ed; casuistical subtleties and word-splitting were rife; error or orthodoxy was often made to depend rather upon the mere use or rejection of a particular phrase, than upon a clear understanding of what was really meant by either party; and the historical records which have come down to us of the points in discussion are often perplexing and contradictory. These remarks apply to the case of Nestorius; for though we have, in this instance, the advantage of the decision of a general council, convened specially to consider the matters in discussion, there was so much of heat and mutual anathematization, that men's sayings and doings were grievously distorted. Take the broad palpable facts, that Nestorius, bishop and patriarch of Constantinople, affirmed that the Virgin Mary ought not to be called "the mother of God;" which declaration his opponent Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, protested against as heretical; and, for asserting which, Nestorius was condemned by the council (A.D. 431), and was eventually banished to an Oasis in the deserts of Libya, where he died. But it is clear that the use or refusal of this particular phrase, "mother of God," was orthodox or heterodox according to the meaning attached to it. There was the human nature of Christ, and there was his divine nature; but these constituted but one person. Nestorius did not say that there were two persons in Christ; but he affirmed that the Virgin Mary was mother only of the manhood, and not of the Godhead; and this was considered to carry that meaning. It might be, that wishing to correct the popular superstitions in regard to the Virgin Mary, who began already to be worshipped, he wished to shew the distinction between the human and the

divine nature of our Lord; or it might be that he really embraced a heresy akin to that of Paul of Sarmosata in the third century, denying the union of the Word with the humanity; in which view Cyril and the council construed his declarations. But whatever were the distinctions which existed in his own mind, the heresy which bears his name was considered by those who repelled it, if not by those who embraced it, to separate the divinity of Christ from the humanity; so as to make two persons, instead of two natures in one person. But indistinct as may have been the opinions of Nestorius, those who were called after his name, soon became one of the most active and proselyting of all the sects which have divided Christendom. Nestorianism spread rapidly throughout central Asia; it took deep root in Arabia, Syria, Assyria, Persia, India, Tartary, and found its way to China itself; and it is to this hour the prevailing creed of large bodies of the oriental Christian communities. It is not likely that either the Nestorian missionaries, or their converts, understood very accurately the distinctive tenets which separated them from other sects. The former preached, and the latter received, Christianity in the form in which it happened to be presented to them, without much knowledge either of the sacred text or of the specialities of other churches. At the present moment it is not the peculiarities of the creed of Nestorius with which we have so much to contend, as with the prevailing ignorance, superstition, and abject debasement of heart, thought, and life, of those who are called after his name. Indeed his name alone is no impediment, for they deny that they are called after him. When Dwight and

Smith visited them, the bishop of Jamalava "constantly affirmed that their name is not derived from Nestorius but from Nazareth." These travellers add that the people always call themselves, and are known among their neighbours of other sects, by the name of Nusrany, which is the very word commonly used in Arabic to designate all Christians, and is generally regarded as equivalent to Nazarene." Their countrymen of the monophysite sect they call Yakoby (jacobite Christians); and themselves they sometimes call Syrian Christians. Dr. Grant also states as follows: "Nestorian is a name disliked by the people thus designated. They rarely apply it to themselves, and they are averse to its application by others, lest, as it seems, they should be thought to participate in the reputed heresy of Nestorius, a bishop of Constantinople, who was excommunicated from the general church A.D. 431. But the reason which they assign for objecting to the use of this name is, that they

never derived either their doctrines or their rites from Nestorius. They reverenced him for raising his voice against the worship of images, and against the prevalent use of the title Mother of God; which, as they affirm, virtually takes away the humanity of our Saviour, and thus leaves us without a Mediator. But having themselves never applied any other title than Mother of Christ to the Virgin Mary, and their worship having never been polluted with images; while, at the same time, they have ever held to the human and Divine nature in one person in Christ, they ask, where is the propriety of calling their ancient church after a bishop who lived in a comparatively late day, and with whom they never had any connection? It is true, they espoused his cause as the cause of an injured man, whom they regarded as a faithful servant of the Lord Jesus, persecuted for righteousness' sake; and on this account the enemies of Nestorins endeavoured to fasten reproach upon them by calling them after his

name."

