to be paid to our author's remarks upon forbidden food, as if this were confined to the Nestorian Christians; whose abstinence from swine's flesh no more proves them to be of Hebrew than of Mohammedau descent. So again when Dr. Grant says that they observe the passover as their principal festival, and "call it Pascha, after the original name of that ordinance as observed by the Jews," only that "the mode of observance is modified by their faith in Christ;" for "regarding him as the final passover, they substitute the emblems of his body and blood for the Paschal Lamb," he only describes what the universal Church of Christ has done in every age till some ultra reformers abolished many good customs because they had been identified with, or abused by, popery, though they were neither Papal nor Nestorian, but œcumenical or Catholic. Is Dr. Grant unaware that all episcopal churches, as much as the Nestorians, observe Easter Day, in memory of Christ our passover; for, as our Church says, "he is the very Paschal Lamb." To adduce the use of the word " Pascha," and the celebration of the Lord's Supper on that day, as any portion of proof that the Nestorians are the lost tribes, exhibits such ignorance of church matters, that it leads us to depend less upon the writer's judgment in regard to other alleged coincidences. It is clear, from the remark made by Mr. Stocking, as above quoted by Dr. Grant, that their Nestorian friends, being segregated from the great mass of Christendom, ill-read in ecclesiastical story, and regarding the American missionaries as the representatives of occidental reformed Christianity, are often puzzled to give a reason for some of their observ. ances retained from early days and therefore account for everything which their American friends regard as peculiar, but which Episcopalians might not so regard, by turning to something analogous in the Old Testament, and saying that their observance has reference to their Israelitish extraction. One of their priests remarked to Mr. Stocking, "We were formerly Jews, and hold to our fasts; but you are Gentile Christians, and do not wish to adopt our customs." And this Dr. Grant treats as argument! The priest might more correctly have said, "We retain the fasts and feasts of the primitive church, as, for the most part, all the Eastern and Western episcopal churches do, including those of the Reformation; but you have rejected them." Again, Dr. Grant specifies the offering of first-fruits as another proof of Jewish extraction; but did not Christians of other churches bring "bread, milk, wine, and honey," as offerings to the Lord's table? He further mentions the fencing off of a portion of the church, as a sanctuary or holy of holies, as a proof that the Nestorians are the lost Tribes. But does he not know that both the Eastern and the Western communions, in all their divisions, did the same? Did he never hear of the Bnua, or "suggestum," or sanctum, or sacrarium, or Ovolaorηpior, or iɛparetov, or as we should say, the chancel, as distinguished from the nave? And so also with regard to the proof that the Nestorians are of Hebrew lineage, that the women may not enter the church till forty days after child-birth, is he not aware that a similar observance prevailed early throughout the church? The Church of England prescribes no express time for a woman coming to return thanks; it only says “at the usual time;" but in the Oriental liturgies the time is forty days; and in the Greek church the service is called "The prayers for a woman forty days after child-bearing." Yet the members of the Greek church are not therefore the lost tribes. Yet, lest our American friends should accuse us of Jewish ceremonialism, we add the remark of Wheatley, that "When our own liturgy came to be reviewed, to prevent all misconceptions which might be put upon the word Purification, the title was altered, and the office named, The thanksgiving of women after child-birth,' commonly called, The Churching of Women." Comber also says: "There is great difference between the Jewish purification of women under Moses's law, and the Christian giving thanks for them; and though that gave the first intimation to this, and Christian women thought themselves bound, by way of analogy, to do some solemn acts of religion, since their deliverance is as great as the Jewish women's was, yet this is not a Mosaical ceremony, but a piece of Gospel worship as we observe it." We have noticed these matters, both because they shew that much must be subtracted from our author's coincidences-seeing that he regards various things as indicating that the Nestorians are of Jewish descent, which are not peculiar to the Nestorian Christians; and also because they illustrate our observation respecting the inconvenience of missions to the oriental churches being in the hands of those ultra-Protestants, who have discarded more than Scripture required or authorized; including, in the former word, various seemly and edifying rites, and in the latter episcopacy itself. It is rather hard upon the Nestorian bishops and priests, that in their ignorance of the doctrines of the Reformation as embraced by epis copalians, they should be forced to defend many things which are truly catholic, as if they were peculiarities of their own arising from their alleged Israelitish extraction. The result, as we before said, must be, when they become thoroughly in earnest in their religious inquiries, they will be in danger, either of reducing their church to the baldness of modern dissent, or of rejecting necessary reformation in order to avoid it. We heartly wish they had the Anglican prayer-book, that they might find a way of escape from both these evils. Dr. Grant next appeals to their physiognomy, names, tribes, and other proofs. We will again give an outline of his arguments in his own words. "The physiognomy of the Nestorian Christians bears a close resemblance to that of the Jews of the country in which they dwell. Even the natives, who are accustomed to discriminate by the features between the various classes of people, are often unable to and I have taxed my own powers of distinguish a Nestorian from a Jew; discrimination with no better success." "Their names are as strikingly Israelitish as their physiognomy. I have seen promiscuous circles of ten or twelve Nestorians, in