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In their petition, they detailed the history of their past grievances, and the bad faith with which they had been treated. The result was the passage by the Diet of an act granting them all that was demanded on the subject of mixed marriages, and exercise of worship. This being secured, the attention of the Church was called to its internal affairs. The Constitution of the Lutheran Church was revised, and schemes adopted for her prosperity. But the spirit of persecution was not yet dead. Pastor Wimmer was arrested, and tried for publishing a translation of Barth's Church History, on the ground that it represented Rome unfavourably. How could it have done otherwise, if truthful? The death of the Palatine was a great calamity to the Protestants; for, though a Catholic, he was anxious that they should enjoy their rights. His pious widow, who had been as a guardian angel to the persecuted Church, was, in violation of the will of her husband, and of the marriage contract, not allowed to remain in Hungary, but required to fix her residence at Vienna.

Glorious things now seemed at hand for Hungary. The thrones of Europe were tottering. The shock, as of an earthquake, starting from Paris, was felt in a moment at Vienna. The despots were willing to concede anything to the rising people, but it was only to gain time to mature their plans for crushing them at last. The revolution at Vienna brought the Court to terms. Long had it been attempted to make Hungary a mere province of Austria, though it was in fact an independent kingdom, with a constitution of its own, and a king constitutionally elected. But now, an independent ministry was given to Hungary, and full religious liberty was introduced. The resolutions of the Diet were all sanctioned by the king. Bathyani was made Prime Minister. Devout thanksgivings were offered in the churches. A bright day had suddenly burst on the nation.

But all was given with secret reluctance, to be withdrawn as soon as a favourable opportunity should offer; and perfidy at once laid plans to bring about such an opportunity. A serious question had now to be decided by the Church. Should she become the servant of the State; surrender her schools and institutions to the State, and derive her support from it? The

General Assembly of the Lutheran Church decided that her internal government and the schools should remain entirely under her own control, subject to the laws of the land. Though there was little harmony between the various parts of the Protestant Church, owing to difference of nationality or of faith, yet all, Saxon, Magyar, Sclave, Lutheran, Calvinist, and Unitarian, agreed that the independence of the Church must be maintained. All bribes and lures in the form of endowment were therefore rejected.

This was wise and well, for trouble now came in like a flood. Jellachich, Ban of Croatia, was on the way to Pesth. The Imperial Commissioner was murdered. Kossuth was made governor, and issued his proclamation. The people were in arms. The pastors were obliged to read Kossuth's proclamation from the pulpit. For this they were reckoned traitors by Windischgratz, and tried by court-martial wherever his army was successful. They were then required to read his proclamations, for which they were punished in turn by the Revolutionists, when they got the mastery. Görgy's treachery, and Haynau's approach, soon finished the work. The prisons were filled. Vengeance was taken on the Protestant Church, as if it had been a special fomenter of rebellion. Haynau took its liberty away by a single stroke, removed its superintendents, appointed others, furnished endowments, and endeavoured, as he expressed it, "to bind the Protestant Church closer to the State."

Both the Lutheran and Calvinist Churches in Hungary were, from the first, organized on the principle of self-government. A pastor and lay-inspector presided over every local congregation, chosen by the suffrages of its members. Delegates elected by the members formed the seniorial meetings, over which a senior or dean, with a lay-inspector, presided. Above these, were the Districtual Conventions, four belonging to the Lutheran Church, and four to the Reformed, presided over by as many Superintendents. Besides these, the Lutherans, also, had a General Assembly. But, at this day, the Protestant Churches in Hungary, embracing three million of people, are virtually without self-government. Free suffrage, and independent church courts, have given way to consisto

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rial administration, by men nominated by the government. Under pretence too, of re-organizing the schools, many have been broken up, while a few have been saved by incredible sacrifices. Let us hope and pray, for God only can reach the case, that the day of deliverance for the bleeding cause of Protestantism in Hungary may speedily come.

ART. III.—Biblische Numismatik oder Erklärung der in der heil. Schrift erwähnten alten Münzen, von D. Celestino Cavedoni. Aus dem Italienischen übersetzt und mit Zusätzen versehen, von A. von Werlhof, 1855. 8vo. pp. 163; with one plate of fac-similes.

THIS treatise on the money of the Bible, with which we have first become acquainted in its German dress, was published in Italian at Modena in 1850, and received a prize the same year from the Academy of Inscriptions at Paris. The author is, what are not often found combined, both a theologian and a numismatologist. The translator, who is himself the author of a Handbook of Greek Numismatics, has enhanced the value of the work by occasional notes from his own observations, or those of Bockh, and other Germans of note in this depart

ment.

