said to have taken away all their books and prohibited the rite of circumcision; whilst Theodosius was more fre able to them.

In the reign of Theodoric they were so numerous at as to be able to contest with that church the right to as ing, which they claimed as one of their ancient synage

In the reign of Zeno they rebelled and elected a kit the name of Julian, but who was defeated by the gener Justinian, and thereupon all their synagogues were des Jished. And it is said that no less than twenty thous of them were slain by the sword, and twenty thousand sold by the Arabs to the infidels of Persia and India.*

By degrees, however, these people sunk into insignificar and perhaps it would be difficult to be sure that one of genuine descendants is now in existence. The famous Ben min of Tudela could find but about one hundred of them : in the twelfth century, who were very poor and wretched, » Sichem ; but who still continued to offer there such sacrit as their poverty would allow.

Baldensel found some of them in the fourteenth century, carefully distinguished themselves from the Jews as wellas Mahometans, and Christians; and who Basnage thinks we genuine descendants of the Samaritans.

Basnage alleges there were in his timet some Samarita still left at Sichem or Naplous,+ situate between mount E

Maundrell visited this place in 1697, and had a very curiou conversation with a Samaritan high priest then residing there, re pecting many questions arising out of the Old Testament.-See his Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, pp. 79. 85.; and for the present state of Naplous see Jolliffe's Letters from Palestine, p. 44. Wilson's Travels, vol. i. 976. and Gray's Key to the Old Testament, pp. 17 and 18. The learned Joseph Scaliger also entered into a corres pondence with these people, from which it appears that at that time

SAMARTS

nount Gerizim, who observed the law of Moses more ly than the Jews; and that they had there the tomb of >h, and his bones which were brought from Egypt;*

A as well as the Jews, were looking for a Messiah, who they d Hasheab, or Hathab.-Bp. Chandler's Vindication of his De, vol. ii. 398. 408. where see many other particulars relating to Samaritans.

Napolose, the ancient Sychar or Sichem, is luxuriantly emboed in the most delightful and fragrant bowers, half concealed by bez gardens, and by stately trees collected into groves all around beautiful valley in which it stands." Clarke's Travels, vol. ii.

"The remark may be interesting to the Christian reader, that ile Capernaum, the capital of Galilee, which was exalted unto aven, or the highest prosperity, when Jesus and his apostles eached there in vain, is brought down to hell, Hades, to death, or tire destruction, being nothing now but shapeless ruins, as Chozin and Bethsaida also are; and while Samaria, the capital of the untry which bore its name, is cast down into the valley; Sychar, en one of its inferior cities, from which the inhabitants came forth meet Jesus, and in which many believed in him as the Saviour hen they heard his word, is ranked by every traveller who describes t, amongst the most striking exceptions to the general desolation, which has otherwise left but a remembrance of the cities of Judah, of Samaria, and Galilee."-Keith from Prophecy, p. 153. Nor was the utter destruction of Samaria without distinct and appropriate prophecies. "I will make Samaria as a heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard: and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley; and I will discover the foundations thereof.”—Micah, i. 6. "Thus saith Jehovah, As the shepherd taketh out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear, so shall the children of Israel be taken out that dwell in Samaria, in the corner of a bed, and in Damascus in a couch ;-and I will smite the winter house, with the summer house, and the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end, saith Jehovah."-Amos, iii. 12-15. And literally have these predictions been fulfilled, even to the very stones being poured into the valley !-Maundrell, p. 78. Buckingham's Travels in Palestine, vol. ii. 391-420. Keith, 155.

* Gen. 1. 25. Exod. xiii. 19. Dr. Edward Clarke, in his Travels

together with some priests of the posterity of Am whom is appointed high priest; and that they offer upon mount Gerizim, according to the Levitical riobserve the passover, and all the other festivals. T author mentions that in the year 1688, the year of oc lution (now for ever tarnished and obscured), they letters to some of their brethren in England, to inform of the death of their high priest, and that the lean Ludolph kept up a regular correspondence with them."

found in the aperture of the great pyramid, was the actual s coffin in which the bones of Joseph were deposited (Ges.) and from whence they were removed by Moses when he con the Israelites out of Egypt. (Exod. xiii. 19.) And it certain y a little singular, that the soros was seen without any body in... the aperture in the same state, by the earliest historians, viz. S the elder Pliny, Herodotus, and others.

Basn. 77-100. Dr. Huntington's Epistles, by Smith, La 1704. These letters which contain a correspondence betwee Dr. Huntington who was some time provost of Trinity College, ♪lin, and afterwards, although for a few days only, Bp. of Ra and the learned Job Ludolph of Frankfort, are very curious and worth a careful perusal; as well with reference to the Samarb as to the state of the Syrian Christians of that period, with wi patriarch Bp. Huntington also corresponded. See also a m account of these people in Prid. i. 489-502, and Buckinghas Travels in Palestine, vol. ii. 440-465.

In page 299 it has been assumed, that the Samaritan character the same as the ancient Hebrew, before the Jews were carried capt into Chaldea. In a journal of a rout from Cairo to mount Sinai, tak by some Franciscans in 1722, and translated by Bp. Clayton, p. it is said, "that on some hills near Gebel Faran, called Gebel a Mohatab, or the written mountains, they discovered several unknow characters, twelve or fourteen feet in height from the ground, deeply engraved in the solid marble rock, but totally unintelligible to a▼ the party." The Editor is not aware that these characters haw ever been transcribed, or even noticed by more modern travellers. although the idea was strongly suggested by the Bishop in his pre

F

at they were likely to prove the original character of the rest: language, and to have been actually engraved by the des during their abode in the wilderness.

rear

wilderness of Paran is frequently mentioned in the Scriptures. ells (vol. i. 272.) says that the wilderness of Paran, is taken to more particularly, that part of Stony Arabia which lies between Sinai and Hazeroth to the west, and mount Seir to the east ; at there is a city in those parts, near the Red Sea, called Phawhich probably gave name to the adjacent wilderness of Paran,

saran.

the Chevalier Lapie's splendid map of the Ottoman empire, ished at Paris in 1828, we find a place laid down as WADI AN, situate between mount Sinai and the Red Sea; and those who acquainted with the Hebrew are aware, how slight the difference between P and Ph in that language.

N. B.-In running his eye over the preceding pages, since they ere printed, the Editor has discovered a few typographical errors, ach as Hippodrone for Hippodrome, p. 361,—&c. &c. and perhaps n incorrect criticism in p. 77.

FINIS.