a chapter to an account of the origin of the Jews; represents them as sprung from ten sons of Israel, and speaks of Moses as the commander of the Jews who went out of Egypt, of the institution of the Sabbath, and the priesthood of Aaron. PLINY speaks of Moses, as giving rise to a sect of Magicians, probably with reference to his contest with the magicians of Egypt. TACITUS says, "Moses gave a new form of wor ship to the Jews, and a system of religious ceremonies, the reverse of every thing known to any other age or country." JUVENAL, in his 14th Satire, mentions Moses as the author of a volume, which was preserved with great care among the Jews, by which the worship of images and eating swine's flesh were forbidden; and circumcision and the observation of the Sabbath strictly enjoined. LONGINUS cites Moses as the lawgiver of the Jews, and praises the sublimity of his style in the account he gives of the creation. The ORPHIC verses, which are very ancient, inculcate the worship of one God as recommended by that law "which was given by him who was drawn out of the water, and received two tables of stone from the hand of God." (Eus. Præp. Ev. l. 13, c. xii.) DIODORUS SICULUS, in his first book, when he treats of those who consider the gods to be the authors of their laws, adds, "Among the Jews was Moses, who called God by the name of law, Iaō," meaning Jehovah. JUSTIN MARTYR expressly says, that most of the historians, poets, lawgivers, and philosophers of the Greeks, mention Moses as the leader and prince of the Jewish nation. From all these testimonies, and many more were it necessary might be adduced, it is clear that it was as commonly received among ancient nations, as among the Jews themselves, that Moses was the founder and lawgiver of the Jewish state.

As to CHRIST, it is only necessary to give the testimony of two historians, whose antiquity no one ever thought of disputing. SUETONIUS mentions him by name, and says, that Claudius expelled from Rome those who adhered to his cause. (6) TACITUS records the progress which the Christian religion had made; the violent death its founder had suffered; that he flourished under the reign of Tiberius; that Pilate was then procurator of Judea; and that the original author of this profession was Christ. (7) Thus not only the real existence of the founder of Christianity, but the period in which he lived is exactly ascertained from writings, the genuineness of which has never been doubted. The ANTIQUITY OF THE BOOKS which contain the history, the doctrines, and the laws, of the Jewish and the Christian lawgivers, is next to be considered, and the evidence is not less satisfactory. The im

(6) Judæos impulsore Christo assidue tumultuantes Româ expulit. (SUET Edit. Var. p. 544.)

(7) Auctor nominis ejus Christus, qui Tiberio imperitante, per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat. (Annal. 1. 5.)

portance of this fact in the argument is obvious. If the writings in question were made at, or very near, the time in which the miraculous acts recorded in them were performed, then the evidence of those events having occurred is rendered the stronger, for they were written at the time when many were still living who might have contradicted the narration if false; and the improbability is also greater, that, in the very age and place when and where those events are said to have been performed, any writer would have dared to run the hazard of prompt, certain, and disgraceful detection. It is equally important in the evidence of prophecy; for if the predictions were recorded long before the events which accomplished them took place, then the only question which remains is, whether the accomplishment is satisfactory; for then the evidence becomes irresistible.

With respect to the Scriptures of the Old Testament, the language in which they are written is a strong proof of their antiquity. The Hebrew ceased to be spoken as a living language soon after the Babylonish captivity, and the learned agree that there was no grammar made for the Hebrew till many ages after. The difficulty of a forgery, at any period after the time of that captivity, is therefore apparent. Of these books too there was a Greek translation made about two hundred and eighty-seven years before the Christian era, and laid up in the Alexandrian library.

Josephus gives a catalogue of the sacred books among the Jews, in which he expressly mentions the five books of Moses, thirteen of the Prophets, four of Hymns and Moral Precepts; and if, as many critics maintain, Ruth was added to Judges, and the Lamentations of Jeremiah to his prophecies, the number agrees with those of the Old Testament as it is received at the present day.

The Samaritans, who separated from the Jews many hundred years before the birth of Christ, have in their language a Pentateuch, in the main exactly agreeing with the Hebrew; and the pagan writers before cited, with many others, speak of Moses not only as a lawgiver and a prince, but as the author of books esteemed sacred by the Jews. (8)

If the writings of Moses then are not genuine, the forgery must have taken place at a very early period; but a few considerations will show, that at any time this was impossible.

These books could never have been surreptitiously put forth in the name of Moses, as the argument of LESLIE most fully proves :-" It is impossible that those books should have been received as his, if not written by him, because they speak of themselves as delivered by Moses, and kept in the ark from his time: And it came to pass when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book until

(8) See note A at the end of this chapter, for a larger proof of the above particulars.

they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, Take the book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee,' Deut. xxxi, 24-26. A copy of this book was also to be left with the king: And it shall be, when he sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom that he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites; and it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life,' &c, Deut. xviii, 18. This book of the law thus speaks of itself, not only as a history or relation of what things were done, but as the standing and municipal law and statutes of the nation of the Jews, binding the king as well as the people. Now in whatever age after Moses this book may be supposed to have been forged, it was impossible that it could be received as truth, because it was not then to be found (as it professed to be) either in the ark or with the king, or any where else; for when first invented, every body must know that they had never heard of it before.

