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decisive against the conjecture of M. Montucla, I need not urge the great antiquity of Menu's Institutes; in which the twenty-seven asterisms are called the daughters of Dacsha, and the consorts of Soma, or the moon; nor rely on the testimony of the Brahmans, who assure me, with one voice, that the names of the zodiacal stars occur in the Vedas; three of which I firmly believe, from internal and external evidence, to be more than three thousand years old." And he concludes his paper with saying, "I hope on some other occasions to satisfy the public, as I have perfectly satisfied myself, that the practice of observing the stars began, with the rudiments of civil society, in the country of those whom we call Chaldeans; from which it was propagated into Egypt, India, Greece, Italy, and Scandinavia, before the reign of Sisac, or Sacya, who by conquest spread a new system of religion and philosophy from the Nile to the Ganges about a thousand years before Christ." (Sir W. Jones's Works, iv. 91.)

The Zodiac derived from Chaldea underwent slight modifications in the countries into which it passed; not such as to affect its structure, or throw any doubt upon its origin, but merely the substitution of an animal common in the country instead of the original animal, which might be little known. Thus Aries is supplied by a goat in some countries, by a deer in others: Aquarius is exchanged for a water-rat in Tartary, for a crocodile or alligator in some countries, and for a shark in others: Sagittarius is often represented by a bow and arrow, and sometimes by an arrow only: Leo is sometimes represented by the hind legs and tail only: and Pisces occasionally by a single fish. But these are only the representations of the signs in the ideal zodiac; and for a very different purpose from the grouping of constellations. The forms given to the principal asterisms, both in and beyond the zodiac, may be traced, with very little change, to the remotest antiquity, and afford most important data for settling early chronology and history.

The early astronomers had not the methods of regular intercalation now employed, to keep the solar and lunar year in correspondence, and fix the recurrence of the months to the same seasons of the year. Till after the Exode, the Egyptians and all other nations had no other method of keeping their calendar in any reasonable correspondence with the seasons of the year, than intercalating a whole month, when the discrepancy became of that amount; as the Jews do to the present day. But in the time of Moses, the true length of the year having been determined, and the lunar periods reckoned by long cycles instead of single years, an exact intercalation was adopted, to keep the calendar in correspondence with the equinoxes and solstices. But another irregularity was also to be remedied, arising from

the precession of the equinoxes, which occasions the signs of the Zodiac to recede from the equinoctial station of the sun at the rate of one degree in 71 years. The remedy applied was that still in use,-a fixed, and a moveable zodiac: reckoning the beginning of the year from the equinoctial point, in whatever sign that might be; and considering that point as the beginning of the first sign of the zodiac in all future calculations, however much the constellations may have receded from it.

The Zodiac from its structure contains internal evidence to prove that these remedies were applied nearly 1500 years before Christ, which was the age of the second Thoth, Hermes or Mercury of the Greeks; from whom all heathen tradition asserts it to have been derived, and who was either the same with, or shortly preceded by, Belus II. who effected a similar improvement in Chaldean astronomy. This system, introduced by Hermes, is indicated by that beautiful symbol, the Caduceus, which Mercury carries in his hand, and which on many gems is represented placed before him, he in the act of contemplating it; or before the ram, the dog, or the ibis, his symbols. The caduceus, in two opposing serpents, represents the opposite courses of the sun, the ruler of the day; and the moon and stars, which rule the night represented in Egypt by the symbol of two crocodiles turned in opposite directions, and in the ordinary Zodiac by the opposite courses of Aries and Taurus, between which signs the vernal equinox stood in the time of Hermes. The sun appears to move from East to West in his daily rounds; but all the motions in the ecliptic, of the sun during the year, of the moon during the month, or of the signs receding from the equinox, are from West to East. The serpents of the caduceus are winged, to represent the flight of time; and Hermes is represented also winged, to shew that he kept pace with its flight. On some gems he is represented riding on a ram at full speed, to signify that he fixed the scientific zodiac to the sign Aries, notwithstanding the inevitable departure of the equinox from that constellation by its recession. The cloud from which Taurus is represented as emerging, is between 46 and 47 degrees from the present equinoctial point; which, reckoning 71 years to each degree, carries us back to the period between 1459 B. C. and 1530 B. C., the exact period at which Mr. Cullimore had fixed the Hermaic corruption in chronology, and at which science certainly emerged from the cloud under which it had been veiled.

The Egyptians represented the commencement of the year by a circle between the horns or on the shoulder of Taurus, or on the head of the Ram; shewing by the same calculation where the equinox stood at the time to which the symbol was meant to refer the sun in the head of the Ram denoting some time.

posterior to the fifteenth century before Christ, when Hermes lived; the shoulder of the Bull going back to the time of the first Hermes, the contemporary of Ham; and the sun on the Bull's horn ascending to near the time of the creation: the vernal equinox having stood just one degree in advance of the point of the foremost horn of the Bull at creation, if the rate of precession was the same before as after the Deluge; just at that point where the mundane egg stands which Taurus is breaking, in the well known Japanese and other symbols of creation.

