dence which not only was promifed, but was the natural confequence of a Theocratic form of government. But I am inclined to keep between the two contrary fuppofitions, and take up the premiffes of the one, and the conclufion of the other: to hold that the fterility of Judea was very corrigible; but that all poffible culture would be inadequate to the vast numbers which it fuftained, and that therefore its natural produce was ftill further multiplied by an extraordinary bleffing upon the land.

To support this fyftem, we may observe, that this extraordinary affiftance was beftowed more eminently, because more wanted, while the Ifraelites remained in the Wilderness. Moses, whose word will yet go as far as our General Historian's, fays, that when God took Jacob up, to give him his Law, he found him indeed in a desert Land, and in the wafte bowling Wilderness; but it was no longer fuch, when now God had the leading of him, "He led him about," [i. e. while he was preparing him for the conqueft of the promised Land] "He inftructed him," [i. e. by the LAW, which he there gave him] "He kept him as the apple of "bis eye," [i. e. he preferved him there by his extraordinary Providence ;] the effects of which he defcribes in the next words,-" He made him ride "on the high places of the earth," [i. e. he made the Wilderness to equal, in its produce, the best cultivated places]" that he might eat the increase " of the fields; and he made him to fuck honey "out of the Rock, and oil out of the flinty Rock: "Butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bafhan" [i. e. as large as that breed] "and goats, with the fat “ of kidneys of wheat," [i. e. the flour of wheat]

"and

" and thou didft drink the pure blood of the "Grape."

That this was no fairy-fcene appears from the effects." Jefhurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou "art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art "covered with fatnefs; then he forfook God "which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock "of his falvation", &c." This fevere reproof of Mofes certainly did not put the Ifraelites in an humour, to take the wonders in the foregoing account on his word, had the facts he appeals to been the least equivocal.

On the whole, we can form no conception how God could have chofen a People and affigned them a land to inhabit, more proper for the difplay of his almighty Power, than the People of Ifrael and the land of Judea. As to the People, the PROPHET in his Parable of the Vine-tree, informs us, that they were naturally, the weakeft and most contemptible of all nations: and as to the land, the POET, in his great Fable, which he calls a General History, affures us, that Judea was the vilest and moft barren of all countries. Yet fomehow or other this chofen People became the Instructors of mankind, in the nobleft office of humanity, the science of true Theology: and the promised Land, while made fubfervient to the worship of one God, was changed, from its native fterility, to a region flowing with milk and honey; and, by reafon of the incredible numbers which it fuftained, defervedly entitled the GLORY OF ALL LANDS.

This is the ftate of things which SCRIPTURE lays before us. And I have never yet feen those DEUT. chap. xxxii. ver. 10. & feq.

L 4

Strong

Book V. Strong reafons, from the schools of Infidelity, that fhould induce a man, bred up in any school at all, to prefer their logic to the plain facts of the Sacred Hiftorians.

I have used their teftimony to expofe one, who, indeed, renounces their authority: but in this I am not confcious of having tranfgreffed any rule of fair reafoning. The Freethinker laments that there is no contemporary Hiftorian remaining, to confront with the Jewish Lawgiver, and detect his impoftures. However, he takes heart, and boldly engages his credit to confute him from his own hiftory. This is a fair attempt. But he prevaricates on the very first onset. The Sacred Hif tory, befides the many civil facts which it contains, has many of a miraculous nature. Of these, our Freethinker will allow the firft only to be brought in evidence. And then bravely attacks his adverfary, who has now one hand tied behind him: for the civil and the miraculous facts, in the Jewish Difpenfation, have the fame, nay, a nearer relation to each other, than the two hands of the fame body; for these may be used fingly and independently, tho' to difadvantage; whereas the civil and the miraculous facts can neither be understood or accounted for, but on the individual inspection of both. This is confeffed by one who, as clearfighted as he was, certainly did not fee the confequence of what he fo liberally acknowledged.

The miracles in the Bible (fays his philofophic lordship)" are not like thofe in Livy, detached "pieces, that do not disturb the civil History, "which goes on very well without them. But

* See the View of Lord Bolingbroke's Philofophy, p. 192. &feq. of the third edition.