which every individual had a Jewish name. From forty-five members of our seminary who were taken promiscuously, thirtytwo had Jewish names found in the Bible. Others had received names of significant import, in accordance with the custom of the Jews, and such as are common among those of Ooroomiah." "Most of the Nestorian Christians, like the ancient Israelites, live in separate tribes. We do not deem it essential to our main position, and shall not attempt, to identify each one of the tribes separately. But, in the midst of this general ignorance on the subject, the family of the patriarch, who of all others are the most likely to have preserved correct information regarding their genealogy, assure us particular tribe from which they are most confidently that they know the descended; and they make the assertion with so much apparent integrity of purpose, and with such attendant circumstances, as leave us no to doubt their sincerity. They claim room descent from Naphtali; a claim that certainly savours little of vanity." "Their form of government partakes much of the theocracy of the ancient Jewish code, when the high-priest was at the head of all religious affairs, and was the ordinary judge of all difficulties that belonged thereto, and even of the general justice and judgment of the Jewish nation.' This is just the relation sustained by the Nestorian patriarch to the independent tribes." "The avenger of blood among the independent Nestorians is the minister of justice for capital crimes, as was the case among the Hebrews." "Cities of refuge were appointed by the Hebrew legislator to prevent abuses in the summary manner of punishing the guilty. These cities were the property of the priests and Levites, and were required to be numerous and accessible. Among the Nestorians, the churches in most respects correspond to this description; and they are the constituted cities of refuge, where the man-slayer may flee for security, and safely remain till the elders shall decide on his case." "If the Nestorians were idolaters, would not this militate against our position that they are the children of Israel? How remarkable, then, that they alone, of all the churches of the East, are entirely free from the least appearance of idol-worship. While all of these churches are filled with pictures, they have none. They bow their knees before no likeness of anything in heaven above, or in the earth beneath; and, while the other Christians pay their homage to the consecrated host which is daily held up for their adoration, the Nestorians observe almost a scriptural simplicity in their sacramental rites." These circumstances, taken in connexion with all the preceding facts, certainly furnish very remarkable evidence in proof of the Israelitish origin of the Nestorians; but we must still demur as to the conclusion, more especially as Dr. Grant continues, (as in the instance of making churches places of refuge) to attribute to Israelitish descent what would equally prove all the old Churches of Christendom to be the lost tribes. body at the era of Pentecost, they may have been converted to Christ. They had not the same prejudices as the Jews; they did not crucify the Lord of life and glory; they had the Old Testament in their hands, and the proofs were clear that Jesus of Nazareth was he of whom Moses and the prophets did speak. We know also that some of the Apostles penetrated far into the East; and they and the primitive disciples made it their first business to preach the Gospel "to the lost tribes of Israel." Parthians and Medes" (and Parthia comprehended that portion of Assyria to which the present dis. cussion applies) are mentioned among those who heard the Gospel on the day of Pentecost. St. Paul speaks of the twelve tribes serving God, and looking for the promise of the resurrection; the epistle of St. James is addressed to the twelve tribes; and there is nothing incredible in the supposition, that the ancestors of the present Nestorians on the borders of Persia were among them. Their not being speci fically mentioned in the New Testament, or by early writers, though a difficulty, is not insuperable, as their remoteness and seclusion might possibly account for the circumstance. At the same time it remains to be considered, whether so extensive a conversion of Hebrews in that early age is compatible with what is stated in the New Testament of the blindness which still hung over Israel. Dr. Grant concludes his volume with several chapters upon the predicted conversion and future prospects of Israel. For these particulars we refer to his pages; our chief object having We see nothing improbable in been to exhibit the proofs by the supposition, that if the ten which he urges the identity of tribes. were really existing as a the Persian Nestorians with the ten tribes; and still more to of making zealous efforts to proadvocate the cause of the Eastern mote their revival. desolated churches, and the duty PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS. Personal Recollections. By CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH. 1841. CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH (for so we must call her, since she gives herself no other appellation, not mentioning either her maiden name, or her first marriage name of Phelan, or her present name which we will not attempt to write lest we should mispel it,) has published a book-not exactly all about herself, but about herself as a peg for her notes on a great number of subjects and persons, with her opinions, and hopes, and fears, and joys, and some of her sorrows, in the lively graphic style which has popularised her pen. We will not enter into a discussion upon the good and evil of auto-biography, and the circumstances under which it becomes an individual not only to write but to publish his own life; but will merely quote Charlotte Elizabeth's statement of her reasons for adopting this step, leaving each reader to approve or disapprove of them according to his own taste and judgment. "I have given my best consideration to the arguments by which you support the demand for a few notices of events connected with my personal recollections of the past. That which bas chiefly influenced me is the consideration, urged on what I know to be just and reasonable grounds- that when it has pleased God to bring any