BOOK about Caucasus, where Prometheus is feigned to lie and III. the eating of Prometheus's heart is only an interpretation of ; which, applied to the heart, signifies to waste away, and be consumed. Thus far Bochartus.

Græc.

10.

The Phoenician antiquities seem to have preserved the memory of Abraham's sacrificing his son Isaac, by that place which Eusebius produceth out of Porphyry's book V. Scaliger concerning the Jews; where he relates, how Saturn, ad Frag. whom the Phoenicians call Israel, when he reigned in those parts, and had an only son called Jeoud, of a nymph called Anobret, being under some great calamity, did sacrifice that son of his, being clothed with a royal habit. Here we have a royal person called Israel; and that Abraham should be accounted a king in those elder times is nothing strange, considering his wealth, and what petty royalties Grot. in there were in those times. But Grotius, and from him Deut. xviii. Vossius, do not think that Abraham was here called Vossius de Israel, but that the transcriber of Eusebius meeting with Idol. 1. i. A, supposed it to be a contraction of 'Ioganλ, and so writ at length. It must be acknowledged that la is used in the Phoenician theology for Saturn; but yet the circumstances of the story make the ordinary reading not improbable neither is it strange that Abraham should be called by the name of the people which he was the progenitor of. That Isaac should be meant by his only son called Jeoud, is most likely; for when God bids Abraham go sacrifice Gen. xxii. him, he saith, Take thy son, T, thy only son; Jehid is the same with the Phoenician Jeoud. That Sara is meant by Anobret, the original of the name implies; which Bochart. de is as Bochartus derives it may, Annoberet, that Phoen. Col. is, ex gratia concipiens; which the Apostle explains, Heb. xi. 11. Through faith Sarah herself received strength to conceive

c. 18.

2.

1. ii. c. 2.

seed. Now all the difference is, that which was only designed and intended by Abraham, was believed by the Phoenicians as really done, that it might be as a precedent to them for their 'Av pamodual, sacrificing of men; a thing so much in use among the Phoenicians, and all the colonies derived from them, as many learned men have at large shewed. But besides this, there are particular testimonies concerning Abraham, his age, wisdom, and knowledge; his coming out of Chaldæa, and the propagation of knowledge from him among the Chaldæans, Phoenicians, and Egyptians, are extant out of Berosus, EupoleJoseph. An- mus, and others, in Josephus and Eusebius, and from thence transcribed by many learned men, which on that account Evang.l.ix. I forbear transcribing, as being common and obvious.

tiq. i. i. c. 8.

Eus. Præp.

C. 2.

V.

X.

Clem. Al.

Strom. 7.

Herald. ad

Some have not improbably conjectured, that the me- CHAP. mory of Jacob's long peregrination and service with his uncle Laban, was preserved under the story of Apollo's banishment, and being a shepherd under Admetus. For Callimach. Callimachus reports, that love was the cause of Apollo's Hymn. in travels, as it was of Jacob's; and withal mentions a Apoll. strange increase of cattle under Apollo's care, answerable to what the Scripture reports concerning Jacob. But it is more certain that the memory of Jacob's setting up Gen.xxviii. the stone he had rested on for a pillar, and pouring oil 18. Scalig. Not. upon it, and calling the place Bethel, was preserved under in Frag. Gr. the anointed stones, which the Phoenicians from Bethel Bochart. called Barrúxia, as hath been frequently observed by Can. 1. ii. learned men; from whence came the custom of anointing Seld. de stones among the Heathens, of which so very many have Diis Syris. largely discoursed. Thence the proverb of a superstitious V. Heins. in man, πάντα λίθον λιπαρὸν προσκυνεῖ, which Arnobius calls lubricatum lapidem, et ex olivi unguine sordidatum. It Casaubon. seems the anointing the stones with oil was then the ad Theoph. symbol of the consecration of them. The name Baituλos for P: 295. such a stone occurs in Hesychius, the Greek etymologists, Arnob. 1. i. Damascius in Photius, and others. That the memory of Colvium ad Joseph in Egypt was preserved under the Egyptian Apis, Ouzel. et Apul. Flor. hath been shewed with a great deal of probability by the Elmenlearned Vossius, in his often-cited piece of idolatry, from horst. ad the testimonies of Julius Maternus, Rufinus, and Suidas ; Idol. 1. i. and from these three arguments. 1. The greatness of the c. 29. benefit which the Egyptians received by Joseph; which was of that nature that it could not easily be forgot, and that no symbol was so proper to set it out as the Egyptian Apis, because the famine was portended by lean kine, and the plenty by fat; and Minucius at Rome, for relieving the people in a time of famine, had a statue of a golden bull erected to his memory. 2. The Egyptians were not backward to testify their respect to Joseph, as appears by Pharaoh's rewarding him. Now it was the custom of the Egyptians to preserve the memories of their great benefactors by some symbols to posterity; which were at first intended only for a civil use, although they were after abused to superstition and idolatry. 3. From the names of Apis and Serapis. Apis he conceives to be the sacred name of Joseph among the Egyptians, and is as much as 38, father; so Joseph himself saith, he was as a father to Pharaoh. And Serapis, as Rufinus and Suidas both tell us, had a bushel upon his head; and Serapis is probably derived from, Sor, which signifies a bull, and Gen. xlv. 8.

Minuc. de

BOOK Apis. So that by this means the story of Joseph is attested by the Egyptians' superstitions; of which they can give no account so likely as this is.

30.

III.

XI.

1. xx.

