M

their combination, certain remarkable coincidences with the Druidical ranges of pillars, certain mysterious subdivisions, and geometrical as well as numerical symbols are pointed out, their lineage being traced to the freemasonry of the Egyptian institutions, modified by the Platonists and Gnostics, whose doctrines came to be incorporated with Christianity. Having gone into details upon some of the proofs of the identification contended for, as obtained in the course of a brief analysis of the organization, exterior and interior of the order of the Templars, and the character of their symbols, Mr. Clarkson proceeds to remark that they had also a certain form of penal disciplination, as he calls it. And here again he makes the Temple Church the text and illustrator of his doctrine, drawing not only upon its existing features, and referring to certain documents for proof, but to the supposed remaining vestiges at the present day of accessory buildings for this purpose as well as for initiation. The conclusion of the whole is, that the Church in question was an idolatrous temple; or, at least, by his analysis, it is sought to be made plain, that the pure geometrical theology of the primitive church, Patriarchal and Christian, was corrupted by idolatrous associations with the Gnostic heresy. "The analysis lays open," says Mr. C., " link by link, the chain which unites Egyptian idolatry with Planotic idealism, and Guostic heresy with Christian apostacy. It must be remembered, that one of the greatest men that ever trod the stage of the world, the Emperor Julian, believed in the Platonic intelligences, whose geometrical signs (according to Plato,) we have reproduced from the Temple Church, and traced them thither through their progress from their origin. Great as he was, he was the greatest of apostates from the Christian faith. We have brought together proofs which demonstrated that the Knights Templars were at least infected with similar dogmas, as testified by the masonic forms and symbols of the Temple, and tending to a similar apostacy."

Von Hammer's charge, to which we have before alluded, of the Eastern order of the Assassins being in some respects connected or identical with that of the Templars, leads him to found upon the evidences which he brings forward of this similarity and unity, the following allegations as given in Mr. Clarkson's summary; viz., " that the charges brought against the Knights Templars in France by Philip de Bel, on the strength of which their order was extinguished, were mainly true; that they taught secret doctrines subversive of the welfare of society; and, finally, that they adopted for the purpose of training their adepti a system of secret freemasonry, the initiations into which were partly borrowed from the ancient initiations of Egyptian freemasonry, blended and jumbled with new forms or doctrines, derived partly from the Magian superstition, and partly from the modern heresies which the Gnostics and Manichees derived from the two former."

In the main, Mr. C. agrees in all this, adducing other evidences than those with which the German author was acquainted, taking the Teinple Church for his guide as well as subject of illustration.

Before closing the volume, we shall transcribe a striking paragraph on the subject of the charge of idolatrous practices preferred against the order under consideration :

"We have," says Mr. C., "in our possession gems, commonly called Basilidian, found in Templars' houses. They carry with them the full evidence of the Gnostic or Egyptain heresy. A jumble of Egyptian and Magian idols appear upon them. The most common symbol is three legs or three arms, united triangularly in a centre. One of the idols has the head of a hawk, holding in one hand the scourge of Osiris, and with his limbs terminating in the folds of a serpent; the mystic letters A O (I breathe) in the oval, are its only inscription; but another Gnostic gem exhibits the very idol which they were accused by Philip de Bel and their French judges, of worshipping. It is that of the calf Bahumeth -a figure constructed out of the forms of a calf, a beetle, and a man,-holding between its human fore legs an open book, and having a female head crowned. It is in fact nothing but the Egyptian sphynx. They were accused of worshipping this idol, while they denied Christ and trampled on the cross. That the first crusaders were infected with a secret idolatry, is in fact clear, from a story which Gibbon laughs at while he relates. He laughs at it because it was unintelligible to him. We refer to the allegation that the first great army of crusaders were led by a goose and a goat. We have no doubt that they were Manichees or Gnostic standards. The goose in Egyptian symbols, as every Egyptian scholar knows, meant, divine son,' or son of God.' The goat meant Typhon or the devil. Thus we have the Manichee opposing principles of good and evil as standards at the head of the ignorant mob of crusading invaders."

There are other remarkable conclusions at which Mr. Clarkson arrives than we have noticed, or than can be gathered from our abstract. One of these is that all the forms which he describes are known hierogliyphical symbols, either consigned to the representation of the gods, or identified with religions rites and assocations; nay, that they in fact constitute the primitive elements of the Phonetic language, to which Clemens of Alexandria referred, and which have hitherto puzzled the commentators.

From what appears in our pages, however, it must be manifest that upon an extremely obscure but interesting subject of antiquarian research, our author has lavished the fruits of a large stock of curious learning, and that whatever may he thought of some of his conclusions as regards soundness or fancifulness, he has fully succeeded in establishing for the Temple Church in London, an importance which few or none, of its visiters, or the modern worshippers in it, ever dreamt of.

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NOTICES.

ART. XIV.-Nan Darrell; or, the Gipsy Mother. By the Author of "The Heiress, &c. &c. 3 Vols. London: Boone.

ONE of the best romances we have met with for a long time. The writing is good; a great variety of characters, which are distinctly and ably drawn, sustain the plot; while that plot is intricately, yet effectively, contrived, working up the feelings and anxieties of the reader to a degree of suspense that is extraordinary, before all its mysteries are satisfactorily explained and developed. We do not say that those who look for proba. bility, and the usual occurrences of this matter-of-fact world, were we to give a rapid summary of the story, and had they nothing else to convince them, would agree with us in the decided opinion we have now expressed; but we are sure that were they once to sit down to a perusal of it in its uncurtailed form, they would very soon become so enchained and absorbed, that a cool and nice balancing of probabilities would be unthought of,that such a process would be impossible. We shall not therefore even glance at the mysteries alluded to. In conclusion, however, we are bound to say, that the fair writer crowds her volumes with incidents, beautiful or affecting pictures of noble as well as amiable and natural feeling, and that there is also no lack of touching and impressive moral lessons; things which are of still higher moment than the contrivance of a deeply-interesting chain of unimproved events.

