as being the boundary of the Persian Empire in the reign of that monarch called Ahasuerus, who married Esther. See INDIA.

Such are the countries of Asia chiefly mentioned in the Books of the Old Testament-countries in which occurred the most important events, from which emanated the arts and sciences of civilized life, and which abound with the most interesting memorials, and the most solemn and hallowed traditions.

It would require volumes to illustrate the history of the vast continent of Asia, which contains a larger area than any of the other divisions of the globe. Its physical aspect, its islands, mountains, and plains, its rivers and lakes, its vegetable productions, animals, birds, and other matters in natural history, mineralogy, geology, and science in general, are copious subjects for inquiry, which, as far as they are connected with the present work, the reader will find under their proper heads. The manners, customs, condition, religions, and political history of the various Asiatic nations, also afford materials for an extensive investigation. Idolatry, under the various names of Brahmaism, Budhism, or Lamaism, the worship of the Fire, and a host of other distinguishing beliefs, is the dominant re ligion of the greater part of Asia, while in the south-west of this mighty continent Mahometanism is the prevailing religion. With regard to the number of inhabitants in Asia we have no accurate estimate, for the Asiatics possess no statistical knowledge, and, except surveys instituted by their several governments and their princes for the purposes of taxation, no other political inquiries are ever set on foot by authority. The accounts of the extent of the Chinese population differ to the extent of one hundred millions; those regarding Persia, Hindostan, the Asiatic Islands, and other countries, are of no better authority, and no accurate census can be expected of the roving tribes of Armenia, Arabia, and Tartary. One writer (Hassel) estimates the whole Asiatic population at

480,000,000, which he divides in the following manner:-Christians of all denominations, 17,000,000; Jews, 650,000; Mahometans, 70,000,000; the sect of Budho, or Fo, 295,000,000; Brahmins, 80,000,000; Shamans, 8,550,000; Sikhs, 4,500,000; sect of Lao-Kiun, and sect of Confucius in China, 3,000,000; sect of Sinto in Japan, 1,000,000; Guebres, or Fire Worshippers, 300,000-in all, 480,000,000, as above stated. The reader will observe, however, that the above estimate is altogether fanciful, as are also the numbers of the adherents to the different systems of religion. He is decidedly in error, for example, in his estimate of the number of the Jews. That people are found in almost every part of Asia, and must be double or triple the number he allows them.

We conclude this sketch of ancient Asia, as far as it respects the countries mentioned in the Sacred Scriptures, with an extract from a well known and valuable work on the character and manners of the Asiatic nations. "The character of the Asiatics," says the writer, "is represented in a very unfavourable light by all travellers. Lieutenant Pottinger, who travelled in Hindostan, Persia, and other countries, asserts that moral turpitude may be said to pervade the population and society of every nation in Asia of which we have the slightest knowledge; and this description is confirmed by other travellers, who describe the people to be dissolute in their morals, of cold and selfish dispositions, and withal cruel and treacherous, without any regard to truth, and indulging without either restraint or shame in the most scandalous crimes. Of all the nations in Asia, the Persians are reckoned to be the most refined, and yet, according to Herbert, Chardin, and others, and more recently, Fraser, Pottinger, and Sir John Malcolm, they are tinged with all the Asiatic vices of cruelty, meanness, lying, and the grossest licentiousness. The Hindoos do not rank higher than the Persians in the scale of morality; and among the Burmese and other Eastern states, the treatment of

