in 1838, 1839. Intended solely for private circulation. 2 vols. 8vo. London. 1842. AMONG the societies lately formed for 1. Eusebius, Bishop of Cesarea, on the publishing manuscript works contained in Theophania, or Divine Manifestation of our public libraries, there is none which our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. A embraces a sphere so extensive, which aims Syriac Version edited from an ancient at promoting so high a class of literature, Manuscript recently discovered. By and which, if adequately supported, promSamuel Lee, D.D., Regius Professor of ises to afford so valuable an addition to Hebrew in the University of Cambridge. our stock of learning and science, as that Svo. (Printed for the Society for the under whose auspices Dr. Lee has put forth Publication of Oriental Texts.) 1842. the volume named at the head of this pa2. The same. Translated into English, per. It is to the East only that we can with Notes; to which is prefixed a Vin- look for direction in our endeavors to obdication of the Orthodoxy and Prophet- tain fuller information upon many of the ical Views of Eusebius. By Samuel most interesting of subjects. It is hence Lee, D.D. 8vo. 1843. only that we can hope to draw any additional knowledge concerning the earliest races of mankind, or any help in tracing their descendants among the present nations of the world. In the absence of any written record of events, the only course is to collect the traditions prevalent in those countries, to endeavor to decipher ancient inscriptions, to read the legends of coins, and to trace the connection and intercourse of peoples by the affinities and intermixtures of language. But no one can qualify 3. The Antient Syraic Version of the Epistles of St. Ignatius to St. Polycarp, the Ephesians and the Romans; together with Extracts from his Epistles collected from the Writings of Severus of Antioch, Timotheus of Alexandria, and others. Edited, with an English Translation and Notes, by William Cureton, M. A. 8vo. London. 1845. 4. Journal of a Tour through Egypt, the Peninsula of Sinai, and the Holy Land, Vol. VII.-No. III. 19 MONASTERIES. 1. Eusebius, Bishop of Cesarea, on the in 1838, 1839. Intended solely for private circulation. 2 vols. 8vo. London. 1842. AMONG the societies lately formed for publishing manuscript works contained in our public libraries, there is none which embraces a sphere so extensive, which aims at promoting so high a class of literature, and which, if adequately supported, promises to afford so valuable an addition to our stock of learning and science, as that under whose auspices Dr. Lee has put forth the volume named at the head of this paper. It is to the East only that we can look for direction in our endeavors to obtain fuller information upon many of the most interesting of subjects. It is hence only that we can hope to draw any addi3. The Antient Syraic Version of the tional knowledge concerning the earliest Epistles of St. Ignatius to St. Polycarp, races of mankind, or any help in tracing the Ephesians and the Romans; togeth- their descendants among the present naer with Extracts from his Epistles col- tions of the world. In the absence of any lected from the Writings of Severus of written record of events, the only course is Antioch, Timotheus of Alexandria, and to collect the traditions prevalent in those others. Edited, with an English Trans-countries, to endeavor to decipher ancient lation and Notes, by William Cureton, inscriptions, to read the legends of coins, M. A. 8vo. London. 1845. and to trace the connection and intercourse of peoples by the affinities and intermixtures of language. But no one can qualify to give their aid in spreading knowledge and civilization among the Arabs. himself for such a task otherwise than by studying the present languages and literature of those countries. In vain will he Of these translations many still remain. pore over the hieroglyphic or demotic in- Those of which the originals are extant scriptions and papyri of Egypt who has may often be used wih great advantage. not grappled with the Coptic: vain will be We would instance the case of Ptolemy; every endeavor to explain the Pehlevi, and where the astronomical skill of the Arabs arrow-headed inscriptions at Persepolis, or at that period would enable them to corthe legends on the Babylonian bricks and rect mistakes in numbers and figures cylinders, unless the inquirer has previous- which might altogether escape the notice ly made himself acquainted with the Chal- of Greeks, and where the evidence of dee or Aramaic, and the modern Persian, their tradition will be most important, beand the Zend as preserved in the books of cause in such cases no critical knowledge the Parsees. What has been already done of the original language can be of any avail for ethnography by the comparison of lan- to rectify an error. Of works lost in guage since the introduction of the Sans- the original which have already been recrit into Europe, shows how much more stored to us through this channel, we may we may reasonably expect when the differ- instance the fifth, sixth, and seventh books ent stocks and dialects of oriental tongues of the Conic Sections of Apollonius of shall have been more extensively cultivated. Perga, translated into Latin from the Arabic But not only may we look to the East by the Maronite Abraham Ecchellensis; and for fuller means of tracing the history of his work on the Section of the Ratio, made the earliest races of mankind;-from the known by the publication of Halley, who, same quarter we may also hope to recover without understanding a word of Arabic, much of the science and literature of was enabled by his great geometrical skill Greece and Rome, which appears to have to state and demonstrate the several propoperished in the original languages. And sitions from the schemes in the manuscript still more, even in those authors which of the Bodleian. have been preserved many obscurities may Versions were also made from the Greek be cleared up and difficulties explained by into the Armenian at a very early period, comparing them with oriental versions especially of ecclesiastical works. The made previously to the time when multi- publication of the Armenian translation plied transcriptions had introduced many of the Chronicon of Eusebius, has been of errors into the original text. Elian, writing essential service to history, and has conin the first half of the third century, men- firmed the criticism of Scaliger respecting tions that it was reported that the Indians the original. The Book of Enoch, first and Persians had translations