4

« the

"the miracles of the Jewish Hiftorian are intimately connected with all the civil affairs, and "make a neceffary and infeparable part. The "whole history is founded in them; it confifts of "little elfe, and if it were not an hiftory of them, it would be a history of nothing "."

From all this, I affume that where an Unbeliever, a Philofopher if you will, (for the Poet Voltaire makes them convertible terms) pretends to fhew the falfhood of Mofes's miffion from Mofes's own hiftory of it; he who undertakes to confute his reasoning, argues fairly when he confutes it upon facts recorded in that history, whether they be of the miraculous or of the civil kind: fince the two forts are so infeparably connected, that they must always be taken together, to make the history understood, or the facts which it contains intelligible.

A

SECT. II.

LLOWING it then, to have been God's purpofe to perpetuate the knowledge of himself amidst an idolatrous World, by the means of a feparated People; let us fee how this defign was brought about, when the Family, he had chofen, was now become numerous enough to fupport itfelf under a feparation; and Idolatry, which was grown to its moft gigantic ftature, was now to be repreffed.

Bolingb. pofth. works, vol. III. p. 279.

The

-11 [Ninus fils de Belus] ne peut être inventeur de l'idolatrie qui etoit bien plus ancienne; je ne dis pas feulement en Egypte, mais même au dela de l'Euphrate, puifque Rachel deroba les Teraphims, &c. Il faut aller en Egypte pour trouver

fur

BOOK V. The Ifraelites, were, at this time, groaning under the yoke of Egypt; whither the all-wife providence

fur cela quelque chofe du mieux fondé. Grotius croit que, du temps de Jofeph, l'idolatrie n'etoit point encore commune en Egypte. Cependant on voit des-lors dans ce pays un extrême attachement à la magie, à la divination, aux augures, à l'interpretation des fonges, &c. Moyfe defend d'adorer aucune figure, ni de ce qui eft vifible dans les cieux, ni de ce qui eft fur la terre, ni de ce qui eft dans les eaux. Voilà la defenfe generale d'adorer les aftres, les animaux, & les poiffons. Le veau d'or etoit une imitation du dieu Apis. La niche de Moloch, dont parle Amos, etoit apparemment portée avec une figure du foleil. Moyfe defend aux Hebreux d'immoler aux boucs, comme ils ont fait autrefois. La mort en l'honneur duquel il defend de faire le deûil, etoit le même qu'Ofiris. Beelphegor, aux myfteres duquel ils furent entrainez par les femmes de Madian, etoit Adonis. Moloch cruelle divinité, à laquelle on immoloit des victimes humaines, etoit commune du tems de Moyfe, auffi-bien que ces abominables facrifices. Les Chananeens adoroient des moûches & d'autres infectes, au rapport de l'auteur de la fageffe. Le même auteur nous parle des Egyptiens d'alors comme d'un peuple plongé dans toutes fortes d'abominations, & qui adoroit toutes fortes d'animaux, même les plus dangereux, & les plus nuifibles. Le pays de Chanaan etoit encore plus corrompu. Moyfe ordonne d'y abbattre les autels, les bois facrez, les idoles, les monumens fuperftitieux. Il parle des enclos, où l'on entretenoit un feu eternel en l'honneur du foleil. Voilà la plus indubitable epoque qui nous ayons de l'idolatrie. Mais ce n'eft point une epoque qui nous en montre fa fource & le commencement, ni même le progrés & l'avancement: elle nous préfente une idolatrie achevée, & portée à fon comble; les aftres, les hommes, les animaux mêmes adorez comme autant divinitez; la magie, la divination, l'impieté au plus haut point où elles puiffent aller; enfia le crime, & les defordres honteux, fuites ordinaires du culte fuperftitieux & de regle. Calmet Differt. fur l'Origine de l'Idolatrie, tom. 1. p. 431, 432. Thus far this learned writer. And without doubt, his account of the early and over-bearing progrefs of idolatry is exact. Another writer who would pafs for fuch, is in different fentiments. He thinks its rife and progrefs much lower. If we look (fays he) amongst the Canaanites, we fhall find no reason to imagine that there was a religion different from that of Abraham. Abraham travelled up and down many years in this country, and was refpected by the inhabitants of it, as

a perfon