the great ferpent Ophioneus battled it with the Gods long before the Greeks had invented their Apollo. We learn from a fragment of Pherecides, that this ftory of the grand ferpent, the enemy to the Gods, was one of the most ancient fables among the Phenicians.

Dreams and reveries have introduced the fame fpecies of fuperftition in every part of the world. If I am restless in my fleep, and fee my wife and children in the agonies of death, and they fhould die fome few days after, I make no doubt that my dream was a warning from Heaven. If, on the other hand, my wife and children ftil! live and do well, the dream was a fallacious reprefentation, with which it pleafed Heaven to terrify or amufe my fancy. Thus in Homer, Jupiter is faid to have fent a fallacious dream to Agamemnon. Indeed, all dreams, true or falfe, fuperftition deduced from Heaven, while the oracles eftablifhed themfelves by the fame means on earth.

Does a woman afk of the Magi, whether her husband will die within the year or not? One of them anfwers, yes, and the other, no. Now one of them muft certainly be right. If the hufband lives, the wife fays nothing of the matter; but, if he dies, fhe foon tells ne prediction about the town, and the lucky Magi is of courfe a Prophet. This certainty of fuccefs, when once obferved. foon multiplied the prophets and oracles, who took the name of Seers, as well among the Egyptians as in Chaldea and Syria. Every temple alfo had its oracles. Thofe of Apollo gained fo much credit, that Rollin, in his ancient history, records the oracular predictions of Apollo to Crefus. He does not examine, however, whether fuch predictions, worthy only of Noftradamus, were not made after the facts predicted had happened. He does not even question the fore-knowledge of the priest of Apollo; but conceives that God Almighty might permit Apollo to fpeak truth; probably to confirm the Pagans in their religion.

The origin of good and evil, is a queftion which engaged the attention of all the polifhed Afiatic nations, while the first theologues of every country muft neceffarily have enquired, as every individual does, why is there any evil in the creation? They teach, in India, that Adimo, the daughter of Brama, brought forth at the navel, the juft from her right fide, and the unjuft from her lelt; and that it was from this left fide that we originally deduce phyfical and moral evil. The Egyptians had their Typhon, who was the enemy of Ofis. The Perfians believed that Arimanes made a hole in the egg, laid by Oromafes, and adulterated the yolk with fin. The Grecian fable of Pandora's box, is well known, and is one of the most beautiful of all thofe which have been handed down to us from antiquity. The allegory of Job was certainly written in Arabia, as is plain from the Arabic terms retained in the Hebrew and Greef ver

fions. That book, which is of high antiquity, reprefents Satan, who is the Arimanes of the Perfians, and the Typhon of the Egyptians, as wandering up and down the earth, folliciting permiflion of God to afflict Job. Satan appears, indeed to be fubordinate to God; but he is, nevertheless, reprefented as a very powerful Being, capable of inflicting difeafes and death on the animal creation.

The whole univerfe hath, from the earliest times, in fome. degree adopted the Manichean doctrine of a good and bad principle. In like manner, it was equally natural for all people to admit of expiations; for where was there a man that was not guilty of fome injury against fociety, or was thence totally deftitute of remorfe? Water was found to be the purifier of the body and its cloathing: fire was the purifier of metals. Fire and water, therefore, became the purifiers of fouls, nor was any temple without its holy water and facred fires. The devotees plunged themselves into the Ganges, the Indus and the Euphrates, at every full moon, and particularly during every eclipse. This immerfion washed away their fins, and if they did not make the fame expiations in the Nile, it was only for fear the crocodiles fhould devour the penitents. The Greeks alfo had facred baths and fires in all their temples, as the univerfal fymbols of purification and purity. In a word, fuperftition appears to have eftablifhed itself by the fame means, and to have produced the fame effects in all countries, and among all people, except among the learned in China.'

We fhall finish thefe quotations, with a paffage or two from the chapter, entitled, On the Angels, Genii, and Devils of the ancient Nations, and particularly of the Jews.

