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Dr. Buchanan,* "my mind was much occupied with the pre"sent state and circumstances of the Jews. I visited them in "the different provinces of the British dominions."-" By the ❝events of the late war in India, a colony of Jews have become "subject to Great Britain, the colony of the white and black "Jews of Cochin: I visited this colony; its number is calcu"lated to be 16,000. The number of the Jews in the United Kingdom is not reputed to be greater than 14,000; so that "our Jewish subjects in the East are yet more numerous than "in the West. The white Jews live on the sea coast-the black "Jews live chiefly in the interior; they call themselves Beni"Israel, for their ancestors did not belong to Judah, but to the "kingdom of Israel; they consider themselves to be descended "from those tribes who were carried away at the first captivity. "In some parts of the East (for they are dispersed through it) "they never heard of the second Temple; they never heard of "the coming of the Messiah: some of them possess only the "Pentateuch and Psalms, and the Book of Job."-" The Jews "of Cochin (he adds) may be addressed with advantage on the "subject of the Christian religion, for they have the evidence " of the Syrian Christians before them; these ancient Christians "live in their vicinity, and are our witnesses. At one place in "the interior of the country which I visited, there is a Jewish "synagogue and a Christian church in the same Hindoo village; "they stand opposite to each other, as it were the Law and the "Gospel, bearing testimony to the truth in the presence of the "heathen world."

Surely we cannot but see, in this statement, a clear and irrefragable proof of the accomplishment of those predictions, which foretel the dispersion of the Jewish race from one end of the earth even to the other; and yet the facility with which Providence may prepare arrangements for again reuniting them, when we see two bodies of Jews so numerous, and from each other so remote, as those of our United Kingdom and those of Cochin in Asia, brought as it were into contact, by being placed under the dominion, and capable of being influenced by the measures,

* Vide Dr. Buchanan's Speech as to the State of the Jews in the East, delivered at a public Meeting of the London Society for promoting Chris tianity among the Jews, in December, 1809, published in London in 1810.

of the same Christian power. Can it be conceived that such predictions should have been the mere effusions of random conjecture, and such accomplishment the effect of blind chance?

Next to the universal dispersion of the Jewish race, the prophet foretells the miseries and sufferings which should every where attend them, so emphatically expressed by the declara tion, “I will draw out a sword after you ;" and in the prophetic Legislator's final address to the people, "The Lord shall scat❝ter thee among all people, from the one end of the earth even "unto the other; and among these nations shalt thou find no "ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest: but the “Lord shall give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of 66 eyes, and sorrow of mind." On almost the slightest glance into the records of history, we find melancholy proofs of the accuracy with which this prediction has been fulfilled. The learned Historian, who has exhibited so accurate a view of the fortunes of the Jews from the destruction of Jerusalem to the beginning of the 18th century, observes, that in former captivities + "God was careful to preserve the nation in a body, by conveying them to the same place; it was all united together "in the plains of Goshen, preparatory to its departure from "Egypt. In the Babylonish captivity, one part inhabited the "same cities, and another peopled both the banks of the same "river; so that when Cyrus determined to restore them, he re"united them with ease. But at the destruction of Jerusalem, "and afterwards in the war of Adrian, the nation, weakened by “unheard-of massacres, was dispersed into all the provinces of "the empire: this dispersion continues to this hour, and has even extended to the ten tribes, of whom it is difficult now to "discover the remains in the East, where they were once nu"merous and considerable." In the earlier period of their dispersion, they frequently rebelled, and struggled against the oppressions they sustained, which only terminated in rendering them more severe. Thus they were prohibited, by the most rigorous edicts, from appearing at Jerusalem, to which they always turned with unceasing and unabated desire. Wherever

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we find them recovering any degree of populousness, tranquillity,

and respect, we see the transitory gleam is soon obscured by the darkest shades of sorrow. If in the tenth century they enjoyed in the East a temporary tranquillity, with an establishment of academies and schools, it was speedily destroyed: "When the "house of the Abassides (says their historian), which also fa"vored them, sunk from its authority, the sultan who succeeded "to their power, resolved to exterminate the Jews: he shut up "their academies, which have never since been opened-ba"nished their profession, killed the prince of the captivity with

his family, and raised so severe a persecution as to reduce the "Jews to a handful of men, disperse them into the deserts of "Arabia, and drive them into the western world."* Nor could they in the western world find rest. When a military fanaticism collected the Europeans in thousands to recover the Holy Land, the same spirit led them to persecute with indiscriminate fury the nation which in that land had crucified the Lord of the Christians, and still regarded his followers with contempt or aversion. "This persecution (says their historian) was universal—it was “felt alike in Germany and in England, in France and Spain, "and Italy; the public cry was, Come, let us massacre them " in such a manner that the name of Israel shall be no more "remembered. They put to death great numbers, but still