Notwithstanding these statements, there can be no reasonable doubt, we think, that they were originally called Nestorians

after Nestorius; but their disclaimer happily shews that the name of that individual opposes no bar to their embracing scriptural truth in its simplicity. They have nothing to stickle for as respects the creed of their alleged founder.

The Nestorians of Persia, among whom the American mission is located, reside chiefly upon the plains of Oormiah. They belong to the same branch of the Nestorian church as the mountaineers of Kurdistan. The seat of their patriarch, Mar Shimon (Simeon), is at Joolamerk, in the mountains of Kurdistan, a few days' journey to the west of Oormiah. They are bowed down by oppression, and would gladly hail the kindly intercourse of their fellow Christians from other lands. To the American missionaries they express the highest gratitude; and Dr. Grant, whose medical skill has been of very great service to them, is regarded by them with extraordinary reverence and affection. They feel deeply their degradation since the days when Nestorian patriarchs resided in Ctesiphon and Selucia; whose supremacy was acknowleged by twenty-five metropolitans. They have patiently borne the persecutions of heathens, of Mohamedans, and resisted, unflinchingly and with very little defection, the proselytism of the Papal See. Of their worship, rites, and manners, many interesting particulars are detailed by Dr. Grant, from whose statements we extract the following:

"We arrived at Tabreez, one of the chief commercial cities of Persia, on the 15th of October, 1835, and met with a cordial reception from the few English residents in the place, and from our respected associates, the Rev. Justin Perkins and lady, who had precellency the Right Honourable Henry ceded us to this place. From his ExEllis, the British ambassador and en

voy extraordinary at the court of Persia, with whom we had already formed a pleasant acquaintance at Trebizonde, we received the kindest offers of aid and protection; and I seize this occasion to acknowledge the same kind and unremitted favours from his successors and other English gentlemen with whom we have met in the East.

"After resting a few days at Tabreez, I proceeded to Ooroomiah, to make arrangements for the commencement of our contemplated station among the Nestorians in that province. My professional character secured the favour of the governor and of the people generally. Comfortable houses were soon provided, and on the 20th of November my associate arrived with our ladies. We entered upon our labours under the most encouraging auspices, and they have gone on prosperously up to the present time.

"The sick, the lame, and the blind gathered around by scores and hundreds, and my fame was soon spread abroad through the surrounding country. We were regarded as public benefactors, and our arrival was hailed with general joy. The Nestorians, in particular, welcomed us with the greatest kindness and affection. Their bishops and priests took their seats at our table, bowed with us at our family altar, drank in instruction with child-like docility, and gave us their undivided influence and co-operation in the prosecution of our labours among their people. They regarded us, as coadjutors with them in a necessary work of instruction and improvement, and not as their rivals or successors. We had come, not to pull down, but to build up to promote knowledge and piety, and not to war against their external forms and rites.

"We found much in their character to raise our hopes. They have the greatest reverence for the Scriptures, and were desirous to have them diffused among the people in a language which all could understand In their feelings towards other sects they are charitable and liberal; in their forms, more simple and scriptural than the Papal and the other Oriental churches. They abhor image-worship, auricular confession, and the doctrine of purgatory; and hence they have broad common ground with Protestant Christians; so that, not inappropriately, they have been called the Protestants of Ásia.

"But they had, as a people, sunk into the darkness of ignorance and superstition: none but their clergy could read or write; the education of their females was entirely neglected; and

they attached great importance to their numerous fasts and feasts, to the neglect of purity of heart and life. Still there are some who now appear to lead exemplary lives, and to sigh over the degradation of their people. Indeed, we cannot but hope that something of vital piety may have continued to burn upon their altars from the earliest ages of the Church, and we trust it will again shine forth in a resplendent flame.

"In such a state of things, it is not surprising that we have been permitted to prosecute our labours without a breath of opposition from the ecclesiastics or the people.

"Twelve or fourteen free-schools have been opened in the villages of the plain; a seminary and girl's boardingschool have been established on the Mission premises in the city; considerable portions of the Scriptures have been translated into the vernacular language of the Nestorians. They have opened their churches for our Sabbathschools and the preaching of the Gospel; native helpers are being raised up and qualified for usefulness; our mission has been reinforced by accessions from America; and a press, with suitable type, has been sent out.

