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NOTE A.

WHEN engaged in preaching the sermon, of which the foregoing is the substance, I stated that the place from which these Jews came was "the north of China." The error arose from the following circumstance, that I had not read the statement since its first appearance in the year 1838, and quoted what was then stated from memory. I subjoin a copy of the account to which I then referred, which cannot fail to interest every Christian reader :

THE TEN LOST TRIBES.

"The following paragraph, which lately appeared in a German paper, under the head of Leipsic, is calculated to lead to some interesting inquiries.

"After having seen, for some years past, merchants from Tiflis, Persia, and Armenia, among the visitors at our fair, we have had for the first time two traders from Bucharia with shawls, which are there manufactured of the finest wool of the goats of Thibet and Cashmere by the Jewish families, who form a third part of the population. In Bucharia, formerly the capital of Sogdiana, the Jews have been very numerous ever since the Babylonian captivity, and are there as remarkable for their industry and manufactures as they are in England for their money transactions. It was not till last year that the Russian Government succeeded in extending its diplomatic missions far into Bucharia. The above traders exchanged their shawls for coarse and fine woollen cloths of such colours as are most esteemed in the East."

"Much interest has been excited by the information which this paragraph conveys, and which is equally novel and important. In none of the geographical works which we have consulted do we find the least hint as to the existence in Bucharia of such a body of Jews as that here mentioned, amounting to one-third of the whole population; but, as the fact can no longer be doubted, the next point of inquiry is, Whence have they proceeded, and how have they come to establish themselves in a region so remote from their original

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country? This question, we think, can only be answered by supposing that these persons are the descendants of the longlost ten tribes, concerning the fate of which, theologians, historians, and antiquaries, have been alike puzzled; and, however wild this hypothesis may at first sight appear, there are not wanting circumstances to render it far from being improbable. In the 17th chapter of the 2d book of Kings, it is said, 'In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away unto Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor, by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes;' and in the subsequent verses, as well as in the writings of the prophets, it is said, that the Lord then put away Israel out of his sight, and carried them away into the land of Assyria unto this day.' In the Apocrypha, 2d Esdras 13, it is said that the ten tribes were carried beyond the river Euphrates, and so they were brought into another land, when they took counsel together, that they would leave the multitude of the heathen, and go forth into a further country, where never mankind dwelt; that they entered in at the narrow passages of the river Euphrates, when the springs of the flood were stayed, and went through the country a great journey, even of a year and a half:' and it is added, that 'there they will remain until the latter time, when they will come forth again.' The country beyond Bucharia was unknown to the ancients, and it is, we believe, generally admitted that the river Gozan, mentioned in the Book of Kings, is the same as the Ganges, which takes its rise in those countries in which the Jews reside of whom the Leipsic account speaks. The distance which these two Jewish merchants must have travelled cannot, therefore, be less than three thousand miles; and there can be little doubt that the Jews, whom they represent as a third part of the population of the country, are descendants of the ten tribes of Israel, settled by the river Gozan.

"The great plain of central Asia, forming four principal sides, viz., Little Bucharia, Thibet, Monguls, and Mantcheons,

The

contains a surface of 150,000 square miles, and a population of 20,000,000. This vast country is still very little known. The great traits of its gigantic formation compose, for the most part, all that we are certain of. It is an immense plain, of an excessive elevation, intersected with barren rocks and vast deserts of a black and almost moving sand. It is supported on all sides by mountains of granite, whose elevated summits determine the different climates of the great continent of Asia, and form the division of its waters. From its exterior flow all the great rivers of that part of the world. In the interior are a great quantity of rivers, having little declivity or no issue, which are lost in the sands, or perhaps feed stagnant waters. In the southern chains are countries populous, rich, and civilized, Little Bucharia, Great and Little Thibet. The people of the north are shepherds and wanderers. Their riches consist of their herds. Their habitations are tents, and their towns camps, which are transported according to their want of pasturage. Bucharians enjoy the right of trading to all parts of Asia, and the Thibetians cultivate the earth to advantage. The ancients had only a confused idea of central Asia. 'The inhabitants of this country,' as we learn from a great authority, are in a high state of civilization, possessing all the useful manufactures, and lofty houses built with stone. The merchants of Cashmere, on their way to Yarkand, in Little Bucharia, pass through Little Thibet. This country is scarcely known to European geographers.' The immense plain of central Asia is hemmed in and almost inaccessible by mountain ranges of the greatest elevation, which surround it on all sides, except towards China; and when the watchful jealousy of the Government of the Celestial Empire is considered, it will scarcely be wondered at, that the vast region in question is so little known. Such is the country which these newly-discovered Jews are said to inhabit in such numbers."

LECTURE VI.

THE BETTER COVENANT CONSIDERED AS THE NATIONAL COVENANT OF ISRAEL IN

THE LATTER DAY.

BY THE REV. FRANCIS GOODE, M.A.,

LECTURER OF CLAPHAM, MORNING PREACHER AT THE FEMALE ORPHAN ASYLUM, AND LATE FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.

JEREMIAH XXXI. 31-34.

"Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make A NEW COVENANT with the HOUSE OF ISRAEL, and with the HOUSE OF JUDAH; not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand, to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord. But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more

every man his neighbour, and brother, saying, Know the Lord. all know me, from the least of

every man his

For they shall them unto the

greatest of them, saith the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their

sin no more."

THE subject presented to us, in these words, is one so great and glorious, that we can scarcely do more, within the limits of a single sermon, than contemplate some principal features of it, and that but imperfectly.

May our Lord Jesus, the Divine "Messenger of the covenant," be with us, and bless us, while I proceed, without further introduction, to the consideration of it.

The leading topics suggested by it, and on which I propose now to treat, are the three following:

I. The establishment of this new covenant with Israel and Judah, as a NATIONAL Covenant.

II. The PLENARY fulfilment, in them, of its promises.

III. The character of the DISPENSATION resulting therefrom.

Consider, I. The establishment of this new covenant with Israel and Judah, as a NATIONAL covenant.

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