Page:The travels of Macarius, Patriarch of Antioch - Volume I.djvu/14

vi repeated, nearly all, with little variation, and serving to mark the Calendar of the Archdeacon's Journal. To neglect them altogether, would have been to interrupt the thread of the narrative, and sometimes to lose sight of the Clerical travellers for periods of weeks together. I have, therefore, been compelled to give such as seemed absolutely necessary to the continuation of the history; but much, I fear, to the weariness of those who shall undertake to read them, from the aversion, which our English habits and pure practices of religion produce in us, to the tedious forms of unmeaning and superstitious ceremonial. The Archdeacon himself often complains of the excessive length to which the ceremonies of the Greek Church are protracted, particularly amid the Cossacks and in Muscovy; and yet, from his inbred love of Ecclesiastic rites, he omits no opportunity to dwell on the description of their lengthened splendors, as though detailing them to none, but such inveterate amateurs of them, as his own education had made him. These details, however, give him frequent opportunities for remarks on the morals and religious principles of the various Nations whom he visits, which it is hoped may be interesting to the Reader: and the Political and Statistical history of countries, so little known as Moldavia and Wallachia, may be simultaneously gathered from his Ecclesiastical records.

To the excellent Institution, which owes its origin mainly to the activity and influence of its inestimable Treasurer,, who has himself set the example, in the Narrative of his Journey from India, through Egypt, to England, of collecting useful instruction, and communicating it, through the Press, for the benefit of his countrymen the English Public will soon be indebted for much novel information on the history of the Eastern World, over so great a part of which the British Empire is extended. Hitherto it must have been the frequent regret of every scholar, at all acquainted with the riches of Oriental Literature, that so little wealth has been extracted from it, for the practical purposes of Commerce and Government. While the valuable time of diligent investigators has been perpetually wasted on re-editing and re-translating, for times innumerable, the well-known pages of the Greek and Roman Authors, well-attested facts and solidly-grounded theories, which, if made known to the world, might powerfully promote its improvement and augment its general happiness, have lain buried in voluminous Manuscripts of intelligent and benevolent Authors, scarcely ever perused by even the few, whose attainments have qualified them for the task.