that the same person had, in a late visit to her, greatly confused and distressed her mind by a long and loud prayer containing sentiments not at all agreeable to her. Mrs. Talinage was of a very yielding disposition, which, since the decease of her husband brought her apparently much under the influence of persons not belonging to the New Church; affliction, however, that unwelcome but salutary monitor, soon restored her real estimation of the heavenly doctrines, and made her as anxious to see her New Church friends, as she was reluctant to be troubled with Methodist instructors. I have been rather diffuse perhaps in this account, but I cannot conclude it without reprehending the truly papistical and jesuitical conduct of certain religionists, in taking advantage of the mental feebleness frequently attendant on the extreme exhaustion of nature, by offering a full and free pardon in the name of the only Searcher of hearts, provided the sufferer will make a confession of the truth of their dogmas, and enable them to delude their thoughtless votaries with the marvellous tale of the zealous saint, who effected the glorious work of conversion and justification, that he was just in time to save the soul of the departed from everlasting perdition; for which assertion a scarcely intelligible sign from a wandering, and perhaps unconscious mind, doubtless sometimes affords his only warrant. If this is not Popery revived, in respect to its fallacies of auricular confession and absolution by the priest (nay even a layman will do), I am much mistaken. W. M. London, Dec. 1824. VARIETIES, PHILOSOPHICAL AND LITERARY. GENERAL VIEW OF THE AUTHENTICITY OF ANCIENT HISTORY IN ASIA. The following succinct Analysis of an Essay on the Authority of the Asiatic Historians, by the celebrated Orientalist, M. Julius Klaproth, is translated from the Sixth Number of De Ferussac's "Bulletin des Sciences Historiques." "The history of ancient nations consists of three grand divisions; Fabulous history, which is nevertheless abundant in truths, although enveloped in the obscure veil of allegory; Doubtful history, in which the facts are true, or at least probable, but without chronology; and lastly, Authentic history, in which the principal facts are true, and the chronology incontestably proved. Authentic history commences but from a recent period among the great bulk of the nations of Asia. The Mussulmans, animated by an ill-directed religious zeal, have destroyed the ancient histories, in their fear that the perusal of those writings might prove fatal to their religion. The authentic history of the Arabs scarcely ascends to the fifth century of our era. The history of the Turks, among the Persians, rises higher, but neither agrees with that of the Greeks, nor with the historical notions which are found in the sacred books of the Parsees in India. The nations of the Turkish race, who have adopted the religion of Mahomet, are in possession of nothing historical prior to this period. With respect to the Mongols, they have a history of their nation digested at the commencement of the 14th century by Khodja Rachid, from documents preserved in the royal archives, and from respectable traditions. Among the Hindoos, religion has destroyed all history; for, considering the present life only as a state of pain and trial through which it is necessary to pass, they consider external events as unworthy of record or remembrance. Thus the English, notwithstanding all their researches, have not found among them a single ancient history in the language of the country. With difficulty can we discover a few historical traces in their sacred poems full of mythological allegory. The Mussulman dynasties, however, which have governed the countries of India, have had historians who have written either in Persian or in Hindostanee. What has been observed respecting the deficiency of history among the Hindoos, is applicable to every nation which has adopted one of the divisions of the Indian religion. The Tibetians, nevertheless, have historical works which go back as far as to the commencement of the Christian era, the period at which the religion of Bouddha was introduced from India into Tibet. It would seem as if the history of China were to be considered as isolated from that of the other nations; this, however, is not the case: for in it many passages are found which illustrate events of an important character, such as those from which Europe has derived its existing condition: for the migrations of nations, in the middle ages, cannot be sufficiently elucidated, without having recourse to the historical books of the Chinese." Here M. Klaproth dilates on the Chinese history, and distinguishes their books of true history, from those which are not of this character: he then passes to the examination of the Japanese history, of that of the central Asiatics, of the Armenians, and of the Georgians; and finishes his dissertation with the following table, which enables us to contemplate its results at one view. "Commencement of authentic history: Arabs, in the 5th century of the Christian era; Persians, in the 3rd.; Turks, in the 14th.; Mongols, in the 12th.; Tibetians, in the Ist.; Chinese, in the 9th., before Cbrist; Japanese, in the 7th., B. C.; Armenians,, in the 2nd., B. C.; Georgians, in the 3rd., B. C. The doubtful history of the most ancient people goes as far back only as to rather more than 3000 years prior to the Christian era." FRESH DISCOVERIES OF FOSSIL BONES, SOME OF THEM BELONGING