women, who are held to be an inferior class, and are sold into slavery by their busbands and parents, and the cruelties which they commit in war, besides other revolting customs, indicate a state of manners which, contrasted with those of Europe, may be justly considered barbarous. Of the low state of morals among the Chinese, we need seek no other evidence than the inhuman practice, which is known to prevail in all the populous cities, of exposing new-born children to perish in the streets. There is no truer mark of barbarism than an indifference to the sufferings of our fellow creatures; and, on the other hand, it is only in a highly civilized community that man is trained to the exercise of social benevolence. The savage is always found to be cold, unsocial, and selfish. In the progress of society this selfish principle is corrected; man is impressed with the duties which he owes to his fellow men, and is taught to know experimentally that it is not in the selfish pursuit of his own good, but in the mutual interchange of benefits, that the greatest sum of individual happiness is to be found. If we examine the manners, institutions, and policy of different nations, it will be seen that mankind are humane and moral exactly as they are instructed; and that, as the diffusion of knowledge leads to the practice of the social virtues, ignorance as surely produces cruelty, selfishness, and vice. Thus, among the Persians and Turks, cruelties are committed which would be repudiated by the more advanced civilization of Russia; and in illustration of the same principle, we may here mention a circumstance which serves to place in an equally striking contrast the manners of the English and the Chinese. An English vessel happened to be at anchor in the roads of Canton, when a Chinese boat was upset, and the crew precipitated into the water. The accident was observed by numbers of the Chinese, who beheld with the utmost indifference their countrymen struggling for their lives; but the officers and seamen of the English vessel instantly

lowered their boats, and were seen, with their usual zeal in the cause of humanity striving to save the lives of those who were entire strangers to them. Now we cannot have a surer index to the station which each nation holds respectively in the scale of civilization than the opposite conduct which they severally pursued in this case; and this insensibility to human distress is not peculiar to the Chinese, it seems to pervade the whole population of Asia; while in Europe we see every where proofs of active benevolence, the most munificent establishments for the relief of misery, hospitals for the sick and infirm, houses of refuge for the aged, the blind, the destitute, and the insane, besides charitable associations of every description. In Asia the rich and the powerful associate not to relieve but to oppress the poor; and throughout its wide extent no asylums for distress nor any charitable institutions are to be seen; the miserable are left to their fate, which is generally to die unpitied either of famine or disease. This degraded state of society seems to be the joint effect of tyranny and superstition. In Asia there is no government which wears even the semblance of freedom. In form, as well as in practice, they are purely despotic, the princes being tyrants and the people slaves. The manners of Asia favour the exercise of unlimited power; and this vast continent is accordingly one scene of excess and misrule, where the mere will of the monarch is a warrant for the prescription and death of any individual, however powerful, and for the ruin of his family The people, ruled according to these severe maxims of despotism, live in continual dread of violence and wrong; and they naturally resort in self-defence to fraud, falsehood, and treachery, which are the resources of weakness. Thus all sense of their independence is at last extinguished, and under the iron rod of their political masters they degenerate into abject slaves, without honour, intelligence, or morality. Despotism in Asia assumes so severe a character, that it

invades the security of private life, relaxes all social ties, and re-acting on the people with its pernicious influence, tends still fruther to debase them, and to fit them for the endurance of its degrading yoke. The sanction given to polygamy by all the systems of religion (Christianity excepted) in the East, has also tended to encourage licentiousness. Mahomet found it convenient to allow this indulgence to his followers, and the Hindoos, the Burmese, the Chinese, and most of the other Asiatic nations, follow the same rule. The domestic tyrants of the East rule with despotic power over all the inmates of the harem, any of whom, in a fit of rage or jealousy, they may consign to a cruel death, no eye witnessing the deed. The institution of polygamy, which in this manner converts one half of the community into tyrants and the other half into slaves, has proved in every country in which it has been introduced the bane of morality as well as of peace. In Europe, the purer influence of Christianity consecrating the marriage union, and impressing on a man just considerations for the other sex which properly belongs to them, has released them for ever from the bondage of tyranny and vice, and, under its mild and beneficent maxims, the nations of Europe attained to a degree of morality, refinement, and intelligence, which distinguishes them to their advantage above the most polished nations of antiquity, and present a decided contrast to the licentiousness and misery of the East. The prevailing superstitions of Asia have also had their due share in corrupting the manners of the people. In Asiatic Turkey, in Arabia, Persia, and partly also in Hindostan and the Asiatic isles, the people have adopted the Mahometan faith; in Hindostan they have followed the religion of Brahma; and in Thibet, and farther eastward among the Burmese, in China, and the isles of Japan, the religion of Buddha or Fo is universally established, which, however corrupted in its various forms and idolatries, is still known to be derived from the Brahminical

faith. Now, all these different systems enjoin a variety of minute observances, and tedious pilgrimages and penances, a strict compliance with which constitutes the essence of religion. A pilgrimage to Mecca, for example, atones for all the iniquities of a Mahometan life; and the Hindoos and others have their pilgrimages and penances for the expiation of guilt.

