upon our guard against future acts of folly and rebellion. A shield will be given us against impending danger; a motive to increased precaution and vigilance. Beacon lights will gleam out from the past, to guide our present course, and warn us of the old and sunken perils. In times of excitement, of delusion, of trial, when the enemies of our virtue and constancy are out upon us with their forces, and we waver in the conflict, happy will it be for us then, if the memory of former guilt rise up and interpose itself between us and them, point to the melancholy consequences of defeat, and stimulate us to the victory. Good reason we shall have to render thanks to God, and ascribe to him the power and the praise, crying, 'Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to thy name give the glory.' pp. 308-311.

We have endeavored in a hasty survey, to give some idea of the general contents and character of this volume; esteeming the best recommendation of a good book to be its introduction to the knowledge of those whom we desire to read it, rather than a mere description. Here then we leave it. May it give the pleasure which it ought, and do the good for which it is designed.

H. W., JR.

NOTICES OF BOOKS.

A Residence of Eight Years in Persia, among the Nestorian Christians; with notices of Muhammedans: by Rev. JUSTIN PERKINS; with a Map and 27 Plates. Andover: Allen, Morrill & Wardwell. 1843. 8vo. pp. 512.

Or this large and imposing volume, of more than five hundred pages, we cannot pretend, within any limits now at our command to give a full and sitisfactory account. We have not been

able to read it with such attention, as to feel competent to decide very confidently either upon the merits of the book, or upon the manner in which the author and his fellow laborers discharged their duties as Christian missionaries, and fulfilled the just expectations of those who commissioned them. Nevertheless we have read it with sufficient attention to perceive, that the work contains a large amount of valuable information about a country, with which we are little familiar, about manners and modes of life always interesting from their relation to those of the ancient inhabitants of Asia, and concerning the Nestorian Christians, a small remnant of those who, in the 5th century, followed into banishment the excommunicated bishop of Constantinople. It would give us pleasure to watch the course of action adopted by the missionaries to note their methods and state their results, and this we may do at another time. At present the pleasure of the reader will be better consulted, and his profit also, by gleaning from these ample pages a little of the information which the author of the work has been eight years in accumulating.

The seat or field of the mission lay in the northwest part of modern Persia, between the Black and the southern end of the Caspian seas, but much nearer the latter. The station was first for a short time at Tabreez, but permanently afterwards at Oróomiah, a city on the shore of a lake of the same name. Of the situation, aspect of the country, population, &c., let the author speak.

"The district of Oróomiah consists of a magnificent plain, situated at the eastern base of the Koordish mountains, and extending from them to the beautiful lake of the same name. The lake of Oróomiah is about eighty miles in length and thirty in breadth, lying in direction a little to the west of north and east of south. Its waters are very salt, perhaps as much so as the waters of the Dead Sea. No fish are found in

it; but fowl, particularly the duck and flamingo, frequent it in great numbers. The plain of Oróomiah is about forty miles in length, lying upon the central section of the lake, and in its broadest part, is about twenty miles wide. Imposing branches of the Koordish mountains sweep down quite to the waters of the lake, at the extremities of the plain, enclosing it like a vast amphitheatre. This great plain, with the adjacent declivities of the mountains, comprising an area of about six hundred square miles, contains at least three hundred and thirty villages. It is amply watered by three considerable rivers, (i. e. considerable, for Persia, each being from one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet wide,) besides many smaller streams. Its soil is extremely fertile, and is all under high cultivation. Its staple productions are wheat, rice, cotton, tobacco, and the vine. It also abounds in a great variety of fruits. Besides its ten or twelve species of the grape, it yields cherries, apricots, apples, pears, quinces, peaches, plums, melons, nuts, etc. in most ample abundance. And such is the number of orchards and trees, planted along the water courses,' on all parts of the plain, as to give much of it the appearance of American forests.

"About twelve miles back from the lake and about two miles from the mountains, is the city of Oróomiah. It is the ancient Thebarma, the birth-place, as tradition says, of Zoroäster, the founder of the ancient sect of fire-worshippers; a tradition which is rendered, perhaps, the more credible, from the fact, that there are, on different parts of the plain, several artificial mounds, each covering an area of an acre or more, and rising to a height of fifty or seventy feet, which seem to be vast piles of ashes, that accumulated during the lapse of centuries, under the perpetual fires,' before which they paid their adoration. This is the explanation which the native inhabitants give of these monuments; and I see no particular reason to question its accuracy. The city contains about twenty-five thousand inhabitants. It is nearly four miles in circumference. Like other cities of Persia, it is surrounded by a mud-wall and a ditch; and most of its houses are built of unburnt brick. Its markets are good, for this country; its streets are wider than are common, in Eastern cities; and it has a very agreeable air of comfort, from the great number of shade-trees, interspersed among the houses.

