name is indissolubly connected with it. GEBER. Or this philosopher, who devoted his life to the study of alchemy, but few particulars are known. He is thought to have lived in the year 730. His true name was Abou Moussah Djafar, to which was added Al Sofi, or "The Wise," and he was born at Houran, in Mesopotamia. Some have thought he was a Greek, others a Spaniard, and others a prince of Hindostan; but of all the mistakes which have been made respecting him, the most ludicrous was that made by the French translator of Sprenger's History of Medicine, who thought, from the sound of his name, that he was a German, and rendered it as the "Donnateur," or Giver. No details of his life are known; but it is asserted, that he wrote more than five hundred works upon the philosopher's stone and the water of life. He was a great enthusiast in his art, and compared the incredulous to little children shut up in a narrow room, without windows or aperture, who, because they saw nothing beyond, denied the existence of the great globe itself. He thought that a preparation of gold would cure all maladies, not only in man, but in the inferior animals and plants. He also imagined that all the metals labored under disease, with the exception of gold, which was the only one in perfect health. He affirmed, that the secret of the philosopher's stone had been more than once discovered; but that the ancient and wise men who had hit upon it would never, by word or writing, communicate it to men, because of their unworthiness and incredulity. But the life of Geber, though spent in the pursuit of this vain chimera, was not altogether useless. He stumbled upon discoveries which he did not seek; and science is indebted to him for the first mention of corrosive sublimate, the red oxyd of mercury, nitric acid, and the nitrate of silver. For more than two hundred years after the death of Geber, the Arabian philosophers devoted themselves to the study of alchemy, joining it with that of astrology. THS philosopher was born in the year 1193, of a noble family, at Lawingen, in the Duchy of Neuburg, on the Danube. For the first thirty years of his life he appeared remarkably dull and stupid, and it was feared by every one that no good could come of him. He entered a Dominican monastery at an early age, but made so little progress in his studies, that he was more than once upon the point of abandoning them in despair; but he was endowed with extraordinary perseverance. As he advanced to middle age, his mind expanded, and he learned whatever he applied himself to with extreme facility. So remarkable a change was not in that age to be accounted for but by a miracle. It was asserted and believed that the Holy Virgin, touched with his great desire to become learned and famous, took pity upon his incapacity, and appeared to him in the cloister where he sat almost despairing, and asked him whether he wished to excel in philosophy or divinity. He chose philosophy, to the chagrin of the Virgin, who reproached him in mild and sorrowful accents that he had not made a better choice. She, however, granted his request, that he should become the most excellent philosopher of the age; but set this drawback to his pleasure, that he should relapse, when at the height of his fame, into his former incapacity and stupidity. Albertus never took the trouble to contradict the story, but prosecuted his studies with such unremitting zeal, that his reputation speedily spread over all Europe. In the year 1244, the celebrated THOMAS AQUINAS placed himself under his tuition. Many extraordinary stories are told of the master and his pupil. While they paid all due attention to other branches of science, they never neglected the pursuit of the philosopher's stone and the elixir vitæ. Although they discovered neither, it was believed that Albert had seized some portion of the secret of life, and found means to animate a brazen statue, upon the formation of which, under proper conjunctions of the planets, he had been occupied many years of his life. He and Thomas Aquinas completed it together, endowed it with the faculty of speech, and made it perform the functions of a domestic servant. In this capacity it was exceedingly useful; but, through some defect in the machinery, it chattered much more than was agreeable to either philosopher. Various remedies were tried to cure it of its garrulity, but in vain; and one day, Thomas Aquinas was so enraged at the noise it made when he was in the midst of a mathematical problem, that he seized a ponderous hammer and smashed it to pieces. He was sorry afterward for what he had done, and was reproved by his master for giving way to his anger, so unbecoming in a philosopher. They made no attempt to reanimate the statue. the age. Every great man who attempted to study the secrets of nature was thought a magician; and hence it is not to be wondered at that, when philosophers themselves pretended to discover an elixir for conferring immortality, or a red stone which was to create boundless wealth, popular opinion should have enhanced their pretensions, and