Literature.

woven by no profane hand , the holy Brahmin alone can twine the hollowed thread it is made with the utmost solemnity ,

SEEVA , liltAII . llA , VISUS'O . and with mystic observances . In the Ayeen Alcbery , the mode is thus described ;— " Three threads are first twisted together , then they are folded into three , and twisted again , making it to consist of three times three ; this is folded again into three , but without more twisting , so that they are three distinct cordseach being onebut composed of three . Each

, , end is fastened with a knot , and thus a figure is formed resembling the Jod of the Hebrews , their acknowledged symbol of God . " Tavernier , in his account of the Benares pagoda , states that its deity is saluted by prostrating the body three times ; he is adorned with a triple crown , and bears in his hand a three forked sceptre . Throughout India ( says

Maurice ) the sun , the moon , and Mercury , under the triune name of Buddha , for ever occur in the varied page of their mythology . But this I shall more fully elucidate when treating of our Masonic observances . And now , having dwelt some time in Hindostan , we , like the sons of Shemwill emigratenoticing , as we travel on

, , , that according to Oliver lludbeck , even in the remote islands of the Pacific Ocean , peopled from the Malay shores , the supreme deities are God the Father , God the Son , and the Bird or Spirit . Dr . Parsons and the celebrated Van Strahlenburgh , after remarking how universal a veneration prevails through all

northern Tartary for the sacred number three , mention a race of Tartars called Takuthi , who arc idolaters , and the most numerous people of Siberia ; they adore an invisible god , under three different denominations . Colonel Grant thus translates their vernacular tongue , descriptive of this deity and his attributes—first , the creator of all things ; secondly , the gocl of armies ; thirdly , the spirit of heavenly love proceeding from the other two . " The Japanese , from their constant intercourse with the

Chinese , have adopted nearly the same religious creed . Thenmost ancient religion however is that of Sinto , who was the offspring of the sun , the founder of the ancient royal family , and of tike empire . It has been already explained that the Egyptian Osiris or the sun , was the great patriarch 2 \ oah , and that Ham his son was the founder of his nation . The

similarity of the Japanese Sinto , the offspring _ of the Sun , or Noah , is too striking to require elucidation ; were it otherwise , their numen triplex , or triple deity , would set the point at rest . We here perceive how closely it resembles the triple emblems which in my former remarks 1 submitted . This deity , possessing three head . * , is furnished with four

Xl'MEX TIIIPEEX . TAP 0 N 1 C 1 T . M . pairs of hands ; multiplicity of members was with th ? ancients of all nations a mode of expressing power or majesty , and has been copied by the poets—Homer gives to Briareus an hundred hands , and the watchful Argus has an hundred eyes . Chinaone of the countries apportioned to Shemand in

, , which we as Britons must at this time feel strong political interest , has within its vast territories three established religions . It has also a fabulous chronology similar to that of the Hindoos , and almost equally extravagant . The Ten-Ids , or ages which elapsed from Pan-kow / tho first man , to their prophet Confucius , about five hundred years before tho

Christian era , are variously estimated from two hundred and seventy-six . thousand years to ninety-six million nine hundred and sixty-one thousand seven hundred and forty years . There is this important distinction however between the Hindoos and the Chinese—that while the Hindoos admif these chronologies into their Yedas or sacred books and

implicitly believe in them , the better class of Chinese treat their fabulous records not only with contempt as puerile and ridiculous , but with horror as profane . Tho first dawn of