and darkness was on the face of the deep: and the Spirit of GOD moved upon the waters ;" and gradually out of chaos came light, distinction, order; "the mountains rose, and the rivers flowed;" "the sun and the moon began their courses in the skies;" plants, animals, and man, successively appeared; and all this by the forming hand of a present God, whose care is over all his works; and without whose notice not even a sparrow falleth to the ground. But, it is asked, Is it not more rational to believe that, by the laws of nature, without any further concern of a God, these successive generations were developed, from the cryptogamies to the rose and the mountain oak; from the polyp to the elephant; from the frog through the monkey up to man? But the Bible represents the different orders of beings, as having distinct and separate origin by the fiat of the Almighty. It tells us that, instead of leaving the baboon to civilize himself into a man, by some inexplicable process of development and curtailment, He said, "Let us make man in our image and after our likeness;" not that of the ape. "And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." And further, as if to confound in advance these schools of man's wisdom, which insist that the different races of men must have sprung up from different soils, it is recorded that the command to this single pair which he had created, was, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth;" and, by the mouth of the apostle, he declared the grand historic counterpart to this command, that he "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." The fact is certain, because given on the authority of Omniscience. Philosophy, so far from being able to have discovered it, is unable to comprehend, and ready to reject it; and even now, men whom our country delights to honour for their learning, are endeavouring to force upon us their anti-scriptural conclusions for scientific theory.

We are lost again in confusion in our inquiries after the origin of evil. Are there two independent principles in nature, a good and a bad, which contributed to the production of the world? Is it that matter is essentially evil, and that spirit, in connexion with matter, necessarily partakes of its nature? Some such hypothesis is the best that philosophy can do for us; but we read here, that when the Creator had ended his works, he pronounced them good, and it was "Man's first disobedience, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste

Brought death into the world and all our woe."

Is this God revengeful, and of like passions and frailties with man, as the heathen have imagined; or is he wise and good? Rea

son has no answer to give; but in this book, where he proclaims his name, he says, "The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, and transgression, and sin; and that will by no means clear the guilty." And in another scene, the highest and purest ranks of created intelligences are shown as casting their crowns before him, and crying, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come;-thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and power!" The dark problem of man's destiny and hopes is, in the hands of philosophy, shrouded in still deeper gloom, and anxiously, often despairingly, he asks, “If a man die, shall he live again?" But now," the Saviour, Jesus Christ, hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." We are assured that the God who styles himself the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, "is not the God of the dead, but of the living." We are told that the dead, small and great, shall stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, to be judged according to the deeds done in the body; and that the wicked "shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." And so, if we go down through all the doctrines of practical life, the Scriptures are, in every sense of the word, profitable, and are the only source of reliable and authoritative instruction. In human teachings we are perplexed with uncertainties, and contradictions, and. confusion. In the sacred page all is clear; all is plain to the simplest understanding; so that "he may run that readeth it;" and "the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein."

This subject is, in its practical bearings, one of vital importance, because of the innate tendencies of the heart to turn from the divine to human wisdom. To this cause we are indebted for every calamitous error, and every grievous heresy that has afflicted the Church from the time of the apostles, and for every false theory for the "reconstruction of society" that has disgraced the world from the tower of Babel to the temple of Nauvoo, and every unchristian form of Socialism, from Paris to the Salt Lake. Nor is it in its general and historic aspect merely that it concerns us, but equally in our individual experience. For in so far as we neglect the study of the revealed word, and seek for doctrine in the conclusions of human reason, our views of divine things will be imperfect, defective, if not positively erroneous; and we shall find ourselves at the last cultivating a barren faith in philosophy, falsely so called. We subvert thereby the order of things; we magnify reason at the expense of revelation; we dishonour the mistress, that we may exalt the handmaid; we would dethrone God, that we might deify man

Then only do we "walk in the light," when we have a living faith in the inspired Scriptures as the sole and sufficient teacher in matters of doctrine. The want of this faith is the great want of the world. The neglect to cultivate it properly, is the great lack in all our systems of Christian education. It behooves us to take caution against this fatal error, before the allurements of rationalism shall have drawn us into the chilling shades of doubt and disbelief, where the soul feels not the warming and vivifying rays of evangelical Christianity. For, wander as we may through the mazes of speculation, we must come back at last with the humble and saving confession to the Son of God-"THOU hast the words of eternal life."

