flietion of torment, when under the influence of a principle of malignity.

In the war with Turkey and the states of Venice, about the year 1571, the Venetians were besieged by the Turks in the city of Famagosta in the island of Cyprus. Through famine and want of ammunition, the Venetian garrison was compelled to enter upon terms of capitulation. A treaty was accordingly set on foot, and hostages exchanged. The following terms were agreed to by both parties :-That the officers and soldiers should march out with all the honours of war, drums beating, colours flying, five pieces of cannon, all their baggage, and be conveyed in safety to Candia, under an escort of three Turkish gallies; and that the inhabitants should remain in the free use of their religion, untouched in their property, and in full possession of their freedom. Next day Bragadino, the Venetian commander, went to pay his compliments to Mustapha, the Turkish general, attended by some of his chief officers. At first they met with a civil reception, Mustapha ordering a seat to be placed for Bragadino on his own right hand. They soon entered into discourse about the prisoners, and Mustapha taxing Bragadino with some violences committed by the garrison during the suspension granted for settling a capitulation, Bragadino, with a generous disdain, denied the charge. Upon which Mustapha, rising up in a fury, ordered him to be bound hand and foot, and the others to be massacred before his face, without regard to hospitality, their bravery, the treaty subsisting, or their being unarmed.

Bragadino was reserved for a more cruel treatment: after being insulted with the most vilifying and opprobrious language; after undergoing the most excrutiating tortures; after having his ears, nose, and lips slit, his neck was stretched upon a block, and trampled upon by the das tardly Mustapha, who asked him where was now that Christ whom he worshipped, and why he did not deliver him out of his hands? At the same time the soldiers on board the fleet were despoiled of every thing, and lashed to the cars. This day's work being finished, Mustapha entered the city, where he gave immediate orders, that Tiepolo, a person of high rank and authority, should be hanged upon a gibbet. A few days after, before Bragadino had recovered from the wounds he had received, he was carried in derision to all the breaches made in the walls, loaded with buckets filled with earth and mortar, and ordered to kiss the ground as often as he passed by Mustapha, a spectacle that raised pangs of pity in the callous hearts of the meanest Turkish soldiers, but could not move compassion in the obdurate breast of Mustapha. Afterwards, the brave Bragadino was cooped up in a cage, and ignominiously hung to a sail-yard in one of the gallies, where his intrepid soldiers were chained to the oars. This sight rendered them almost

furious: they exclaimed against the baseness, the treachery of Mustapha; they called aloud for revenge, and desired to be set at liberty, that they might, even without arms, rescue their brave general, and inflict the deserved punishment upon their mean, dastardly, and cowardly foes. Their request was answered with cruel lashes Bragadino was taken down, conducted to the market-place, amidst the din of trumpets, drums, and other warlike instruments, where he was flayed alive, and a period put to his glorious life. His skin was hung, by way of trophy, to the sailyard of a galley sent round all the coasts to insult the Venetians. His head, with those of Andrea Bragadino, his brother, Lodovico Martinenga, and the brave Quirino, were sent as presents to Selim the Turkish Emperor.*

Could an infernal fiend have devised more excruciating tortures, or have acted with greater baseness and malignity than this treacherous and cruel monster? What a horrible thing would it be to be subjected to the caprice and under the control of such a proud and vindictive spirit every day, only for a year, much more for hundreds and thousands of years! A group of such spirits giving vent to their malevolent passions without control, are sufficient to produce a degree of misery among surrounding intelligences, surpassing every thing that the human mind, in the present state, can possibly conceive.

When the Norman barons and chevaliers, under William the Conqueror, had obtained possession of England, they displayed the most cruel and malignant dispositions towards the native inhabitants. They afflicted and harassed them in every state, forcing them to work at the building of their castles; and when the castles were finished, they placed on them a garrison of wicked and diabolical men. They seized all whom they thought to possess any thing-men and women-by day and night; they carried them off; imprisoned them; and, to obtain from them gold or silver, inflicted on them tortures such as no martyrs ever underwent. Some they suspended by their feet, with their heads hanging in smoke; others were hung by the thumb, with fire under their feet. They pressed the heads of some by a leathern thong, so as to break the bones, and crush the brain; others were thrown into ditches full of snakes, toads, and other reptiles; others were put in the chambre à crucit. This was the name given in the Norman tongue to a sort of chest, short, strait, and shallow, lined with sharp stones, into which the sufferer was crammed to the dislocation of his limbs.-In most of the castles was a horrible and frightful engine used for putting to the torture. This was a bundle of chains so heavy that two or three men could hardly lift them. The unfortunate person upon whom