one before the public in the capacity of an author, that person becomes in some sense public, property; having abandoned the privacy from which no one ought to be forced, but which any body may relinquish; and courted the observation of the world at large. Such individuals are talked of during life, and after death become the subject, I may say the prey, of that spirit which reigned in Athens of old, and from which no child of Adam is wholly free-the desire to hear and to tell some new thing. No sooner has the person withdrawn from this mortal stage, than the pen of biography is prepared to record, and a host of receive, some fragments at least of curious expectants are marshalled to private history. I wish I could dissent from your remark, that even godliness itself is too often sought to be made a gain of in such cases. Writers who are themselves wholly unenlightened by spiritual knowledge, and uninfluenced by spiritual feeling, will take up as a good speculation, what must to them be a memorial while they injure the cause mystery, and wrong the subject of their in which he laboured. Even among those of better understanding in the ways of truth, we do not often meet sound judgment, calm discretion, and refined delicacy, combined with affection for the departed, and zeal for the gospel. Private journals are sought out, confidential letters raked together, and a most unseemly exposure made, alike of the dead and the living. "This I have always seen and lamented; and being aware that my turn would probably come to be thus exhibited, I have abstained from preserving even the slightest memoranda of events, thoughts, or feelings, that could be laid hold on as a private journal and I have most distinctly intimated to all those friends who possess any letters of mine, that I shall regard it as a gross breach of confidence, a dishonourable, base, and mercenary proceeding on their part, if ever they permit a sentence addressed by me to them to pass into other hands. Indeed, to such an extent have I felt this, that for many years past I have kept some friends under a solemn pledge that, immediately after my death, they will proclaim my having so guarded my correspondence, in order, if possible, to shame the individuals from a course with regard to me which I have never been inveigled into with regard to others. Looking on epistolary communications as a trust not to be betrayed, I have invariably refused to -deliver to the biographers of my departed friends any letters of theirs that I might possess:-the first application for them has always been the signal for committing the whole budget to the flames. "This you know; and you say that the very precautions I have used will leave my memory more completely at the mercy of ill-judging or ill-informed survivors, who, in the absence of more authentic information, may draw on their own invention, and do me injustice. This is the plea that has prevailed with me now: the uncertainty of mortal life, with the apprehension that if suddenly removed I shall become the heroine of some strange romance, founded probably on the facts of a life by no means deficient in remarkable incidents, but mixed up with a great deal of fiction; and the consciousness that others may be thereby wounded, whom I would not wish to wound-have decided me to act upon your suggestion, and to draw out a little sketch of such matters as can alone concern the public in any way. Into private domestic history no person possessed of a particle of delicacy can wish to intrude. It is melancholy to witness the prying spirit that some are but too ready to cater to, for filthy lucre's sake; and grievous to reflect, that the boasted immunity which makes the cottage of the English peasant, no less than the palace of the English noble, a castle,-which so fences his domestic hearth that no man may set foot within his door without his consent, or proclaim an untruth concerning him without being legally compelled to render compensation, should be withdrawn from his grave. I cannot tell you how I have blushed for the living, and kindled with resentment on behalf of the dead, when contemplating the merciless desecration of what may truly be called the sacredness of home, in some biographical notices." As speech, said the Prince of Benevento, is given to man to conceal his thoughts, so Charlotte Elizabeth has published a memoir to prevent a memoir being published. We however respect the motive which induces her to anticipate what she considers may be proper to be said of herself, in order to prevent less scrupulous persons transgressing that boundary by alluding to others; for the name of this lady memorials are not blended with is not so little known, that other her narrative in the minds of her friends. If her book is egotistical; that is precisely what she tells us on the title-page she meant it to be; for if Hamlet writes his own life, he must not leave out his chief sayings or doings, by particular desire. We should not have urged her to publish her own memoirs, as did the friend to whom she addresses them; for such a proceeding was fraught with peril in many ways; it may savour of self-love; or minister to vanity; or even where most honest, call forth invidious remark; but the deed being done, we are bound, from the excellent character of the writer, to believe that it was done in Christian simplicity, and with the hope that with the blessing of God her recollections of herself may minister benefit to others. She tells us she was gay, giddy, frolicksome, and romantic; strict indeed in morals and reverencing religion, but in and of the world; but that it pleased God of his infinite mercy to bring her to himself, chiefly through the reading of his most blessed word under the guidance of his Holy Spirit, and that to this she is indebted for the will and the effort to glorify him, and to benefit the her life, which had otherwise souls of her fellow-creatures, with been spent in worldly-mindedness, and with her pen, which might have been devoted frivolity and ungodliness. She delivers her opinions upon Romanism; the condition of Ireland, political and religious; unfulfilled prophecy, especially in regard to the Jews, the millennium, and the personal reign of Christ upon earth; and on various other subjects, with no little fervour; and evidently with the assured feeling to |