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The consequences are, already, that the belief in Mohammed is declining both at Constantinople and in Egypt, in the better classes of society; and the same mutation is taking place in Persia.* Thus the mental abolition of all that is false and imposture in the Islam system is visibly taking place. From these facts I cannot but infer that the Arab mind is moulding into the primitive Ishmael state of pure theism; that the Egyptian and Persian aristocracies or upper classes are undergoing a similar transition, and that the general Mussulman world will in time imitate their example. Beyond this I cannot at present penetrate.

What farther direction will be given, is as yet undiscernible; but the downfall of Mohammed as a divine teacher is certain and unavoidable. Nothing can restore his influence where it has once declined, because it has no reality in its favour. On the contrary, the actual truth is against it, and the line. He put his commercial and foreign affairs under an Armenian of Smyrna. His own long barge was built at Deal, in Kent. He employed an English engineer to improve the canals, and two Englishmen, under Mr. Briggs, in boring for water in the desert. European instructers were teaching the Arab musicians our notes of music, and to play the popular airs of England, France, and Germany, on European instruments. He has established a military hospital and a naval school, and also a school of medicine and anatomy, where botany, mineralogy, and chymistry are taught. He has established schools for all classes, and a public assembly to meet on national business forty days in each year. He has also set up a weekly newspaper, in Arabic and Turkish, and protects all Christian merchants settled in the country.-Sir A. Johnston's Report to Asiat. Soc. 1833. Another fact is curious. In January, 1834, a young Swiss artist went to Cairo to preach the French St. Simonian doctrines. To counteract this attempt, "In the Moniteur Egyptien (the pacha's newspaper,) the Gospel was recommended as the best means of civilizing mankind, in opposition to the apostles of St. Simon."-Miss. Reg. 1834, p. 313.

* I have observed these facts stated in the accounts of several recent travellers and missionaries in these countries. The feeling extends even into Libya and Ethiopia, for one gentleman says, "I observed that many of the Berberas and Nubians who came to Egypt, and who serve there as servants, especially at Cairo and Alexandria, are skeptics, and careless as to their religion. I heard some say, They cared very little about Mohammed and his religion. They had been forced to it by the cimeter."

† As an instance of this desire to substitute theism for Islamism, the following may be quoted: "The Persians are very much inclined to conversation, and no subject is so commonly introduced by them in company with foreigners as that of religion. I believe that a large majority of the educated Persians have little or no confidence in the claims of Mohammed. They will dispute with Christians for the sake of disputation, and then proceed to canvass the arguments derived from nature and reason of the being and character of God."-Miss. Reg. 1832, p. 386.

VOL. II.-M m

the divine agency will be now in operation to accelerate its obliteration, as fast as what is better can be established in its stead. But until this can be effected, we cannot expect that what is objectionable will be overthrown. The bad is never removed while what is worse would succeed; nor until something better can take its place.

The present positions and activities of the Nomadic or Bedouin Arab population are remarkable.

They skirt the north coast of Africa, from Morocco to Algiers. They are about Tunis, and scattered along the Lybian territory up to Egypt. They abound in Lower Egypt, and appear also in its upper provinces. They roam over the deserts between the mountain boundaries of the Nile and the Red Sea. They spread down from Abyssinia to Mozambique and the Straits of Babelmandel. They appear in the plains and chief cities of the southeastern coasts of Africa, until the Caffraria and Zooly tribes begin. They are in Madagascar. They are visiters for trade, or settled residents, in the towns on the Niger, and on the other rivers and towns of West Africa, nor are they absent from Morocco. How far they have penetrated into inland Africa, we as yet do not know; but from this sketch you see that they are everywhere on the seacoast of this continent, in almost all parts of its vast circuit.*