• See "Modern Universal History," vol. 27, pp. 405, 406.

they were iaid, was kept on his feet by an iron collar fixed in a post, and could neither sit, nor lie, nor sleep. They made many thousands die of hunger. They laid tribute upon tribute on the towns and villages. When the townspeople had no longer any thing to give, they plundered and burned the town. You might have travelled a whole day without finding one soul in the towns, or in the country one cultivated field. The Roor died of hunger, and they who had formerly possessed something, now begged their bread from door to door. Never were more griefs and woes poured upon any land; nay the Pagans in their invasions caused fewer than the men of whom I now speak. They spared neither the church-yards, nor the churches; they took all that could be taken, and then set fire to the church. To till the ground had been as vain as to till the sand on the seashore.*

What scenes of wretchedness do such proud and malignant demons produce even in the present world! Can such spirits be supposed qualified for joining the general assembly and church of the first-born, and for taking a part in the beneficent operations of heaven? If they exist at all in a future world, they must exist in misery; and so long as such diabolical passions continue to rage, they must produce "lamentation and wo" among all the associates with which they are surrounded.-Even within the confines of mortality, the man who is under the despotic sway of pride, ambition, and similar malevolent passions, unbitters every enjoyment he might otherwise possess, produces pain in the minds of others, and experiences in his own soul pangs similar in kind to those which are felt in the place of punishment. I shall illustrate this position by the spirit and temper displayed by two illustrious individuals who have lately departed to the invisible state;-the one renowned in the political, the other in the literary world.

The first character to which I allude is that of Napoleon Buonaparte. This extraordinary man, who for nearly twenty years dazzled the whole Eastern hemisphere, like a blazing meteor, appears to have been actuated by the most extravagant and restless ambition. Though he exercised many cruelties in the midst of his career, as at Jaffa and other places, yet delight in deeds of atrocity formed no part of his ruling passion, and were only occasionally resorted to, in order to accomplish his ambitious projects. The agitated state of mind into which he was thrown by his love of conquest, and the daring enterprises in which he embarked, is strikingly depicted by M. Segur, in his " History of Napoleon's Expedition to Russia." When at Vitepsk, on his way to Moscow, M. Segur says—“ He at first hardly appeared bold enough • Thierry's "History of the Norman Conquest,"

Vols. 1825.

to confess to himself a project of such great te merity-[the marching against Moscow.] But by degrees he assumed courage to look it in the face. He then began to deliberate, and the state of great irresolution which tormented his mind, affected his whole frame. He was observed to wander about his apartments, as if pursued by some dangerous temptation: nothing could rivet his attention; he every moment began, quitted, and resumed his labour; he walked about without any object; inquired the hour, and looked at his watch; completely absorbed, he stopped, hummed a tune with an absent air, and again began walking about. In the midst of his perplexity, he occasionally addressed the persons whom he met with such half sentences as Well -What shall we do!-Shall we stay where we are, or advance?-How is it possible to stop short in the midst of so glorious a career?' He did not wait for their reply, but still kept wandering about, as if he was looking for something, or somebody, to terminate his indecision.-At length, quite overwhelmed with the weight of such an important consideration, and oppressed with so great an uncertainty, he would throw himself on one of the beds which he had caused to be laid on the floor of his apartments. His frame, exhausted by the heat and the struggles of his mind, could only bear a covering of the slightest texture. It was in that state that he passed a portion of his day at Vitepsk."