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greater numbers, driven to despair by such violence, destroyed "themselves."+ In other instances, avarice and injustice were as destructive to them as in this instance fanaticism. Universally engaged in commerce, they accumulated wealth, and wealth drew down upon them pillage and extortion. Well may we here adopt the language of their elaborate historian: "We here be"hold the greatest prodigy, in the preservation of the Jewish "nation, in despite of all the calamities it has sustained for 1700 years: we here see a church, which has been hated and per"secuted for 1700 years, still subsisting and numerous: kings "have often employed the severity of edicts, and the hands of “the executioner, to destroy it; the seditious multitude has "perpetrated massacres and persecutions infinitely more tragical "than the princes; both kings and people, heathens, Christians, "and Mahometans, however opposite in other points, have

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* Basnage, Book vii. ch. iv. sect. 13.

+ Ibid. Book vii. ch. vi. sect. 32.

"united in the design of ruining this nation, and have not "effected it. The bush of Moses, surrounded by flames, has "always burnt without consuming. Dispersed through all parts of the civilized world; driven from or persecuted wherever "they have appeared, they have from age to age endured misery "and persecution, and waded through torrents of their own "blood; yet they still exist in spite of the disgrace, and hatred, ❝ and suffering, which attend them; while there remains nothing "of the greatest monarchies antecedent to the era of their de"struction, but the name."*

It is peculiarly interesting, and must greatly confirm the conclusions for which we have adduced these facts, to observe the exact conformity of the impressions which these events have made on the minds of the Jews themselves, with these conclusions; a conformity most conspicuously shewn in a tract, cited in the Transactions of the Sanhedrim of Jews assembled at Paris a few years since, by order of Buonaparte, and entitled, "An Appeal to the Justice of Kings and Nations," written by a Jew. The author, after describing, in all the pathos of eloquence, the sufferings of his nation, by persecution, extortion, calumny, the pious rage of the crusaders, the general fury of prejudice and intolerance; after declaring, that it seems as if they were allowed to survive the destruction of their country, only to see the most odious imputations laid to their charge; to stand as the constant object of the grossest and most shocking injustice, as a mark for the insulting finger of scorn, as a sport to the most inveterate hatred: he asks, "What is our guilt? is "it that generous constancy which we have manifested in de"fending the laws of our fathers? But this constancy ought "to have entitled us to the admiration of all nations; and it has only sharpened against us the daggers of persecution. Braving "all kinds of torments, the pangs of death, and the still more "terrible pangs of life, we alone have withstood the impetuous "torrents of time, sweeping indiscriminately in its course na❝tions, religions, and countries. What is become of those cele"brated empires, whose very name still excites our admiration, "by the ideas of splendid greatness attached to them, and whose "power controlled the whole surface of the known globe? they *Basnage, Book vi. ch. i. sect. 1.

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are only remembered as monuments of the vanity of human .46 greatness. Rome and Greece are no more! their descendants, mixed with other nations, have lost even the traces of their origin; while a population of a few millions of men, so often subjugated, stands the test of 3,000 revolving years, and the fiery ordeal of fifteen centuries of persecution. We still pre"serve laws, which were given us in the first days of the world,

in the infancy of nature! The last followers of that heathen "religion which had embraced the universe, have disappeared "these fifteen centuries, and our temples are still standing! "We alone have been spared by the indiscriminating hand of time, like a column left standing amidst the wreck of worlds "and the ruins of nature. The history of our nation connects "the present times with the first ages of the world, by the "testimony which it gives of the existence of these early periods: "it begins at the cradle of mankind, and its remnants are likely to be preserved to the day of universal destruction." *

* P. 68 of “ Transactions of the Parisian Sanhedrim," translated by F. D. Kirwan, Esq. Lond. 1807.