CHAPTER II. 

 EARTHS. 



WE must again solicit the reader's indulgence, for some occa- 

 sional departures from the method which an adherence to a strict- 

 ly scientific analysis would require. We are greatly averse from 

 multiplying divisions, where no advantages are to be obtained by 

 so doing. 



BRIMSTONE. 



THIS well-known preparation of sulphur is frequently mention- 

 ed in the sacred writings, as one of the materials which God has 

 appointed to carry into effect his righteous decrees of punishing in- 

 corrigible sinners ; and also as a very significant symbol of desola- 

 tion and barrenness. In the Hebrew Scriptures it is called goph- 

 rith, which the LXX. render theion, from theios, divine, for which 

 Parkhurst adduces the following reasons, from Holloway. 



'Sulphur was eminently applied among the idolaters of various 

 nations to their religious purifications. One method of purifying 

 persons among the Greeks was by going round him three times, 

 and sprinkling him as often, with a laurel bough, or with a torch of 

 some resinous wood, first lighted at the altar, and then dipped in 

 the holy water, which they consecrated with a mixture of salt and 

 sulphur; for, as the solar fire or a demon in the sun's orb, was 

 their chief acting god, so they thought fire was of sovereign virtue 

 to purify and make them holy ; and therefore, to secure effectually 

 its said supposed virtue, they took care to have it in double and 

 triple respects, as in a torch of some turpentine tree, and that set 

 on fire, with the addition of sulphur. 



God made it an instrument of his vengeance on the heathen and 

 other delinquents, condemning them and their land to brimstone 

 and fire forever. See Job xviii. 15 ; Psalm xi. 6 ; Deut. xxix. 23 ; 

 Isa. xxxiv. 9 ; and Jude ver. 7, on the overthrow of Sodom and 

 Gomorrah, 



