that is neatness in your drefs and appearance, when you minifter in facred things. A flovenly habit is difgufting, and furely fuch an employment requires external as well as internal purity.

These general obfervations may perhaps be useful: the fum is "Be devout and in earnest, be unaffected and natural;" and you will do your duty with propriety in the defk. For the reft you must trust to my next-and till then will believe me, &c.

J. G.

A DISSERTATION on the Ufe of Ointments, &c. amongst the Ancients, with a view to explain our Saviour's Words, Matt. vi. 17.

I.

The ufe made of ointments by the ancients. They never anointed their heads but at table. At what time of their meals they anointed their heads? Why they anointed them. What is obferved with regard to this at the tables of the kings of Syria.

THE

HE true fenfe of our Saviour's words in Matt. vi. 17. must be derived from a perfect knowledge of the ancient customs of people, with respect to anointing.

All people in general, without exception, amongst the ancients, often used baths and ointments; they never took one without the other, but they did not anoint indifferently all the parts of the body; they had different times, and ointments for every different part. The interpreters of fcripture would perfuade us, that baths and ointments were prohibited on faft days. The words of Jefus Chrift overthrow their pretenfions, and fhew that the prohibition which they fuppofe, confifted folely in an arbitrary custom which the Pharifees had abused.

But that which is very important for us to remark on this occafion is, that they never, or very feldom anointed their heads but at table, at the middle of the feast, or a little before. This may be gathered from feveral paffages in the pfalms, where the prophet fometimes thanks God, because

he

he had prepared a table before him, and had afterwards anointed his head with oil; fometimes he praises his providence, because he had provided for the nourishment of man, by making bread come out of the earth, and wine which rejoices the heart, and by giving him oil, that it may diffuse joy over his countenance. But this truth is much more evidently difcovered from profane authors, who, in their magnificent defcriptions of the feafts of their times, always mark the circumftance of ointments poured upon the heads of the guests, about the middle of the feaft, or a little before.

But it is not the time, fo much as the principles, upon which the ancients did this, which is to be regarded. They held that the fumes of wine warmed and dried up the brain; and fo to obviate this inconveniency, as well as to deftroy the force of wine, they thought that the head ought to be anointed or befprinkled with fome fat liquor, which was aftringent and refreshing. As for the reft, this liquor, was fiimple and natural in its origin; that is to fay, men had no regard for any thing in the beginning but health and neceffity; but pleafure and luxury infinuating themselves, as ufual, into the customs which men made, as remedies to nature, they in procefs of time exchanged common oil for an exquifite and precious perfume; upon which Poffidonius obferves, that at the tables of the kings of Syria, where they endeavoured to draw from ointments all the different advantages which induftry could invent; when the time to pour out the ointments was come, crowns were given to all the guefts; and as foon as they had placed them on their heads, flaves entered with veffels full of Babylonian ointment, and befprinkled the crowns only.

The Perfians obferved the fame thing, which gave occafion to a smart saying of a celebrated Spartan.* The Egyptians imitated the Perfians and Syrians with this circumftance, that they tied little birds by their feet to the crowns, that by their chirping, and the blows which they gave the heads of

the

The king of Persia being one day at table with Antalcides who was come to his court to conclude peace, soaked, himself, a crown of roses in ointment, and presented it to that general; who receiving it said, "I accept with gratitude this present, as a pledge of your friendship; suffer me however to say, that the ointment stifles the natural odour of the roses, and that simple and fair nature blushes to yield to art and industry." Ælian Variar. Hist. lib. 1.

guests with their bills, they might keep them brifk, and hinder them from fleeping.*

II.

Jefus Chrift would have men really anoint their heads, if they cannot otherwife hide their fafting; a story of Agrippa The Pharifees made ufe of fome drug to disfigure their faces at fafts. The command of hiding our fafts, is a fequel of the obligation by which we are bound to conceal from others our good works.

.

ALL these paffages render evident what I have already faid, that the head was never anointed but at table. This truth is the key to the words of Chrift, But thou when thou fafteft, anoint thy head, and wash thy face, that thou feem not to faft to men. These words do not fignify fimply, as fome interpreters fay, that men ought to be fo far from appearing to faft, that they should appear quite otherwise; and that inftead of the auftere and fad manners of the Pharifees, they fhould put on an open and free carriage, as common. This glofs neither contains nor gives the force of the words of Chrift, Anoint thy head; they were spoken at a time when people always anointed their heads at table. This is what interpreters have not always attended to: they have not feen, that anointing the head, and fafting, were then, I dare fay, things contradictory, by the force of the custom above mentioned; and confequently that the ointment of the head carried with it an idea of a feaft, where the guests anointed themselves; for one was never without the other.

