"It is therefore meet, that good men should say to lim who is about to buy them, ' Buy us, and we will teach thee sobriety of mind;' to him who threatens to banish us to a foreign clime, The whole earth is our country;' to him who deprives them of their goods, We are content with little. Nor are we inferior to those, who combat in the public games. They are not frightened with things like these; though they fight for a prize, which is hardly a shadow of our high reward, and which gives them only firmness and strength of body; whereas, the glory set before us arms us with strength of mind, and steels us against every sense of pain.'

Lastly. In the persecution of the christian Jews at Alexandria, we see the origin of monas

Αξιον ουν και τῳ σπουδαιῳ προς μεν τον εχοντα ωνητικώς, λέγειν, σωφροσύνην αρα αναδιδαχθηση προς δε τον απειλούνται φυγήν ὑπερορίαν, πασα γη μοι πατρις προς δε τον την των χρημάτων ζημίαν, άρχει μέτρια βιοτα μοι προς δε τον πληγας και θανατον επανατεινομενον, οὐ μορμυλέττεται με ταυτα ουδε ειμι πυκτων και παγκρα τίαςων ελάττων, οι τινες αμαυρα είδωλα αρετης όρωντες, ατε σωμάτων αυτο μονον ευεξίαν διαπονήσαντες, ἑκατέρα πλητικώς ὑπομενουσιν. ὁ γὰρ ἡγεμων σώματος εν εμοί νους ανδριά τονωθείς, όυτω σφόδρα νενευρωται, ὡς επάνω πάσης αλγηδόνος ίςασθαι δυνασθαι. Ρ. 887.

tic institutions. This is a subject of no less curiosity than importance; and we may draw the most unquestionable information respecting it from the authentic writings of Philo*. The Jews, when their houses were attacked, withdrew from the city, and sought in the wilderness, or in retired and solitary places, that peace and security, which their enemies had denied them in the midst of society. The first christians in Egypt and Palestine became monks and hermits from compulsion, and not from choice; and

* The following account of Prideaux (vol. ii. 283.) expresses the opinion of protestants on this mistaken subject. "Christian monkism had its beginning about the year of our Lord 250. Paul, a young gentleman of the country of Thebais, in Egypt, to avoid the Decian persecution, fled to the adjoining desart, and fixing his abode in a cave there, first of all christians, began the practice of an ascetic life, in which he continued ninety years, being of the age of 113 at the time of his death. About twenty years after his thus retiring to this place, Antony, another young gentleman of the same province, being excited by the fame hereof to follow his example, retired to the same desart; and many others after a while, out of the like zeal of devotion, retiring to him, he formed them into a body, and became their abbot," &c. Mosheim (Eccles. Hist. vol. i. 275.) supposes the monastic life to have been the offspring of the mystic theology derived from the school of Plato; whereas he would have been much nearer the truth, if he had said, that the mystic theology was the offspring of the monastic life.

thus the gross superstition, which afterwards, from this source, disgraced christianity, originated in the violence and cruelties with which it was at first assailed.

The book of the Revelation, while in general it delineates the yet future state of the church, contains, in many parts, allusions to facts, which had already come to pass. Of this kind is the following passage, the force of which will be immediately felt, when compared with the account which Philo gives of the christians, and their escape to the wilderness to avoid persecution. “And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child. And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth helped the woman; and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood, which the dragon cast out of his mouth. And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandment of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ." Chap. xii. 13.-The

dragon or serpent, which pursued the woman, stands for the people who worshipped it, namely, the Egyptians. And the earth helped the woman, that is, the christian church; and this not only because the believers found shelter in the wilderness, but as being given to agriculture, they derived from the earth the means of sub

sistence.

In the book concerning the christians, Philo has one passage, which is worthy to be translated in this place. The argument he uses supposes, that the men he was defending possessed very extraordinary fortitude and virtue; and he anticipates the question which the adversary might put, "Whether any men then existed, or ever had existed, that realized the character which he was delineating?" The author answers, “ I may well reply, that, in former times, certain men flourished, who having God for their guide, excelled all their contemporaries in virtue; and who, living conformably to the divine law, which is also the law of reason and nature, not only became themselves free, but filled all around them with the same manly freedom. And in our own days there are men, who, as images of the same high original, have copied the fair and honourable conduct of those wise patriarchs. For we are not to suppose that, because the souls of our adversaries are themselves destitute of spi

ritual freedom, as being the slaves of folly and bad passions, all men are incapable of the same elevated virtue. If such persons do not appear like flocks in vast numbers, it cannot be deemed strange: first, because great moral excellence, like every other excellence, is rare; and secondly, because they pursue truth in retirement, remote from vulgar eyes, wishing, if it be possible, to come forth and reform the world: for virtue by its very nature is disposed to benefit the community. But as they are not able to effect this laudable purpose, on account of the mad prejudices and vices, which have overspread society, and which have been deeply rooted in the public mind, they have retired, and in solitude sought shelter from the persecution, which, with the violence of a torrent, threatened to sweep them away. And we, if we have any zeal for reformation, should pursue them to their retreat, and supplicate them to return, that their presence might prove instrumental in healing the monstrous disorders, which, like wild beasts, overrun the community, offering them peace and liberty, and other earthly blessings, instead of assailing them with war and slavery, and other innumerable evils*."

* Επειδή δε τινες των ήκιςα συγκεχορευκότων μουσαις ειώθασιν ερωταν, τινες ή πρότερον γεγονασιν άνδρες, η νον