ART. III. THE CHURCH AND ASIA.

A GLANCE at any Map of the World will show at once the vast extent of territory embraced in the grand division of the earth's surface called Asia. Including the adjacent islands, it stretches through eighty-eight degrees of latitude, and one hundred and sixty degrees of longitude. Its superficial area is about 17,500,000 square miles, or nearly as large as the Americas and Europe together.* Geographically, the Asiatic continent may be distributed under five divisions, whose boundaries are marked by prominent physical features. 1. The central table-land, (Mongolia, Ili, Thibet.) It is situated near the centre of the continent, having for its bearersnorth, the Great Altai; east, the Manchurian Mountains; south, the Himmaleh and Mountains of China; west, the Belur-tag, the Elburz and the Persian Mountains. 2. The Northern Slope, (Siberia,) extending northward from the central table-land, and comprising the northern portion of the continent. 3. The Eastern Slope, (Manchuria and Corea.) 4. The Western Slope, (Persian Empire, Turkestan, Caucasian Provinces, and Asiatic Turkey.) 5. The Southern Slope, (China Proper, Farther India, Hindostan, Southern shore of the Persian Empire, and Arabia.)

The population of Asia is immense. It is startling to read the estimates of reliable authorities on the subject. Including the islands which belong geographically to it, the sum of the population, as given in a recent work, is 655,643,300.† Making from this statement a liberal deduction, on the ground of its being, as the writer remarks, only "an approximation to the truth," still what myriads Book of the World, vol. ii, p. 417.

† M'Culloch's Geog. Dict., art. Asia, p. 172.

remain. More than one-half of the human race are now living beneath the sun of Asia! This population, according to Dr. Prichard,* is composed of seven races, or families: 1. The Syro-Arabian; including the Syrians, now nearly extinct; the Homerites, in Arabia, of whom little is known; the Arabs; and the Jews found in the northern parts of India, in the interior of Malabar, in Cochin-China, China and Tartary. 2. Caucasian nations; divided into, Western, comprising Circassians and Abassians; Middle, comprising several tribes; Eastern, seven tribes; and Southern, consisting of Imeretians, Mingrelians, Soani, and Lazians. 3. Arians; embracing the Hindoos, with the Siah-Pôsh, and the natives of Kashmir, shown by their languages to belong to the Hindoo race; the Persians, or Tajiks, "who inhabit not only the towns of Persia, but of Transoxiana, and all the countries subject to the Uzbek Tartars;" the Afghans, Baluchi and Brahúi, Kurds, Nestorians, who speak the Syrian language, Armenians, and Ossotines. 4. The Great Nomadic races; the Ugorian, or Ugrian, comprising Finns and Lappes, Tschudes, Ugrians Vogouls of the Uralian Mountains, and the Ostiaks on the Obi; the Turkish, comprising the Ouigers, or Eastern Turks, whose history has been elucidated by Abel Remusat; and the Seljúki and Osmanli Turks, known to European historians; the Mongolian, Mongoles Kalmuks, Bouriæts, &c.; the Tungusian, in China, called Manchus; the Bhotiyn, who inhabit Thibet. 5. The Ichthyophagi, or Fishing Tribes; the Namolles, Tschuk-tschi, and Koriaks, Kamtschatkans, Yakugers, Samoiedes, and Ainos or Kurilians. 6. Chinese and Indo-Chinese; the former embracing the Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans; the latter, the nations of Farther India and adjacent islands, comprising, (a) Aborigines: Tchampans, Cambojans, and Peguans; (b) More civilized: Anamese, Burmese, Siamese, and the Laos, or Lia; (c) Indo-Malayan. 7. Aborigines of India; the Cinghalese, embracing all the inhabitants of Ceylon who do not belong to the Tamulian race; the Tamulian, who inhabit the northern portion of Ceylon and the southern part of the Deccan, including also the people of Tulavi on the west, the Karnatas in the interior, and the Telingas on the eastern side of the Deccan; the Parbatiya, or Mountaineers, the Bhils, the Khulis, the Ramusis, the Waralis, and the Katodis, are the most celebrated tribes in the north-western parts of the Deccan; in the more central and western parts are the Gonds, the Pulindas, the Khonds, the Sours, and the Yanadu-Yati; in the southern portions are the Thodaurs, Buddagurs, Curumbars, and Kathars; also the Cohatars, who occupy the