Christ therefore telling the Jews of his time to anoint their heads, that they might not appear to men to faft, would have them take it in a contrary fense with the Pharifees; and that they should be fo far from affecting to carry in their faces any certain mark of their fafts, that they fhould endeavour to conceal them under the favour of thofe figns, from whence men collect that they do not faft; in a word, that they fhould behave themselves, as Agrippa did in a very delicate cafe.

After the death of the emperor Caius, the foldiers of the pretorian cohort raised up Claudius to receive the purple. The

Dagnades sunt avium genus quas Ægyptii inter potandum cum coronis devincere soliti sunt, quæ vellicando, morsicandoque non patiuntur dormire potantes. Festus.

MM

The fenate was alarmed, and intrigued much to divert that prince from yielding to the offers of the army. King Agrippa was then at Rome; he never ceafed in private to prefs Claudius to fubmit to the inftances of the army. The fenate received advice of the underhand dealings of Agrippa, and fent for him. That prince, far from being difconcerted, prefented himself before the fenate, with his head anointed, willing by that to give a turn to their opinions, and to lead them to believe that he had paffed at table, in feftivity, the time he employed in perfuading Claudius. The fenate was deceived when they faw him anointed, which was a sufficient fign to fatisfy them, that he came from dinner, and from drinking.

This example ferves to fhew the meaning of this passage; however, if there be any one who will yet refuse to see it, a reflection to which the words of our Saviour give rife, will open his eyes, and will oblige him to think as we do. Chrift would have the Jews behave in a manner directly opposite to the Pharifees. Thofe of that feet disfigured their faces, that they might feem to men to faft; but these hypocrites feafted well, for they devoured widow's houses, as Jesus Chrift reproached them. To judge truly of things, the fafts which they piqued themselves upon obferving, could not. much leffen their faces; therefore to fhew that they fafted, they must employ fome real thing which fhould entirely dif figure their faces, attract the eyes of the public, and gain them the reputation of great fafters. Therefore it was against this real thing, which the Pharifees employed to disfigure and leffen their faces, that Jefus Chrift declared war; he oppofed real practices, which fhould produce quite a contrary effect; and this was to anoint their heads, and wash their faces. If the Pharifees contented themselves with fafting, our divine Master had said nothing; but they wanted to furprise people; they made an oftentation of their fafts. they fhewed them, they exaggerated them; they even studied to make them appear greater and more fevere, by disfiguring their faces. Jefus Chrift (if I may use the expreffion) pre fcribed a contrary regimen; he wanted them to cleanfe their faces, and that joy fhould be painted upon them; in fine, that they fhould conceal their fafts, that the public should not know that they fafted, which happened when they anointed their heads and washed their faces, or did any thing that produced the fame effect; practices which were as an ap pendix to the feasts of the ancients.

This

This commandment is the fequel of that of our Saviour, to conceal from others our good works. The knowledge of thefe ordinarily produced complacence and vain joy; the fatal ftumbling-block of merit, attached to the practice of good works. It is with good works as with an excellent ointment; fo long as the veffel which contains it, is well fhut, and the ointment does not evaporate, it lofes nothing of its merit and value; but if it comes once to evaporate, what fpirit it has exhales, vanishes, and it is no longer good for any thing. So the value and merit of good works draws itself entirely from the fund of good works; all that is foreign, corrupts, deftroys, and annihilates them.

Letter from BISHOP NICHOLSON to Mr. HUMPHREY WANLEY.

[From the original in the British Mufeum.]

Rofe, August 20, 1705.

SIR,

Yvery

OUR kind letter found me not at home: but had a very hearty welcome when we met. Next to what concerns the preservation of our established religion and government, peace here and falvation hereafter, I know nothing that has a greater fhare in my thoughts and defires than the promotion of Septentrional learning. You have done much toward the advancement of this already; and I am extremely pleased to find that you are not weary of the work. After you have had the approbation of our great and worthy friend Dr. Hickes, in what you are now defigning, you may eafily affure yourfelf of the concurrence of my advice. I was well enough pleased with the publishing of Cædmon, Boethius, and the Saxon Heptateuch, even without verfion and notes; because I thought that a fure way to preferve thefe pieces to pofterity. But I never could hope that (in this naked condition) they'd have many readers, or effectually propagate the knowledge of the Saxon tongue. Your obliging pains will be of more general ufe; and I hope, will not fail of meeting with a proper reward and acknowledgment from the public. I have little or nothing to object against the

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