time, but for that meat which endures, and will nourifh their CHAP. V. fouls to everlasting life, and which he fhould give unto them in due time. And in the following part of this his discourse our Lord plainly acquaints them, that he was the living bread which came down from heaven: If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that he fhould give was his flesh or body, which he should give, by permitting it to be put to death, for the life of the world. To which our Lord fubjoins the indifpenfable neceflity that lies on all Christians to partake of the facrament, in order to obtain eternal happiness; for, faith our Lord, Verily, verily, I fay unto you, except ye eat (not only by believing in me crucified, but also facramentally) the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you, that is, it is impoffible for you to obtain everlasting life. This great and important doctrine I could not but take this fpecial notice of, that fo the reader may fee, that receiving the facrament of the Lord's Supper is necessary to falvation, as well as the receiving the other facrament of Baptifm, John vi. 27, 51, 53.

About this time was celebrated that which was the third The third paffover.

paffover after our Lord's entrance on his public ministry, A. D. 32. and which is mentioned, and only mentioned, by St. John the Evangelist, in the fame chapter, where he records the foregoing difcourfe of our Saviour, viz. John vi. 4.

CHAP.

CHAP. VI.

32 and 33.

A. D. Of our Saviour's Journeyings from the third Paffover after his Baptifm and Entrance upon his Public Miniftry, to the fourth Paffover, at which he was crucified.

1.

THE next journey of our Lord taken notice of by the

Of Canaan and SyroEvangelifts is that, when he went to the coafts of Tyre phoenicia. and Sidon, where he cured the daughter of the woman of Canaan, Matt. xv. 22. or, as St. Mark ftyles her, who was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by nation. That the coasts or territories of Tyre and Sidon lay to the weft and north of Galilee, has been observed chap. i. fect. 8. Where also it was observed, that the old inhabitants of this tract were defcendants of Canaan, and many of them not driven out by the children of Ifrael; whence this tract seems to have retained the name of Canaan a great while after thofe other parts of the faid country, which were better inhabited by the Ifraelites, had lost the said name. The Greeks called the tract inhabited by the old Canaanites along the Mediterranean Sea, Phoenicia; the more inland parts, as being inhabited partly by Canaanites or Phoenicians, and partly by Syrians, Syrophoenicia: and hence the woman faid by St. Matthew to be of Canaan, is more particularly faid by St. Mark to be a Syrophoenician by nation, as she was a Greek by religion and language. It is obfervable that the name Phoenicia, though it be mentioned in the Acts, yet it is never mentioned in the Gospels; but the lower or fouthern parts of it are in these always denoted by the coafts of Tyre and Sidon, two principal cities herein, of which therefore it will be convenient to give a more particular account.

2.

I shall begin with the city of Tyre, which lies fouth of Of Tyre. the other, about the distance of feven hours, or fomewhat better than twenty miles. It is probably supposed to have been first built by a colony of the Sidonians, (whence by

Ifaiah,

Isaiah, chap. xxiii. 12. it is called the daughter of Sidon,) CHAP. VI, and that on an high hill on the continent, the ruins whereof are still remaining by the name of Paletyrus, or Old Tyre. In process of time the city was removed into an adjoining rocky island, about feventy paces from the main land, and became a place of great trade and wealth, and for fome time outdoing even Sidon itself in both refpects. Hence Isaiah in his forementioned chapter faith of it, that her merchants were princes, and her traffickers the-honourable of the earth. It is particularly famous for dying purple, faid to be first found out here, and that by a mere accident; a dog's lips, by eating of the fish called Conchilis, being dyed of a purple colour. It was taken and deftroyed by Nebuchadnezzar; and after it had recovered itself, and flourished for a confiderable time, it was again demolished by Alexander the Great, and by him joined to the main land. Recovering once again both its beauty and riches, the city became a confederate of the Romans, and was by them invested with the privileges of a Roman city, for its great fidelity. It was made in the flourishing times of Christianity the metropolitan see for the province of Phoenicia but in A. D. 636. it was fubjected by the Saracens ; under which yoke having groaned for the space of 488 years, it was at last regained by the Christians, A. D. 1124. It was attempted afterward by Saladine, but in vain: however it was finally brought under the Turkish thraldom, A. D. 1289, as it ftill continues.