"Could any man, now at this day, invent a book of statutes or acts of parliament for England, and make it pass upon the nation as the only book of statutes that ever they had known? As impossible was it for the books of Moses (if they were invented in any age after Moses) to have been received for what they declare themselves to be, viz. the statutes and municipal law of the nation of the Jews: and to have persuaded the Jews, that they had owned and acknowledged these books, all along from the days of Moses, to that day in which they were first invented; that is, that they had owned them before they had ever so much as heard of them. Nay, more, the whole nation must, in an instant, forget their former laws and government, if they could receive these books as being their former laws. And they could not otherwise receive them, because they vouched themselves so to be. Let me ask the Deists but one short question: Was there ever a book of sham laws, which were not the laws of the nation, palmed upon any people, since the world began? If not, with what face can they say this of the book of laws of the Jews? Why will they say that of them which they confess impossible in any nation, or among any people?

"But they must be yet more unreasonable. For the books of Moses have a farther demonstration of their truth than even other law books have; for they not only contain the laws, but give an historical account of their institution, and the practice of them from that time: as of the passover, in memory of the death of the first born in Egypt, Num. viii, 17, 18: and that the same day, all the first born of Israel, both of man and beast, were, by a perpetual law, dedicated to God: and the Levites taken for all the first born of the children of Israel. That Aaron's rod, which budded, was kept in the ark, in memory of the rebellion, and

wonderful destruction of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram; and for the con. firmation of the priesthood to the tribe of Levi. As likewise the pot of manna, in memory of their having been fed with it forty years in the wilderness. That the brazen serpent was kept (which remained to the days of Hezekiah, 2 Kings xviii, 4,) in memory of that wonderful deliverance, by only looking upon it, from the biting of the fiery serpents, Numbers xxi, 9. The feast of pentecost, in memory of the dreadful appearance of God upon Mount Horeb, &c.

"And beside these remembrances of particular actions and occurrences, there were other solemn institutions in memory of their deliverance out of Egypt, in the general, which included all the particulars. As of the Sabbath, Deut. v, 15. Their daily sacrifices and yearly expia. tion; their new moons, and several feasts and fasts. So that there were yearly, monthly, weekly, daily remembrances and recognitions of these things.

"And not only so, but the books of the same Moses tell us, that a par. ticular tribe (of Levi) was appointed and consecrated by God, as his priests; by whose hands, and none other, the sacrifices of the people were to be offered, and these solemn institutions to be celebrated. That it was death for any other to approach the altar. That their high priest wore a glórious mitre, and magnificent robes of God's own contrivance, with the miraculous Urim and Thummim in his breastplate, whence the Divine responses were given, Num. xxvii, 21. That at his word the king and all the people were to go out, and to come in. That these Levites were likewise the chief judges even in all civil causes, and that it was death to resist their sentence, Deut. xvii, 8-13; 1 Chron. xxiii, 4. Now whenever it can be supposed that these books of Moses were forged in some ages after Moses, it is impossible they could have been received as true, unless the forgers could have made the whole nation believe, that they had received these books from their fathers, had been instructed in them when they were children, and had taught them to their children; moreover, that they had all been circumcised, and did circumcise their children, in pursuance to what was commanded in these books: that they had observed the yearly passover, the weekly Sabbath, the new moons, and all these several feasts, fasts, and ceremonies commanded in these books that they had never eaten any swine's flesh, or other meats prohibited in these books: that they had a magnificent tabernacle, with a visible priesthood to administer in it, which was confined to the tribe of Levi; over whom was placed a glorious high priest, clothed with great and mighty prerogatives, whose death only could deliver those that were fled to the cities of refuge, Num. xxxv, 25, 28. And that these priests were their ordinary judges, even in civil matters: I say, was it possible to have persuaded a whole nation of men, that they had known and practised all these things if they had not done it? or, secondly, to

have received a book for truth, which said they had practised them, and appealed to that practice?

"But now let us descend to the utmost degree of supposition, viz. that these things were practised, before these books of Moses were forged; and that those books did only impose upon the nation, in making them believe that they had kept these observances in memory of such and such things as were inserted in those books.

"Well then, let us proceed upon this supposition, (however groundless,) and now, will not the same impossibilities occur, as in the former case? For, first, this must suppose that the Jews kept all these observances in memory of nothing, or without knowing any thing of their original, or the reason why they kept them. Whereas these very observances did express the ground and reason of their being kept, as the passover, in memory of God's passing over the children of the Israelites, in that night wherein he slew all the first born of Egypt, and so of the rest.

"But, secondly, let us suppose, contrary both to reason and matter of fact, that the Jews did not know any reason at all why they kept these observances; yet was it possible to put it upon them-that they had kept these observances in memory of what they had never heard of before that day, whensoever you will suppose that these books of Moses were first forged? For example, suppose I should now forge some romantic story of strange things done a thousand years ago; and, in confirmation of this, should endeavour to persuade the Christian world that they had all along, from that day to this, kept the first day of the week in memory of such a hero, an Apollonius, a Barcosbas, or a Mohammed; and had all been baptized in his name; and swore by his name, and upon that very book (which I had then forged, and which they never saw before,) in their public judicatures; that this book was their Gospel and law, which they had ever since that time, these thousand years past, universally received and owned, and none other. I would ask any Deist, whether he thinks it possible that such a cheat could pass, or such a legend be received as the Gospel of Christians; and that they could be made believe that they never had any other Gospel?

"Let me give one very familiar example more in this case. There is the Stonehenge in Salisbury Plain, every body knows it; and yet none knows the reason why those great stones were set there, or by whom, or in memory of what.

"Now, suppose I should write a book to-morrow, and tell them that these stones were set up by Hercules, Polyphemus, or Garagantua, in memory of such and such of their actions. And for a farther confirmation of this, should say in this book, that it was written at the time when such actions were done, and by the very actors themselves, or eye witnesses. And that this book had been received as truth, and VOL. I.

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