all the scolding and cursing about idolatry; all the squabbling about capricious laws; and all that prattling and gossiping about insignificant rites and ceremonies, which so frequently occur in the Jewish legends. I cannot allow myself to imagine that the Sacred Writers were speaking literally, when they talked of these things; and I feel myself compelled either to consider their writings as impositions on the credulity of mankind, or to believe that they are chiefly, if not entirely, allegorical compositions. In the Edipus Judaicus it will be found, that I have adopted the latter opinion. I recollect, that Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians; and I expect to find traces of that wisdom in his works. The learned among the ancient Egyptians were pure theists, as Cudworth has proved. They were deeply skilled in the sciences; but they carefully concealed their mysterious learning under innumerable symbols and allegories. May we not look then for the same things in the writings, which are ascribed to the Jewish lawgiver? It is what I have done; and I submit to the judgment of a few individuals, the result of my researches. PRELIMINARY NOTICE. As I have had occasion to say a great deal on the subject of Astronomy in the following pages, I must take the liberty of requesting my reader to peruse them with his celestial globe beside him. He will of course make allowances for the retrograde motion of the fixed stars. There is one difficulty, which I ought to mention, and which I have felt during the whole of the time I was employed about this opusculum. It seems to me, at least, impossible to fix the time, when the books of the Old Tes tament, which I have examined, were 1 |