nified by some under the Name of an Egg) and of the framing of Animals, and also of Man's Formation Most amiable of all, who frees the Breasts If we compare this with those of the Phenicians now quoted, it will seem to be taken from them. For Hesiod lived hard by the Theban Baotia, which was built by Cadmus the Phænician. "Epos, Erebus, is the same as Moses's y Ereb, which Night and Day follow, in the Hymns that are ascribed to Orpheus. All Things that are, sprung from a Chaos vast. In the Argonautics, which go under the same name; Nature's great Change; how Heav'n on high was fram'd, And gave to each of them his proper Place. So also Epicharmus, the most ancient Comic Poet, relating an old Tradition. 'Tis said that Chaos was before the Gods. And Aristophanes, in his Play called the Birds, in a Passage preserved by Lucian, in his Philopatris; and by Suidas. First of all was Chaos and Night, dark Erebus and gloomy Tartarus; There was no Earth, nor Air, nor Heaven till dusky Night, By the Wind's Power on the wide Bosom of Erebus, brought forth an Egg, Of which was hatch'd the God of Love (when Time began;) who with his golden Wings, Fixed to his Shoulders, flew like a mighty Whirlwind; and mixing with black Chaos, In Tartarus' dark Shades produced Mankind, and brought them into Light, For, before Love joined all Things, the Gods themselves had no Existence; But upon this Conjunction, all Things being mixed and blended, Ether arose; And Sea and Earth, and the blessed Abodes of the immortal Gods. These Formation after the Divine Image, and the Dominion given him over all living Creatures; which are to be seen in many Writers, particularly (a) in Ovid, These appear, upon a very slight View, to be taken from the Tradition of the Phænicians, who held an ancient Correspondence with the Inhabitants of Attica, the most ancient of the Ionians. We have already spoke of Erebus. Tartarus is in Tehom. "Alvor Abyssos, and non Merachepheth, signifies Love, as was shewn before: To which agrees that of Parmenides: Love was the first of all the Gods. (a) In Ovid, &c.] The place is no further than the First Book of his Metamorphoses, and is very well worth reading; the principal Things in it being so very like those of Moses, and almost the same Words, so that they afford much light to what has been already said, and are likewise much illustrated by it: Before the Sea, and Earth, and Heaven's high Roof The Air devoid of Light; no Form remain'd: Hot jarr'd with Cold, and Moist resisted Dry; By parting Heav'n from Earth, and Sea from Land, The Air succeeds, as next in Weight, and Place; Qvid, who transcribed them from the Greek. Was separated by Divine Command. And first, the Earth not stretch'd into a Plain, Upon whose surface winding Rivers glide, And stormy Seas, whose Waves each Shore rebound. That all Here Fountains send forth Streams, there one broad Lake The gentle Streams which roll along the Ground, Next, between Heav'n and Earth the Air was fix'd, Was the pure Æther plac'd, refin'd and clear. Nothing all Things were made by the Word of God, is Nothing seem'd wanting, but a Mind endu'd Some of the Heavenly Seed remain'd, which sown And when all Creatures to the Earth were prone, asserted Here you see Man has the Dominion over all inferior Creatures given him; and also that he was made after the Image of God, or of Divine Beings. To the same Purpose are the Words of Eurysus the Pythagorean, in his Book of Fortune: "His (that is, Man's,) Tabernacle, or Body, is like that of "other Creatures, because it is composed of the same Mate"rials; but worked by the best Workman, who formed it according to the Pattern of himself." Where the Word x is put for Body, as in Wisdom, Chap. ix. Ver. 15. and in 2 Cor. v. 1 and 4. To which may be added, that of Horace, who calls the Soul And Virgil, -A Particle of Breath Divine. An Ethereal Sense. And that of Juvenal, Sat. XV. -Who alone Have ingenuity to be esteem'd, As capable of Things divine and fit For Arts; which Sense we Men from Heav'n derive, For he that fram'd us both, did only give And those remarkable Things relating hereto, in Plato's Pha don and Alcibiades. Cicero, in the Second Book of the Nature of the Gods, says thus: "For when He, (that is, God,) left "all other Creatures to feed on the Ground, he made Man upright, to excite him to view the Heavens, to which he is "related, as being his former Habitation." And Sallust, in the Beginning of the Catiline War: "All Men that desire " to exceed other Animals, ought earnestly to endeavour not "to pass away their Days in Silence, like the Beasts which "Nature has made prone, and Slaves to their Bellies." And D 2 Pliny, asserted by (a) Epicharmus, and (b) the Platonists; and before them, by the most ancient Writer (I do not mean of those Hymns which go under his Name, Pliny, Book II. Chap. 26. "The never-enough to be ad"mired Hipparchus; than whom none more acknowledged "the Relation betwixt Man and the Stars, and who considered our Souls as a Part of the Heavens." (a) Epicharmus, &c.] "Man's Reason is derived from "that of God." (b) The Platonists, &c.] Amelius the Platonic: "And "this is that Reason, or Word, by which all Things that ever were, were made; according to the Opinion of Hera"clitus. That very Word, or Reason, the Barbarian means, "which set all Things in Order in the Beginning, and which was with God before that Order, and by which every Thing was made, and in which was every Creature; the "Fountain of Life and Being." The Barbarian he here speaks of is St. John the Evangelist, a little later than whose Time Amelius lived. Eusebius has preserved his Words in the Eleventh Book and 19th Chapter of his Preparation; and Cyril in his Eighth Book against Julian. St. Austin mentions the same Place of Amelius, in his Tenth Book, and 29th Chapter of the City of God, and in the Eighth Book of his Confessions. And Tertullian against the Gentiles; "It is evident (says he) that with your Wise Men, the A Logos, Word or Reason, was the Maker of the Universe; for Zeno "would have this Word to be the Creator, by whom all Things were disposed in their Formation." This Place of Zeno was in his Book pas, concerning Being, where he calls the so, the efficient Cause, Air, the Word or Reason; and in this he was followed by Cleanthes, Chrysippus, Archedemus, and Passidonius, as we are told by Laërtius in his Life of Zeno. Seneca, in his LXVth Epistle, calls it the Reason which formeth every Thing. And Chalcidius to Timæus says, "That the Reason of God, is God himself, who has a Regard to Human Affairs, and who is the Cause of Men's living well and happily, if they do not neglect the Gift "bestowed on them by the Most High God." And in another Place, speaking of Moses, he has these words: Who is clearly of opinion, "That the Heaven and Earth were "made by the Divine Wisdom preceding: And that then "the Divine Wisdom was the Foundation of the Uni"verse." 66 but) |