one, who was acquainted with the Mofaick Genealogy. That Adam was the Apostle of the Moon, and exhorted Men to her Worship; that Seth was a Renegado to his Father's Worship, and fo was Noah, who condemned Image-worship. That Adam went into a far Country nigh India, and brought home a Tree with Flowers, Leaves, and Branches of Gold; and likewife a. Tree of Stone, with the Leaves of another green Tree, whofe Leaves would not burn in the Fire; that was fo large, that ten thousand Men of the Bignefs of Adam might shelter themfelves under it, and that the two Leaves which he brought with him were fo large, that each of them would cloath two Men. But I will tire you no longer with these infipid Talmudical Lies, which methinks any Body might guefs a Jew to be the Author of. But however, what rare Stuff is this to explain Scripture by? One would wonder how it fhould come into the Heads of learned Men, to think, that God in framing his facred Laws, fhould have any Regard to fuch idle Tales. For my Part, I pity them, when I fee them so sweating themselves in fuch a filly Enterprise, and throwing away fo much Labour and Learning to no Manner of Purpose; and befides the great Advantage they give to the Infidels, to expofe the Laws of God, when they fee that Chriftians fettle them upon fo flender a Foundation.

Phil. It behoves you to be as zealous for your Religion as you can, for you find we get Ground upon you every Day. We live in a very prying Generation, and 'tis not laying your Hand over a fore Place in your Religion, that will fecure it now, you must maintain your Caufe by pure Dint of Argument, or lofe it. But what fay you now to your great Legiflator, when we shall prove, that all his celebrated Religion which he pretended to give the Jews from Heaven, was only pinched from the Worship of the Heathen Ægyptians? And this your own Divines are fenfible of at laft, and, by Reafon of the plain Evidence of the Cafe, have given over the Caufe to us. For fome of them have proved the Chriftian Religion to be all Jewish; and others the Jewish Religion to

The

be derived from the Heathen: And therefore, for my Part, I am for taking my Religion at the Fountain-head, and fo will continue a primitive Heathen in Defiance to all Innovation. I have nothing to fay to Chriftianity, for the Judaical Laws are the Matter now in Hand; and these I fay were most of them (the Ceremonial especially) nothing but Ægyptian Rites, which Mofes brought over with him thence; which is a confiderable Argument against the Divinity of them; for to be fure God Almighty would never have copied his Laws from a Parcel of fimple Idolaters. To begin with Circumcifion, which is pretended to be the Characteristick of the Jews, that to be fure was taken from the Egyptians, or fome other Na tion; that Ceremony being ufed not only in Egypt, but in Ethiopia, by the Colchi and Arabians. Thus the Urim. and Thummim was enjoined in Imitation of that Locket of Jewels, which hung from the Neck of the Egyptian High-Prieft, mentioned by Diodorus Siculus. Linen Garments, which the Jewish High-Prieft and other inferior ones wore, were copied from the Egyptian Priefts who wore the like, as Herodotus † and Plutarch | relate The Cherubim were only the Imitation of Apis's Hieroglyphick or Image, the Bull, or of those meia súμg fo much in Fashion among the Egyptians; as the Image of Sphinx upon their Temple-doors does evince. And fo was the Ark of the Covenant fetched from the Ufe of the Cifta, in the Rites of the Egyptian Ofiris, the Orgin of Bacchus, and the Elenfinian Sacra. The Feafts of New Moons were taken from the like Practice among the Heathens; and fo were the Jewish Purifications from their Luftrations. And laftly, the Temple of Jerufalem was but a Copy of thofe Egyptians, who are obferved by Herodotus, to be the firft Authors of Altars, Images and Temples. And what I pray becomes of your Religion now, when the Foundation of it was borrowed, you fee,, from the most stupid of all the Heathen Idolaters, that

4

Hift. Fab. Lib. 1. cap. 37. Plutarch de Ifide & Ofyr.

+ Herod. Hift. Lib. 2, cap. 37. + Herod. cap. 4.

fell

fell down and worshiped the very Pot-herbs of their Garden?