The Chaldeans and Perfians appear to be the first people, who talked about angels. The Parfees, a religious fect that worship fire and ftill fubfift, communicated to the learned Hyde, the names of the feveral angels which the ancient Parfees acknowledged. But, though their number amounted to an hundred and nineteen, the names of Raphael and Gabriel, which the Perfians long afterwards adopted, were not among them. Thefe names, indeed, are Chaldean, and were not known to the Jews before their captivity. For it is obfervable, that before we come to the history of Tobit, we meet with the name of no particular angel, either in the Pentateuch or any other Hebrew book. The Perfians, in their ancient catalogue, counted but twelve devils, of which Arimanes was the chief; so that it was, at least some comfort to them, to reflect that there were more good angels in the world, than rafcally demons. We do not find, however, that this do&rine was adopted by the EgypAs to the Greeks, inftead of tutelary genii, they had their fubordinate or fecondary deities, their heroes and their

tians.

demi-gods. Plato, I think was the firft, who spoke of a good and evil genius, prefiding over the actions of man. Since him, both the Greeks and Romans piqued themfelves on having every man his two genii; the evil one having always more bufinefs and more fuccefs than the good.

In procefs of time, the Jews gave names to their celestial militia, dividing them into ten regiments or claffes. The mufterroll of this hierarchy, is only to be found in the Talmud and Targum; and not in the writings of the Hebrew Canon. But, though the fall of the rebellious angels, and their transformation into demons, be the foundation both of the Jewish and Christian religion, it is remarkable, fays our Author, that no mention is made of it, either in Genefis, the books of the law, or in any other canonical writings. In Genefis, we are told exprefsly, that a ferpent fpoke to Eve and feduced her. It is there alfo particularly obferved, that the ferpent was the moft fubtle of all the beafts of the field, and it is before observed, that this was the opinion of all nations, in,regard to the ferpent. It is farther pofitively afferted, in Genefis, that the hatred of mankind toward the ferpent, arifes from the ill-office done by that creature to our first parents. I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy feed and her feed: it fhall bruife thy head, and thou shalt bruife his heel.' The ferpent is alfo accurfed above all cattle upon thy belly fhalt thou go, and duft fhall thou eat all the days of thy life.' It must be confeffed, indeed, that ferpents do not cat duft; but, however, the people of antiquity believed they did, which is to the fame purpofe. Occafion hath been taken from this representation, to perfuade mankind that this ferpent was one of the rebellious angels, who came to avenge himself, by feducing the fair objects of this new creation of his maker. There is not a single paffage, however, in the whole Pentateuch from which we can fairly deduce this, by the mere light of human reafon.-The opinion, concerning the banishment of the fallen angels, their being precipitated into hell, and efcape thence to tempt mankind to their eternal deftruction, hath been current for many ages. But I fay, in this cafe, as in the former, that it is a truth founded on tradition only, there being not the leaft foundation for it in the Old Teftament. It is imagined by fome, that Enoch left a written hiftory of the fallen angels; but to this there are two objections. In the first place, Enoch wrote as little as Seth, to whom the Jews nevertheless impute fome writings and as to the falfe Enoch cited by St. Jude, his teftimony is acknowledged to be forged by a Jew. Secondly, this falfe Enoch fays not a word of the rebellion or fall of the angels before the formation of man. He tells, indeed, a very particular and circumftantial fory of the angels, the Egregori, (or as they are ftiled in our

