that he felt closing about him were one from which he should never escape, Saul had that keener sense that some say comes in the last hours of life, and so, con- scious that the prophet's shade was near, or was about to come, at once sought to see and speak with it, though this had not before been purposed. Strange things we know occur at the moment when man feels he is about to die, and if there be any time when the unseen world is felt while yet unentered, it is when the soul first comes within the chill of its long-projected shadow. "And the woman said unto him. Behold, thou knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut off those that have fa- miliar spirits, and the wizards, out of the land : where- fore, then, layest thou a snare for my life, to cause me to die ? And Saul sware to her by the Lord, saying, [As] the Lord liveth, there shall no punishment happen to thee for this thing," Nothing shows Saul's desperate resolution more than his thus swearing when engaged in a most unholy act, a terrible profanity that makes the horror of the scene complete. Everything being prepared, the final act takes place. "Then said the woman. Whom shall I bring up unto thee '? And he said. Bring me up Samuel. And when the woman saw Samuel, she cried with a loud voice : and the woman spake to Saul, saying. Why hast thou deceived me '? for thou [art] Saul. And the king said unto her. Be not afraid: for what sawest thou? And the woman said unto Saul, I saw gods ascending out of the earth. And he said unto her. What [is] his form? And she said, An old man cometh up; and he [is] covered with a mantle. And Saul perceived that it [was] Samuel, and he stooped with his face to the ground, and bowed him- self. And Samuel said to Saul, Why hast thou disqui- eted [or "disturbed"] me, to bring me up? And Saul answered, I am sore distressed ; for the Philistines make war against me, and God is departed from me, and an- swereth me no more, neither by prophets, nor by dreams ; therefore I have called thee, that thou mayest make known unto me what I shall do. Then said Samuel, Wherefore, then, dost thou ask of me, seeing the Lord is departed from thee, and is become thine enem}-? And the Lord hath done to him as he spake by me ; for the Lord hath rent the kingdom out of thine hand, and given it to thy neighbor, [even] to David : because thou obeyedst not the voice of the Lord, nor executedst his fierce wrath upon Amalek, therefore hath the Lord done this thing unto thee this day. Moreover, the Lord will also deliver Israel with thee into the hand of the Phil- istines; and to-morrow [shalt] thou and thy sons [be] with me : the Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines. Then Saul fell straight- way all along on the earth, and was sore afraid, because of the words of Samuel : and there was no strength in him ; for he had eaten no iiread all the day, nor all the night" (1 Sam. xxviii, 3-20). The woman clearly was terrified by an unexpected apparition when she saw Samuel. She must, therefore, either have been a mere juggler, or one who had no power of working magical wonders at will. The sight of Samuel at once showed her who had come to considt her. The prophet's shade seems to have been preceded by some majestic shapes which the witch called gods. Said, as it seems inter- rupting her, asked his form, and she described the prophet as he was in his last days on earth, an old man, covered either with a mantle, such as the prophets used to wear, or wrapped in his winding-sheet. Then Saul knew it was Samuel, and bo\ved to the ground from re- spect or fear. It seems that the woman saw the ap- pearances, and that Saul only knew of them through her, perhaps not daring to look, else why should he have asked what form Samuel had? The prophet's com- plaint we cannot understand, in our ignorance as to the separate state : thus much we know, that state is always described as one of perfect rest or sleep. That the wom- an should have been aljle to call him u]i cannot be hence inferred ; her astonishment sliows the contrary ; and it would be explanation enough to suppose that he was
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sent to give Saul the last warning, or that the earnest- ness of the king's wish had been permitted to disquiet him in his resting-place. Although the word "disqui- eted" need not be pushed to an extreme sense, and seems to mean the interruption of a state of rest, our transla- tors wisely, we think, preferring this rendering to " dis- turbed," it cannot be denied that, if we hold that Sam- uel appeared, this is a great difficulty. If, however, we suppose that the prophet's coming was ordered, it is not uiisurmountable. The declaration of Saul's doom agrees v.-ith what Samuel liad said before, and was fulfilled the next day, when the king and his sons fell on Mount Gil- boa. It may, however, be asked, Was the apparition Samuel himself, or a supernatural messenger in his stead? Some may even object to our holding it to have been aught but a phantom of a sick brain ; but, if so, what can we make of the woman's conviction that it was Samuel, and the king's horror at the words he heard, or, as these would sa}', that he thought he heard ? It was not onty the hearing his doom, but the hearing it in a voice from the other world that stretched the faithless strong man on the ground. He must have felt the presence of the dead, and heard the sound of a se- jiulchral voice. IIow else could the doom have come true, and not the king alone, but his sons, have gone to the place of disembodied souls on the morrow? for to be with the dead concerned the soul, not the body : it is no difficulty that the king's corpse was unburied till the generous men of Jabesh-gilead, mindful of his old kind- ness, rescued it from the wall of Bethshan. If, then, the apparition was real, should we suppose it Samuel's? A reasonable criticism would say it seems to have been so; for the supposition that a messenger came in his stead must be rejected, as it would make the speech a mixture of truth and untruth ; and if asked what suffi- cient cause there was for such a sending forth of the prophet from his rest, we may reply that we know not the reason for such warnings as abound in the Bible, and that, perhaps, even at the eleventh hour, the door of repentance was not closed against the king, and his impiety might have been pardoned had he repented. Instead, he went forth in despair, and, when his sons had fallen and his army was put to the rout, sore wound- ed, he fell on his own sword.