antiquary and worthy prelate, Dr. Percy, who tranflated it, and who, as he honoured my juvenile productions with his patronage, I hope will extend it to the maturer efforts of my pen. In that poem, the astonished Gangler, being introduced into the lofty palace, or hall, of the gods, the roof of which "was formed of brilliant gold, beheld three thrones raised one above another, and upon each throne fate a facred perfonage. Upon his afking which of these was their king, the guide answered, he, who fits on the lowest throne, is the king, his name is HAR, the lofty one; the fecond is JAFNHAR, or equal to the lofty one; he, who fits on the highest throne, is called THRIDI, or the third."* The right reverend editor informs us, that, in the manufcript of the EDDA, preferved at Upfal, there is a representation, or drawing, very rudely executed, of these three thrones, and of the three perfons fitting upon them, before whom Gangler is drawn in a fuppliant pofture. These figures, his lordship adds, bear fo great a resemblance to the Roman Catholic pictures of the Trinity, that we must not wonder if some have imagined them to be an allufion

EDDA, tranflated by the editor of Mallet's North. Antiq. vol. ii. p. 3.

allufion to that doctrine, particularly those who suppose it was already known to Plato and fome others among the ancient Pagans." To this remark I beg permiffion to subjoin, that though I am very far from conceiving that thefe thrones have any immediate allufion to the thrones which the pious Daniel faw exalted, (for, fo the original words, tranflated caft down, should be rendered,) whereon the Ancient of Days and the eternal Logos fat in heaven to judge mankind, and much farther from drawing any comparison between the IMMORTAL BEINGS that fat upon the latter, and the deified mortals that were exalted to the former, thrones; yet I may furely contend for the perversion of some ancient tradition, by which the mind of the Scandinavian theologue was impreffed with the idea of a heaven, in which were erected three thrones for as many fovereign gods: I fay the perverfion of fome ancient tradition, fince it is for a triad of deity, the manifest veftige of that nobler doctrine, a Trinity in Unity, that I, in this inftance, alone contend. But, left I fhould appear, amidst these excurfive inquiries into the Pagan triads, to have altogether loft fight of that nobler doctrine, I fhall, upon this fubject of celeftial thrones, fubmit to the reader

a very curious paffage, relative to the belief of the Jews in a tri-une Deity, which occurs in the fame extenfive note of the Univerfal Hiftory from which I borrowed a former extract on that fubject, and in which the true meaning of the paffage in Daniel, juft cited, refpecting the throne of Deity, is difcuffed. The writers of the Talmud, they affert, have plainly unfolded their real opinion in agitating this question; Why is the throne of God, in Daniel, mentioned in the plural number? "After feveral trifling anfwers, which are there given as the folution of several learned rabbies, one of whom pretends, that the plural implies the thrones of God and David: the last and concluding reply is to the following purpose: That it is blafphemy to set the creature on the throne of the Creator, bleffed for ever; and the whole is clofed with these notable words: If any one can folve this difficulty, let him do it; if not, let him go his way and not attempt it." The meaning, they observe, is too obvious to need explanation.*

That the vaft continent of America was in the most remote periods vifited, and in part colonized,

* See Ancient Univerfal History, vol. iii. p. 12. Edit. Oft 1748.

colonized, by the great naval and commercial powers of the ancient world, the Phoenicians, Egyptians, and Carthaginians, who, driven by tempests, or some of the various accidents attendant upon the perilous science of navigation, has been rendered highly probable by the learned Hornius in his book, on the Origin of the Americans, from various concurring circumstances of affinity, enumerated by him, respecting the language, civil customs, and religious inftitutions, prevailing among those respective nations. The universal adoration of the folar orb by the Americans, and the remarkable fact mentioned by Sir William Jones in the Afiatic Researches, that the first dynasties of Peruvian kings are dignified, exactly as those of India are, by the name of the fun and moon,* may also be adduced in evidence that a race, wandering from the neighbourhood of Caucafus, and traversing the vast deserts of Afia, towards the northeastern extremity, paffed over the chain of islands, now known to exift between the two continents, and contributed their proportion towards the population of the new world. Whether in Manca, or MANCU, whom

F

• Vide Hornius de Orig. Gent. Americ. p. 105. Edit. O&, 1652.

whom the Peruvian traditional books mention as their firft emperor, may be traced, as Hornius afferts, any real veftige of the race of Tartars called MANCHEW, or, in the appellation of Mafateca, one of the four nations of New Spain; and, in Maffachufeta, a people of New England, the ancient MASSAGETÆ, are discovered; these are points on which, from the uncertainty of general etymology, it would be rafh to form any abfolute decifion. But, on a recent perusal of Acosta's Authentic History of South America, I could not avoid being struck with his account of the dreadful fanguinary facrifices of which both the Peruvians and Mexicans are enormoufly guilty, and I fhall here infert it, as forming a striking and gloomy fimilitude to the bloody facrifices of the old Scythians and Indians, defcribed from Herodotus and Mr. Wilkins in many former pages. That fimilitude is more particularly visible in these two points, the firft is, that the victims thus facrificed are prifoners taken in war ; the second is, that these are offered up for the prefervation of the monarch.*

The ancient Peruvians used to facrifice

young children from foure, or fix, yeares

See the former chapter, p. 181. et feq.

old