"their heart," (x) that is, the Jews are ignorant of the true spiritual meaning of the Mosaic writings. Whence it is evident that, in his time, these writings were read regularly among the Jews, and had long been so. Again, JOSEPHUS, in his book against Appion, says, "We (the Jews) have two-and-twenty

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"books which are to be believed as of divine autho rity, and which comprehend the history of all ages: five belong to Moses, which contain the ori66 gin of man, and the tradition of the succession of "generations down to his death; which takes in a compass of about three thousand years." MAIMONIDES also, in the eleventh century, drew up a confession of faith for the Jews, which all of them at this day admit. Two of its articles relate to Moses: they are, 1. "The doctrine and prophecy of Moses "is true." 2. "The law that we have was given by "Moses." The Jews, then, from the time of Josephus down to the present, have ascribed the Pentateuch to Moses. Assume the hypothesis that these five books were forged any time between Moses and Josephus, and mark the great absurdity thereby produced; you must, in consequence, believe that at some one period the whole Jewish nation suffered themselves to be deluded, to adopt burdensome rites in remembrance of events which they knew never

(x) 2 Cor. iii. 15. Spinoza's objections to the books of Moses, as well as his assertion that they were not written by Moses but by Ezra, or essentially altered by him, are very completely refuted, and shewn to involve the most monstrous absurdities, by Abbadie in his "Vindication "of the Truth of the Christian Religion."

occurred, and to receive, as the law which was ever after to regulate their conduct, rules contrived by a vile pretender, who endeavoured to palm them upon them as laws emanating from the Supreme Being himself. This is in itself so extremely preposterous and improbable, that I might safely have rested the authority of the Pentateuch upon the present argument alone, were it not that as this portion of the Bible has been more exposed than any other to infidel attacks, I thought it right to show that, fortified as it is on all points, it may fairly be reckoned impregnable. (y)

I shall now pass to the book of JOB, the authenticity of which has been more questioned than any of the historical parts of Scripture next to the Penta

(y) Another very strong argument in favour of the authenticity of the Pentateuch is derived from the variety of minute allusions, and indirect coincidences, between the book of Deuteronomy and the preceding books: coincidences such as would never have been found in forged compositions. This argument has been established upon numerous instances selected by the late Dean Graves, of Trinity College, Dublin, in his valuable "Lectures on the Pentateuch." The genuineness of one of the books, Exodus, may also be inferred from the short and modest account of 80 years of Moses's life, preceding his Divine Mission, comprised in twenty-two verses. Many collateral proofs establishing the truth of important facts related in the books of Moses might easily be adduced. Thus, although the history of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is recorded in the Bible, it cannot thence be contended that the testimony of the Dead Sea, and the present state of its waters, (see Dr. Marcet's analysis of them in Phil. Trans. 1807,) ceases to be applicable or credible. Thus, again, the tribes of Arabs which deduce their descent from Ishmael, cannot be denied to be at least some authority for the existence of Ishmael's father. Thus, also, the pyramids of Egypt demonstrate, at the present period, the slavery of the people who built them and the last of them indicates the unfinished state in which the business was left by the workmen: so that even architectural anti

teuch. The great antiquity of this book, however, has not, as far as I recollect, been much disputed. But it has been made a question, "Is this book "dramatic or narrative?" Or, "Was there ever such

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a man as Job?" Now, although the Apostle Paul, in his first Epistle to the Corinthians, quotes a passage from the book of Job with his accustomed. reference to a book of Divine Authority, "For it is "written; (*) yet this does not determine the point. But the reality of the history, however poetical and

quities, as well as profane history, which names the chiefs of the Hebrews as builders of these mountains, serve to confirm the truth of the residence of the Israelites in Egypt, and consequently appear in support of the authenticity of the Mosaic history.