Cred. I am heartily forry that the learned Author De Jewish Legibus Hebræorum has put a keen Sword into the Infidels Rites not Hands, the better to attack Religion with, which their derived blunt Arguments would have been lefs able to do. Not Egyptian. that I think, if Dr. Spencer's Suppofition fhould be true, that the Judaical Rites were derived from the Egyptian; that the Infidels would abfolutely get the better of us. For 'tis poffible that God Almighty might make fuch Condefcenfions to the Hardnefs of the Jews Hearts, and their flavish hankering after the Pomp of the Egyptian Worships, as to allow them in fome Particulars of their Ceremonies. But I think there is no Neceffity of granting this; for all the Rites commanded by the Jewish Law feem either perfectly fet up in Oppofition to their Superftitions, or are fuch as were practised in common with them and the ancient Patriarchs, or else were fuch ordinary Performances in religious Worship, as no Nation could easily avoid. I confefs, I am far from the other Opinion of those who affert, That the Egyptians, and others of the Heathen World, learned all thefe religious Acts from the Jews, because fome of them they might learn from their common Fore-Fathers, and others they might jump upon by Chance, or be led to them by the natural Tendency of the Thing. There are a thoufand Things which Men do very much alike, and yet neither of them can be faid to learn or copy from one another; nor can be fo much as faid to dream of what the other did. Indeed Men of Wit and Learning may make a Pother about them, fhew their own Parts in maintaining a Paradox, and amufe unwary People; but they can make nothing folidly out in fuch a Matter. To make ufe of an odd Inftance. I will undertake to take an ordinary Scrivener's Conveyance, that is drawn up after the most blundering Rate, and put it into a learned Hand that will vouchsafe to lay out Time this Way; and he shall fetch you parallel Cafes for every Period or Word out of the Antiquities of Greece and Rome, bring like Quotations to

U 4

every

Circumcifion not

from the Ægypti

ans.

every Line out of the Codes and Pandects, alledge appofite Sayings out of Tully and Demofthenes, Libanius and Themiftius; fo that the Scrivener might almoft feem to have ftollen the Conveyance out of thefe Books: whereas perhaps the poor Man never heard a Word of them in all his Life. And truly I think Dr. Spencer's Book is but a Project of the fame Nature. He finds that fome Things in the Jewish and the Heathen Ceremonies agree, and therefore refolves the firft was derived from the latter: Now 'tis an eafy Thing for a learned Man, that has Leifure enough, to pick up out of fuch a Number of Heathen Books, which are extant, a great many Expreffions in their Explication of Heathen Rites, which may make them look fomething like the Jewish Ceremonies; and yet in Reality they might be no more alike than the Scrivener's Conveyance to Cicero's Oration pro Milone. But to fpeak to the Particulars which you have menti oned:

1. Circumcifion, though it were not a Rite purely Judaical, yet it was firft given to Abraham, and fo defcended down to all his Pofterity; and as to what other Ufe of it there was in other Nations, it was learned from him and his Off-fpring. As for the Ufe of Circumcifion among all the Ifmaelitif Race in Arabia, and among the Edomites and other Defcendents from Efan and Abraham's Sons by Keturah, they being of the Seed of Abraham as well as the Jews, it is no Wonder that they maintained their paternal Rites as well as the other. As for the Colchi, Grotius has proved them to be probably of the ten Tribes carried away by Salmanaffer; for the Scholiaft upon Ariftophanes declares, that they own themselves to be of Jewish Extraction. And if the Teftimony of Alexander Polyhiftor, quoted by Jofephus *, be to be credited, that the Name of Africa came from Afer, the Son of Abraham, by Ke turah, who planted a Colony there; then we have an cafy Account how Circumcifion came to thee Ethiopians alfo. There remain then only the Egyptians, and why they

Jof. Lib. 1. cap. 16.

might not learn it from Abraham, or Jofeph, especially when he was in his Grandeur in Pharaoh's Court, I confefs I could never fee any good Reafon. Indeed it is fomething difficult to think, that a whole Nation fhould learn fuch a troublesome Rite of a Stranger. But the whole People of the Egyptians were not circumcifed, only the Hierophanta and the Priefts. And they might take this up in Emulation to Jofeph, that they might not feem to be outdone by him in any extraordinary Mark of Holinefs; as the Magicians vied with Mofes in pretending to do the fame Miracles with him. And I take it to be plain, that no other Nation made ufe of an univerfal Cir cumcifion of all their Males, but the Jews only. The Egyptians had among them a Sort of a Female Circumcifion mentioned by Strabo, a Cuftom never dreamt of among the Jews. And 'tis evident that the Gentiles generally believed that Circumcifion was the Characteristick only of a few, or else those reproachful Names given to the Fews upon this Account, fuch as verpus, recutitus, curtus, &c. mentioned by Juvenal, Martial, and others, have no Sense in them; they being defigned to ftigmatife the Jews by them, for a particular Singularity in this Matter above other Nations; which if fo many Nations, as you pretend, had used, there would be no Ground for. Bur we never find, that these odd Names were given to the Egyptians, Arabians, the Colchi, or the Ethiopians; and therefore 'tis plain, that they were not univerfally circumicifed, as the Jews were.

7

mim.

2. And fo for the Urim and Thummim, although the Nor Urim Heathen Ægyptians might ufe fomething like it, yet 'tis and Thum more probable, as Grotius fays, that they did it ut pueri virorum res imitantur, imitate this as Boys ufe to do what is done by Men; than that this Ufage fhould be taken from the Heathen: This being the Cuftom of malicious Dæmons, to put their idolatrous Worshipers upon, as may be seen in many Particulars, as learned Men have proved at large. There are † two Authors which make mention * Epiph. Hær. 30. + Diod. Hift. Fab. Lib. 1. Æl. Var.Hist. Lib. 14. cap. 24.

of