Emperor Adrian was informed of their proceedings, he marched against them with a powerful army, stormed Bither, and slew a great number of Jews, in the seventy-third year from the destruction of the temple." Then the reigns of the three Cozibas lasted but twenty-one years, though some writers extend this term, because they place the elder Coziba under Domitian. The Ancient Jewish Chronicle allows but two years and a half to the Cozibas; but probably it only speaks of the grandson, who was slain by his followers because he could not completely personate the Messiah and distinguish criminals by their smell. The Talmud relates the same thing.

This account is a fabrication so badly put together, that it is astonishing able commentators should be found among Christians, who maintain its correctness. 1. They are unfortunate in supposing two Cozibas, or Barchochebases, for the greater part of the Jews acknowledge but one, and they are correct. 2. The rebellion of the Jews towards the close of Trajan's reign was excited by a man named Andrew, not Barchochebas, and he made no pretensions to the Messiahship. Besides, his insurrection was in Egypt, whereas that of Coziba was in Judea. 3. They display an ignorance of the genealogy of Trajan, for they relate that he sent Adrian, his sister's son, against the Jews of Egypt. But Ulpia, the grandmother of Adrian, was Trajan's aunt, and therefore these princes were only cousins. 4. The critics are also in an error as to the length of Coziba's reign (twenty-one years), the duration of the war against him, and the successors and heirs to his throne and property; for he was the last of his race, and his war was soon ended, as we shall see in the sequel. 5. They place his death in the seventy-third year from the destruction of the temple, whereas Adrian, who in the eighteenth year of his reign closed the war by the storm of Bither and death of Coziba, died before A. D. 141. This chronological error plainly shows that the whole account is false. The author of the Jewish Chronicle is more correct than his commentators, for he allows but two years and a half to the reign of Coziba, and speaks of him only as an impostor. 6. Finally, the Jews relate a fable that savours of rabbinic conceit, when they tell us that Coziba was put to the test by being required to distinguish criminals from others. Is there the least probability, that the Jews would test the Messiah by his powers of smelling? I can admit but one Barchochebas, who lived under Adrian, and brought many dreadful calamities on his countrymen.

This Coziba, endeavouring to persuade the Jews that he was their Messiah, furthered his design by changing his name, and calling himself the son of the star, or Barchochebas, to spread a belief that he was the star seen by Balaam in his vision, Num. xxiv. 17. He proclaimed himself a light from heaven, sent to succour the people, and to deliver them from the oppression of the Romans. To confirm his assertions, he made fire issue from his mouth when he spoke; at least St. Jerome relates that he made the people believe this, by means of lighted tow. He chose a precursor with a character like his own, and thus materially furthered his purposes.

Coziba selected for this dignity Akiba, who was supposed to be a descendant from Sisera, commander-in-chief under Jabin king of Tyre, by a Jewish mother. He passed forty years of his life as a shepherd, guarding the flocks of a rich citizen of Jerusalem named Calba Chuva.

His master's daughter fell in love with him, and urged him to apply himself to study, because she did not wish a shepherd to be her husband. They were secretly married, and Akiba left her, and spent about twelve years at a college. When he returned to his wife, twelve thousand disciples followed him; but his wife advised him to back to his college, and he complied. At the close of the next twelve years he went again to his wife with twenty-four thousand disciples. She came before him with her dress torn and disordered; for her father in his rage, at her marriage, had disinherited her. But when he saw Akiba, he knelt before him, and gave him a large amount of property, though in violation of an oath which he had taken.

'We have no mention of the location of the college whence Akiba drew his disciples. Their immense number surprises us; and our wonder is increased when we learnt that these twenty-four thousand followers all died between the Passover and Pentecost, that no one should have any advantage over another, and that they were buried, together with Akiba and his wife, at the foot of a hill near Tiberias. Akiba contiuued to instruct his followers, and he wrote two works, one of which is cabalistic, and called Jetsirah, and must be distinguished from the book, with the same title, attributed to Abraham. He was so wise a man that he could give a reason for the use of the most insignificant letter in the law; and it is boldly asserted, that God revealed more to him than to Moses. The Mishna and Talmud contain a thousand maxims, which the rabbins attribute to him, and believe to inculcate the most profound wisdom. Indeed, a whole volume would not contain the wonderful things which he did and said. The Deity permitted Akiba to enter paradise with doctor Asia, to whom his sister was betrothed. Thus the rabbins praise this man, who brought desolation on his country, and aided an impostor who pretended to the Messiahship.'-Vol. ii. pp. 238-241.