I cannot help swelling this already long note, by pointing to one remarkable historical fact, which proves the existence of the law of Moses at the dissolution of the kingdom of Israel, when the ten tribes were carried captive to Assyria by Shalmaneser, and dispersed among the provinces of that extensive empire; that is, about 741 years before Christ. It was about that time the Samaritans were transported from Assyria to repeople the country, which the ten captive tribes of Israel had formerly inhabited. The posterity of the Samaritans still inhabit the land of their fathers, and have preserved copies of the Pentateuch, two or three of which were brought to this country in the last century but one. The Samaritan Pentateuch is written in old Hebrew characters, and therefore must have existed before the time of Ezra. But so violent were the animosities which subsisted between the Jews and Samaritans, that in no period of their history would the one nation have received any books from the other. They must therefore have received them at their first settlement in Samaria from the captive priest whom the Assyrian nonarch sent to teach them how they should fear the Lord (2 Kings, xvii. 27). This observation is due to M. Dupin, whose defence of the books of Moses, against the objections of Hobbes, Spinoza, and F. Simon, is most complete and decisive. As it is too extensive for insertion here, I refer to the Preliminary Dissertation in the first volume of his Bibliotheca Patrum.

(2) 1 Cor. iii. 19. Job, v. 13.

elevated the style may be, may be fairly inferred from the prophecies of Ezekiel, and the Epistle of James. In the former, God himself, in speaking to the prophet, repeatedly mentions Job, in conjunction with Noah and Daniel, as men of extraordinary righteousness." Though these three men, Noah, "Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver "but their own souls by their righteousness, saith "the Lord God." And in the latter, James exhibits the patience of Job, and its reward, as an example and encouragement to professing Christians. (a) These passages prove, satisfactorily, I think, that Job was a real, and not an ideal, character. It is probable this book of Job has greater antiquity than any other in the Old Testament: for it contains no allusion to the children of Israel, to their grievous afflictions in Egypt, or their happy deliverance from them; though these topics would have given fine scope to Job and his friends in their various conferences. It should seem, indeed, from the age to which Job lived (but little less than 200 years), that he was a contemporary with the ancient Hebrew patriarchs; and that Uz, his country, was in Edom. The book was most probably written by Moses while he was in the land of Midian, where he had opportunity of coming to the knowledge of this history; and, seeing that it might be very useful to comfort and direct the Israelites, wrote it, under divine superintendance, for their benefit. Thus much, at least, is clear; that the book was written by a Hebrew,

(a) Ezek. xiv. 14, 16, 18, 20. James, v. 11.

by one who had been in Arabia, and by one who wrote before the promulgation of the Mosaic law: these criteria all attach to Moses, and to no other. Besides this, Hebrew scholars affirm that, in the original, the language is often peculiar, the expressions being such as are met with in the writings of Moses, and no where else. This book is indeed the only one from which we can derive a correct knowledge of the patriarchal religion, and which "gives completion to "the Bible, by adding the dispensation of the earliest ages to those of the Law and of the Gospel, by which "it was successively superseded." (b)

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As to the PROPHECIES, the only other compositions in the Old Testament I intend to specify here, it may be observed, that they all entered the Septuagint version of which I have already spoken, and which was executed at least 287 years before Christ, through the means of Demetrius Phalereus, and by the command of Ptolemy Philadelphus. I know very well that Dean Prideaux affirms, on the evidence of Philo, Josephus, and a few others, who had never seen the original version of the LXX, that it only contained the law. But Aristobulus, who was an Alexandrian Jew, tutor to an Egyptian king, living within 100 years after the translation was made, and having free access to it in the Royal library, affirms, that "the whole Sacred

(b) See farther, J. D. Michaelis in R. Lowth Prælectiones, Notæ, et. Epimetra, p. 185. Thomas Scott's Translation of Job; and the elegant Introductory Dissertation to the recent translation of "The Book of Job," by my late learned friend Dr. John Mason Good, F. R. S.

The substance of this dissertation is now inserted in my Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Character of Dr. Good.