II. That there are such means, you will easily. collect, without requiring me to come to a detail on so immense a subject, from the following considerations.

1. Some light may be expected to arise from the study of the prophecies themselves. For the same symbols, or figures, recur frequently in those writings and, by comparing one passage with another; the darker prophecies with the more perspicuous; the unfulfilled, with such as have been completed; and those which have their explanation annexed to them, with those that have not; by this course of inquiry, I say, there is no doubt but some considerable progress may be made in fixing the true and proper meaning of this mysterious language.

2. Very much of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, on which, as we have seen, the prophetic style was fashioned, may be learned from many ancient records and monuments, still subsisting; and from innumerable hints and passages, scattered through the Greek antiquaries and historians, which have been carefully collected and compared by learned

men.

3. The Pagan superstitions of every form and species, which were either derived from Egypt, or

conducted on hieroglyphic notions, have been of singular use in commenting on the Jewish prophets. Their 'omens, augury, and judicial astrology seem to have proceeded on symbolic principles; the mystery being only this, That such objects, as in the hieroglyphic pictures, were made the symbols of certain ideas, were considered as omens of the things themselves. Thus, the figure of a horse, being the symbol of prosperity and success in arms, when a head of this animal was found in laying the foundations of Carthage, the soothsayers concluded, that the character of that state would be warlike, and its fortune prosperous: or, thus again, because the sun was the common emblem of a king, or supreme governor in any state, an eclipse of this luminary was thought to indicate the ruin, or diminution, at least, of his power and fortune; and the superstition is not quite extinct at this day.*

But, of all the Pagan superstitions, that which is known by the name of Oneirocritics, or the art of interpreting dreams, is most directly to our purpose. There is a curious treatise on this sub

Hence the allusion of our great poet,

--or from behind the moon

In dim eclipse diastrous twilight sheds
On half the nations, and with fear of change
Perplexes monarchs.-P. L. i. 596.

ject, which bears the name of Achmet, an Arabian writer; and another by Artemidorus, an Ephesian, who lived about the end of the first century.* In the former of these collections (for both works are compiled out of preceding and very ancient writers) the manner of interpreting dreams, according to the use of the oriental nations, is delivered; as the rules, which the Grecian diviners followed, are deduced in the other. For, light and frivolous as this art was, it is not to be supposed that it was taken up at hazard, or could be conducted without rule; an arbitrary or capricious interpretation of dreams, considered as a mode of divination, being too gross an insult on the common sense of mankind. But the rules, by which both the Greek and oriental diviners justified their interpretations, appear to have been formed on symbolic principles, that is, on the very same ideas of analogy, by which the Egyptian hieroglyphics (now grown venerable and even sacred) were explained. So that the prophetic style, which is all over painted with hieroglyphic imagery, receives an evident illustration from these two works.

* See these two works, publishedtogether, under the title of Artemidori Daldiani et Achmetis Sereimi F. Oneirocritica, by Nicolaus Rigaltius. Lutet. 1603.

† Non enim credo nullo percepto aut cæteros artifices versari in suo munere, aut eos, qui divinatione utantur, futura prædicere, Cic. de Fato, c. 6.

I have said, that this superstition was more im. mediately to our purpose, than any other. For some of the more important prophecies are delivered in the way of dreams; and therefore, without doubt, the rules for interpreting the symbols presented to the mind of the prophet in these inspired dreams, were the very same with those that were laid down in the Gentile Oneirocritics, The conclusion, I know, may appear bold and hazardous. But you will reflect that there is really nothing more strange in applying this mode of interpretation to dreams, than to any other species of prophecy, to visions, for instance, or parables, or even, in general, to any part of the prophetic style. The compliance, on the part of the Inspirer, is the same on every supposition; and only shews that, when the Deity thinks fit to reveal himself to men, he does it in a way that is suitable to their ideas and apprehensions. Nor is any sanction, in the mean time, given, by this accommodation of himself, to the Pagan practice of divining by dreams. For, though the same symbols be interpreted in the same manner, yet the prophecy doth not depend on the interpretation, but the inspiration of the dream. A casual dream, thus interpreted, is only a dream still; the received sense of the symbols, represented in it, no way inferring the completion of it. But when the Almighty sends the

dream, the symbols are of another consideration, and not only signify, but predict, an event.

Now, if men will mistake a barely significant emblem, for a prophetic inspiration, the fault is in themselves, and not in the use of the common emblems: which may be the vehicle of a true prophecy, though craft or superstition take occasion from them to divine lies.* It follows, that the rules which the ancient diviners observed in explaining symbolic dreams, may be safely and justly applied to the interpretation of symbolic prophecies, and especially to such of them as were delivered in the form of dreams.

4. It is lastly to be observed, that not only the Arabic and other oriental writers, but even the Greek and Latin poets may contribute very much to the exposition of the ancient prophets. For these poets abound in strong metaphors and glowing images, which were either copied from the symbolic language of the East, or invented on the same principles of analogy as prevailed in the Egyptian hieroglyphics. So that many expressions, which seem dark and strange in the writings of the Jewish prophets, may be clearly illustrated

* Ezekiel xiii. 9,