rality, together with fuch an account of the création, as might raife in their minds the moft awful veneration of almighty power, wisdom, and goodnefs, was by him perfonally communicated to each fucceffive generation, until the days of Lamech, the father of Noah. Shem, the fon of Noah, lived to the time of Abraham: from the time of the fettling of Jacob's family in Egypt, to Mofes, was but one hundred and thirty five years; so that we may eafily conceive, that traditional knowledge could have scarcely been interrupted from Adam to Mofes. And hence alfo appears the error of Rabbi Elias, who faid, that previous to the written law, men were deftitute of any certain rule to guide them. It is true, indeed, to the cleareft demonftration, according to the expreffion of our bleffed Lord, that the Jews have made void the law through their vain traditions. For by the written law, tradition was annulled, and rendered unneceffary; yet it must be acknowledged, that from this fource, all the nations of the world, at firft, received the information they had, and altho' it became enveloped in fable, by means of poetic fiction and enthusiasm, yet the dim light it afforded, even in this ftate, was held in the highest veneration by many heathen philofophers;

philofophers: wherefore Plato thus expreffes his religious refpect for tradition as being the acknowledged fource of inftruction. "It is juft, that both I who difcourfe, and you that judge, fhould remember that we are but men, and receiving the probable mythologic tradition of our fathers, it is but meet that we inquire no further into it."

And indeed, unless this be allowed, it will be impoffible to account for a variety of circumftances recorded in the fcattered fragments of antiquity; which, like the ruins and monuments of ancient buildings, ftill are fufficient to indicate the ingenuity of their original founders.

Traditional knowledge was undoubtedly fufficient to answer all the purposes of religion, in the antediluvian world. When the ages of men were protracted to fuch amazing lengths, if any difficulty had then arifen to be folved, relative to religious fentiments, an immediate appeal might have been made to an indisputable authority, to the Protogenitor himself, who would have most readily interpofed, to the mutual fatisfaction of the parties. But befides fuch information, God himself vouchfafed to confirm, and establish the doctrines thus received, by holding familiar converfe with his faithful fervants.

There

Therefore, until the idolatry of Nachor, we rad of no difference in religious fentiments, and even then, but little, and that arifing probably from the fancies and whims of fpeculating men; for, about that time probably, began the study of aftronomy, which gave rife to idolatry in Egypt, Chaldæ, and Arabia.

*

Another cause of the corruption of primæval religion, might have originated from the pretenfions of innovating impoftors to the fame familiar intercourfe with God, that Abraham and the Patriarchs undoubtedly enjoyed which will help to explain a difcult paffage in ancient history. "Porrò Rex Suphis. τα δε και περιόπης εις θεες εγένετο, και την ιεραν ureygae Biov. Moreover this (King Suphis) was a contemplator of the Gods, and wrote the facred book. The word ons is understood to mean a very familiar intercourse with the Gods, in the fame manner that it is faid that Amenophis affected Ev year dearn to be a vifionary contemplator of the Gods. Pretenfions of this, nature having been common among the nations, hence the words of Cicero: Fræfentiam fæpe divi fuam declarant, fæpe vifæ formæ deorum. Sir John Marsham has called the Age in which he has treated

*See Warfham.

on

on this fubject, by the title of and with great propriety.

When tradition became inadequate to the information of man, whofe life began rapidly to decline, it pleased the ever-watchful providence of God to make a permanent revelation of his will by the written law.

The Ifraelites, weary of the accumulated oppreffions, beneath which they daily groaned under the power of the Egyptian Tyrant, cried without intermiffion to God, with agonizing fervour, for the accomplishment of the promise made unto their fathers, that he might liberate them from their fufferings, and give them the inheritance they were taught to hope for.

But God is not flack concerning his promife, as fome men count flackness, but is faithful in the accomplishment of all his promises. In his own time, and at an unexpected moment, he visits his people with the joyful profpect of falvation, which first, like the crepufculum or twilight of the morning, gradually increasing, foretels, to a degree of certain affurance, the approaching glory of that bright luminary, before whofe glowing countenance, all clouds and darkness difappear.

SKETCH

SKETCH II.

THE CHARACTER OF MOSES, PREVIOUS TO HIS MISSION.

LET

ET us but confider a few outlines of the character of that moft illuftrious man, who was divinely appointed to be the deliverer of the Ifraelites, and the means of communicating the written law, and then,

the

* In drawing a comparifon between lawgivers, we are always to expect a fuperiority of wisdom from them, in proportion to their having existed in later times, the antiquity of the world, being accounted its infantile flate, and it being known that knowledge and learning have been always gradual in their advances towards perfection. We have no perfon to compare Mofes with in the age wherein he flourished, and many ages had elapfed before the hiftorical age had made a beginning in any other nation but that of Ifrael. The first perfon who was deferving of the appellation of lawgiver in the world after Mofes, was Lycurgus, in the 898th year before Chrift: he was the fon of Eunomus, king of Sparta. A love of moral virtue diftinguished him in the fift inftance, having fpurned at the iniquitous propofal of his elder brother's widow. He travelled into Crete and Ionia, and it is imagined, into Egypt, to ftudy the laws and customs of other countries. On his return to Sparta, as he

was