Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/506

[ i 1 ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS. P. 1 8. at the end of Note Is add this remark. — Thefe ftone- inftruments have been fometimes fuppofed by the learned to be merely domeftic or facrificial implements. Domeftic implements, but not facrificial, were undoubtedly repofited in the Britifti fe- pulchers, as in the barrows upon Salifbury Plain have been found beads and other perfbnal decorations of the deceafed (fee b. I. ch. x. f. 5). The favourite implements of the dead were interred with them (ibid.). And therefore in all unlettered uncommercial ages, when the wild unengaged activity of man ever carries a keen and military edge with it, and when the great employ of man muft neceflarily be war and the chace, the weapons of war muft have been almoft univerfally repofited with the dead. And we have a ftrrking paffage of fcripture to this purpofe, which has never been noticed by the critics, and which (hews the cuftom to have been as general as the fpirit of ambition or the profeffion of arms. Ezekiel, prophetically exulting over the fallen armies of the Egyptians the Perfians and other neighbouring nations, cries out " They fhali not lie with the mighty, that are fallen " of the uncircumcifed, which are gone dozvn to hell with their " weapons of war, and they have laid their /words under their " heads." Ch. xxxii. ver. 27. P. iS. at the clofe of note l7 fubjoin this remark. — The great weight of thefe inftruments has been a familiar objection againft the military application of them* But the objection proceeds upon a falfe eftimate concerning the powers of the human body. It takes not in thafe additional powers of vigour and agility which, the body naturally "acquires in the habitual ule of the heavieft armour.. And the objector may only be remitted for a falficient anfwer to the ponderous, mails of our anccltors in the Tower of London. He may there rctleft at his kiiure, whether he couii uoilibly march and countermarch with liich an heavv incum- O o o 4 b raj ice-