TO ANIMALS NOW EXTINCT. An immense assemblage of fossil bones has recently been discovered in Somersetshire, in a cavern of the Limestone rock at Banwell, near the western extremity of the Mendip Hills, in the property of the Bishop of Bath and Wells. The circumstances which led to this discovery are as follows:-Some miners engaged in sinking a shaft in search of calamine, intersected a steep and narrow fissure, which, after descending 80 feet, opened into a spacious cavern, 150 feet long and about 30 feet wide, and from 20 to 30 feet high. From the difficulty of descending by this fissure, it was lately judged desirable to make an opening in the side of a hill a little below, in a line which might lead directly to the interior of the cave. This gallery had been conducted but a few feet, when the workmen suddenly penetrated another cavern of inferior dimensions to that which they were in search of, and found its floor to be covered, to a depth which has not yet been ascertained, with a bed of sand, mud, and fragments of limestone, through which were dispersed an enormous quantity of bones, horns, and teeth. The thickness of this mass has been ascertained, by a shaft sunk into it, to be in one place nearly 40 feet. Many large baskets full of bones have already been extracted, belonging chiefly to the Ox and Deer tribes; of the latter there are several varieties, including the Elk. There are also a few portions of the skeleton of a Wolf, and of the extinct gigantic Bear. These bones are mostly in a state of preservation equal to that of common grave bones. In the roof of the cave there is a large chimney-like opening, which appears to have communicated formerly with the surface; but which is choked up with fragments of limestone, interspersed with mud and sand, and adhering together imperfectly by a stalagmitic incrustation. Through this aperture it is probable the animals fell into the cave, and perished, in the period preceding the inundation by which it was filled up. The immense quantity of the bones shows the number of individuals that were lost in this natural pitfall to have been very great. In this manner cattle are now continually lost by falling into similar apertures in the limestone hills of Derbyshire. There is nothing to induce a belief that it was a den inhabited by Hyænas, like the cave of Kirkdale, or by Bears, like those in Germany; its leading circumstances are similar to those of the ossiferous cavities in the Limestone Rock at Oreston near Plymouth. The workmen some time since employed in forming the tunnel under the road at Kemp-Town,near Brighton, discovered numerous teeth and bones, which were at first supposed to be parts of human skeletons, but, upon being examined by a gentleman conversant with such subjects, were ascertained to belong to the Horse and Elephant. Similar organic remains are commonly found in beds of debris, like that on which Brighton is situated. The town is built upon an accumulation of water-worn materials, which fill up a valley of the chalk. A short time since, a rib of a very large animal, supposed to be that of an Elephant, was discovered in the bank on the western side of Shoreham harbour. Mr. Mantell, of Lewes, well known as a diligent explorer of the geology of Sussex, has discovered in the iron-sandstone of the county,/ the teeth of an herbivorous Reptile of a gigantic magnitude. This animal approaches nearer to the Iguana of Barbadoes, than to any other recent Lizard, and it is proposed to distinguish it by the name of the Iguano saurus. Detached parts of the skeleton, as vertebræ, thigh-bones, &c.. have been found, of which a particular account is preparing for publication. Mr. Mantell has part of a thigh-bone in his possession, which there is every reason to conclude is referrable to this animal; its size is so great, that upon a moderate computation, the individual to which it belonged must have equalled the Elephant in height, and been upwards of sixty-feet long. We are obliged this time, to omit our usual Poetical Department; the completion of the Number, from unavoidable circumstances, having been driven so close to the time of publication, as to leave no opportunity for arranging it otherwise. Errata in our last. Page 290, line 19, For of that good, read of that of good, 306, THE INTELLECTUAL REPOSITORY FOR The New Church. NEW SERIES.-No. VI.-APRIL, 1825. THE WORD OF THE LORD, Or those Books of Holy Scripture which have an Internal Sense, explained according to that Sense; by a Revelation given to the World, of the Divine Mercy of the Lord, through Emanuel Swedenborg. Together with the Original Text; a New, Complete, and most Accurate Version; and Select Critical and Philological Observations, necessary for the right apprehension of the Literal, Grammatical, and Historical Sense; which is the Basis, Continent, and Support, of the Divine Arcana which are concealed within. Containing 1. The Pentateuch. 2. Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings. 3. The Prophets. 4. The Psalms. 5. The Four Gospels. 6. The Apocalypse. [Translated from the Latin of the Professor of Oriental Languages in the University of Upsala.] 1 SPECIMEN FROM THE PROPHET ISAIAH. Chap. ix. 7, to Ch. x. 4. Continued from last Number, p. 382. II. II. .12 וְהָעָם לֹא שָׁב עַד־הַמַּכָּהוּ .Populus non revertitur ad se per : 72277 .13 דָרָשׁוּ : וְיַכְרֵת יְהוָה Ideo exstirpat Jehova e Israele cutientem, Jehovam exercituum non quærunt. caput et caudam, palmitem et juncum uno die. No. VI.-VOL. I. 3 I |