"The Rev. A. L. Holladay and Mr. William R. Stocking arrived with their wives, June 6th, 1837; Rev. Willard Jones and wife, November 7, 1839; Rev. A. H. Wright, M.D., July 25, 1840; and Mr. Edward Breath, a printer, has embarked with a press of such a construction as to admit of its transportation on horses from the shores of the Black Sea to Ooroomiah.

"The province of Ooroomiah, in which the labours of the mission have thus far been prosecuted, comprises an important part of Ancient Media, and is situated in the north-western part of the modern kingdom of Persia. It is separated by a lofty chain of snowy mountains from Ancient Assyria or Central Koordistan on the west; while on the east the beautiful lake extends about eighty miles in length, and thirty in width. The water of this lake is so salt that fish cannot live in it: its shores are enlivened by numer. ous water-fowl, of which the beautiful flamingo is most conspicuous, and sometimes lines the shore for miles in extent.

"A plain of exuberant fertility is enclosed between the mountains and the lake, comprising an area of about five hundred square miles, and bearing upon its bosom no less than three hundred hamlets and villages. It is clothed with luxuriant verdure, fruitful fields,

an enlightening influence, before they should become alarmed by changes that were occurring among their brethren of the plain. But the way of access to them appeared to be hedged round by the sanguinary Koords, by whom they are surrounded, and who had treacherously murdered Mr. Shultz, the only European who had attempted to reach the Nestorian tribes."

gardens, and vineyards, and irrigated by considerable streams of pure water from the adjacent mountains. The landscape is one of the most lovely in the East; and the effect is not a little heightened by the contrast of such surprising fertility with the stern aspect of the surrounding heights, on which not a solitary tree is to be seen; while in the plain, the willows, poplars, and sycamores by the water-courses, the peach, apricot, pear, plum, cherry, quince, apple, and vine, impart to large sections the appearance of a rich variegated forest.

"Near the centre of this plain stands the ancient city of Ooroomiah, containing a population of about twenty thousand souls, mostly Mohammedans, and enclosed by a fosse and wall of nearly four miles in circuit. At a little distance on the east of the city an ancient artificial mound rises to the height of seventy or eighty feet, and marks the site, as it is said, of the ancient shrine or temple, where in days of yore the renowned Zoroaster kindled his sacred fires, and bowed in adoration to the heavenly hosts.

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The climate is naturally very delightful; but owing to local causes a poisonous miasma is generated, occasioning fevers and the various diseases of malaria, to which the unacclimated stranger is specially exposed; and the mission families have suffered much from this cause. My late inestimable wife was the first victim of the climate we were called to mourn; and in her peaceful and triumphant death, she set the seal to the truths she had so faithfully taught and exemplified in her short but eventful life. She rested from her labours on the 12th of Jan. 1839; and her infant twin-daughters now repose by her side within the precints of the ancient Nestorian church in the city of Ooroomiah.

"In the month of February of that year I received instructions from the Board of Missions to proceed into Mesopotamia, to form a station among the Nestorians dwelling, as was supposed, on the west of the central mountains of Koordistan. By this means it was hoped that a safe way of access might be found to the main body of the Nestorian Christians, the indepenIdent tribes which have their abode in the most difficult fastnesses of the Koordish mountains in the centre of Ancient Assyria. I had long regarded these mountain-tribes as the principal field of our future labours. They comprised the main body of the Nestorian church, and it was of the highest importance to bring them at once under

The

After many difficulties, Dr. Grant made his way to these Nestorian mountaineers by going back to Constantinople. following are extracts from his journal; but they apply also (excepting peculiarities of usage) to the Nestorians of Oormiah.

"October 20, 1839.-Sabbath. A thin piece of board was struck rapidly with a mallet, to call the villagers to church at the rising of the sun. Each person, on entering the church, put off his shoes, and testified his reverence for the sanctuary of God by kissing the door-posts or threshold, and passed on to kiss the Gospels lying upon the altar, then the cross, and finally the hand of his religious teacher.

