dividing the body of Osiris into twenty-six parts, and distributing them to his accomplices: which, being afterwards found by Isis, and delivered by her to distinct bodies of priests to be buried with great secrecy, she enjoined them to pay divine honours to him, and to consecrate some particular animal to his memory. From this account (says our Author very gravely) we may see the reason why so many sacred animals were worshipped in Egypt. p. 226. Again, the Greek account, in Diodorus, of Osiris's expedition, has been shewn to be a heap of impossible absurdities; yet our Author believes it all; and would have believed as much more, rather than have run into the rashness of any modern invention. But this matter comes under our next Section; where wẹ have to do with a very different sort of writer; whose regard, however, for antiquity in that point is, we conceive, as much too small as this Author's is too great.

Section 3.

[See Divine Legation, Book iv. § 5.Ì

WHEN I entered on a confutation of Sir Isaac Newton's Egyptian Chronology, I was willing, for the greater satisfaction of the reader, to set his arguments for the identity of Osiris and Sesostris, on which that chronology was founded, in the strongest and clearest light. On this account I took them as I found them collected, ranged in order, and set together in one view, with the greatest advantage of representation, by the very worthy and learned Master of the Charter-House, in a professed apology for that excellent author. But this liberty the learned writer hath been pleased to animadvert upon in the late Latin edition of the tracts to which that apology was prefixed—“We are not (says he†). "ignorant

* De veris annis D. N. Jesu Christi natali & emortuali Dissertationes duæ Chronologica.

"Non nescimus nuperrime accidisse, ut vir ingenio & erudi"tione præstans, quum ratus sit ad Divinam Legationem Mosis "demonstrandum aliquo modo pertinere, ut probetur Osiris non "esse idem cum Sesostri, omnia huc allata in lusum jocumque "verterit, instituta comparatione Arthuri illius fabulosi cum "Wilhelmo Normanno, quos æquè bonis rationibus in unum homi

D. Warburton Div. Leg. Mosis Demonst. &c. Tom, ii.

nem

ignorant of what has lately happened, that the Author "of The Divine Legation, supposing it, some how or "other, to concern Moses's divine mission to prove that "Osiris was not the same with Sesostris, hath turned all "that is here said into ridicule, by a comparison made "between the fabulous Arthur and William the Norman; who, he says, may be made one by as good reasons (though they have scarce any thing alike or in common "with one another) as those which we have brought to "confound Osiris with Sesostris: and on this point he "draws out a disputation through seventy pages and upwards; wherein, notwithstanding, he neither denies nor confutes, but only laughs at what we have here "said of Sesostris. It is true indeed that some other of "Newton's assertions he does oppose, as those concern

ing the late invention of arts, arms, and instruments by "some certain king; and of this part of the argument "he has the better. For that these things were found "out by the Egyptians long before the age of Sesostris, holy Scripture commands us to believe: but whether "found out by any of their kings, is not so certain. "However, these were matters we never touched upon, "as relating nothing to our purpose; nor do they yet "induce us to recede from that conclusion of the famous "Newton, That Sesac was Sesostris, Osiris, and Bacchus. "But the cause being now brought before the public, let "the learned determine of it." Thus far this candid and ingenuous writer.

He says, the Author of the Divine Legation supposes that it some how or other concerns Moses's divine mission to prove Osiris not the same with Sesostris; which seems

to

nem conflari posse ait (quamvis nihil fere habeant inter se com"mune aut simile) ac nos Osirin cum Sesostri confundimus. Et de hac re disputationem in 70 paginas & ultra producit. In qua tamen hæc nostra de Sesostri neque negat neque refellit, sed "irridet. Alia vero quædam Newtoni dicta de sero inventis ab "aliquo rege artibus, armis, instrumentis oppugnat, et ea quidem parte causæ vincit. Nam ut ista longe ante Sesostris ætatem "apud Egyptios reperta sint, Scriptura sacra jubet credere; ab "ullo unquam regum inventa esse haud ita certum. Sed ea prius "non attigimus, ut quæ nihil ad propositum nostrum attinent, neque nunc nos movent, ut pedem retrahamus ab ista Cl. Newtoui conclusione. Sesacum, Sesostrim, Osirin & Bacchum fuisse. "Lite jam contestata judicent eruditi." In Dedic. pp xii. xiii,

to imply that this learned person doth not see how it' concerns it. And yet afterwards he owns, that Scripture (meaning the writings of Moses) will not allow us to believe, with Sir Isaac, that the invention of arts, arms, and instruments, was so late as the time of Sesostris. Now it follows, as I have shewn, by certain consequence, that, if Osiris and Sesostris were one and the same, then the invention of arts was as late as the time of Sesostris. But this contradicting Scripture, or the writings of Moses, as the learned writer himself confesseth, the reader sees how it concerns Moses's mission to prove Osiris not the same with Sesostris.

