its lakes, and even its deserts are consecrated in his eyes as the scene
of some mighty occurrence. His fancy clothes with qualities almost
celestial that holy land,

Over whose acres walked those blessed feet,
Which eighteen hundred years ago were nailed
For our advantage to the bitter cross.[3]

In a former age, when devotional feelings were wont to assume a more
poetical form than suits the taste of the present times, an undue
importance, perhaps, was placed on the mere localities of Judea, viewed
as the theatre on which the great events of Christianity were realized,
and more especially on those relics which were considered as identifying
particular spots, honoured by the sufferings or triumph of its Divine
author. The zealous pilgrim, who had travelled many thousand miles
amid the most appalling dangers, required a solace to his faith in the
contemplation of the cross, or in being permitted to kiss the threshold of
the tomb in which the body of his Redeemer was laid. To such a character
no description could be too minute, no details could be too particular.
Forgetful of the ravages inflicted on Jerusalem by the hand of the Romans,
and by the more furious anger of her own children within her,--fulfilling
unintentionally that tremendous doom which was pronounced from the Mount
of Olives,--the simple worshipper expected to see the hall of judgment,
the house of Pilate, and the palace of the high-priest, and to be able to
trace through the streets and lanes of the holy city the path which led
his Saviour to Calvary. This natural desire to awaken piety through the
medium of the senses, and to banish all unbelief by touching with the
hand, and seeing with the eye, the memorials of the crucifixion, has,
there is reason to apprehend, been sometimes abused by fraud as well as
by ignorance.