"The church, like all I saw in the mountains, was a very solid stone edifice, with arched roof, and might stand for ages. Others that I saw had stood for more than fourteen centuries, according to their ancient records. For the narrow door (which would not admit a man without much stooping) the usual explanation was given, Strait is the gate,' &c., a truth of which they wished to be reminded when entering the sanctuary.* The prayers and the singing or chanting of the psalms were all in the ancient Syriac language, and quite unintelligible to the common people; but one of the priests read a portion of the Gospels, and gave the translation into the vulgar Syriac spoken by the Nestorians; and this constituted the preaching. Sometimes the reading is accompanied by some explanations or legendary stories, of which they have many.

"It was a sacramental occasion; and the bread and wine were consecrated in the sanctuary or holy place' of the church, and then brought out by a

The solution that the entrance to their churches is made narrow for a symbolical reason, is not, we fear, the true one; but rather in order that the insulting Mohammedans may not ride into their temples on horse-back to profane them.

priest and a deacon, while each mem.ber of the church went forward in rotation, and partook of a small piece of the bread from the hand of the priest, who held a napkin to prevent any particles from falling, as he put the morsel into the mouth of the communicant; and then he drank off the wine, which was held with great care by the deacon, so that not a drop should be spilled. But there was none of that idolatrous adoration of the host, so characteristic of the mass of the Romanists and of the other Oriental churches. On the contrary, there was almost a scriptural simplicity in the observance of this solemn ordinance.

"The priest who had officiated in the prayers and instruction of the congregation, first partook of the sacred elements, and then invited me to partake. Hitherto I had never partaken of this ordinance with the Nestorians; but to have declined under present circumstances, would have done as much injustice to my own feelings as to theirs.

"There was a great stillness and propriety of deportment in the congregation, and all retired without noise or confusion. In passing out, each person received at the door a very thin leaf of bread, rolled together, and enclosing a morsel of meat. This was the 'love feast' of the early Christians of the first and second centuries.

"Several of the people then went to the house of the church steward, and partook of a more substantial but plain repast, retiring soon after to their houses, or calling upon their more immediate friends. The day was observed with far more propriety than I have seen among other Christians of the East. There was a general stillness throughout the village, such as I have noticed in few places in more highly-favoured lands. There was no noisy merriment, no attention to secular business; and the social intercourse of the people was nothing more than what was practised in the ancieut Hebrew Church. Formerly they are said to have regarded the Christian Sabbath with so much sacredness as to put to death persons for travelling on that holy day.

"In the evening many of the people again assembled for worship at the church, and morning and evening prayers are offered there through the whole week. But, unlike what I have seen anywhere else in the East, many of the people say their prayers in their own dwellings, instead of going to the church during the week; and a small

wooden cross may be seen hanging from a post for them to kiss before prayers; a practice which they regard as a simple expression of love to Christ, and faith in his death and atonement. The cross, however, is not considered in any sense as an object of religious worship.

"Oct. 21.-At dawn of day the people came in great numbers for medical aid, and I soon became so thronged by them that I was obliged to stop my prescriptions till they should retire to a distance, allowing no more than three or four to come forward at once. Many of the applicants came from other villages.

"At Asheetha I became the guest of priest Auraham (Abraham), who is reputed the most learned Nestorian now living. He has spent twenty years of his life in writing and reading books, and has thus done much to supply the waste of, if not to replenish, the Nestorian literature. But even he had not an entire Bible; and though the Nestorians have preserved the Scriptures in manuscript with great care and purity, so scarce are the copies, that I have not found but a single Nestorian, and that one the patriarch, their spiritual head, who possessed an entire Bible; and even that was in half a dozen different volumes. Thus divided, one man has the Gospels, another the Epistles, the Psalms, the Pentateuch, or the Prophets. Portions of the Scriptures are also contained in their church liturgy or ritual. The book of Revelation, and two or three of the shorter epistles, they did not possess till furnished with them by our mission; and these portions of the Bible appear not to have reached them when their canon was made up. But they readily received them upon the testimony of other Christian nations, and the internal evidence of their authenticity.

"The Nestorians attach the greatest value to the Scriptures, and are desirous to have them multiplied among their people in a language which all understand; and when I told priest Auraham of the power of the press to multiply books, his keen, expressive eye was lighted up with a new brilliancy, and he manifested a strong desire to see it in operation here.

"Seeing me take the catalogue of his small library, he begged me to write down his application for the Scriptures he had requested; and others, following his example, said, Write down my name: Write my name, that I may have the Gospels too;' referring to the four Gospels in