Weekly Trinity journal., 1866-09-22
NUMBER 81.
Jerusalem by Moonlight.

The broad moon fingers on the summit OF
Mount Olivet but its beams have long iett the
garden of Gethsemane and the tomb OF Absaiom,
The waters of Kedron and the dark abyss OF
Jehosophat Full.falls its splendor, however, on
he onposite city-vivid and defined in its silver
hlaze. lofty wall, with turrets and towers
and freouent gates undulates with the unequal
ground which it covers, as it encircles the lost
canital of Jehovah 1t is city of hills, far more
famous than those of Rome; for all the world
has heard of Sion and Calvary, while the Arab
and Assyrian, and the tribes and the nauons BE-.
yond, are as ignorant Of the Captoiian ana
Aventine Mounts, as they are OF the Malvern or
Chiltern Hills.
The broad steep of Sion, crowned with the
tower of David; nearer still, Mount Moriah,
with the gorgeous tempel of the God of Abra-
ham, but built alas by the child of Hagar, not
by Sarah's chosen one; close to its cedars and
expresses its lofty spires and airy arches, the
moonlight falls on Bethesda's pool; further on,
entered by the gate of ST. Stephen, the eye.
though it is in the noon OF night, traces with
ease, the street of Grief, a long winding ascent
to a vast cupolaed pile that now covers Calvary,
called the street of Grief because there the most
illustrous of the Hebrew race, the descendant CT
King David, and the divine son of the most
favored of women, twice sank under the burden
of suffering and shame which is now throughout
all Christendom the emblem of triumph and
honor passing over the groups and masses OF
houses, built of stone, with terraced roofs or
surmounted with small domes, reach the hill
of Salem, where Melchisedek built his mystic
citadel, and still remains the hill of Scopas,
where Titus gazed upon Jerusalem on the eve OF
his final assault Titus destroyed the temple
The religion of Judea has in turn, subverted the
fanes which were raised to his father and to HIM
self in their imperial capital; and the COD OF
of Isaac and of Jacob, is now wor-
shipped before every altar in Rome.
Jerusalem by moonlight 'Tis fine specta-
Gle, apart from the indissoluble association of
awe and beauty. The mitigating hour softens
the austerity of mountain landscape, magnih-
cent in outline however harsh and severe in de-
tail !; and while it retains all its sublmity, re-
moves much of the savage sternness of the strange
and unrivalled A fortified city almost
surrounded by ravines, and resting in the center
of chains of far spreading hills, occasionally Of
fering, through their rocky glens. the CLEAN of a
distant and richer land.
The moon has sunk behind the Mount of Olives,
and the stars in the darker sky shine doubly
bright over the sacred city. The all prevailing
stiffness is broken by breeze that seems to have
travelled over the plain of Sharon from the sea.
1t walls among the tombs, and sighs among the
cypress groves. The palm tree trembles as it
passes, as if it were the spirit of woe 1t is the
breeze that has travelled over the plains of Tharon
from the sea? Or is it the haunting voice of
prophets mourning over the city they could not
save? Their spirits would surely linger on the
land where their Creator had designed to dwell,
and whose impending fate, Omnipotence
had shed human tears. From this mount who
can believe that at the midnight hour, from the
summit of the Ascent the great departed of Israel
to gaze upon the battements of their
mystic city? There might be counted heroes
and sages who need shrink from no rivalry with
The brightest and wisest of other lands but the
law gvers of the time of the Pharaohs, whose
avs still obeyed the monarch whose reign
has ceased for three thousand years, but whose
wisdom is a proverb in all nations on earth the
eacher whose doctrines have modelled civilized
Europe the greatest of legislators, the greatest
If administrators, and the greatest of reformerS,
what race, extinct or living, can produce three
such men as these?
The last light is extinguished in the village of
Bethany. The wailing breeze has become
moaning wind white film spreads over the
purple sky the stars are veiled the stars are
hid all becomes as dark as the waters of Kedron
and the valley of Jehosaphet. The tower of
David mnrges into obscurity; no longer glitter
the minarets of the mosque of Omar /; Bethesda's
angelic waters the gate of Stephen, the street of
sacred sorrow, the hill of Salem and the nights
of Scopas, can no longer be discerned. Alone
in the increasing darkness, while the very line of
the walls gradually eludes the eye, the church
of the Holy Sepulchre is beacon ilght-
And why is the church of the Holy Sepulchre
a beacon light? Why, when it is already past
the noon of darkness, when every soul slumbers
in Jerusalem. and not sound disturbs the deep
repose save the howl of the wild dog crying to
the wilder wnd-why is the cupola of the sane
tuary illumned, though the hour has long since
been numbered when pilgrims kneel and monks
pray?
An armed Turkish guard are bivouacked in
the court of the church ITSELF two brethren of
the convent of Terra Santa keep holy watch and
ward while at the tomb beneath, there kneels
solitary youth, who prostrated himself at sunset.
and who will there pass unmoved the whole OF
the sacred night.