1798.] 
nefs.and darknefs increafed to an unufual: 
degree: about ten, rain began to fall, . 
which, in the after-part of the night, 
and in the {pace of about four hours, 
amounted in the rain-gage to 1105 
inches. On the evening, and in the night, 
of the 13th of the fame month of Au- 
guft, we had a remarkable ftorm of thun- 
der and lightning ; in fome places, at no’ 
great diftance, it-was violent almoft be- 
yond any thing remembered by very old 
perfons, doing much damages and in 
other places, it was accompanied with an 
inundation of rain. What conneétion 
might fubfift between the ftate of the 
air, which gave occafion to the lunar 
phenomenon, and the fubfequent fate 
of the weather, | muft leave to abler 
meteorologifts to determine. Hntreat- 
ing your indulgence to my prolixity, I 
fubfcribe myfelf : 
Your mof obedient fervant, 
Chichefler, May 10, 1796. M. 
+ 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
DIALOGUE OF THE Gops, 
aN IMITATION OF WIELAND, 
[Aote. The reader is fuppofed to have perufed 
the two dialogues, inferted at p. 233, and 
351, of the fecond volume of Varieties of 
Literature, as the trains of idea therein con- 
tained are here often alluded to, and occa- 
fionally thwarted. ] 
Jupiter, Numa, ApotLo; afterwards, 
LeEvio Socins. ; 
Numa. BEAR own turn is coming now, 
Jupiter. 
Fupiters Whole, Numa ? 
N. I was lately amid the manfions 
of faint Peter. The faints and martyrs 
were bewailing their quenched tapers, and 
denuded temples. Every epithet of exe- 
eration, that defpairing vanity can prompt, 
they heftow on the proteftant ring-leaders 
ef this epidemic reformation. I faw 
Hiidebrand’s proud fhade turn pale, and 
prefs the tiara clofer upon his brow. 
Apollo, What had been the matter ? 
_ WN. Some ghofis had flitted to their 
purgatory from the fields of Ivri. I bes 
lieve, they never gave over their caufe un- 
til now. 
Ff. It is, however, by no means defpe- 
Tate, as yet. 
N. An event makes fo much more 
impreffion, than the caufes which had 
prepared it.— : 
A. Upon the ignorant, whom it fur- 
prifes.— 
F. Alfo upon the interefted, whom it 
whelms. Yet is every revolution in hu- 
man affairs, and this among others) in re- 
Dialogue of the Gods. 
453 
ality, but the crifis of a metamorphofis 
long ago prepared, begun, and to be fore- 
feen. Itis the evolution mercly of a new 
bloffom on the ever-teeming bolom of na- 
ture, which has, at length, acquired the 
vigor to unfoid its colours to the fun, and 
to purfue, in its turn, the endlefs proarefs 
through maturity to decay. Man, change~ 
ful man, will now tend this opening weed, 
or flower, until its fruit be fet ; and fhake 
that down, in due feafon, .with the like 
ftormy impatience, whenits hues fhail have 
_ faded in his eye, and its tafte have dilap- 
pointed his fenfe. 
But, what could draw, 
Numa to the haunts of the Chriftian dei- 
ties ? 
N.. To feek a countryman of mine, 
whofe fhade Mercury pointed out to me, 
as it left the earth. It would itay no- 
where. It looked at the heavenly king- 
dom of the proteftants—viewed the good 
man, Luther, with a fneer, and Calvin, 
with a frown—bowed to Melanéthon, and 
then hovered away, with Servetus and a 
few more, as if in queft of a new limbo, to 
people with the fages and heroes of a pe- 
culiar faith. 
A. I ihould expe& as much from Lelie 
Socini? 
N. The fame: and he is to follow me 
hither. 
A. For a nobleman, born in the bofom 
of Italian refinement, he was fomewhat 
puritanical; but, for a puritan, certainly, 
the moft polifhed, moft philofophical. 
N. How can it have happened that 
4 
_ Apollo fhould become acquainted with his 
character. : 
A. Tired out with the modern poems 
which the Mufes throng around me to re 
cite, I have lately, for relaxation, empioy- 
ed the furies in reading to me polemic 
theology. 
N. An occupation, I fhould little have 
imagined for the leifure of Phoebus, un- 
lefs his fondnefs for divination led him te 
perufe fo much of the new theurgiits, as 
relates to the expounding of prophecy.— 
A. Which in this age of prying igno- 
rance, forms no inconfiderable portion of 
human literature. 
LeLio Socine appears. 
7. Approach, Lelio’ Socini, welcome 
hither, thou venerable old man.  Al- 
though driven by the whip of perfecution 
from the ftudious fhades of Wallombrofa, 
and {carcely allowed, by prudent filence, 
to purchafe a fecure afylum befide the 
lake of Zurich, we bid thee hail! With 
us Olympians, the founder of a new feét 
was Hever an object of fufpicion or aver- 
fion, To cach his own god,” has_al- 
ways 