The learned writer, speaking of the comparison I had made between Arthur and William the Norman, says, they have scarce any thing alike or in common with one another. I had brought together thirteen circumstances (the very number the learned writer thinks sufficient to establish the identity of Osiris and Sesostris) in which they perfectly agreed. I am persuaded he does not suspect me of falsifying their history. He must mean therefore that thirteen in my comparison, is scarce any thing, which, in his, is every thing.

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He goes on,-in a disputation of seventy pages and upwards the Author of the Divine Legation neither denies nor confutes, but only laughs at what we have said of Sesostris. What is it the learned writer hath said of Sesostris? Is it not this? That between his history and that of Osiris there are many strokes of resemblance: from whence he infers (with Sir Isaac) that these two heroes were one and the same. Now if he means I have not denied nor confuted this resemblance, he says true. I had no such design. It is too well marked by antiquity to be denied. Neither, let me add, did I laugh at it. What I laughed at (if my bringing a similar case is to be called by that word) was his inference from this resem‐ blance, that therefore Osiris and Sesostris were one and the same. But then too I did more than laugh: I both denied and confuted it. First I denied it, by shewing that this resemblance might really be, though Osiris and Sesostris were two different men, as appeared by an equal resemblance in the actions of two different men, Arthur and IVilliam the Norman. But as the general history of ancient

ancient Egypt would not suffer us to believe all that the Greek writers have said of this resemblance, I then explained the causes that occasioned their mistaken accounts of the two persons, from whence so perfect a resemblance arose. Secondly, I confuted it, by shewing from the concurrent testimony of antiquity, and from several internal arguiments deducible from that testimony, that Osiris and Sesostris were in fact two different persons, living in two very distant ages.

The learned writer proceeds-It is true indeed that some other of Newton's assertions he does oppose, as those concerning the late invention of arts, arms, and instruments, and in this part of the argument he gets the better. But if I have the better here, it is past dispute I overthrow the whole hypothesis of the identity of Osiris and Sesostris. For, as to that resemblance, which antiquity hath given them, that, considered singly, when the pretended late invention of arts hath been proved a mistake, will indeed deserve only to be laughed at. But 'were it, as Sir Isaac Newton endeavoured to prove, that the invention of arts was no earlier than the time of Sesostris or Sesac, there is then indeed an end of the 'ancient Osiris of Egypt; and he so much boasted of by that people can be no other than the Sesostris of this Author. For the very foundation of the existence of the ancient Osiris was his civilizing Egypt, and teaching them the arts of life: but if this were done by Sesostris, or in his reign, then is he the true Osiris of Egypt. As on the contrary, were the invention of arts as early as Scripture history represents it, then is Egypt to be believed, when she tells us that Osiris, their inventor of arts, was many ages earlier than Sesostris their conqueror: and consequently all Sir Isaac Newton's identity separates and falls to pieces. In a word, take it which way you will, if Osiris were the same as Sesostris, then must the invention of arts (for all antiquity have concurred in giving that invention to Osiris) be as late as the age of Scsostris, the Sesac of Newton: but this, Scripture history * will not suffer us to believe. If, on the other hand, Osiris and Sesostris were not the same, then was the invention of arts (and for the same reason) much earlier than the age of Sesostris; as indeed all mankind thought

before

before Sir Isaac. These were the considerations which induced that great man, who so well understood the nature and force of evidence, to employ his whole sagacity of criticism in proving the invention of arts to be about the age of his Sesostris or Sesac. And is it possible he should have a follower who cannot see that he hath done this? or the necessity he had of doing it? It will be said, perhaps," that Sir Isaac has, indeed, argued much "for the low invention of arts: but hath neither inforced "it under the name of an argument, nor stated it in the "form here represented." The objection would ill become a follower of the great Newton, who should know that his master's method, as well in these his critical as in his physical inquiries, was to form the principal members of his demonstration with an unornamented brevity, and leave the supplial of the small connecting parts to his reader's capacity. Besides, in so obvious, so capital, so necessary an argument for this identity, it had been a ridiculous distrust of common sense, after he had spent so much pains in endeavouring to prove the low invention of arts, to have ended his reasoning in this formal manner : "And now, reader, take notice that "this is a conclusive argument for the identity of Osiris "and Sesostris." Lastly, let me observe, that this very reason which induced Sir Isaac to be so large in the establishment of his point, the low invention of arts, induced me to be as large in the subversion of it. And now some reasonable account, I hope, is given of the seventy long pages.

What follows is still more extraordinary. However, these were matters (says the learned writer, speaking of the invention of arts) we never touched upon, as relating nothing to our purpose. Here I cannot but lament the learned writer's ill fortune. There was but one single point, in the book he would defend, which is essentially to his purpose, and that, he hath given up as nothing to his purpose; and more unlucky still, on a review of the argument, hath treated it as an error in his author who took so much pains about it, but yet as an error that does not at all affect the question. For,

He concludes thus-nor do they yet induce me to recede from that conclusion of the famous Newton, thạt

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Sesac