Marcopolo, and others, who made a voyage into Tartary, in the thirteenth century, took these Lamas for Christians; and the idol, represented upon the medal, feems to be the fame which Du Halde mentions, which he describes to have three heads; before which the people perform their facred rites, with various geftures, motions, and dancings in a ridiculous manner, accompanied with many and repeated invocations. As to the great Lama, the people believe him immortal, and poffeffing all the perfections of divinity; that he has universal knowledge; that when he has advanced to old age, and appears to die, he only changes to another body, in which he is again born; and that the priests, or inferior Lamas, only, know the infant in whom the Dalai Lama exifts, and who is to replace the old one, to the senses of the people. In order to this, they seek out for a child that has as near a resemblance to the former Lama, as poffible, and make him fucceed; and thus they have given their divinity a power of new incarnations and fucceffions, from the beginning of his first appearance in the world.

"Bernier tells us, that he had the following account from a Lama phyfician: when the grand Lama, says he, is advanced to extreme old age, and thinks himself pretty near his end, he calls a council, to tell them, that he must foon pass into the body of fuch an infant, newly born; this infant is brought up, with great care, till he is fix or seven years old; then, in order to make fome proof of him, they lay before him certain little moveables of the dead perfon, mixed among some of his own, and, if he is capable of distinguishing them, it is a manifest proof of

his tranfmigration. This impofture, Father Grueber says, is carried on by the policy of the princes of Tibet. The Dalai Lama fits in a grand apartment, in his palace, adorned with gold and filver, and illuminated with a great number of lamps, upon a kind of bed, covered with the most rich tapestry; when they approach him, they proftrate themselves before him, touching the ground with their heads, and kissing his feet with the most profound

reverence.

"His face is always covered, which none but his chief confidents are permitted to fee. The refidence of this great Lama is upon the mountain of Putola, in the country of Barantola, upon which, twenty thousand other inferior Lamas dwell round about him, of different ranks and subordinations, which renders them respectively more or less worthy of approaching their great Pontif. Prodigious numbers of foreigners, from very great distances, as well as his own people, come to adore him, and receive his bleffing: nor are the kans and princes excufed from this attendance, nor received with lefs haughtinefs, than the meanest of the people. Formerly the Dalai Lama was esteemed only as a fpiritual power; but he is become, by degrees, a temporal prince; efpecially fince the conqueft of the Eluths, the kam of which people put him in poffeffion of a rich patrimony."

In these accounts from the miffionaries, it does not appear that they have done much honour to the Chriftian church; and, indeed, it is a great pity that there is room for so close a parallel between such abfolute idolatry, and any part of the church of CHRIST. The only analogy be

tween

tween the profeffion of the Lamas and that of Chriftians is in the worship of a Trinity in Unity, in my apprehenfion; all the reft they must allow to be idolatrous. And, if we look back at the articles of the ceremonies and rites, just mentioned, which they have informed us of, and from whence they draw fo exact a picture, and examine those of other pagan nations, almost every where, we fhall find them to be much the fame. However, this not being the scope of my inquiries, I fhall only stop a little to examine by what means the notion of a Triune Being was first propagated among these people.

LET us confider, that there can be only two ways by which they could have had any such doctrine implanted among them; and these are, either a tradition handed down from very remote antiquity, or the preaching of Christianity by fome miffionaries: as to the latter opinion, I cannot be inclined to think they had any information from Chriftians concerning the Trinity till lately; because no traces of the foundation of fuch revelation is found among them: if CHRIST had ever been named to them, they could never have forgotten that he was the fecond perfon in the ever-bleffed Trinity; and, therefore, must have had his Name in perpetual remembrance, for every attribute belonging to his divine functions. We find, that wheresoever St. Thomas had propagated the Christian faith, the people, to this day, know the principles of their religion, that JESUSs is the fon, the fecond person in the Trinity; and, according to several authors, he went into India, as far as Sumatra, preaching the Gofpel, and converting great numbers, in Media, Perfia

and other countries, as he went; but thefe were very remote from Tangutia, or Tibet; where, inftead of the incarnation, acknowledged by all true Chriftians, the Lamas make a fucceffion of idolatrous incarnations for the Dalai Lama, as it is already mentioned, without the least trace of the notion of a SAVIOUR, or REDEEMER, of the world.

If it be faid, the Neftorians might have given them fome hint of a Triune Being; then I would afk, why these (as all the numerous Neftorian Chriftians of the Eaftern countries do, and they are many) should not remember the principles of the doctrine of the Trinity; but the Nestorian, or, as fome of them call themselves, the Chaldean Christians have never lost the notion of the Trinity, however they differ from other Christians in some points.

NOR Can it be faid, that any of the Roman miffionaries conveyed that knowledge to the Tangutians; for they all own, with surprize, that they found them in poffeffion of this notion, without knowing the reason of it; and worshiping an idol calculated to represent the Trinity in Unity, as near as they poffibly could. We muft, therefore, rather suppose that this myftery was handed down to them from very high antiquity; and that it is probable the patriarchs, who were the worshipers of the TRUE GOD, had fome notice of it from the beginning: but that, in process of time, these people blended with it a number of idolatrous ceremonies and images, with other mixtures, from the superstitions of the Bramins, Magi, &c. perverting the true worship, yet retaining a fhew of this great mystery, which, by DIVINE Permission, many were informed of, long before its being made manifest in the

coming of our bleffed SAVIOUR. But, that the most ancient Jews had some lights among them of a plurality of persons in the GODHEAD, is more than probable, from certain particulars, mentioned by fome of our learned divines, which have not escaped the notice of the ingenious authors of the Universal Hiftory, and which will not be unentertaining in this place, as those gentlemen have declared it: because it would feem that the Jews were lefs careful to conceal the mysterious sense of certain words, which the wife men among them understood very well, before the birth of CHRIST, than afterwards; and were fince guilty of fome prevarication, with regard to the meaning of the prophefies, which point out the coming of the MESSIAH, in the plainest and most lively colours.

Now, there is one very prevailing reason, with me, that seems to prove that the Lamas had their notion of a plurality of perfons in the Deity, from the patriarchs and earliest Hebrews; besides what will appear in the following quotation from the worthy authors, juft mentioned; and that is that the words, Hear O Ifrael, the Lord our God is one Lord, in the fixth chapter of Deuteronomy, were commanded to be worn by the people as bracelets and frontlets, and to be written upon the posts and gates of their houses, &c. This is pretty nearly the cafe of the Tangutians, with regard to the medal, defcribed and explained by colonel Grant, and Strahlenberg: for it is given to the people as an holy thing to wear about them, and place in that part of their houses in which they usually pray; because it has the triune figure upon it, and the refpectful description of the DEITY upon the reverfe: and

it

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