Their martial activities are now also in a singular state. They are at present engaged in imbodied troops fighting for other powers. We find them in the service of the native powers of India as already mentioned. They were the most faithful and formidable defenders of Burhtpoor, in that peninsula, when the English, in 1833, attacked and stormed it. They are becoming the chief people in the Turkish navy, now the Greeks cease to be so. They were regimented in the Egyptian army in large numbers when Ibrahim Pacha invaded Asia Minor. They continue to be a portion of his active force in Syria, after this province had been ceded to his father Mehemet Ali, by the Turkish

It would take up too much room to quote my authorities for all the circumstances in this and the next paragraph, but they are now upon my table before me. There are some Mohammedans, even in China, who, with the Koran, have the Arabian language there. M. Gutzlaff says of one at Amoy, who was a Mandarin, "Some Arabic sentences were familiar to him; but the Chinese organs of speech can scarcely pronounce the Arabic well."-Gutzl. Journ. p. 225.

sultan, although others of their Nomadic race in that country are joining in the revolt and warfare against him, as his most troublesome and endangering enemies. This remarkable contest began in the spring of 1834. The Arabian tribes in Syria, roused by the pacha's enforcing a regular taxation, and more especially forcing their youth into his armies by a conscription, suddenly combined and took Jerusalem by storm.* This city was retaken from them in the beginning of summer by Ibrahim,† but the contest con

* A gentleman, who wrote from Jerusalem on 16th July, 1834, thus describes these events. After mentioning that on his arriving at that city he had been kindly treated by Ibrahim Pacha, he adds: "As I made continual excursions among the Arabs, and they conversed with me without reserve, I discovered that they were very discontented with the Pacha's government, particularly with his taking their young men for soldiers. They informed me that a widely-extended conspiracy was on the point of breaking forth into rebellion, and that I should do well to quit Palestine. I accordingly made preparations for my departure; but in spite of all my diligence, I was too late. No sooner did the Pacha part for Jaffa, than the revolution commenced. The garrisons of Herek and Solth were cut to pieces; and the Arabs from Samaria and Hebron marched on Jerusalem. The Pacha had left only 600 men in Jerusalem, and the assailants were more than 40,000. As, however, the walls were furnished with a few cannon, and the Arabs were armed with nothing but lances and muskets, we could have held for ever, had not the Arabs discovered a subterranean passage. They entered at midnight, and the soldiers, after a gallant defence, were obliged to retire to the castle.

"All the Christians fled to the different convents, and thus saved their lives. For five days the city was given up to plunder; and never did I witness such a heart-rending spectacle. The Jews, who had no place of safety to which they could retire, suffered very much. Their houses were so pillaged, that they had not a bed to lie on; many were murdered, and their wives and daughters violated. Barbarities were committed too shocking to relate. From the hope of being well paid, or some other motive, these savages spared the convents.

"To add to our miseries, an EARTHQUAKE, one of the strongest ever felt in Palestine, destroyed several houses, and threw down that part of the city wall which passes by the mosque of the temple. In Bethlehem the convent was rendered uninhabitable, and many inhabitants were buried in the ruins of their houses. For more than ten days, successive earthquakes continued to shake the city, but none were so strong as the first."-Plymouth Herald, November, 1834.

On 5th June, 1831, Ibrahim marched with his troops from Jaffa, to the aid of his besieged garrison in Jerusalem. "The Pacha, hearing our situation, hastened from Jaffa, with 5000 men. There are only twelve hours' march from Jaffa to Jerusalem, and the Pacha was three days and a half before he could relieve us. More than 30,000 Arab peasants had occupied the passes of the mountains; and as the soldiers wound their way through the narrow ravines beneath, the rebels took murderous aim at them from behind the rocks, and sometimes rolled down on their heads enormous masses of stone; thus, crushing their enemies, and rendering

tinued through the autumn, and in November, 1834, these asserters of their independence are still unsubdued.*