Never did the world present such a singularly constituted race as were the Jews just previous to, and immediately after, the destruction of their city. It was not the depth of ruin into which they were plunged, the mere consequences, however dire, of resist ance to a superior force, which made the horror of their condition so deep and dreadful. There was a mystery and supernatural darkness in the character of their minds. False prophecying, necromancy, imposture in all its death-working energy, obscured and poisoned the very air about them. Nature and revelation were alike clothed in darkness. A mortal sickness and phrenzy attacked all that spoke or thought of faith, or freedom, and men looked every instant either for the dead to rise from the graves, or a conqueror to descend from heaven. There was no cool spot, no green shelter in this arid wilderness of human thought, to which the fevered wretch could flee-none but that which he had learnt to avoid as perdition, and which his phrenzied imagination had heaped round with the burning ashes of his lost home. The louder, therefore, the false prophet lifted up his voice, the better was he received. The more daring the gloss of the scribe, the more acceptable was it to the reader of the law. Never was truth so simultaneously banished from a whole people-never was a people so completely

under the influence of a wild and self-renewing superstition. Famine, pestilence, and all the horrors for which the sword of war makes a path, have worked their full work on other lands. The darkest page of one history is in these things the parallel of the darkest in another. Judea stands alone in the moral awfulness of her later doom.

However uninteresting our history may be in other respects, it presents one fact which excites our admiration. We refer to the preservation of the Jews as a distinct nation, notwithstanding all the miseries which they have endured for seventeen hundred years. The religions of other nations have depended on temporal prosperity for their duration; they have triumphed under the protection of conquerors, and have fallen and given place to others under a succession of weak monarchs. Paganism once overspread the known world, even where it now no longer exists. The Christian church, glorious in her martyrs, has survived the persecutions of her enemies, though she cannot soon heal the wounds which they have inflicted. But Judaism, hated and persecuted for seventeen centuries, has not merely escaped destruction; but it has always been powerful and flourishing. Kings have employed the severity of laws and the hands of the executioner to eradicate it, and a seditious populace have injured it by their massacres more than kings. Sovereigns and their subjects, Pagans, Christians, Mohammedans, opposed to each other in everything else, have formed a common design to annihilate this nation; but without success. The bush of Moses has always continued burning and never been consumed. The expulsion of the Jews from the great cities of kingdoms, has only scattered them through the world. They have lived from age to age in wretchedness, and shed their blood freely in persecution; they have continued to our day in spite of the disgrace and hatred which have everywhere clung to them, while the greatest empires have fallen and been almost forgotten.

After the destruction of Jerusalem, the wretchedness of the Jews was peculiar in its nature. During their other captivities, God always fixed a time when he would break the yoke of their tyrants and restore them to liberty and the Holy Land. Their longest captivity was that of Egypt, which lasted but a few centuries. They returned from Babylon at the end of seventy years, and the persecution of Antiochus ceased after three years and ten days. But God has not foretold by his prophets the length of their present sufferings, although the evangelists inform us that they are to be restored. God consoled them under former misfortunes, by raising up heroes and inspired men. Ezekiel prophecied at Babylon, and Daniel foretold the advent of the Messiah. The Maccabees too supported the glory of the Jews against the kings of Syria; but from the destruction of Jerusalem, false Messiahs only have appeared, and rendered the yoke which they wished to break the more burthensome. The succession of prophets has ceased, and there is no one to mark out the time when the Jews shall regain their liberty. Formerly, when God delivered over his people to the heathen, he preserved the body of the nation in one place; as for instance, the Jews were assembled in the valley of Goshen previous to leaving Egypt. Cyrus had no difficulty in uniting the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, when he restored them to their country. A part of the

nation lived in the same villages, and the Israelites cultivated the banks of both branches of the Chaboras. But after the destruction of Jerusalem, and during the war of Adrian, the Jewish nation, weakened by horrid massacres, were scattered through every province of the empire. This dispersion continues to the present day, and a remnant of the ten tribes can now hardly be found in the east, where formerly they were numerous and powerful.'-vol. ii. pp. 269–271.

