the supreme legislator. The religion of Christ is one of cheerfulness and holy joy; the primitive believers "did eat their meat with gladness of heart;" and though there is a good moral in the words of Herbert, we must not allow the principle to rob us of our privilege "to rejoice evermore :

"Take thy meat; think it dust: then eat a bit,

And say with all, Earth to earth I commit."

X. SLEEP.

Whilst yet in innocence, Adam slept; and calm indeed must have been the midnight hour of Paradise. The repose of all animate creation would be profound; the beast as still in its slumber as the herbage upon which it reclined, or the flower that grew in beauty by the side of its lair. But the ancient ascetics regarded sleep as a part of animality they were to throw off to as great an extent as possible. With some it would be difficult to accomplish this design, as those persons who have few cares to perplex their minds are possessed of powers of sleep to which we whose lot has been cast in this restless generation must ever be utter strangers. The better informed among them would perhaps sometimes remember that Adam was neither deprived of wedlock, nor food, nor speech, nor sleep; and as they in their solitude were debarred from the former of these privileges, they would be tempted the more to indulge in the fourth, and to say to themselves, " a little more sleep and a little more slumber," when the rule of their order or their personal vow would call upon them with its stern voice to arouse themselves and pray; yet it is a hard task to resist sleep in some frames of the body, and the morning twilight would often see them nodding their heads like the bulrush when bowed down by the wind, at a time when they ought to have been erect as the trunk of the tree, blasted by the lightning and now decayed, into which they had crept at sunset.

In eastern climes the nights are so beautiful, and the bare ground so comfortable a place of rest, that in the Indian systems of asceticism we meet with little account of the modes of penance that are connected with sleep. It is an ordinance of the Dina Chariyáwa that the novice is to arise before daylight. There are sixty hours

in the day, according to the mode of reckoning in India, thirty of which belong to the night, which is divided into three watches of ten hours each. It is said that Gótama Budha slept during onethird of the third watch, or three hours and one-third. In the first watch he preached or engaged in religious conversation; in the second watch he answered questions put to him by the déwas; and in the first division of the third watch he slept, in the second exercised meditation, and in the third looked abroad in the world with his divine eyes to see what being or beings it would be proper to catch in the net of truth during the day.*

The last of the Thirteen Ordinances is called Nésajjikanga, which is the same as nisajja, ni being a particle of emphasis, and sajjika the act of sitting. He who keeps this ordinance may not lie down to sleep, and during the whole of one watch of the night he must walk about. He may not recline at full length, but may walk, or stand, or sit. The priest who keeps the superior ordinance may not lean on any place, or make his robe into a seat, or take hold of a piece of cloth fastened to a tree. He who keeps the middle ordinance is allowed to make use of any of these assistances. He who keeps the inferior ordinance may make seats (in particular ways that are mentioned). None of the three are permitted to lie down. The last of the Twelve Sacred Ordinances of the Chinese is called naïchadika. It prohibits the mendicant from lying down. A seated position is that which comports best with his design. His digestion and respiration are easily carried on, and he can bend his mind to that which is wise. Indolence leaves itself open to be attacked by vice, that seizes its advantage. The mendicant ought therefore to take his repose sitting, and his body ought not to touch the earth.†

This mode of penance has probably been carried to a greater extent by the Brahmans than by any other order of ascetics. And in their case it is not an incredible tale upon which we have to depend; they are presented before our eyes in vast numbers, with bodies and members so dry and withered, that they cannot have been brought to such a state without the practice of the most painful austerities. But it is the recluse alone who is called upon to endure these hardships. According to the sage Aurva, the householder, "after eating his evening meal, and, having washed his feet, is to go to rest. His bed is to be entire, and made of wood; it is + Remusat's Relation.

* Amáwatura.

not to be scanty, nor cracked, nor uneven, nor dirty, nor infested by insects, nor without a bedding; and he is to sleep with his head either to the east or to the south; any other position is unhealthy."

There was an order of monks called aкounro, insomnes, the sleepless; and by other monks the same austerities were observed. One was called Rectus, from standing erect until his legs refused to hold him up any longer. Chrysostom persisted in remaining in a standing posture so long, that with this and other exercises he ruined his health. Anthony was accustomed to remain whole nights without sleep. Paul, the hermit, never lay down to sleep, but only leaned his head against a stone or tree. John, of Old Castile, only slept two or three hours in the night. Peter of Alcantara, knelt a great part of the night, sometimes leaning on his heels for a little rest; but he slept sitting, leaning his head against a wall. Pallodius neither stretched out his legs nor lay down to sleep; the night through he sat erect at his work of platting ropes, and sleeping only in a doze at his meals; an angel might be persuaded to sleep, but not he. Macarius continued abroad during twenty days and twenty nights, in order to conquer his propensity to sleep, until he was in danger of going mad; he remained erect during the forty days of Lent, neither bending the knee, nor sitting, nor lying down. The Ethiopian Moses persisted six years in standing erect the night through, never closing his eyes. Daniel, the Stylite, supported himself against the balustrade of his pillar, until, by continually standing, his legs and feet became swollen and full of ulcers. On one occasion, in the winter, he was found so stiff with cold, that his disciples had to soak some sponges in warm water, and rub him therewith, before he could be revived. Nor has our own country been without saints of the same order. Cuthbert was accustomed to spend whole nights in prayer; and to resist sleep he walked about the island in which he lived-Landisfarne. One night he was seen to go down to the sea-shore, where he went into the water until it reached his arm-pits, and continued there until the break of day, singing the praises of God. It is not said whether his position was affected by the tide.