have endowed them with powers still more miraculous. It was believed of Albertus Magnus that he could even change the course of the seasons-a feat which the many thought less difficult than the discovery of the grand elixir. Albertus Magnus was made Bishop of Ratisbon in 1259; but he occupied the see only four years, when he resigned, on the ground that its duties occupied too much of the time which he was anxious to devote to philosophy. He died in Cologne in 1280, at the advanced age of eightyseven. The Dominican writers deny that he ever sought the philosopher's stone, but his treatise upon minerals sufficiently proves that he did. ARNOLD DE VILLENEUVE. THIS philosopher has left a distinguished reputation. He was born in the year 1245, and studied medicine with great success in the University of Paris. He afterward traveled for twenty years in Italy and Germany, where he made acquaintance with Pietro d'Apone, a man of a character akin to his own, and addicted to the same pursuits. As a physician, he was thought, in his own lifetime, to be the most able the world had ever seen. Like all the learned men of that day, he dabbled in astrology and alchemy, and was thought to have made immense quantities of gold from lead and copper. When Pietro d'Apone was arrested in Italy, and brought to trial as a sorcerer, similar accusation was made against Arnold; but he managed to leave the country in time, and escape the fate of his unfortunate friend. He lost some credit by predicting the end of the world, but afterward regained it. The time of his death is not exactly known; but it must have been prior to the year 1311, when Pope Clement V. wrote a circular letter to all the clergy of Europe who lived under his obedience, praying them to use their utmost efforts to discover the famous treatise of Arnold on The Practice of Such stories as these show the spirit of Medicine. The author had promised, ARNOLD DE VILLENEUVE, during his lifetime, to make a present of the work to the Holy See, but died without fulfilling it. terested in the matter; and the chickens are to be fed upon it for two months. They are then fit for table, and are to be washed down with moderate quantities of good white wine or claret. This regimen is to be followed regularly every seven years, and any one may live to be as old as Methuselah! It is right to state that M. Harcouet has but little authority for attributing this precious composition to Arnold of Villeneuve. It is not found in the collected works of that philosopher; but was first brought to light by a Monsieur Poirier, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, who asserted that he had discovered it in MS. in the undoubted writing of Arnold. RAYMOND LULLI. WHILE Arnold de Villeneuve flourished in France, a more celebrated adept appeared in Spain. This was Ray In a very curious work by Monsieur Longeville Harcouet, entitled History of the Persons who have lived several centuries and then grown young again, there is a receipt, said to have been given by Arnold de Villeneuve, by means of which any one might prolong his life for a few hundred years or so. In the first place, say Arnold and Monsieur Harcouet, "the person intending so to prolong his life must rub himself well, two or three times a week, with the juice or marrow of cassia, (moëlle de la casse.) Every night, upon going to bed, he must put upon his heart a plaster, composed of a certain quantity of oriental saffron, red rose-leaves, sandal-wood, aloes, and amber, liquefied in oil of roses and the best white wax. In the morning, he must take it off, and inclose it carefully in a leaden box till the next night, when it must be again applied. If he be of a sanguine temperament, he shall take six-mond Lulli, a name which stands in teen chickens; if phlegmatic, twenty-five; the first rank among the alchemists. Unand if melancholy, thirty, which he shall like many of his predecessors, he made no put into a yard where the air and the water pretensions to astrology or necromancy; are pure. Upon these he is to feed, eating but, taking Geber for his model, studied one a day; but previously the chickens are intently the nature and composition of to be fattened by a peculiar method, which metals, without reference to charms, inwill impregnate their flesh with the qualities cantations, or any foolish ceremonies. that are to produce longevity in the eater. It was not, however, till late in life that Being deprived of all other nourishment he commenced his study of the art. His till they are almost dying of hunger, they early and middle age were spent in a difare to be fed upon broth made of serpents ferent manner, and his whole history is and vinegar, which broth is to be thickened romantic in the extreme. He was born with wheat and bran." Various ceremo- of an illustrious family, in Majorca, in the nies are to be performed in the cooking year 1235. When that island was taken of this mess, which those may see in the from the Saracens by James I., King of book of M. Harcouet who are at all in- Aragon, in 1230, the father of Raymond, |