One other point only will we for the present touch upon, as illustrative of our inquiry, and that only briefly: the natural history of the animals chosen for signs of the Zodiac. The ear of corn in the hand of Virgo has generally been acknowledged to denote harvest; but we believe all the signs had originally some reference to the natural history of the animals at the corresponding season, or to the turn and return of the year, and its periodical accompaniments. The lion may have been more dangerous at the summer solstice, and the scorpion in autumn: the land crab may have migrated when the sun was in Cancer, and Aquarius may have been chosen to mark the inundations; followed by the fishes, and sometimes exchanged for the crocodile or shark and Libra certainly denoted the balance of day and night at the autumnal equinox.

These points we shall find occasion to touch upon again; and though they do not all afford evidence equally conclusive, we shall find some of them full and direct to the purpose; and the minor ones strengthen that chain of evidence which, if we are able to produce it to the public in that compactness and consistency it seems to have in our own mind, will bear every trial, and fully sustain all the weight of argument we wish to rest upon it: will bring out at length from Heathen science a demonstration of Scripture chronology perfectly satisfactory and conclusive: will enable us to wrest its trusted weapons out of the hands of Infidelity, and, giving them a heavenly temper, turn them against all the strength of scientific scepticism, and rout it in its strongest hold. With such an end in view, we entreat the patience of our readers; for we feel that some apology is due to them for the slowness of our progress and the dryness of these details. Without this caution we might fall into mistake; without these details no real progress would be made. We must both be sure of our way, and make good our footing step by step.

THE LORD'S SUPPER.

"Whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the

Lord but let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup: for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation" (judgment or punishment by divers diseases and sundry kinds of death), discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep." (1 Cor. xi. 27-30).

"not

In order, therefore, rightly to discern the Lord's body, meditate on the following heads.

I. Bread-not corn which contains life in it, but bread made of corn which has been bruised to death, and is now, being baked with fire, the staff of life-shews forth the body of JESUS bruised to the death for our sins (Isaiah liii. 5), but now raised to the throne of God to give life to the world. The red wine poured into the cup shews the blood, the life, of Jesus, shed for the remission of sin.

II. The ONE bread broken into many parts shews forth the one body of CHRIST, consisting of many members: the one cup shews forth the one blood, by which all the children of Adam are one with each other, and with Jesus Christ, the Son of Mary and the Son of God-one with his flesh, and with his blood.

III. Bread and wine being the strength and refreshment of the body of man, shew forth that the soul of man also requires to be sustained by corresponding food, even by the body and Spirit of THE LORD. Men, now on earth, can only be united to the body of THE LORD, now on the throne of God, by having the same Spirit flowing through them which is in Him. The bread shews forth his risen and glorified body, on which we feed; and the wine shews forth the Spirit that flows through all his members from Him the head.

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IV. “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us; therefore let us keep the feast." (1 Cor. v. 7). The Feast of Unleavened Bread was not kept till after the Passover: "not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." Christ being raised from the dead, dieth no more" (Rom. vi. 9) and the church therefore now "keeps the feast," not the Passover. Leaven is always used in Scripture to represent what is evil (Matt. xvi. 6, 12; Luke xii. 1): therefore Christians are commanded to use unleavened bread, to shew forth the perfect holiness which must be in the church, the body of Christ.

Thus in obeying the commands of Jesus to celebrate the Supper in remembrance of Him, we receive the assurance of the remission of our sins which is past; and also partake of the risen life which He has now with the Father for us, as the Head of his body.

THE REV. JOSEPH WOLFF.

WE stated in our last Number, that the commencement of Mr. Wolff's Journal for 1832, dated from Bokhara in March last, had been received: the continuation has not yet come to hand, and the portion before us will not fill a sheet: we reserve it, therefore, to a future opportunity. In the interim, however, we are enabled, through the kindness of the friend with whom Mr. Wolff corresponds, to lay before our readers a letter from this enterprising Missionary of so late a date as AUGUST LAST, written within the British territory in India.

Simlah, in the Himlaya Mountains, 3d August, 1832.

DEAR PATRON,-First of all I have to say, that I beg you to mention to the Right Honourable J. H. Frere, that I have forwarded, by means of Lord William Bentinck, and Captain Wade, Political Agent of Lodianah, 2480 rupees (10 rupees 17. sterling) to Messrs. Mackintosh and Co., Calcutta; and requested Mr. Campbel, British Envoy at Tabreez, to draw on the said sum, and forward the money to Mr. Frere, as a repay of the bills which I have drawn. Runt Jut Singh, the emperor of the Seiks, has made me a present, in Cashmeer shawls, money, and horse, to the amount of 4000 rupees.

You will soon receive a copy of my Journals from Meshed to Sarakhs Mowr in the kingdom of Khiva, Bokhara, Balkh, Cabool, Peshawr, Lahore, to Simlah; where I have now been longer than a month, with Lord and Lady William Bentinck, and preach every Sunday at his house, in the presence of Lord and Lady William Bentinck, and Sir Edward and Lady Barnes, Commander in Chief: and every week I give three lectures on the Prophecies. Lord and Lady William Bentinck intend getting my Journal printed at Calcutta ; and they have permitted me to dedicate it to them. Love to Lady Harriet.

Yours truly,

JOSEPH WOLFF.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

MR. H. FRERE has requested us to announce that he has in the press "Eight Letters on the Prophecies, published in 1831: to which is now added, a Postscript, containing Observations on the Prophecies relating to the Individual Infidel Antichrist of the last days."

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