The same restless agitations seemed to have accompanied him at every step in this daring expedition. "At Borodino," says the same writer, "his anxiety was so great as to prevent him from sleeping. He kept calling incessantly to know the hour, inquiring if any noise was heard, and sending persons to ascertain if the enemy was still before him,-Tranquillized for a few moments, anxiety of an opposite description again seized him. He became frightened at the destitute state of the soldiers, &c. He sent for Bessieres, that one of his marshals in whom he had the greatest confidence:-he called him back several times, and repeated his pressing questions, &c. Dreading that his orders had not been obeyed, he got up once more, and questioned the grenadiers on guard at the entrance of his tent, if they had received their provisions. Satisfied with the answer, he went in, and soon fell into a doze. Shortly after he called once more. His aid-de-camp found him now supporting his head with both his hands; he seemed, by what was overheard, to be meditating on the vanities of glory. What is war? A trade of barbarians, the whole art of which consists in being the strongest on a given point.' He then complained of the fickleness of fortune, which he now began to experience. He again tried to take some rest. But the marches he nad just made with the army, the fatigues of the preceding days and nights, so many cares, and nis

intense and anxious expectations, had worn him out. An irritating fever, a dry cough, and excessive thirst consumed him. During the remainder of the night he made vain attempts to quench the burning thirst that consumed him."

What man that ever enjoyed the pleasures of tranquillity, would envy such a state of mind as that which has now been described, although the individual were surrounded with every earthly glory? Such mad ambition as that which raged in the breast of this singular personage, must be a perpetual torment to its possessor, in whatever region of the universe he exists, and must produce baleful effects on every one within the sphere of its influence.-The coolness with which such characters calculate on the destruction of human life, and the miseries which their lawless passions produce on their fellow-creatures, appears in the following extract.

"He asked Rapp, if he thought we should gain the victory? No doubt,' was the reply, but it will be sanguinary.' 'I know it,' resumed Napoleon, but I have 80 000 men; I shall lose 20,000; I shall enter Moscow with 60,000; the stragglers will then rejoin us, and afterwards the battalions on the march; and we shall be stronger than we were before the battle.'"

tion with all the gall he could throw into satire." -He declaimed against the ties of consanguinity, and abjured even the society of his sister, from which he entirely withdrew himself, until after the publication of "Childe Harold," when at length he yielded to my persuasions, and made advances to a friendly correspondence."

Here we have a picture of an individual, in whom "resentment, anger, and hatred," reigned without control: who could vent his rage even against the Creator, and the universe he had formed, who hated his fellow-creatures, and even his own existence; who spurned at the ties of relationship, and "abjured even the society of his sister." What horrible mischiefs and miseries would a character of this description produce, were such malevolent passions to rage with unbounded violence, without being checked by those restraints, which human laws impose in the present state!

I shall state only another example of this description, taken from Captain Cochrane's "Travels in Russia."-On arriving at the Prussian frontiers, says the captain, “My passport demanded, myself interrogated by a set of whiskered ruffians, obliged to move from one guard to another, the object of sarcasm and

The following sketches of his character are taken from "Recollections of the life of Lord Byron, from the year 1808 to the year 1818. Taken from authentic documents, &c. by R. C. Dallas, Esq."

"He reduced his palate," says Mr. Dallas, "to a diet the most simple and abstemious-but the passions of his heart were too mighty; nor did it ever enter his mind to overcome them. Resentment, anger, and hatred, held full sway over him; and his greatest gratification at that time, was in overcharging his pen with gall, which flowed in every direction, against individuals, his country, the world, the universe, creation, and the Creator.-Misanthropy, disgust of life, leading to skepticism and impiety, prevailed in his heart, and imbittered his existence. Unaccustomed to female society, he at once dreaded and abhorred it. As for domestic happiness he had no idea of it. A large family,' he said, appeared like opposite ingredients, mixed per force in the same salad, and I never relished the composition.' He was so completely disgusted with his relations, especially the female part of them, that he completely avoided them. sider,' said he, collaterial ties as the work of prejudice, and not the bond of the heart, which must choose for itself unshackled.'-In correspondence with such dispositions and sentiments, "he talked of his relation to the Earl of Carlisle with indignation." Having received from him ■ frigid letter," he determined to lash his rela