Many things concerning Moses are preserved in the story of Bacchus; not that from thence we are to conclude that Moses was the Bacchus of the Greeks, as Vossius thinks; but they took several parts of the Eastern traditions concerning him, which they might have from the Phoenicians who came with Cadmus into Greece, while the memory of Moses was yet fresh among the CanaanVossius de ites. In the story of Bacchus, as Vossius observes, it is Idol. 1. i. . expressly said that he was born in Egypt, and that soon after his birth he was put in an ark, and exposed to the river; which tradition was preserved among the Brasiatæ of Laconica: and Bacchus in Orpheus is called Mions, and by Plutarch de Iside et Osiride, Palæstinus; and he is called Bárug, which agrees to Moses, who, besides his own mother, was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter. Bacchus was likewise commended for his beauty, as Moses was, and was said to be educated in a mount of Arabia called Nysa; which agrees with Moses's residence in Arabia forty years. So Plutarch mentions Φυγὰς Διονύσε, Non. Dion. the banishments of Bacchus; and Nonnus mentions Bacchus's flight into the Red Sea; who likewise mentions his battles in Arabia, and with the neighbouring princes Diod. 1. iv. there. Diodorus saith, that Bacchus's army had not only men, but women in it; which is most true of the company which Moses led. Orpheus calls Bacchus erμopópov, and attributes to him Δίπλακα Θεσμόν : whereby we understand Moses's being legislator, and that he delivered the laws in two tables. Moses's fetching water out of a rock with his rod, is preserved in the Orgia of Bacchus; in which Euripides relates, that Agave and the rest of the Baccha celebrating the Orgia, one of them touched a rock, and the water came out: and in the same Orgia Euripides reports how they were wont to crown their heads with serpents; probably in memory of the cure of the fiery serpents in the wilderness. A dog is made the companion of Bacchus; which is the signification of Caleb, who so faithfully adhered to Moses. To these and some other circumstances insisted on by Vossius, BoCanaan. 1. chartus adds two more very considerable ones; which are, that Nonnus reports of Bacchus, that he touched the two rivers, Orontes and Hydaspes, with his thyrsus, or rod, and that the rivers dried, and he passed through them; and that his ivy-staff being thrown upon the

Bochart.

i. c. 18.

a

V.

Idol. 1. i.

ground, crept up and down like a serpent; and that the CHAP. Indians were in darkness while the Bacchæ enjoyed light: which circumstances considered, will make every one that hath judgment say as Bochartus doth, Ex mirabili illo consensu vel cæcis apparebit priscos fabularum architectos a scriptoribus sacris multa esse mutuatos. From this wonderful agreement of Heathen mythology with the Scriptures, it cannot but appear that one is a corruption of the other. That the memory of Joshua and Sampson was Vossius de preserved under Hercules Tyrius, is made likewise very c.26.p.118, probable from several circumstances of the stories. Others 169. have deduced the many rites of Heathen worship from those used in the Tabernacle among the Jews. Several others might be insisted on; as the parallel between Og and Typho, and between the old Silenus and Balaam; both noted for their skill in divination; both taken by water, Num. xxii. 5; both noted for riding on an ass: ἐπὶ ὄνου τὰ πολλὰ ὀχέμενος, saith Lucian of the old Silenus ; Lucian. de and that which makes it more probable, is that of Pausa- Pausan.l.vi. nias, Ἐν γὰρ τῇ Ἑβραίων χώρᾳ Σιληνοῦ μνῆμα, which some p. 391. learned men have been much puzzled to find out the Ed. Xyland. truth of; and this conjecture, which I here propound, may pass at least for a probable account of it. But I shall no longer insist on these things, having, I suppose, done what is sufficient to our purpose, which is, to make it appear what footsteps there are of the truth of Scripture-history amidst all the corruptions of Heathen mythology.

Deor. Con.

III.

I.

:

CHAP. VI.

Of the Excellency of the Scriptures.

I. Concerning Matters of pure Divine Revelation in Scripture: the Terms of Salvation only contained therein. The Ground of the Disesteem of the Scripture is tacit Unbelief. II. The Excellency of the Scriptures manifested as to the Matters which God hath revealed therein. IV. The Excellency of the Discoveries of God's Nature which are in Scripture. V. Of the Goodness and Love of God in Christ. The Suitableness of those Discoveries of God to our natural Notions of a Deity. The Necessity of God's making known himself to us, in order to the regulating our Conceptions of him. VI. The Scriptures give the fullest Account of the State of Men's Souls, and the Corruptions which are in them. The only Way of pleasing God discovered in the Scriptures. VII. The Scriptures contain Matters of greatest Mysteriousness, and most universal Satisfaction to Men's Minds. VIII. The Excellency of the Manner wherein Things are revealed in Scriptures, in regard of Clearness, Authority, Purity, IX. Uniformity, and Persuasiveness. X. The Excellency of the Scriptures as a Rule of Life. The Nature of the Duties of Religion, and the Reasonableness of them. The Greatness of the Encouragements to Religion contained in the Scriptures. XI. The great Excel lency of the Scriptures, as containing in them the Covenant of Grace in Order to Man's Salvation.

BOOK HAVING thus largely proved the truth of all those passages of sacred Scripture, which concern the history of the first ages of the world, by all those arguments which a subject of that nature is capable of, the only thing left in order to our full proving the divinity of the Scriptures, is the consideration of those matters contained in it, which are in an especial manner said to be of Divine revelation. For those historical passages, though we believe them, as contained in the Scripture, to have been divinely inspired, as well as others, yet they are such things as, supposing no Divine revelation, might have been known sufficiently to the world, had not men been wanting to themselves as to the care and means of preserving them. But those matters which I now come to discourse of, are of a more sublime and transcendent nature; such as it had been impossible for the minds of men to reach, had they not been immediately discovered