GENERAL SKETCH OF THE NESTORIAN CHRISTIANS.
THE interest with which we contemplate a nation or people, is often in great disproportion to its numbers. The little States of Greece stand unrivalled on the pages of history, as the early instructors and civilizers of the race. The small community of the Waldenses, pent up in the narrow valleys of Piedmont, was the repository of that inestimable treasure-the vitality of our holy religion during the long night while the rest of Europe lay torpid under the darkness of spiritual death. The few thousands of Moravians occupy a place on the records of the church, in the vigor of their zeal and the energy of their efforts to extend the triumphs of the gospel, which great christian nations might worthily covet. And the small island of Britain is, at this hour, exerting an influence on the condition and destinies of the whole world, which the vast extent and the unnumbered myriads of China have not only never known, but would hardly be able to rival, were her broad territory and countless inhabitants, illumined by the light of science and controlled by the spirit of Christianity.
The obscure people who are the particular subject of this volume, possess a humble claim to illustrate the principle I have suggested. The Nestorian Christians are the small, but venerable, remnant of a once great and influential christian church. They are the oldest of christian sects; and, in their better days, were numerous through all the vast regions from Palestine to China; and they carried the gospel into China itself. Their history is a checkered one. Sometimes, as under the tolerant policy of the mighty Jhengis Khân, they were raised to high places in the camp and at the court; while at other times, as by the crushing arm of the bloody Timourláne, they were cut down and swept away, till scarce a vestige remained, save in the fastnesses of inaccessible mountains. But in both prosperity and adversity, during more than a thousand years of their history, are furnished the brightest examples of persevering toil and self-de