time. And in the following part of this his dis- CHAP. VI. course 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 should 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 subjoins the indispensable necessity that lies on all Christians to partake of the sacrament, in order to obtain eternal happiness; for, saith our Lord, Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat (not only by believing in me crucified, but also sacramentally) the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you, that is, it is impossible for you to obtain everlasting life. This great and important doctrine I could not but take this special notice of, that so the reader may see, that receiving the sacrament of the Lord's Supper is necessary to salvation, as well as the receiving the other sacrament of Baptism, John vi. 27. 51. 53.

About this time was celebrated that which was The third the third passover after our Lord's entrance on his passover. public ministry, and which is mentioned, and only A.D. 32. mentioned, by St. John the Evangelist, in the same chapter, where he records the foregoing discourse of our Saviour, viz. John vi. 4.

CHAPTER VI.

A. D.

Of our Saviour's Journeyings from the third Passover after his Baptism and Entrance upon his 32 and 33. Public Ministry, to the fourth Passover, at which he was crucified.

1.

THE next journey of our Lord taken notice of by the Evangelists is that, when he went to the coasts Of Canaan of Tyre and Sidon, where he cured the daughter of and Syro

phoenicia.

PART I. the woman of Canaan, Matt. xv. 22. or, as St.

2.

Of Tyre.

Mark styles her, who was a Greek, a Syrophænician by nation. That the coasts or territories of Tyre and Sidon lay to the west and north of Galilee, has been observed chap. i. sect. 8. Where also it was observed, that the old inhabitants of this tract were descendants of Canaan, and many of them not driven out by the children of Israel; whence this tract seems to have retained the name of Canaan a great while after those other parts of the said country, which were better inhabited by the Israelites, 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 said by St. Matthew to be of Canaan, is more particularly said by St. Mark to be a Syrophoenician by nation, as she was a Greek by religion and language. It is observable that the name Phoenicia, though it be mentioned in the Acts, yet it is never mentioned in the Gospels; but the lower or southern parts of it are in these always denoted by the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, two principal cities herein, of which therefore it will be convenient to give a more particular

account.

:

I shall begin with the city of Tyre, which lies south of the other, about the distance of seven hours, or somewhat better than twenty miles. It is probably supposed to have been first built by a colony of the Sidonians, (whence by Isaiah, chap. xxiii. 12. it is called the daughter of Sidon,) and that on an high hill on the continent, the ruins whereof are still remaining by the name of Palætyrus, or Old Tyre. In process of time the city was removed into an adjoining rocky island, about seventy paces from the main land, and became a place of great trade and wealth, and for some time outdoing even Sidon itself in both respects. Hence Isaiah in his forementioned chapter saith of it, that her merchants were princes, and her traffickers the

honourable of the earth. It is particularly famous CHAP. VI. for dying purple, said 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 destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar; and after it had recovered itself, and flourished for a considerable 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 subjected 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 still continues.

Mr. Maundrell* has given us this account of its state and condition, A. D. 1697. This city, saith he, standing in the sea upon a peninsula, promises at a distance something very magnificent. But when you come to it, you find no similitude of that glory, for which it was so renowned in ancient times, and which the prophet Ezekiel describes, chap. xxvi. xxvii. and xxviii. On the north side it has an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle; besides which you see nothing here, but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, &c. there being not so much as one entire house left. Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches, harbouring themselves in vaults, and subsisting chiefly upon, fishing, who seem to be preserved 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 rook, a place for fishers to dry their nets on, Ezek. xxvi. 14.

* Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, p. 47%.

PART I.

In the midst of the ruins there stands up one pile higher than the rest, which is the east end of a great church, probably of the cathedral of Tyre: this having been an archiepiscopal see in the Christian times; and why not the very same cathedral, that was erected by its bishop Paulinus, and honoured with that famous consecration-sermon of Eusebius, recorded by himself in his Ecclesiastical History, b. x. ch. iv.

I cannot in this place omit an observation made by most of our company in this journey, viz. that in all the ruins of churches which we saw, though their other parts were totally demolished, yet the east end we always found standing, and tolerably entire. Whether the Christians, 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 these, out of an awe and veneration; or whether they have stood thus long by virtue of some peculiar firmness in the nature of the fabric; or whether some occult providence has preserved them as so many standing monuments of Christianity in these unbelieving regions, and presages of its future restoration, I will not determine. This only I will say, that we found it in fact so as I describe, 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 justly seem a trifling observation, were it founded upon a few examples only. But it being a thing so often, and indeed universally, observed by us, throughout our whole journey, I thought it must needs proceed from something more than blind chance, and might very well deserve this animadversion.

But to return from this digression: There being an old stair-case in this ruin last mentioned, I got up to the top of it; from whence I had an entire prospect of the island part of Tyre, of the isthmus, and of the adjacent shore. I thought I could from this elevation discern the isthmus to be of a soil of

a different nature from the other two, it lying lower CHAP. VI. than either, and being covered all over with sand, which the sea casts upon it, as the tokens of its natural right of a passage 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 discovers still the foundations of a wall, which anciently encompassed it round, at the utmost margin of the sand. It makes with the isthmus two large bays, one on its north side, the other on its south. These bays are in part defended from the ocean, each by a long ridge, resembling a mole, stretching directly out, on both sides, from the head of the island: but these ridges, whether they were walls or rocks, whether the work of art or nature, I was too far distant to discern.

Coming out of the ruins we saw the foundation of a very strong wall, running across the neck of land, and serving as a barrier, to secure the city on this side. From this place we were one-third of an hour in passing the sandy isthmus, 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 universe, and the most Of Sidon. northern of all those which were assigned for the portion of the tribe of Asher. It is with great probability thought to take its name from Sidon, one of the sons of Canaan, Gen. x. 15. and did for a long time excel, as all the other cities of Phonicia, so Tyre itself; nay, it is said by an heathen author to have been the greatest of maritime cities in general, having for a long time quietly enjoyed a great trade, which brought in vast riches, and made the inhabitants live in great voluptuousness; insomuch that to live quietly and securely in ease and pleasure, is denoted in the holy writings by living after the manner of the Sidonians, Judg. xviii. 7. The men of Sidon being great shipwrights,