To "THE ANTIQUITIES OF MEXICO," the following pages are indebted for the most valuable portion of the testimony by which they are enriched.

This rare and costly compilation, which was a few years. ago published by the Right Honorable Lord Viscount Kingsborough, has hitherto been little known beyond the libraries of Universities, and those of a few Noblemen.

"The ANTIQUITIES OF MEXICO" at the present time consist of seven folio volumes, which, with the exception of the sixth, contain fac-similes and drawings from such historical remains, as had escaped the destruction to which all the primitive records and other memorials of the tribes of the New Continent had been condemned by the policy of their invaders in the fifteenth century.

Literary and antiquarian travellers having from time to time transmitted these precious relics to their respective governments, they have been preserved in the Royal Libraries of Paris, Berlin, Dresden-the Imperial Library of Vienna-the Vatican Library, in the Museum at Rome, in the Library of the Institute of Bologna, and in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

As a specimen of the genius of a primitive race, over whose origin has long brooded a mysterious obscurity; and as a successful attainment in antiquarian research, the pub

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lication of Viscount Kingsborough is highly interesting and curious but rising as it does to the sublime character of an illustration and confirmation of Scripture testimony, in disclosing the Hebrew origin, history, experience, and genius of that grand division of the Hebrew nation, which, although cut off for a series of ages from their own, and the nations of the earth, have nevertheless occupied a prominent place in the prophetic pages; the importance of such a testimony (at such an ominous crisis in the history of Christendom,)-so miraculously preserved,so long withheld,-so unexpectedly reclaimed ;-(whether in its internal or relative character) like the Bow of peace and promise, speaks of a PLACE and state of REST beyond the impending cloud of retributive storm.

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS.

TERRITORIAL empire was immediately after that purification which the earth received from the Deluge, assigned to the three surviving representatives of the present inhabitants of the globe: and the boundary of each was soon after specifically determined and defined. The appointment was one of unerring wisdom and universal goodness; but alienation of heart and mind from the divine supremacy soon manifested itself in that self-will which suggests covetous desires, and enforces these by arbitrary violence.

The LORD blessed all the sons of Noah on their coming forth from the ark to inherit the baptised earth: it was by coveting the possession of territories beyond their rightful empire, that the sons of Ham forfeited that blessing in which they were originally included, and by this demonstration of rebellion against the appointments of the Most High, and usurpation of the rights of others, they incurred that curse by which they have been distinguished. Covetousness,' by withdrawing the mind and heart from the will of God, and by constituting some substituted object supreme in our regard, 'is,' in essence and effect idolatry.' Hence the incalculable evils of this early infringement of His authority who "appointed to all nations the bounds of their habitations."

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Self-will and licentious desires prepared the ungodly Ham for that malediction, which a specific provocation at length called forth. It was prophetically addressed to him as the father of Canaan, whose lawless and impious acts would justify the curse of degradation then pronounced by the patriarch.

An isolated act of provocation would have called for a personal rebuke; but in that prophetic curse, Canaan, the son of the immediate delinquent, is specially implicated, and that most justly.

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That the malediction should have been given in the spirit of prophecy-in a fore-knowledge of the character which would justify it, was in Israel a common occurrence. dren of eight days old were in this spirit so characteristically named, that not alone their own circumstances, but the history of their tribe was frequently involved in the prophetic appellation then given. The descriptive blessings of Jacob and of Moses to the heads of the twelve tribes, fully illustrate this truth.

But why did Noah select Canaan as the worst branch of the family of Ham? did he not foresee that Cush also, and his sons, would invade a great portion of that territory allotted to one of the branches of the family of Shem? and that having thus rebelled against the divine appointment, they, on the warrant of the same self-will, would, in renouncing the authority of the Creator, constitute the "host of Heaven" the objects of their supreme regard and homage, together with those graven images' which should represent their famous leaders.

Assuredly Noah had a premonition of their departure from the Most High, since he foresaw that Canaan would be guilty of a still more aggravated enormity.

By sovereign right and choice, the Creator of all had