ART. XV.-Desultory Thoughts and Reflections. By the Countess

of BLESSINGTON. London: Longman.

A BEAUTIFUL little volume externally, and full of rich morsels, sweetly compressed, of thought and reflection. Lady Blessington is a woman of mind, and her obversation has been close as well as extensive. In these aphoristic morsels, many of them real gems, she has presented, we may presume, the best of her gleanings; some of them being but repetitions, yet dressed out in new attire, others originals, both in substance and clothing.

ART. XVI.-Roscoe's London and Birmingham Railway Guide. London: Tilt. 1839.

THIS serviceable, amusing, and elegant work, which has for some time been appearing in Parts, is now complete. The descriptions of localities, the introduction of traditionary matters, and the seasoning which a number of striking anecdotes affords, are agreeably pressed upon the apprehension and imagination by means of a map judiciously coloured, and a variety of engravings superior to what generally illustrate Guide books. Mr. Roscoe's well known taste and lively fancy, are seen to much advantage in this publication.

ART. XVII-Fra Cipolla, and other Poems. By SIR JOHN HANMER, BART. London: Moxon.

It is a long time since we met with a candidate for poetic honours so deserving of welcome as Sir John Hanmer. The present volume will secure for him an eminent position among living bards. He has brought real and sound cultureto improve a genuine possession of the Muse's fire, and a keen perception of the beautiful characteristics of nature. We do not think -we have no right to expect it-that all the pieces display equal merit. The larger poems, indeed, which are comic in regard to subject and treatment, though clever, and the lines often remarkably felicitous, do not appear to us either so original or so well suited to the Authors' genius and ability, as those which are shorter, many of them in the sonnet form. It is an encouraging circumstance that the pieces which seem to have been the latest, as regards the periods of composition, are the best; or, at least, the grave and the serious are most to our minds. For example, in the "Strategy of Death," an allegory, we find the following bold and sonorous lines.

"Oft by the door where sleep had never been,
Danced a lone girl, and twirled her tambourine,
And shook pale roses from her scattered hair,
Like hopes forgot, and none replaced them there.
Oft stood the gipsey 'neath the morning star,
And looked like priestess of pale Lucifer:
But happier maidens with averted eye
Sped the rude haunt of losel lingerers by,
On where the dome its bird-loved steeple rears,
And cleaves the air as glory cleaves the years,
With hurrying steps they passed and joyed to gain
The open space that guards the holy fane,
And scent its lime trees in the wandering wind,
And leave the noisy narrow street behind."

The stanza to Melancholy exhibits a similar sketch of imagination and command of colouring:

""There sat a Maiden 'neath a regal tower,
Girt with a forest of great oaks and pines:
It seemed a lodge of some high conqueror
In the old days, and round it creeping vines
Grew wildly, that no more men drank of now;
And in the topmost arch there was a bell
That with the wind did vibrate; vague and low
Sped o'er the hills its modulated swell.
Palely she sat, and at her side were things
Of strange device to measure earth and stars,
And a small quiet genius, with his wings
Unfolded, and his eyes still fixed on hers.
Men uttered not her Queenly name; but she
Had graved it in the dust, -' Melancolie.'"

A winter piece, and an Address to Spring, constitute a pair, which testify that the hold which Nature in her varied moods takes of the author is deep and self-bred :

"It is the winter: sharp and suddenly

His angel frost hath breathed upon the land.
Tartuffe now at the chancel-door doth stand,
Dispensing loaves from others' charity;
And round about him come a hungry band
With piteous voice and asking eyes; but he,
A little backward sheltered from the wind,
A book turns over, for the Church must be
Maintained, and therein all who are behind
With Easter-dues are writ: 'tis poverty
Moves them, but duty stern his reverence;
The loaves were given the Church, with pious mind:
And justly they by wanting, must be fined,
Although it grieves him, till they pay their pence."

"Young pine that, like a many-plumed Cacique,
Thy tufted head dost in the garden rear,
'Tis now the first rejoicing April week :
Now comes the true renewing of the year;
For all before was winter, stern and drear,
Warming his hands, where Time (like Saturn old
Devouring his own race) some woodland peer
Heaped on the fire, to save him from the cold;
And men beside of storm sad stories told,
The shipwrecks, and the sea-salt on the panes :
Now, all the Chesnuts their great buds unfold,
And that unloving season but remains
In sight, like some black hill we leave behind,
South steering with a fair and sunny wind."

How long Sir John has been in the habit of building such lofty rhymes, it is not necessary to inquire. It will be more gratifying to find that he has not relinquished the delightful trade.

ART. XVIII.- The French School. Part 1. By M. LEPAGE, Professor of the French Language in London. Effingham Wilson. Fourth Edition.

A SELECTION of phrases and idiomatic forms of speech which one would hear daily if living in France, and therefore such, if studied by persons who have never been in that country, as are calculated to convey a correct knowledge of the genius of the language, and to enable foreigners to make a happy use of it, with very little other assistance than what any one may, in a course of self-teaching, obtain from a Grammar and Dictionary. Fourth Edition says much in behalf of the work.

Since writing the above notice, we have received other Parts of the Series, which follow out the plan described with manifest skill and success.