The following very remarkable speech of one of the rabbis, merits being quoted as an accompaniment to the foregoing :

66

A rabbi, who instructed the king of Cozar, wishing to explain the cause of the miseries which afflicted the Jews, maintained that they bore the penalty of the sins of mankind. My nation," said he, "is to the world what the heart is to the human body. As the heart suffers from weakness of constitution, copiousness of the juices, bad digestion, and the passions, so the Jews are punished for the sins of mankind. As the veins discharge themselves into the heart, so every nation burthen the Jews with their crimes, who become the more sinful by an intercourse with pagans, as David predicted: they were mingled among the heathen, and learned their works.' While the Jews are oppressed and wretched, the world enjoys a profound peace. But as an abscess does not form itself in the heart, so guilt belongs to the heathen and not to the Jew. Calamities will one day re-establish the law, and effect the object of God in preserving the Jews; that is, the separation of the chaff from the wheat." In a word, the Jews look upon themselves as the cause of happiness to every creature; as the heart of mankind, which, though it may be diseased, is still the source of life and activity to all the members. Thus the Jews, in spite of their afflictions and calamities, consider, themselves as exalted above every other people, to be the favourites of heaven. They represent God as prescribing for two sick men, one of whom is incurable and the other may be healed. The first is permitted to indulge in wine and delicacies, which are forbidden to the second, lest they should increase his fever and destroy his life. The sick man whose case is hopeless is intended for the Gentiles and Christians, who are permitted to enjoy worldly pleasures and prosperity but the Jew is confined to a regular diet, lest he should become corrupt and be condemned. It is thus that they gloss over their calamities, instead of confessing their own guilt,'

The account given of the Jewish people in the remainder of the volume, carries their history down to the time of their utter dispersion. But we have said enough of the character of the work to evince our high opinion of its merit and usefulness. No biblical student should be without it, unless he can afford, which few can, the purchase of many expensive books, and it will be readily understood, from the nature of the extracts we have given, that it may be read with interest and profit by the general inquirer into the character and situation of the nations of antiquity.

ART. VIII.-1. The Legendary Cabinet, or a Collection of British National Ballads, Ancient and Modern, from the best Authorities, with Notes and Illustrations. By the Rev. J. D. Parry, M.A., of St. Peter's College, Cambridge. 8vo. London: Joy. 1829.

2. Minstrelsy, Antient and Modern, with an Historical Introduction and Notes. By William Motherwell. Glasgow: Wylie. 1829.

WE did not anticipate, when in noticing a volume of Poetical Extracts, a short time since. (Vide Monthly Rev., for May,* Schultes) we digressed into praises of the more meritorious editors and collectors of metrical tradition, that we should so soon be called upon to turn our attention to two new and highly meritorious labourers in this walk. Mr. Motherwell is of the higher class, but Mr. Parry deserves all the praise which belongs to a diligent and conscientious student, who is anxious to render easily accessible and intelligible to the mass of youthful readers, those Legendary Tales, which have, at the same time, gratified his own taste, and which his scrupulous morality has found unobjectionable. The man of letters who is desirous of obtaining the most comprehensive, minute, and literal information respecting the earliest English narrative poetry, will not feel himself largely indebted to Mr. Parry; but if he is habituated to estimate the merit of publications by their effect on numerous classes of society, and not merely by the variety of new ideas, which he individually derives from them, he will find in the Legendary Cabinet,' much that he can dwell upon with disinterested approbation.

The editor states in his preface, the principle by which he has been guided in making his selections. He refers to

At

A previous announcement, of its being conducted, as far as the subject would admit, on a MORAL plan; or, at the least, with the exclusion of all articles of a directly exceptionable character. the same time, it is hoped that no candid and intelligent reader will mistake this for an unqualified panegyric on its contents; or subject that to a rigid assay, which was never intended for, and consequently never can come forth as, pure and unmixed metal.

It is well known that this description of poetry possesses to many minds, and particularly to those of the young, peculiar charms; it is also a fact which may easily be verified by observation, that in no previous selection of this kind, has any discretion been exercised as to the general character and effect of their miscellaneous contents. To render, then, that which is popular, at least comparatively innocent, is surely an object which a superior mind might not consider beneath its notice;-and in this view of the subject, the editor has had the satisfaction of coinciding with the ideas of a high ecclesiastical character, but whose name he is not at liberty here to mention. Such then has been his prevailing design in the production of this little volume; and whether or not he shall be pronounced by

*Vol. xi. pp. 31-33.