Besides Isaac and Ishmael, there were six other children born to Abraham by his last wife Keturah, whom he settled in the eastern countries. There was of course a posterity from these, because the sons of three are mentioned by name. But as nothing is stated of their descendants, except as to one, I will not substitute conjecture in the place of historical fact. This one was MIDIAN. The Midianites are frequently noticed in the Mosaic Pentateuch, and are allowed to have been the descendants of this son of Abraham. They have been called an Arabian people,t because after the Augustan age, the name of Arabia was extended to these regions, as it has been to Idumea; but they are distinguished from the Arabs in Scripture. Their country was part of the Arabian desert, and a memorial of their name still remains on the Red Sea. Moses married the

the path impassable to cavalry and artillery. The activity and courage, however, of Ibrahim Pacha, overcame every opposition: and he at length entered Jerusalem in triumph. As the Pacha is still waging a bloody war with the Arabs, it is impossible to quit the city. If I quit Jerusalem at present, there is not the least doubt of my being killed by the Arabs." -Letter of 16th July, 1834, in the Plymouth Herald.

*The Austrian Observer has thus mentioned these conflicts: "Ibrahim reached Jerusalem by the way of Bethlehem; but the BEDOUINS Of the environs surrounded the city; while others, in numerous detachments, scoured the plain, and plundered and laid waste the whole country between Mount Carmel and Gaza. A regiment which had hastened from Damascus was attacked in Nazareth, and overpowered in the plains of Esdrelon, before it could reach the mountains of Samaria. The loss of the Egyptians in these several actions was estimated at 6000 men. Lebanon was tranquil, but several ARAB tribes beyond the Jordan had joined those of Samaria. The number of men under arms is stated to be 20,000."--Austrian Observer, 24th August, 1834. The Ottoman Moniteur of the 11th October, 1834, states, that so far from the hostilities being ended, "these events have become of such a serious character as to require the Egyptian Pacha to leave his dominions and proceed in person to Jaffa." --These are the latest notices I have seen of this warfare.

Philo calls them "a most populous nation of Arabs, whose ancient name was Madienei."-De Fortit. 741. So Stephanus in Ethnicis," Madieni et Madianitæ, populus Arabiæ." Midian was not far from Mount Sinai. H. Reland's Palestina, v. i. p. 98.

Jerom says, "Madian and Epha are regions beyond Arabia, fertile of camels, and all the province is called Saba."-Comm. Is. 60. "It is undoubted that the Midianites and all that wilderness were adjacent to the Arabian country."--Ib. Ezek. 25.

There is a town still called Midjan on the Arabian Gulf, where Ptolemy placed Modianam. Josephus mentions it," The city of Madian on the Red Sea."--Ant. 1. ii. c. 5; 1. iv. c. 7.

daughter of the chief of Midian,* and this state became so powerful, as to reduce the Israelites to that subjection from which Gideon delivered them.t

LETTER XXVII.

Cursory Outline of the Formation, Increase, and Decline of the Jewish Nation-And Views on the Divine Purposes and Attained Ends in its several Stages.

MY DEAR SYDNEY,

WE now approach, more particularly, the most deeplyinteresting subject which has occurred in the history of mankind, and with which their sacred history has been vitally connected.

Intellectually interesting, from the grand and pathetic compositions which are attached to it, and which, on their peculiar subjects, no other ancient literature in any of the past nations of the world either equalled or resembled, it is also that to which our personal wellbeing-probably the everlasting continuity of our existence is inseparably attached; I mean the formation of the Jewish nation, and that gradually-developed, but most momentous train of operations and results which were appended to it, and have issued from it; which have been destined to be still flowing, with increasing importance, on the human race, and which will never cease to be evolving either to all, or to selected portions of them, till time itself shall expire, if time ever can have a terminating period.

This, however, will never be. Time cannot end. It is associated with eternity, and will differ from that, only in being that continued succession of the periods, into which the intelligent beings of every orb, for their convenience, distinguish it, of which eternity is really composed.

Time in this world, is but that portion of the never-begin

* Exodus.

† Judges, vi. "Because of the Midianites, the children of Israel made them the dens which are in the mountains, and caves, and strong holds."-Ib. 2.

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