A relaxation of morals is

the consequence; and hence, in those Eastern countries a strict profession of religion is not inconsistent with the most scandalous crimes."

ASIA MINOR, now called NATOLIA or ANATOLIA, and sometimes ANADOLI, is not expressly mentioned in the Sacred Scriptures by this name, but several of its countries and cities are prominently recorded by the New Testament writers. It is mentioned at the commencement of the preceding article, that Asia, the designation of the vast continent so called, was unknown to the Jews, or to the more ancient writers; and that the name ASIA was applied by Homer, Herodotus, and Euripides, to a district of Lydia watered by the Cayster, in which ancient geographers trace a people called Asiones, and a city called Asia, whence the name was extended by the Greeks, until all the countries of the East were comprehended under the general designation of Asiatic. Whether the tradition respecting the Asiones and the city Asia in Lydia be correct or not, it would be useless to inquire; certain it is, that Asia Minor or Natolia, solely referred to in the New Testament, under which we include the province of Caramania, was known to Europeans from the earliest times, while their knowledge of the countries of the great continent of Asia was acquired by degrees, and is yet to a certain extent very imperfect. Asia Minor is the most western part of the great continent of Asia, and is bounded by the Black Sea on the north; the river Euphrates on the east; and on the west and south by the Mediterranean, the Sea of Marmora, the Straits of the Hellespont and Bosphorus,

and part of Syria. It is of an irregularly oblong figure, about 1000 miles in length from east to west, and between 400 and 500 miles in breadth from north to south. The whole country is a part of the Turkish Empire, and is divided into provinces; the inhabitants are Christians of various communions, and Mahometans. The soil of this extensive region is extremely fertile; but, by the habitual indolence of its Turkish masters, many parts of it resemble a blighted desert. It produces corn, tobacco, fruits, silks, and cottons, and a vast trade is carried on in various important articles of merchandize. The chief divisions of Asia Minor in ancient times were, Lydia, Mysia, Lycia, Caria, Pamphylia, Pisidia, Galatia, Phrygia, Bithynia, Paphlagonia, Pontus, Cappadocia. Cilicia, and the Islands of Rhodes and Cyprus. Many of these provinces are particularly mentioned in the New Testament as the scenes of important events, and are described in this work under their several heads. A part of Asia Minor, however, is often mentioned by ancient writers under the general name of Asia, especially the Roman Proconsular province, which comprehended Phrygia, Mysia, and the adjacent districts.

In the New Testament, where the name exclusively occurs in the canonical Scriptures, Asia means either Asia Minor in general, or is restricted to the Roman Proconsular province; or perhaps Lydia, including Ionia and Æolis, within which were the Seven Churches called by St John the Seven Churches of Asia.

Asia Minor, like other regions of the continent of Asia, has been subject to many revolutions. It was tributary to the Scythians for upwards of fifteen hundred years, and was long under the domination of the Lydians, Medes, and other powerful nations of antiquity. The western parts of Asia Minor were the receptacles of all the ancient migrations from Greece, and may be said to have been totally peopled by Grecian colonies. "Those parts of Europe and Asia," says Dr Prichard, "where the two continents

approach to each other, including on the one side Thrace in its widest extent, and on the other Lesser Asia, have been connected from the earliest periods of history by political relations, and seem to have been originally peopled by the same races of men. These are the countries to which the names of Europe and Asia appear to have properly belonged, until both these appellations became gradually extended beyond the regions first known to their respective neighbours, The Bosphorus and the Hellespont were often passed from either side on warlike incursions; and while the Asiatics wcre more powerful and civilized than the people of Europe, no formidable barrier opposed the progress of the invaders until they came to the Danube. Several of the early conquerors, African or Asiatic, are said to have crossed this boundary; but all the districts to the southward of it were long, more or less, under the influence of Asiatic society and manners, and their connections with Asia are more intimate the farther we go back into the history of the world." The ancient inhabitants of Asia Minor may be referred to the Lydians and Thracians, who were descended from what are termed the Semitic or Syrian nations, of whom were the Elamites, the Assyrians, the Chasdim or Chaldeans, the Hebrews, Edomites or Idumeans, and the Arabs. The carly Greeks, before they left Asia for Europe, adopted some of the superstitions of the East. It has been rightly observed, that the worship of Vesta, both among the Greeks and Latins, was a relic of the Magian religion; and the worship of fire prevailed among the Lydians to a late period of their history. Strabo describes the mode in which the worship of fire was practised by the Magi in Cappadocia; and Pausanias mentions the fire temples in Lydia, where the priests, after arranging the wood, repeated litanies out of a book in a barbarous tongue, while, the flames caught. Among the Thracians, whose chief seat was in Europe, where they occupied all the countries between the Euxine or Black Sea and the Adriatic,

