recorded that the first man lived a thousand years*. It is probable that he referred only to passages which generally admit the longevity of men in primeval times.

Hesiod's account of Pandora, who was endowed with gifts from the gods to deceive Epimetheus, though he was warned against the danger, and who deprived mankind of all good, leaving only hope, is supposed by Hales, in conformity to the opinion of many writers, to be an allegorical fiction, built on the circumstances of the fall, which introduced all evil, and left men destitute of every thing but the hope of redemption, through the seed of the woman.

The poet, in his Theogony, mentions the cruel serpent, who, in the obscure parts of the earth, guarded the golden apples in spacious borders, alluding, there can be little doubt, to some descriptions of the serpent, near the tree in Paradise †.

There are striking passages in Hesiod, the general spirit of which reminds us of the strains of inspired piety.

In the beginning of his Works and Days, he calls, by a solemn invocation, on the

Antiq. lib. i. c. 3. p. 14.

+ L. 334, 335.

Pierian muses, to sing their hymns in praise of their Divine Father, by whom mortal men, whether obscure or distinguished, ignoble or celebrated, were created; for that Jove easily strengthened the weak, and easily subdued the strong; easily diminished the confident, and encreased the lowly; easily corrected the perverse, and weakened the proud*.

He inculcates the salutary instruction, that riches are not to be sought by violence, since such bring down destruction from the gods, and the ruin of families, and that riches so obtained endure but for a little time.

He inveighs also against adultery, the fraudulent deception of orphans, and irreverence to parents, with great animation, and with threats of Divine vengeance +.

In the spirit however of Heathen error, he recommends the withholding of friendly offices from an enemy, delivering sentiments very similar to some which are alluded to as defective by our Blessed Lord; teaching men to love those that loved them; and to bate those that hated them §; to give to him

* L. 3. 7.

† Εργα καὶ ἡμέραι, 1. 320. 326.

‡ L. 330. 333.

§ *Egya xai nuśpas, 1, 353. 355; see also 1. 715.

that hath given, and not to give to him that hath not given: precepts very different from and corrected by those which the Gospel enjoins.

There are passages in Hesiod which much resemble some in Homer, and which seem to argue an imitation on one side or the other. This particularly appears in the use of Oriental expressions and forms of speech *. Some of the names in Hesiod are of Phoe nician etymology..

Zach. Bogan. in Hesiod, Oungiwr. Oxon. 1658. et Eustath.

CHAP. III.

Homer.

CONSIDERING Homer as the most distinguished writer of Heathen antiquity, and as having flourished among the earliest, if he were not himself the earliest of the classical writers, we must look with particular earnestness to examine whether any fragments of Revealed Knowledge or any scattered relations of Sacred History, are to be found in his poems.

It may be observed, be observed, that Clement of Alexandria supposes Homer to have lived five hundred years after the siege of Troy, subsequently to the time of Orpheus, from whom he conceives him to have borrowed * ; and Suidas asserts, that he drew the plan of his Iliad from Corinnus, who wrote a poem upon the subject of the war of Dardanus

against the Paphlagonians at the time the city was besieged *.

These accounts are not of sufficient authority to overturn the statement of Herodotus and others, who represent Hesiod and Homer as the earliest of the Grecian writers †. We may suppose, therefore, in agreement with the opinion of Hales +, that Homer lived 27 years after Hesiod, in the Archonship of Diognetus, who began his office 893 years before Christ, and we may admit him to have flourished about 299 years after the siege of Troy, assigning that event to an era about 1183 years before the time of our Saviour, which is 26+ years earlier than it is placed by Sir Isaac Newton.

Magical arts were employed, and even the shades of the dead were invoked, to determine where Homer was born. This point, however, was left undecided by antiquity, and is still a subject of controversy §. Without pretending to pronounce upon the

• Voce Κόριννος.

+ Herod. lib. ii. c. 53.

New Analys. vol. i. p. 241.

Plin. lib. xxx. c. 2. Tatian cont. Græc. Biblioth. Pat. vol. i. p. 180. Edit. Par. 1624. Heliodor. Ethiop. lib. iii Justin Martyr, &c.