The Press.
London, England, 1858-10-02 00:00:00

Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy. Mr. Framjee has devoted
nearly a whole chapter to the recital of his good
works. He has released debtors, he has built
causeways, he has founded schools and colleges,
he has erected hospitals, dharumsallas for the con-
venience of travellers, and works for the supply
of water. Altogether he has expended in public
works a quarter of a million sterling. Education
enjoys his peculiar patronage. For the children
of poor Parsees he has founded a school at an
expense of nearly. 50,000/. His example, and
that of other conspicuous Parsees, appears to have
turned the enthusiastic feelings of the whole sect
into this channel. Education, especially female
education, appears to be their hobby. They have
set on foot a Translation Fund, the object of
which is to pay for the translation into their
language and cheap publication of standard
European and Asiatic works. Liberality, in
fact, and a ready reception of the ideas of other
nations, appears to be the characteristic of the
community, as in the Middle Age this was the
characteristic of the Normans. Every Parsee is
a citizen of the world. This appears most clearly
in their religious opinions. They have no
patience with superstition, though their women
are not yet quite cured of it. After the birth of a
shad, says Mr. Framjee,

the astrologer is consulted as to the inßuence the chill
will exert upon the f 'mimes of the father, the mottle.,
brother, an 1 fatuity generally. The pretender gravely
delivers Ii i iii self in some such strain as this:—" The child
really is a fortunate one. To its father it has brought
increased respectability and wealth; the mother will be very
fortunate. By the birth of this babe there will be increased
affection between the husband anti wife. With its brothers
and sisters it will be on good terms when of age." The
men generally laugh at the absurdity of this stuff, but the
condition of the Parsee females is not yet sulficientty ad-
vanced to make them conscious of its folly. The spread of
education now happily commenced will soon purge away
such superstitious trash from among them.

The state of the Parsee Church reminds us of
the state of our own. About thirty years ago
it split into two sects upon the question of the
date of one of their festivals. " Newspapers
" were started," we are told, "as the organs of
" the respective parties, and a good deal of violent
" writing was indulged in, but no satisfactory
"result ensued froth the controversy." This
purely ritual and ecclesiastical controversy merely
served, like one which has taken place nearer
home, to alienate the laity from both parties.
Priests, in short, maintained the cause of religion
so strenuously that they quite forgot the cause of
God. The laymen, while the priests were
quarrelling, appear to have formed their own
notions of religion without priestly assistance;
and Mr. Framjee speaks of the Parsee clergy
with some contempt :—" They are ignorant and
" unlearned ; they do not and cannot command
" the respect of the laity, who are more en-
lightened and educated than they." The
account here given of the religion of Zoroaster,
which is that of Mr. Framjee and of the Parsees,
must, we think, be taken with a grain of salt.
The author is evidently not profound in this sort
of lore, quoting, in support of his assertions, the
opinions of writers, some contemporary: some
belonging to the last century and to the infancy
of Orientalism, without any criticism or discrimi-
nation. The exposition he gives must be taken,
not as an exposition of the religion of Zerdusht,
but of the philosophical creed which his disciples
in the nineteenth century, determined to be
liberal and at all hazards to eschew old-fashioned
superstitions, have constructed out of it. Ahri-
man, we are told, is an allegory, representing the
temptations which divert men from virtue. The
glorious garden which the prophet beheld, where
the soil is composed of diamonds and rubies ;
where all things shine with a splendour more
than that of the sun at noonday, and emit a
radiance like the radiance of lightning ; where
shrubs of every leaf and odour bloom, and brooks
of crystal wander ; where the air is melodious
with the trill of the nightingale, and balmy. with
the fragrance of jasmine and rose,—this Oriental
heaven is also an allegory, we are told, repre-
senting the prosperity of the virtuous. It may
be well enough to translate the old oracle's
utterances in this way, but it is not so clear that
they were meant to be so translated. When,
however, Mr. Framjee protests against the charge
of idolatry which is brought against the Parsees
as worshippers of fire, we imagine he is right.
Fire, he says, is not supposed to be
God, but tobe a symbol of God. That it is an apt symbol
Christians must allow. Wc ourselves, following