of the poems made known to Europe by the translation of Homer, which they used to sing in their of the late Archbishop Laurence, shows own language. (Var. Hist., lib. xii. c. that something has been already recovered 48.) And the historian Agathias, in the from the Ethiopic: and the Coptic too may middle of the sixth century, informs us that yet make us better acquainted with writthe Persian monarch Chosroes was said to ings hitherto only known to us by the trabe more thoroughly imbued with the writ-dition that they once existed. ings of Aristotle than even Demosthenes with those of Thucydides, and to be perfectly versed in the works of Plato, which had been translated expressly for his use. (Hist. Justin., lib. ii.) We have also evidence before us that as early as about the end of the seventh century of our era, several works were translated from the Greek into the Arabic. In the eighth and the earlier part of the ninth century, under the Abbassides, this labor of translation is known to have been carried on to a great extent. No expense was spared to procure the works of the learned in every language. Greeks, Syrians, Persians and Indians met on the banks of the Tigris But it is above all to the Syriac or Aramaic that we may look for the recovery of works lost in the original Greek. This language, which with slight variations prevailed from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates, and from the confines of Arabia and Egypt to Armenia, not only possesses peculiar interest for us as being that used by our Saviour and his disciples, but also as being the vernacular tongue of many writers who hold a high rank in Grecian literature; whose works therefore can hardly be entirely free from some of the idiomatic expressions of their native land. The New Testament is, as we may naturally expect, full of Aramaisms; and one of the evangelists is be lieved, not without good grounds, to have written his Gospel in that tongue. The earliest version of the New Testament is undoubtedly the Syriac; and after the Septuagint, that of the Old Testament also This is not the place to discuss the question as to the period when those versions were made; but better arguments than occidental scholars have hitherto been willing to admit, support the belief of those branches of the Christian Church which first made use of them, that they touch upon Apostolic times. The work of translating from the Greek into the Syrian was certainly commenced very early. We are told by Eusebius, in his account of the Martyrdom of Procopius, A. D. 303, that he had been employed in translating from the Greek into Aramaic. This passage does not indeed occur in the Greek text of the Martyrs of Palestine, as it has come down to us, but it is found both in the Syriac and in the ancient Latin version. Indeed the age of the manuscript itself in which the Syriac translation of the Acts of the Martyrs of Palestine and the Theophania of Eusebius, together with the Recognitions of St. Clement and the treatise of Titus of Bostra against the Manicheans, are found, shows that considerable progress in the work of translation from the Greek into Syriac must have been made as early as about A. D. 400. lation..... The manuscript containing our work is very neatly written in the Estrangelo or old Church-hand-writing of the Syrians, on very fine and well-prepared skin. It is of the size of large quarto, each folio measuring about 144 inches by 111, and containing three columns, each of the width of 24 inches.' The Professor then translates a note from one of the margins, which states that the transcript was made at Edessa in Mesopotamia, in the year of our Lord 411. The age of the manuscript therefore, according to this note, the veracity of which there is no ground to question, is 1434 years. At first sight, notwithstanding all our readers have heard of the dryness of the Egyptian climate, the date assigned may startle them; but we can assure them that in the collection of upwards of three hundred manuscripts amongst which this was discovered, there are many from the fifth to the thirteenth century as to which there can be no doubt. They are all noted with the year of the era of the Greeks (Seleucida); some also with that of the Martyrs; others, which are more recent, with that of the Hijrah likewise; and these notices are accompanied by so many particulars as to the scribe himself, as to the convent where each manuscript was transcribed, who was its superior, who its principal officers, who was then bishop of the diocese, and who the supreme patriarch, Dr. Lee has given us in one volume the as to leave no possibility of mistake as to Syriac text of the Theophania, and in an- the date. By comparing the style of the other his own version of it into English-handwriting, the nature of the vellum, and with a preface and notes displaying great other particulars of those manuscripts and varied erudition. But what we propose at present to consider is not the contents of the book, but its external history; the discovery of a very considerable theological treatise by Eusebius, of which only two or three fragments had been known, must excite a desire to learn what circumstances have at length brought it to light, and what reasons we may consequently have to hope for further acquisitions of a similar nature. which are not dated, or in which the note of the year is either erased or lost, with such as still retain the record of the year, we are enabled to decide, with a tolerable degree of certainty, the age even of the manuscripts without a date. There are in the collection one dated manuscript of the fifth and many early in the sixth century, and from comparing Dr. Lee's volume with these, we could not attribute it to a later date than that in which he acquiesces. About six years ago the Rev. Henry Tattam, of Bedford, made a journey to The manuscript was purchased by Mr. Egypt, with a view of collecting MSS. ser- Tattam from the convent of St. Mary Deiviceable towards an edition of the Scrip- para, in the desert valley of Nitria, situated tures in Coptic. Besides Coptic treasures, between 30 and 31 degrees both of latitude he brought back about fifty volumes of and longitude, about 35 miles to the left Syriac MSS.-some extremely ancient. of the most western branch of the Nile. Dr. Lee says: 'It was in looking over these manuscripts tl at I had the extreme pleasure of discovering that of which the following work is a trans The name of Nitria belongs properly to the northern part of the valley, where the famous Natron Lakes are situated; the southern part is more correctly the Valley of |