The tradition which makes money to have been first coined at Ægina, by direction of Phidon, king of Argos, about the time of the founding of Rome, receives confirmation from the fact, that rude Æginetan coins have been found of a higher antiquity than any others. For this reason the preference is accorded to this, above the opposing statements that coined money was an invention of the Lydians or of the Phenicians. The earliest form of traffic was a simple barter of one article of utility for another; in the next, certain metals were taken as representatives of value, and in the form of lumps, or bars, were given and taken in exchange for wares. In the primitive mode of barter, the domestic animals, which formed the chief wealth of the patriarchs, seem to have constituted the earliest standard

of valuation. Hence, when lumps of the precious metals subsequently came into use, they were graduated in size to correspond to the value of an ox, a sheep, or some other animal. Hence the pecunia of the Latins derived its name from pecus. And the kesita (Gen. xxxiii. 19; Job xlii. 12) of the patriarchs, which, by consent of the ancient versions, means "a lamb," must have denoted a piece of uncoined silver equal in worth to a lamb. This is sometimes incorrectly explained as a piece of money bearing the image of a lamb: the coin which gave rise to this explanation was not struck for a thousand years after the time of Jacob. So too, in the Iliad, which knows nothing of coined money, the tripod of Achilles was prized at twelve oxen, and a female slave at four oxen, in the games at the death of Patroclus. The precious metals seem also in Egypt to have been weighed out in portions answering to the value of an ox, a goat, or a frog; the last being esteemed for mythological reasons.

The pieces of metal used in trade were mostly in the form of plates or bars. Of this character was the wedge (Heb. tongue) of gold coveted by Achan. Such bars continued in use long after the introduction of coins, and a considerable quantity was found some years since at Cadriano, along with many thousand Roman denarii, which had been buried in the civil wars of Pompey and Cæsar. A Greek inscription of the time of Nerva mentions as a definite sum, seventy plates (dry) of silver, though iά may have a double sense, like the Italian piastra, meaning both a plate and a coin. The Egyptians seem to have preferred the form of rings. Hence possibly it may be accounted for, that the Septuagint renders the "ring of gold," Job xlii. 12, by Tetpáòpayμov, which is an indication that the gold rings of Egyptian trade weighed four Alexandrian, which are equivalent to eight Attic, drachmæ.

From its original shape, that of a bar or spit, (33λós), the Greek obolos derived its name. Six oboloi made a drachma, pay, literally a handful, as many as one can hold in the hand. That these bars were sometimes tied together in bundles of definite size, may be inferred from the history of Joseph's brethren, Gen. xlii. 35, where the LXX have deopòs apropion. For transactions of small moment, in which less apἀργυρίου.

prehension was entertained of error or fraud, small pieces of silver of known weight appear to have been in circulation, which were given and taken without being freshly weighed each time. Of this sort was the quarter shekel in the possession of the servant of Saul, (1 Sam. ix. 8,) and the bit of silver, i, mentioned 1 Sam. ii. 36. In matters of greater consequence, the silver and gold were weighed, and were ascertained, whether by the touchstone or by some conventional mark upon the bars, to possess the requisite purity and fineness; hence we read in the time of Abraham of "silver current with the merchant." Gen. xxiii. 16. The frauds to which this mode of trade was incident, are forbidden by Moses, (Deut. xxv. 13) and by Solomon, (Prov. xx. 10) and denounced by the prophets, (Amos viii. 5; Micah vi. 10, 11,) the having weights of different sizes, the smaller for the articles sold, the larger for the price to be received.

To prevent these frauds, which must have prevailed to a much greater extent among heathen nations than among the covenant people, coins bearing a recognized stamp, which should entitle them to public confidence, were first introduced into Greece; and thence, as it would appear, the practice was borrowed by the Persians and the Phenicians. Egypt had no native coins until the reign of the Ptolemies, and then only with Greek figures and inscriptions. The Hebrews at the time of the Babylonish captivity made use of Persian, Phenician, and Greek coins, and, at a subsequent period, had coins of their own; but prior to the captivity they continued to observe the old method of weighing the precious metals.

Abraham, who was very rich not only in cattle but in silver and gold, weighed four hundred shekels of silver as the price of the cave of Machpelah. Joseph's brethren brought back with them to Egypt the money (Heb. silver) found in their sacks in full weight. Gen. xliii. 21. The man who saw Absalom hanging in the oak, said to Joab, (Eng. Ver. Marg.), Though I were to weigh upon my hand a thousand shekels of silver, yet would I not put forth my hand against the king's son." 2 Sam. xviii. 12. Isaiah speaks, (xlvi. 6) of men lavishing gold out of the bag and weighing silver in the balance. He asks, (Iv. 2,) "Wherefore do ye weigh silver (Heb.) for that

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