'I con

tigued as I was, to proceed on my journey, but even this was not permitted me. A large public room, full of military rubbish, and two long benches serving as chairs, to an equally long table, were the place and furniture allotted me. I asked the landlord for supper; he laughed at me; and to my demand of a bed, grinningly pointed to the floor, and refused me even a por-. tion of the straw which had been brought in for the soldiers. Of all the demons that ever existed, or have been imagined in human shape, I thought the landlord of the inn the blackest. The figure of Gil Peres occurred to me, but it sunk in the comparison with the wretch then before me for ill nature, malignity, and personal hideousness. His face half covered with a black beard, and large bristly whiskers, his stature below the common, his head sunk between his shoulders to make room for the protuberance of his back; his eyes buried in the ragged locks of his lank grisly hair;-added to this a club foot, and a voice which, on every attempt to speak, was like the shrieking of a screech-owl,-and you have some faint idea of this mockery of a man."-Here, we have presented to view a human being, who, in the malignity of his mind, and in the conformation of his body, bears a certain resemblance to those wretched beings in whose ore benevolence never glows, and in whose dwellings nothing is seen but the most haggard and deformed objects, and nothing heard but horrid imprecations, and the sounds of wo.

Let us now suppose, for a moment, a vast

assemblage of beings of the description to which I have adverted, collected in a dark and dreary region. Let us suppose many thousands of millions of such characters as Nero, who set fire to Rome, that he might amuse himself with the wailings and lamentations which this calamity inspired, and insulted Heaven by offering thanksgivings to the gods, after murdering his wife and his mother,-Tiberius who delighted in torturing his subjects, and massacring them in the most tormenting and cruel manner,-Caligula, celebrated in the annals of folly, cruelty, and impiety, who murdered many of his subjects with his own hand, and caused thousands who were guilty of no crimes to be cruelly butchered, -Antiochus Epiphanes, who butchered forty thousand of the inhabitants of Jerusalem in cold blood, and rushed forward, like an infernal demon, with the intention of destroying every inhabitant of Judea,-Hamilcar, who threw all the prisoners that came into his hand, to be devoured by wild beasts,-Asdrubal, who put out the eyes of all the Roman captives he had taken during two years, cut off their noses, fingers, legs, and arms, tore their skin to pieces with iron rakes and harrows, and threw them headlong from the top of his battlements,Jenghiz Khan, who caused seventy chiefs to be thrown into as many caldrons of boiling water, and took pleasure in beholding his army beheading a hundred thousand prisoners at once, -Tamerlane, who displayed his sportive cruelty in pounding three or four thousand people in large mortars, or building them among bricks and mortar into a wall,-Mustapha, who treacherously murdered the Venetian officers, after having entered into a treaty with them, and who beheld with delight the noble-minded Bragadino, whom he had cruelly tortured, flayed alive, Buonaparte, whose mad ambition sacrificed so many millions of human beings, and Lord By

ron,

,* in whose breast "resentment, anger, and hatred," raged with violence, and who made his gall flow out "against individuals, his country, the world, the universe, creation, and the Creator;"-let us suppose such characters associated together in a world where no pleasing objects meet the eye, or cheer the heart and imagination; and let us likewise suppose, that the malignant principles and boisterous passions which reigned in their minds during the present state, still continue to rage with uncontrolled and perpetual

The Author trusts, that none of his readers will for a moment suppose, that, in bringing forward the above-mentioned characters as examples of malignity, he presumes to decide on their eternal destiny. His object merely is to show, that such malignant principles and passions as they displayed in

the general tenor of their conduct, if resolutely persisted in, necessarily led to misery. With regard to Buonaparte and Lord Byron, he is disposed to indulge a hope, that their malevolent dispositions

were in some measure counteracted, before they passed into the eternal world. The grounds of his bope, on this point, are stated in the Appendix.

violence against all surrounding associates; it is evident, that, in such a case, a scene of misery would be produced, beyond the power of the human mind either to conceive or to describe. If so dreadful effects have been produced, by such diabolical passions, even in the present world, where Providence "sets restraining bounds to the wrath of man," and where benignant dispositions are blended with the evil principles which so generally prevail, what must be the effects where pure malignity, without any mixture of benevolent feelings, reigns universally, is perpetually tormenting its objects, is ever increasing in its fury, and is never controlled by physical obstructions or by moral con-> siderations! This is the society of hell: this is the essence of future misery: this is "the worm that never dies, and the fire that is never quenched;" and the natural effects produced by it is universal anguish and despair," weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth."-If such be the end of the ungodly, and the malignant despiser of God's law, and the riches of his mercy as manifested in Christ Jesus,-how careful should we be to counteract every evil propensity and passion, and how fervently ought we to join in the prayer of the Psalmist, and in the resolution of Jacob: "Gather not my soul with sinners, nor my life with bloody men.' "O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united!"

