áre all within the enumeration of those six tribes mentioned Deut. xxvii. 12, 13, whose lot it was to repeat the blessings; the other six being appointed to curse on Mount Ebal. He also directed his hand toward the spot, where those were to stand who were appointed to curse.

We asked if the report was true, that, in any way, they worshipped the symbol of a Dove-looking, at the same time, to see if the emblem of the Dove was any where to be seen on the curtain, which screens the Altar, as some had said. He replied, "It is a falsehood of the Jews, who endeavour to calumniate us."

As to Jerusalem, they have no respect for it as a holy city; regarding the Jews as their rivals, and speaking entirely in the spirit of the Woman of Samaria (John iv. 20): Our fathers worshipped in this mountain.

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We then produced a few passages in the Penta, teuch, concerning which we desired to know his opinion, whether or no they referred to the Messiah. Genesis iii. 15 (I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel) he said did NOT refer to the Messiah. Genesis xlix. 10 (The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come) they consider as a prophecy of the Messiah, who is Shiloh: and, when pressed on the circumstance, that the sceptre was already departed from Judah, he gave the explanation which many of the Jews give, that Judah has always hitherto existed and still exists somewhere in the world, exercising regal authority; although he acknowledged that he did not know where. We asked if there were any

other passages: he quoted no other this morning; but, yesterday, he had already cited Deut. xviii. 15.

On coming out, we asked how long this Synagogue had been occupied by them: he pointed to a small marble slab inserted in the wall, engraven with Samaritan characters; which, he said, recorded the period of their occupying this building-now four hundred and ninety years. There were two or three other slabs with Samaritan characters, inserted in like manner in the wall. That which records the date of their possession of the Synagogue is in a small recess, on the left side of the door.

Three times a year they go up Mount Gerizim: but we did not understand what their Services were on these occasions; not, he said, to sacrifice, for fear of the Turks. When they do sacrifice, it is done in some private place, and in the city, that they may not be molested. We understood them to say that they had not a daily sacrifice*.

The House of this Priest, and the Synagogue which adjoins it, are very clean-a perfect contrast to the inveterate filth of the Jewish Houses and Synagogues, which we had seen at Tiberias and Safet; one only excepted, that of the Austrian Consul at Tiberias. Whether this is owing to the national character of the Samaritans-if NATIONAL be a term applicable to a hundred persons-or whether it is owing to their being in tolerably easy circumstances, or whether it is the case with the Priest's house alone, which was the only one we visited, it is not in my power to judge.

When, on a subsequent occasion, I passed through Nablous, the Chief Layman of the Samaritans told me, that, at the Passover, they still sacrifice and eat the Paschal Lamb.

The Priest, in a very friendly manner, asked us to take up our lodging with him for the night; as he had done on the evening before: but we designed to leave at noon; and, therefore, bid him farewell. He desired us to join our fingers together with his, in token, as he said, that the English were his friends ; adding, that he wished to be considered as under English protection*.

REMARKS ON THE SAMARITANS.

The character, and indeed the existence to the present day, of this now-diminished people, must appear a very singular fact. They seem to have made Nablous, what it anciently was to the Israelites when its name was Shechem, their City of Refuget; and here, in some faint sense, to have found

* On the subject of the Samaritans, the Reader may consult Basnage's History of the Jews; and also Prideaux's Connection, Part I. Book 2. The following Extract is from Prideaux:

"There is an old Copy of the Samaritan Pentateuch now shewn at Shechem, (or Naplous, as they now call it,) the head seat of that Sect, which would put this matter beyond all dispute, were that true which is said of it. For they tell us, that therein are written these words: 'I Abishua, the son of Phineas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the High Priest, have transcribed this copy at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, in the 13th year of the Children of Israel's entrance into the Holy Land.' But Dr. Huntington, late Bishop of Rapho in Ireland, having, while Chaplain to the Turkey Company at Aleppo, been at Shechem, and there examined this copy upon the spot, found no such words on the Manuscript, nor thought the copy ancient. Whether the Samaritans did, in ancient times, absolutely reject all the other Scriptures besides the Pentateuch, some do doubt; because it is certain, from the discourse of the Woman of Samaria with our Saviour, that they had the same expectations of a Messiah that the Jews had; and this they say they could no where clearly have, but from the Prophets. And it cannot be denied, but that there is some force in this argument. Perchance, although they did read the Pentateuch only in their Synagogues, yet anciently they might not have been without a due regard to the other Sacred Writings, whatsoever their sentiments may be of them at present." + Joshua xx. 7, and xxi. 21.

security. Were their own account of their genealogy to be admitted, they might almost be regarded-ac cording to our view of the division of the Twelve Tribes between Rehoboam and Jeroboam-as representing the most ancient Schism in the Church of God. This would place them on a footing of greater antiquity than even the Karaïm; who claim for their date the return from the Babylonish Captivity.

Of the true origin of the Samaritans, however, we shall naturally judge from those Scriptures, which are by us received as Canonical. A mingled raceprincipally Cuthæan, though partly, perhaps, of Israelitish blood-they have, in the course of ages, vainly endeavoured to claim as an hereditary right every privilege of Israel; and to identify themselves, almost in a more exclusive manner than the Jews themselves, with the great Hebrew Legislator. * Their pretensions have never been, to this day, admitted by the Jews; and, by our Lord Himself, they were repeatedly spoken of and treated as strangers.

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It is easy to account, therefore, for their repugnance to receive a large portion of the Books of our Holy Scriptures.

The History of the Kings of Judah and Israel, (although they acknowledge the fact, there recorded, of the Babylonish Captivity,) must be, above all, peculiarly obnoxious, as fixing upon them the stigma of a spurious and idolatrous origin: see 2 Kings xvii. 24-41.

The Psalms, designed for the spiritual edification of the Church in every place and age, yet record their rejection, and declare the superior favour shewn to their rival city Jerusalem: Moreover, he refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of

Ephraim. But chose the tribe of Judah, the Mount Sion which he loved. (Ps. lxvii. 67, 68, with other similar passages.) This invaluable treasure of devotion is, therefore, in a manner lost to them.

Isaiah must offend them, as he everywhere uses the terms of Zion and Jerusalem, in describing the seat of the Messiah's Kingdom. Jeremiah confirms the expressions quoted from the Psalms (Jer. vii. 15. also iii. 17). Micah gives to Bethlehem the honour of Messiah's birth. Daniel, in his prayer, declares Jerusalem to be the holy mountain of God. And thus it is with many other passages of the Old Tes→ tament.

Our Lord expressly charges them with worshipping they knew not what-an expression so similar to that in the Acts of the Apostles (xvii. 23), that it seems to describe them, while partially enlightened, yet to be little better than Heathens: and He accordingly directs His Disciples, in the same verse, to decline going either to Gentiles or Samaritans; plainly intimating, that the Samaritans were not to be accounted, any more than the Gentiles, as of the House of Israel: (Matt. x. 5, 6.) He, also, expressly deno, minated the Samaritan Leper, a stranger: (Luke xvii. 18.)

Their existence to the present day, maintaining that very geographical post, to which, in consequence of their opinions, they must in every age have been most partial, demonstrates, in a high degree, the extreme tenaciousness of party-spirit. Christianityfor this was once a Christian Bishopric-appears not to have dislodged these ancient tenants of the Mountains of Ephraim. In what light their future conversion is to be regarded, whether as belonging