By the rule of Basil, sleep was not to be continued after midnight, the rest of the night being devoted to prayer. Alexander, in 402, instituted the order of Akoemites, which differed from that

* Wilson's Vishnu Purána, 309.

of Basil only in this rule, that each monastery was divided into different choirs, which, succeeding each other, continued the offices of the church day and night without interruption. Among the Cistercians, the monks, who slept in their habits upon straw, rose at midnight, and spent the rest of the night in singing the offices.*

XI. THE TONSURE.

The prophet of Israel made use of a very significant figure to describe the calamities that were about to overtake his countrymen for their sins, when he said that, instead of "well-set hair" there should be baldness. The right arrangement of the hair tells of comfort and ease, and betokens a sense of the proprieties of social existence; whilst, if left in disorder, it tells with a voice equally truthful of carelessness or calamity. It is a great addition to the grace or dignity of the human form; and whether we see it in flowing ringlets upon the necks of children, or in the modest tresses of the matron as she walks in comeliness, or in the scanty locks upon the head of the aged, white as the falling snow, the appearance that it presents is in unison with the circumstances of the individual, and therefore beautiful. We cannot wonder, then, that the hair has been an especial object of dislike to the gloomy founders of all monastic institutions; and that they have been unsparing in their demand that it should either be entirely removed, or deprived of all its grace.

But in some instances there have been other motives for its removal. It has been supposed that it would promote the cleanliness of the person, or that, as it is a mere earthly excrescence, the body is more pure, and partakes more of divinity, when free from its presence. It is said that the Hebrew priests shaved off all their hair when inaugurated, and that when on duty they cut it every fortnight. They were not allowed, in cases of mourning, to make baldness upon their head, nor to shave off the corner of the beardLev. xxi. 5. The passage, "Uncover not your heads," Lev. x. 6, is by many of the Jews translated, "Let not the hair of your head grow," as was sometimes the custom of mourners. They supposed that this law, except in the case of the high priest, was only binding

*Hospinian, Giesler, and Alban Butler, passim.

during the period of their ministration. It is remarkable that, in the only rite approaching to asceticism in use among the Israelites, the Nazarite was required to allow his hair to grow long. The Egyptian priests every third day shaved every part of their bodies, to prevent vermin or any other species of impurity from adhering to their persons when engaged in their sacred duties. Hence Plutarch, in his exhortation to the priestess of Isis, says, "As the long robe and the mantle do not make a philosopher, neither does the linen garb and shaven head constitute a priest of Isis." The learned Origen was once shaved by his persecutors, when in Alexandria, and taken to the temple of Serapis, that he might be induced to join in an act of idolatry as a priest.

Among other nations the hair has been cut off for different reasons—as a sacrifice; at marriage; after escape from imminent danger; after a campaign; on the day of consecration; and as a token of mourning. Sappho (epigram ii.) says of Timas,

"Her loved companions pay the rites of woe,
All, all, alas! the living can bestow;

From their fair heads the graceful locks they shear,
Place on her tomb, and drop the tender tear."

Fawkes's Sappho.

The hair of Achilles was dedicated to the river-god, Spercheius. In honour of the Hyperborean virgins (Herod. iii. 34) who died at Delos, the Delian youths of both sexes celebrated certain rites, in which they cut off their hair. This was done by virgins previous to their marriage, who wound their hair round a spindle, and by the young men, who wound it round a certain herb, and placed it upon the strangers' tomb. The Spartan ephors, on entering upon office, issued a kind of edict, in which it was ordered "to shave the beard, μvora, and obey the laws," the former being a metaphorical ex¬ pression for subjection and obedience. At Sparta the beard was considered as a mark of freedom, as well as at Byzantium and Rhodes, where shaving was prohibited by ancient laws. The slaves were shaved as a mark of servitude. The hair of the vestal virgins was cut off, probably at the time of their consecration.

Among the Scandinavians it was a mark of infamy to cut off the hair. The Dutch, when in possession of Ceylon, adopted this custom as a mode of punishment, which was continued by the English;

* C. O. Müller's History of the Dorians.