fins by auftere penances; but they have no notion of presenting gifts to the Deity, nor of deprecating his wrath with the blood of animals. On the contrary, they reckon it a fin to flay any living creature; which reduces them to vegetable food. This is going too far; for the Deity could never mean to prohibit animal food, when man's chief dependence originally was upon it. The abstaining, however, from animal food, fhows greater humanity in the religion of Hindoftan, than of any other known country. The inhabitants of Madagascar are in a stage of religion, common among many nations, which is, the acknowledging one fupreme. benevolent deity, and many malevolent inferior deities. Most of their worship is indeed addressed to the latter; but they have fo far advanced before feveral other nations, as to offer facrifices to the fupreme Being, without employing either idols or temples.

66

Philofophy and found fenfe, in polished nations, have purified religious worship, by banifhing the profeffion at least of oblations and facrifices. The Being that made the world, governs it by laws that are inflexible, because they are the beft poffible; and to imagine that he can be moved by prayers, oblations, or facrifices, to vary his plan of government, is an impious thought, degrading the Deity to a level with ourselves: Hear, O my people, and I will testify against thee: I am God, even thy God. I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he-goat out of thy fold: for every beaft of the foreft is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand "hills. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? "Offer unto God thanksgiving, and pay thy vows to the Most High. Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver thee, "and thou fhall glorify me (a).” "Thou defireft not facrifice, "elfe would I give it; thou delightest not in burnt-offering.

,,

(a) Pfalm 50.

The

The facrifices of God are a broken fpirit: a broken and a con"trite heart, O God, thou wilt not defpife (a)." "For I defired

mercy, and not facrifice; and the knowledge of God, more "than burnt-offerings (b)." In dark ages, there is great fhew of religion, with little heart-worship: in ages of philofophy, warm heart-worship, with little fhew *.

This is a proper place for the history of idolatry; which, as will anon appear, fprung from religious worship, corrupted by

σε

1

Agathias urges a different reafon against facrifices.

Ego nullam naturam "effe exiftimo, cui voluptati fint fœdata fanguine altaria, et animantium lanien. "Quod fi qua tamen eft cui ifta fint cordi, non ea mitis et benigna eft aliqua, fed “fera ac rabida, qualem pavorem poetæ fingunt, et Metum, et Bellonam, et Ma"lam Fortunam, et Difcordiam, quam indomitam appellant.”— [In English thus : "I cannot conceive, that there should exift a fuperior being, who takes delight in "the facrifice of animals, or in altars ftained with blood. If fuch there be, his nature is not benevolent, but barbarous and cruel. Such indeed were the gods "whom the poets have created: fuch were Fear and Terror, the goddess of War, "of Evil Fortune, and of Difcord."] Arnobius batters down bloody facrifices with a very curious argument. "Ecce fi bos aliquis, aut quodlibet ex his animal, "quod ad placandas cæditur mitigandafque ad numinum furias, vocem hominis. "fumat, eloquaturque his verbis: Ergone, O Jupiter, aut quis alius deus es, humanum eft iftud et rectum, aut æquitatis alicujus in æftimatione ponendum, "ut cum alius peccaverit, ego occidar, et de meo fanguine fieri tibi patiaris fatis, qui nunquam te læferim, nunquam fciens aut nefciens, tuum numen majesta"temque violarim, animal, ut fcis, mutum, naturæ meæ fimplicitatem fequens, nec multiformium morum varietatibus lubricum ?"- [In English thus: "What "if the ox, while he is led out to flaughter to appeafe the fancied wrath of an offended deity, should affume the human voice, aud in thefe words aftonish his "conductors: Are thefe, O merciful God, are thefe the dictates of humanity, or "of justice, that for the crime of another I should forfeit my life. I have never "by my will offended thee, and, dumb as I am, and uninformed by reafon, my "actions, according to the fimplicity of my nature, cannot have given thee dif "pleafure, who haft made me as I am."]→→→ If this argument were folid, it would be equally conclufive against animal food.

(a) Pfalm 51.

(b) Hofea vi. 6.

3 F 2

men

men of fhallow understanding and grofs conceptions, upon whom things invisible make little impreffion.

Savages, even of the lowest class, have an impreffion of invifible powers, tho' they cannot form any diftinct notion of them, But fuch impreffion is too faint for the exercife of devotion. Whether inspired with love to a good being, or with fear of an ill being, favages are not at eafe without fome fort of vifible object to animate them. A A great stone served that purpose originally; a very low inftrument indeed of religious worship; but not altogether whimfical, if it was introduced, which is highly probable, in the following manner. It was an early and a natural custom among favages, to mark with a great stone, the place where their worthies were interred; of which we have hints every where in ancient history, particularly in the poems of Offian. "Place me, fays Calmar, mortally wounded, "at the fide of a stone of remembrance, that future times may hear my fame, and the mother of "Calmar rejoice over the stone of my renown." Superftition in later times having deified thefe worthies, their votaries, rejoicing as formerly over the ftones dedicated to them, held these stones to be effential in every act of religious worship performed to their new deities*.

