it being understood to imply that their country Gods had now taken up their residence in Constellations of benignant influence.

IV. Nor is there anv better foundation for the fourth opinion; which is that of PORPHYRY*; who supposes that the doctrine of God's pervading all things was the original of brute-worship. But, 1. It proves too much: for according to this notion, every thing would have been the object of divine worship amongst the early Egyptians; but we know many were not. 2. Accord ing to this notion, nothing could have been the object of their execration; but we know many were. This notion was never an opinion of the people, but of a few of the learned only: 4. And those, not of the learned of Egypt, but of Greece. In a word, this pretended original of brute-worship was only an invention of their late Philosophers, to hide the deformities, and to support the credit of declining Paganism.

V. Akin to this, and invented for the same end, is what we find in JAMBLICHUS†; namely, That brutes were deified only as the symbols of the first Cause, considered in all his attributes and relations. Groundless as this fancy is, yet as it is embraced by our best philologists, such as Cudworth, Vossius, and Kircher, on the faith of those fanatic and inveterate enemies to Christianity, Porphyry and Jamblichus, I shall endeavour to expose it as it deserves. This will be the best done by considering the rise and order of the three great species of idolatry. The first, in time, was, as we have

* ̓Απὸ δὲ ταύτης ὁρμώμενοι τῆς ἀσκήσεως, καὶ τῆς πρὸς τὸ θεῖον οἰκειώσεως, ἔγνωσαν, ὡς ἐ δι ̓ ἀνθρώπε μόνα τὸ θεῖον διῆλθεν, ἔτε ψυχὴ ἐν μόνῳ ἀνθρώπῳ ἐπὶ γῆς καλεσκήνωσεν, ἀλλὰ σχεδὸν ἡ αὐτὴ διὰ πάνων διῆλθεν τῶν ζώων· διὸ εἰς τὴν θεοποιίαν παρέλαβον τᾶν ζῶον.—De Abst. lib. iv.

+ Πρότερον δή τον βάλομαι τῶν Αἰγυπίίων τὸν τρόπον τῆς Θεολογίας διερ μηνεῦσαι· ἔτοι γὰρ τὴν φύσιν τὸ παντὸς, καὶ τὴν δημιεργίαν τῶν θεῶν μιμέμενοι, καὶ αὐτοὶ τῶν μυσικῶν καὶ ἀποκεκρυμμένων καὶ ἀφανῶν νοήσεων εἰκόνας τινὰς διὰ συμβόλων ἐκφαίνεσιν, ὥσπερ καὶ ἡ φύσις τοῖς ἐμφανέσιν εἴδεσι τὰς ἀφανεῖς λόγες διὰ συμβόλων, τρόπον τινὰ, ἀπετυπώσατο ἡ δὲ τῶν θεῶν δημιεργία, τὴν ἀλήθειαν τῶν εἰδῶν διὰ τῶν φανερῶν εἰκόνων ὑπεγράψατο εἰδότες εν χαίροντα τάλα τὰ κρείττονα ὁμοιώσει τῶν ὑποδεεσέρων, καὶ βα λόμενοι αὐτὰ ἀγαθῶν ἔτω πληρῶν διὰ τῆς κατὰ τὸ δυνατὸν μιμήσεως, εἰκότως καὶ αὐτοὶ τὸν πρόσφορον αὐτοῖς τρόπον τῆς κεκρυμμένης ἐν τοῖς συμβόλοις μυςαγωγίας προφέρωσιν. De Myst. Ægypt. § 7. c. i.

