history; but the religious aspect, which it wears, particularly fixes the attention, and awakens the sympathy of the Christian, whilst contrasting its present degeneracy with its former splendid condition: it was in this quarter where the grand scene of Revelation was gradually unfolded, where Patriarchs and Prophets lived, and in the fulness of time Jesus promulgated that religion, the sum and substance of former revelations, whose benign influence has meliorated the condition of mankind, and to whose sublime discoveries we are indebted for the clearest and most consolatory views of eternity.
The spectacle now exhibited by the Eastern world, is that of an affecting apostasy from the true faith, which has existed for more than twelve centuries, with a very injurious effect, and a marked and striking contrast to the beneficial operation of the Christian dispensation, The revolutions of empire read