"From elevations back of the city, the beholder, as he looks down upon the gardens directly below him, and then, upon the city, half buried in shrubbery, —and next, over the vast plain, studded with its hundreds of villages, verdant with thousands of orchards and hedges of poplars, willows, and sycamores, upon the streams, and gleaming with almost illimitable fields, waving a golden harvest, - and farther still, upon the azure bosom of the placid lake, beaming and sparkling like an immense mirror, under the brilliancy of the pure Persian sky, and finally, upon the blue mountains, far in the distance beyond the lake, -one of the loveliest and grandest specimens of natural scenery is spread out before him, that was ever presented to the eye of man. ***** Not more than six hundred Nestorians reside in the city of Oróomiah. They are principally in a compact position, adjacent to which the premises of our mission are situated. There are about two thousand Jews in the city, and the remaining part of the population are Muhammedans." ""***

"To the Christian scholar, the language and literature of the Nestorian Christians are objects of much interest. Their ancient language is the Syriac, by some supposed to have been the common language in Palestine in the days of Christ, and the same in which the Saviour himself conversed and preached, and probably not differing much from it. This language is still the literary language of the Nestorians. Their Books are nearly all written in it. They conduct their epistolary correspondence in it; and though a dead language, the best educated of their clergy become able to converse in it with fluency. * * The vernacular language of the Nestorians is a modern dialect of the ancient Syriac, much barbarized by inversions, contractions, and abbreviations, and by the introduction of a great number of Persian, Koordish, and Turkish words, each class prevailing respectively, in a particular district, in proportion as it is situated near to the people using either of those languages. Though thus corrupted, however, as now spoken by the Nestorians, the body of the language comes directly from the venerable ancient Syriac, as clearly as the modern Greek comes from the ancient. It is a softer language than the ancient Syriac, its guttural words being fewer, and its nouns even more extensively ending in open vowel sounds. The accent is almost invariably upon the penult syllable.” * *

"The few books which the Nestorians possess, however, are objects of deep interest. Among them are found the whole of the Holy Scriptures, with the following exceptions, viz., the epistle of Jude, the second and third epistles of John, the second of Peter, and the Revelation; also, the account of the woman taken in adultery in John viii, and the much discussed passage in 1 John v. 7, none of which are found in any of their Ms. copies, or seem to have been known to them until introduced by us, in the printed editions of the British and Foreign Bible Society; i. e. the Peschito is the only version of the New Testament with which they seem ever to have been acquainted. They make no objection to these portions of the Scriptures, as introduced by us, but readily recognise and acknowledge them as canonical. Their Scriptures are not found in one volume, but are usually in six, the division being as follows, viz., 1. The Pentateuch, copies of which are not so rare as some other portions. 2. The remaining books of the Old Testament as far as the Psalms, with the exception of the two books of Chronicles, copies, few. 3. The two books of Chronicles, copies of which are very rare. 4. The Psalms, copies comparatively numerous. 5. The Prophets, copies rare. 6. The New Testament, copies more numerous than of any other portions except the Psalms. In the second book, in this list, occurs the apochryphal work, Ecclesiasticus, or the Wisdom of Sirach, and most of the other books of the apochrypha, as known to Europeans, are mentioned as existing in the mountains. The Nestorians have also, in a separate volume, a work purporting to be the Revelation of Paul, which is said to consist of communications of the 'unutterable words, which,' he tells us, it is not lawful for man to utter,' that he heard, when he was caught up to the third heavens.'' - pp. 7-14.

Mr. Perkins speaks of manuscripts of the Bible, whose claims to great antiquity one would desire to see learnedly investigated.

"Among the books of the Nestorians are some very ancient manuscripts. There are copies of the New Testament, for instance, written, some on parchment and some on paper, which date back about six hundred years. Some of these are written in the Estrangelo, and some in the common Nestorian character. The very ancient copies of the Scriptures are regarded by the Nestorians with much veneration, and are used with great care. They are kept wrapped in successive envelopes, and when taken into the hands, are reverently kissed, as very hallowed treasures. In the village of Kówsee, is a copy of the New Testament, which purports to be fifteen hundred years old. A few of the first parchment leaves are gone, and their place is supplied by paper, on which that early date is recorded, with how much authority is uncertain. The rubrics, in most ancient copies, moreover, betray a later origin than tradition or their dates would claim for them. I tried to borrow the revered copy here mentioned, to bring with me to America, as an object of interest; but the Muhammedan master of the village interposed, and forbade its being taken away, apprehending that some dire calamity would befal the inhabitants, should so sacred a deposit be removed from among them. And such is the reputation of its antiquity and sanctity, that Muhammedans, as well as Nestorians, are sometimes sworn upon that New Testament.” — p. 16.

There are nine ecclesiastical orders among the Nestorians. Celibacy is required of all the Episcopal orders, and abstinence from animal food. The bishops are supported by a small tax, but are poor, and live in the simplest manner. "The religious belief and practices of the Nestorians are much more simple and scriptural than those of other oriental Christians. They have the deepest abhorrence of all image worship, auricular confession, the doctrine of purgatory, and many other corrupt dogmas and practices of the Papal, Greek, and Armenian churches; while they cherish the highest reverence for the Holy Scriptures, and, in theory at least, exalt them far above all human traditions. Their doctrinal tenets, so far as I have learned them, are, in general, quite clearly expressed and correct. On the momentous subject of the divinity of Christ, in relation to which the charge of heresy is so violently thrown upon them by the Papal and other oriental sects, their belief is orthodox and scriptural." They are described also as charitable towards other sects of Christians.

These facts are drawn from a general introduction to the work, in which is condensed much general information. Our remaining extracts shall be from the body of the work, after the missionaries were established in their quarters. To read the following paragraphs should bring a blush of shame upon the face of New England distillers and traders. They are in answer to inquiries propounded in letters from America.

"To the several points on which you request information, I will