there were numerous circumstances in the manners, opinions, and superstitious practices, which indicated a previous connection with the people of Upper Asia. They practised polygamy; and when a husband died, his favourite wife immolated herself, dressed as if for some spectacle, on his funeral pile; and those who survived were considered as disgraced.

The name Asia Minor was not known among the ancients. Their general name for Upper and Lower Asia was simply Asia. It has been already observed, that when Asia is mentioned in the Apocryphal Books and in the New Testament, it is solely restricted to Asia Minor. In the Second Book of Esdras (xv. 46), the writer denounces Asia, whom he describes as "partaker of the hope of Babylon," and as the "glory of her person." He continues, "Woe be unto thee, thou wretch! because thou hast made thyself like unto her, and hast decked thy daughters in whoredom, that they might please and glory in thy lovers, which have alway desired to commit whoredom with thee!" Again, in the 16th chapter (verse 1), "Woe be unto thee, Babylon and Asia! Woe be unto thee, Egypt and Syria!" In these passages it is evident that Asia Minor must be exclusively denounced under the name Asia, because it is mentioned with countries which are in Asia, namely, Babylon or Babylonia, and Syria. Antiochus the Great is termed "the great king of Asia" in the First Book of the Maccabees (viii. 6), although his dominions were chiefly in Asia Minor. With reference to this kingdom, we are told in the same book, that "Tryphon went about to get the kingdom of Asia, and to kill Antiochus the king, that he might set the crown upon his own head" (xii. 39); and that he was successful in his conspiracy, for "Tryphon dealt deceitfully with the young king Antiochus, and slew him, and he reigned in his stead, and crowned himself king of Asia, and brought a great calamity upon the land." Tryphon's usurpation, however, was speedily terminated by his being taken and put to

death; and we find Seleucus, “king of Asia," the son of Antiochus the Great, rendering peculiar honours to Jerusalem: -"Now when the holy city was inhabited with all peace, and the laws were kept very well, because of the godliness of Onias the high priest, and his hatred of wickedness, it came to pass that even the kings themselves did honour the place, and magnify the Temple with their best gifts, insomuch that Seleucus, king of Asia, of his own revenues, bare all the costs belonging to the service of the sacrifices," 2 Macc. iii. 1–3.

The same remarks apply to the meaning of Asia in the New Testament. In the Acts of the Apostles, we find, amongst others specified, certain persons from Asia "disputing with Stephen" in the synagogue on the truth of Christianity (Acts vi. 9); for every synagogue had an academy in which persons exercised themselves under their rabbis in the study of traditions. St Paul and Silas " were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia" at that time, "because," says Dr Whitby, "it was the will of the Lord to employ them in a new work which they had not yet begun, namely, to preach to a Roman colony." The Evangelical historian proceeds"After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit suffered them not;" the Holy Spirit, according to Dr Hales, not suffering them "to waste their time in Asia Minor, intending that they should pass over to Europe, in order that they might sow the seed of a more abundant spiritual harvest," Acts xvi. 6, 7. It appears from the same Evangelical narrative, that in A.D. 56, the Christian Church numbere many converts in Asia Minor, Act xix. 10. St Paul appears to have bee the chief instrument in propagatin Christianity in Asia at this period; a least when he was residing at Ephesu in Proconsular Asia, he was accused b "Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines for Diana," of having "persuaded and turned away much people. saying that they be no gods which are