Natural Hist. of Man, pp. 140-256.

Natural Hist. of Man, Appendix, pp. 567, 568.

summits of the hills; lastly, a great number of petty, barbarous tribes, between the Indian and Indo-Chinese Peninsulas; as the Ahams, Garros, Cachars, Cossyahs, Manipurs, Miris, Abors, Kangtis, and Nagis, or Kukis.

The distribution of this population is worthy of remark. In the Northern Slope the proportion of inhabitants to the area is in the ratio of 1 to a square mile; in the Central Table-land and Eastern Slope, it is 10; in the Western Slope, it ranges from 6 to 63, the minimum occurring in Beloochistan, and the maximum in the plains of Armenia; in the Southern Slope it varies from 3, occurring in the Malay States, to 370 in China Proper, while in the Danish colony in Hindostan, it rises to 416.*

The religions of Asia are, Brahmanism, (in Hindostan,) Budhism, (in Farther India, China Proper, Central Table-land, Eastern Slope, and eastern part of the Northern Slope,) Confucianism and Rationalism, (China Proper,) Sinto, (Japan,) Shamanism, (Siberia,) Fetichists, the Sikhs, Parsees, &c., Jewish and corrupt forms of Christianity. The Brahmins number 100,000,000; Budhists, 260,000,000; Mohammedans, 155,825,000; Confucians and Rationalists, 67,000,000; sect of Sinto, 25,000,000; Fetichists, 50,000; Shamans, 50,000,000; Sikhs, Parsees, &c., 5,000,000; Jews, 800,000; Christian sects, 2,005,000.†

For our present purposes, the languages of Asia may be arranged in four great families: 1. The Indo-European, sometimes termed Indo-Germanic, frequently Japetic, and by late writers, Arian, or Iranian; comprising the languages of Hindostan, Persian Empire, Turkestan, and the Caucasian Provinces. 2. Syro-Arabian, often termed the Semitic; embracing the languages of Arabia, Syria, Asia-Minor, and of the aborigines of Palestine. 3. Languages of the Central Table-land, Eastern and Northern Slopes, called Turanian, and by Dr. Prichard, Ugro-Tartarian. 4. The Monosyllabic and uninflected languages, as the Chinese and Indo-Chinese. The precise number of languages and dialects spoken in Asia, it is at present impossible to determine. What we have written, however, in reference to the population of Asia, suggests that it must be almost infinite. In Hindostan, it is stated there are thirty distinct languages.§ In Farther India, a great number of languages and dialects prevail; the same remark applies to the nations of the Central Table-land, Eastern and Northern Slopes; while in Western Asia, we find many dialects of the Arabic, Persian, Syrian, and

Book of the World, vol. ii, p. 417. Book of the World, vol. ii, p. 697. Edinburgh Review, No. 178, art. Ethnology: republished in the Eclectic Magazine, New-York, vol. xvi, p. 55. § M'Culloch's Geog. Dict., art. Hindostan.