verfish,

verfion, the fons of God) falling in love with the daughters of men and taking them to wife: a ftory evidently founded on part of the fixth chapter of Genefis, where we are told, that there were giants in the earth in those days; and alfo after that, when the fons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bore children to them; the fame became mighty men, which were of old, men of renown.' Both the book of Enoch and of Genefis, perfectly agree, in regard to the copulation of these angels, or fons of God, with the daughters of men, and alfo as to the race of giants their iffue. But neither this book of Enoch, nor any one of the Old Teftament, fpeaks a fyllable of the war of the angels againft God, their defeat, their defcent into hell, nor of their enmity to mankind. In the allegory of Job, and the adventure of Tobit, mention is made of Satan, and of an evil fpirit. The first, I have shewn, is not of Jewish original; and as to the latter, who killed the firft feven hufbands of Sarah, and was diflodged by Raphael, he was not a Jew devil, but a Perfian. We find that Raphael did not fend him back to hell, but went to chain him in Upper Egypt. Indeed the Jews had no idea, at that time, of an hell, and could not have any of devils. They began very late to believe in a hell, and the immortality of the foul, and this was not till the fect of Pharifees began to prevail. They were, therefore, very far from thinking, that the ferpent which tempted Eve, was a devil, or fallen angel, precipitated into hell. This notion, which ferves now as the foundation ftone of the whole edifice, was laid down last of all. Not that we have the less reverence for the history of the fallen angels, but we know not whence to deduce its origin. It is very certain that the Jews knew nothing of the matter, till about the time of the Babylonish captivity; deducing it very probably from the Perfians, who had it frorn Zoroafter. Thefe facts cannot be difputed, unless by ignorance, fanaticism, and want of candour religion, however, has nothing to dread from the confequences. God Almighty moft certainly permitted the belief of good and evil genii, of the immortality of the foul, and of the doctrine of eternal rewards and punishments, to be received by twenty different nations of antiquity, before it was adopted by the Jews. Our holy religion, it is true, hath now confecrated thofe doctrines; and what was only an opinion among the ancients, is become one of the divine truths of Revelation to the moderns.'

It is greatly to be wished, that this writer's obfervations were as candid and just as they are generally fhrewd and ingenious. We have not thought it worth while, however, to contravert eyen the most exceptionable; as, fuppofing them ever so just or well founded, the cui bono naturally occurs to every fenfible and

con

confiderate reader. What inferences would our Author have us to draw from the perufal of reflections, that apparently ferve to no other end than to invalidate the teftimony of history both facred and profane? It is doubtlefs, expedient as ufeful to point out the palpable inconfiftencies, improbabilities, and abfurdities of fuch hiftories, as impofe on the ignorance or credulity of the reader but to infinuate the falfehood of almoft every thing indifcriminately that is recorded in hiftory because we cannot trace its origin, or reconcile it with all its attendant circumftances, is to demolish the evidence of all hiftory at once. It is in many cafes the part of a philofopher to doubt; but this is, in thofe matters only that will admit of a more fatisfactory evidence than is produced.

Matters of fact and moral relations, will not admit of mathematical demonfiration; if the best evidence, therefore, be brought which the circumftances and nature of the thing will admit of, it is furely more irrational to doubt than to believe, nor is fcepticism in this case, a jot more philosophical than credulity.

Hiftoire de l' Academie Royale des Infcriptions et Belles Lettres, &c.

The Hiftory of the Royal Academy of Infcriptions and Belles Lettres; with the Literary Memoirs extracted from the Registers of that Academy, from the Year 1758 to 1760 inclufive. Vols. 29 and 30. 4to. Paris, 1764.

THE

HE King of Denmark being about to dispatch a literary embaffy to Arabia Felix, Abyffinia, and parts adjacent, the hiftory of this celebrated Academy, for the interval abovementioned, contains little more than a memoir addreffed to the Literati, who were engaged in that unfuccefsful expedition.

In the history of the works prefented to the Academy, we have an account of the following articles.

ART. 1. A differtation on the fabulous origin of nations. The Author of this tract endeavours to explode the ridiculous vanity, which moft nations, as well as individuals, poffefs, of deducing their origin from the highest antiquity. There is no people in the world, fays he, that lay claim to fuch a long fucceffion of Kings as the English. They were formerly perfuaded that their island was inhabited even fo far back as the days of Eli and Samuel; that the natives were of a gigantic race, and were fubdued by Brutus the fon of Sylvius, and grand-fon of Eneas. For the truth of this affertion, he refers to Polydore Virgil, and proceeds, on the authority of Geoffry of Mon

Mouth,