b

Mr. Maundrell has given us this account of its state and condition, A. D. 1697. This city, faith he, standing in the sea upon a peninfula, promises at a distance fomething very magnificent. But when you come to it, you find no fimilitude of that glory, for which it was fo renowned in ancient times, and which the prophet Ezekiel describes, chap. xxvi. xxvii. and xxviii. On the north fide it has an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle; befides which you fee nothing here, but a mere Babel of broken walls,

Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, p. 47.

pillars,

PART I. pillars, vaults, &c. there being not fo much as one entire houfe left. Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches, harbouring themselves in vaults, and fubfifting chiefly upon fifhing, who feem to be preferved in this place, by divine providence, as a visible argument, how God has fulfilled his word concerning Tyre, viz. That it Should be as the top of a rock, a place for fifhers to dry their nets on, Ezek. xxvi. 14.

In the midft of the ruins there stands up one pile higher than the reft, which is the east end of a great church, probably of the cathedral of Tyre: this having been an archiepifcopal fee in the Christian times; and why not the very fame cathedral, that was erected by its bishop Paulinus, and honoured with that famous confecration-fermon of Eufebius, recorded by himfelf in his Ecclefiaftical Hiftory, b. x. ch. iv.

I cannot in this place omit an obfervation made by most of our company in this journey, viz. that in all the ruins of churches which we faw, though their other parts were totally demolished, yet the east end we always found standing, and tolerably entire. Whether the Chriftians, when overrun by infidels, redeemed their altar from ruin with money; or whether the barbarians, when they demolished the other parts of the church, might voluntarily spare thefe, out of an awe and veneration; or whether they have ftood thus long by virtue of fome peculiar firmness in the nature of the fabric; or whether fome occult providence has preferved them as fo many standing monuments of Christianity in these unbelieving regions, and presages of its future restoration, I will not determine. This only I will fay, that we found it in fact fo as I defcribe, in all the ruined churches that came in our way, being perhaps not fewer than one hundred: nor do I remember ever to have seen one instance to the contrary. This might juftly feem a trifling obfervation, were it founded upon a few examples only. But it being a thing fo often, and indeed universally, obferved by us, throughout our whole journey, I thought it muft needs proceed from fomething more than

than blind chance, and might very well deferve this anim- CHAP. VI adverfion.

But to return from this digreffion: There being an old stair-cafe in this ruin laft mentioned, I got up to the top of it; from whence I had an entire profpect of the island part of Tyre, of the ifthmus, and of the adjacent shore. I thought I could from this elevation discern the isthmus to be of a foil of a different nature from the other two, it lying lower than either, and being covered all over with fand, which the fea cafts upon it, as the tokens of its natural right of a paffage there, from which it was by Alexander the Great injuriously excluded. The island of Tyre in its natural state seems to have been of a circular figure, containing not more than forty acres of ground. It difcovers ftill the foundations of a wall, which anciently encompaffed it round, at the utmoft margin of the fand. It makes with the ifthmus two large bays, one on its north fide, the other on its fouth. These bays are in part defended from the ocean, each by a long ridge, resembling a mole, ftretching directly out, on both fides, from the head of the island: but thefe ridges, whether they were walls or rocks, whether the work of art or nature, I was too far diftant to discern.

Coming out of the ruins we faw the foundation of a very strong wall, running across the neck of land, and serving as a barrier, to fecure the city on this fide. From this place we were one third of an hour in passing the fandy ifthmus, before we came to the ground, which we apprehended to be the natural shore. This is the account that Mr. Maundrell has lately given us of Tyre.

3.

Proceed we now to its mother city Sidon, one of the most ancient cities in the univerfe, and the most northern Of Sidon.. of all those which were affigned for the portion of the tribe of Afher. It is with great probability thought to take its name from Sidon, one of the fons of Canaan, Gen. x. 15. and did for a long time excel, as all the other cities of Phoenicia, fo Tyre itself; nay, it is faid by an heathen author to have been the greateft of maritime ci