Let none imagine, because I have selected some of the more atrocious characters recorded in history, as illustrations of the effects of depravity-that only such are "vessels of wrath, fitted for destruction." The principle of malevolence is substantially the same in every heart where it is predominant, however much it may be varnished over by hypocrisy, dissimulation, and the various forms of politeness which prevail in the world; and it requires only a certain stimulus to excite it to action, and full scope to exert its energies, in order to produce the most horrible and extensive effects. Several of the atrocious characters to which I have alluded, appeared, in the commencement of their career, to be possessed of a certain portion of benevolence, and of other amiable qualities. Nero, in the beginning of his reign, showed several marks o the greatest kindness and condescension, affa. bility, complaisance, and popularity. When he was desired to sign his name to a list of malefactors that were to be executed, he exclaimed, "Would to Heaven I could not write "Caligula began his reign with every promising appearance of becoming the real father of his people. Tiberius at first concealed his thoughts under the mask of an impenetrable dissimulation, He governed with moderation, and even appeared to excel in modesty. But afterwards, when these individuals became intoxicated with power,

and had thrown aside all considerations of morality and decorum, the latent principles of malignity burst forth in all their violence, till they became a scourge and an execration to mankind. So will it happen with those who now harbour malicious and vindictive passions, under a cloak of dissimulation and fashionable politeness, when they enter the invisible world under the dominion of such affections. When the restraints of society, of common decorum, and of human laws, are completely removed; when they have lost all hopes of the divine mercy; when they find themselves surrounded by none but malignant associates, and when they feel the effects of their infernal malice and revenge-those passions, which sometimes lay dormant in this life, will be roused into action, and rage with ungo. vernable fury against every one around, against themselves," against the universe, and against the Creator."

Nor let it be imagined, that God will interpose at the hour of death, and, by an exertion of his power and benevolence, destroy the principles of sin, and prepare such characters for the joys of heaven. Such an interference, in every individual case, would imply a continued miracle, and would be inconsistent with the established order of the divine government; as it would supersede the use of all those instructions, admonitions, and moral preparations which God hath appointed for rendering his people "meet for the inherit ance of the saints in light;" and would prevent the moral renovation of the world, which is now gradually effecting by the exertions of those who are "renewed in the spirit of their minds." It is true, indeed, that the mercy of God is infinite, and that so long as there is life, there is hope; so that the most abandoned sinner has no reason to despair, while he remains within the confines

of the present state. But as for those who pass from time into eternity, evidently under the power of revengeful and depraved passions, we have but slender grounds on which to hope that they shall ever afterwards be prepared for the felicity of heaven.

From the whole of what I have stated in this department of my subject, it is evident, that there are two different states in the future world; or, in other words, a heaven and a hell; a state of happiness, and a state of misery. If human beings are to exist at all in another region of creation, and throughout an unlimited duration, it is necessary that there be a separation effect ed, on the ground of their leading dispositions and characters. The nature of things, the moral constitution of the universe, and the happiness of the intelligent creation, as well as the decree of the Creator, require, that such an arrangement should take place. For it is altogether incompatible with the laws of moral order, that pride, hatred, malignity, and revenge, should dwell in the same abode with humility, benevolence, friendship, and love; or, that beings, actuated by principles and affections diametrically opposite to each other, could engage with harmony in the same employments, and relish the same pleasures. Were such an incongruous association permitted, the moral universe would soon become a scene of universal anarchy, and happiness be banished from all worlds. So that the two states of immortality revealed in Scripture, are equally ac cordant with the dictates of reason, and with the declaration of our Saviour, who has solemniy assured us, that "the wicked shall depart into everlasting punishment, and the righteous into life eternal,"