"But re

* Frequent mention is made of fuch ftones in the poems of Offian. "member, my fon, to place this fword, this bow, and this horn, within that dark "and narrow houfe marked with one gray stone." p. 55. "Whofe fame is in "that dark-green tomb? Four stones with their heads of mofs stand there, and "mark the narrow house of death." p. 67. "Let thy bards mourn those who "fell. Let Erin give the fons of Lochlin to earth, and raife the moffy ftones of "their fame; that the children of the north hereafter may behold the place where "their fathers fought." p. 78. " Earth here inclofes the lovelieft pair on the

hill: grafs grows between the ftones of the tomb." p. 208. In the fame poems we find ftoncs made inftruments of worship. The fpirit of Loda is introduced threatening Fingal: "Fly to thy land, replied the form: receive the wind and fly, The blafts are in the hollow of my hand: the courfe of the ftorm is mine. The "King of Sora is my fon: he bends at the ftone of my power." p. 200.

Tradition

Tradition points out many ftones in different parts of the world, that were used in religious worship. A large ftone worshipped by the Peffenuntians, a people of Phrygia, under the name of Idea mater, was, upon a folemn embaffy to that people, brought to Rome; it being contained in the Sybilline books, that unless the Romans got poffeffion of that goddefs, they never would prevail over Hannibal. And Paufanias mentions many ftones in Greece, dedicated to different divinities; particularly thirty fquare ftones in Achaia, on which were engraved the names of as many gods. In another place, he mentions a very ancient ftatue of Venus in the island Delos, which, instead of feet, had only a fquare stone. This may appear a puzzling circumftance in the hiftory of Greece, confidering that all the Grecian gods were originally mortals, whom it was easy to reprefent by ftatues: but in that early period, the Greeks knew no more of statuary than the most barbarous nations. It is perhaps not eafy to gather the meaning of fawith refpect to fuch ftones: the most natural conjecture is, that a great stone, dedicated to the worship of a certain deity, was confidered as belonging to him. This notion of property had a double effect: the worshippers, by connection of ideas, were led from the stone to the deity: and the stone tended to fix their wandering thoughts. It was probably imagined, over and above, that fome latent virtue communicated to the ftone, made it holy or facred. Even among enlightened people, a fort of virtue or fanctity is conceived to reside in the place of worship: why not alfo in a stone dedicated to a deity? The ancient Ethiopians, in their worship, introduced the figure of a ferpent as a fymbol of the deity two sticks laid cross represented Caftor and Pollux, Roman divinities: a javelin reprefented their god Mars; and in Tartary, formerly, the god of war was worshipped under the fymbol of an old rufty fabre. The ancient Perfians ufed confecrated fire, as an emblem of the great God. Tho' the negroes of Congo

vages,

and

and Angola have images without number, they are not however idolaters in any proper fense: their belief is, that these images are only organs by which the deities fignify their will to their vota➡

ries.

If the use that was made of ftones and of other fymbols in religious worship, be fairly represented, it may appear ftrange, that the ingenious Greeks funk down into idolatry, at the very time they were making a rapid progrefs in the fine arts. Their improvements in ftatuary, one of these arts, was the caufe. They began with attempting to carve heads of men and women, repre→ fenting their deified heroes; which were placed upon the stones dedicated to thefe divinities. In the progrefs of the art, ftatues were executed complete in every member; and at last, statues of the gods were made, expreffing fuch dignity and majesty, as infenfibly to draw from beholders a degree of devotion to the ftatues themselves. Hear Quintilian upon that fubject." At quæ Poly→ "cleto defuerunt, Phidiæ atque Alcameni dantur.Phidias ta❝ men diis quam hominibus efficiendis melior artifex traditur › "in ebore vero, longe citra æmulum, vel fi nihil nifi Miner66 vam Athenis aut Olympium in Elide Jovem feciffet, cujus pul"chritudo adjeciffe aliquid etiam receptæ religioni videtur; adeo "majeftas operis deum æquavit *" Here is laid a foundation for idolatry: let us trace its progrefs. Such ftatues as are reprefented by Quintilian, ferve greatly to enflame devotion; and during a warm fit of the religious paffion, the reprefentation is loft,

* "The deficiencies of Polycletus were made up in Phidias and Alcamenes. "Phidias is reckoned to have had more skill in forming the ftatues of gods than of "men. In works of ivory he was unrivalled, altho' there had been no other proofs. "of his excellence than the ftatue of Minerva at Athens, and the Jupiter Olym"pius in Elis. Its beauty feems to have added to the received religion; the majeftic ftatue refembling fo much the god himself."

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