shewn, the worship of the heavenly bodies; and this continued unmixed till the institution of political Society: Then, another species arose, the deification of dead kings and lawgivers. Such was the course of idolatry in all places as well as in Egypt: but there, the method of recording the history of their hero Gods, in improved hieroglyphics, gave birth to the third species of idolatry, brute-worship; and this was peculiar to Egypt and its colonies. Now as the method used by all nations, of ingrafting hero-worship on star-worship, occasioned the Philologists to mistake* the former as symbolical of the latter; so the method, used by the Egyptians (mentioned a little before) of supporting brute-worship, which was really symbolical of their hero Gods, made the same writers think it to be originally symbolical of star Gods, and even of the first Cause. Thus the very learned Vossius fell into two mistakes: 1. That heroworship was symbolical of star worship: worship was symbolical of it likewise. The consequence of which was, that the system of physical-theology, which was, indeed, one of the last sciences of the Egyptian school, was supposed to be the first; and hero-worship, which was indeed the first religion of the Egyptian church, was supposed to be the last. This is no more than saying, that (for reasons given before) the Magistrate would very early institute the worship of their dead benefactors, and that the Philosopher could have no occasion, till many ages afterwards (when men grew inquisitive or licentious), to hide the ignominy of it, by making those hero Gods only shadowy Beings, and no more than emblems of the several parts of nature †.

. That brute

Now though the doctrine of this early physical Theology, as explained by the Greeks, makes very much for the high antiquity of Egyptian learning, the point I am concerned to prove; yet as my only end is truth, in all these enquiries, I can, with the same pleasure, confute an error which supports my system, that I have in detecting those which made against it.

The common notion of these Philologists, we see, brings Hero-worship, by consequence, very low; and

* See Book iii. § 6.

+ See note [TTT] at the end of this Book.

as

Conse

nings. matter > [the tols of

commages

S are

igures
have
ipped

THE

RY *" ifraid, fom a es (he

is are

res of
doubt

Same

body Gods other $ the eling; nout. ing t;

ds in

to be

pus **

wor

eeling
these
round

Fig. 1.from the Bembine Table.

Fig. 2. A Mummy from Kirchers Oedipus.

This Mummy Fig.2, shews what sort of Idol it is we see worshiped Fig.1.

Fig.3. The Pictoral Cloth of Mummy Fig.2. on which is depicted the fice and manner of embalming From Kirchers Oedipus.

as some of their followers have pursued that consequence, I shall beg leave to examine their reasonings. The learned author of the Connections pushes the matter very far:-" It does not appear from this table (the

Bembine] that the Egyptians worshipped any idols of "human shape, at the time when this table was com"posed; but rather, on the contrary, all the images "herein represented, before which any persons are "described in postures of adoration, being the figures "of birds, beasts, or fishes; this table seems to have "been delineated BEFORE the Egyptians worshipped "the images of men and women; WHICH WAS THE

LAST AND LOWEST STEP OF THEIR IDOLATRY

*

Now the whole of this observation will, I am afraid, only amount to an illogical consequence drawn from a false fact; let the reader judge. All the images (he says) herein represented, before which any persons are described, in postures of adoration, are the figures of birds, beasts, and fishes. I was some time in doubt whether the learned writer and I had seen the same table for in that given us by Kircher, the whole body of the picture is filled up with the greater Egyptian Gods in HUMAN SHAPE; before several of which, are other human figures in postures of adoration; unless the learned writer will confine that posture to kneeling; which yet he brings no higher than the time of Solomon†. Some of these worshippers are represented sacrificing; others in the act of offering; and offering to Gods inthroned . One of which figures I have caused to be engraved, where a mummy from Kircher's Edipus ** will shew us what sort of idol it is which we see worshipped by offerings. With regard to the kneeling postures of adoration, to birds, beasts, and fishes, these are in a narrow border of the table, which runs round the principal compartments. The learned writer indeed seems to make a matter of it, "that all the images that "kneel are represented as paying their worship to some

Sacr. and Prof. Hist. of the World connected, vol. ii. p. 320.

+ Ibid. p. 317.

As at [S. V.]

¶ See Plate IX. fig. 1.

As at [T..] [0. E.] and [S. X.]

** Fig. 2.

04

†† Fig. 1.

"animal