city others place her later, in the time of Romulus, and even suppose her to have been the same with the Italic Cumaan Sibyl, of whom the well known story is related of her having burnt six, and sold her three remaining books to Tarquinius Priscus, or, as some say, to Tarquinius Superbus *.

The story was contrived, probably, with a view to assist the Roman kings in the early periods of their government, and to aid their controul over the minds of their subjects by a superstitious influence.

The books were placed in the capitol, and guarded with particular care in the strictest privacy. Tarquin encreased the number of them by collecting verses of the Sibyls from all the cities of Italy and Greece, and they were at length committed to the custody of the Quindecemvirit. They were burnt, however, with the capitol in the time of Sylla. When the capitol was rebuilt, C. Scribonius. Curio proposed to the senate that ambassadors should be sent to Erythræa to collect what could be recovered of the Erythræan Sibyl's productions: and P. Gabinius,

16.

See Dion. Halicar.

Lact. de fals. Rel. lib. i. Alex. ab Alexand. lib. iii, c. 737. vol. 1. Edit. Lug. Bat.

p.

M. Otacilius, and L. Valerius being sent, brought back a thousand verses; and others were collected from different parts.

But these having been obtained in many instances from private persons, and copies of them having spread into circulation, they were no longer in the exclusive possession of the government, and could not, therefore, be applied to purposes of state policy. By the encrease of numbers, and the general dispersion of them, the reverence, which had been entertained for the original verses, was diminished, at the same time that they excited so much popular delusion, that Augustus collected private copies, and burnt to the amount of two thousand volumes, which were supposed to contain the destinies of Rome, and placed those, which he preserved, in the temple of Apollo. They appear afterwards to have been examined by Tiberius, who destroyed others: till at length Honorius, availing himself of the failure of a pretended prophecy in them with relation to Christianity, ordered the whole collection to be committed to the flames, A. D. 399.

The Romans, in general considered their verses as derived from the Cumæan Sibyl. Cicero, though he, as well as Plato and

4

Aristotle, entertained, or professed to enter tain, some reverence for them, yet appears at other times inclined to disparage their authority, intimating that they were composed too artificially to indicate the enthusiasm of inspiration; and he observes, that they were contrived with such latitude, as to be capable of accommodation to different events and circumstances *.

some

Vossius thought that a great part of the Sibylline verses was fabricated by the Jews; and Pausanias says, that one Sibyl was called Sabbat, she is supposed to have traced her descent from Noah, and is times called the Babylonian, and sometimes the Hebrew. St. Austin states, that some thought that the Sibylla Erythræa was the same as the Cumæan, and that she had nothing of idolatry in her verses, but that she belonged to the City of God §, that is, was a Jewess, or within the pale of the universal church. The Sibylline verses, however, countenanced many abominable rites and customs. Justin Martyr conceives the Cu

De Divin. lib. ii. c. 54.

+ Pausanias in Phoc. p. 828. Edit. Lips. Elian, Suidas. Alex. ad Alexandro, lib iii. c. 16.

De Civit. Dei. lib. xviii. c. 23.

mæan to have been of Babylonian descent, and the daughter of Berosus, and therefore to have lived in the time of Alexander, considering her, probably, the same as the Erythræan*. Virgil makes her contemporary with Æneas.

The verses, which we now possess, having been preserved in scattered and detached works of the Fathers and early writers, were collected again together. They were published at Basil, with a version of Castalio, and the notes of Xystus Betalicu, from manuscripts at Augsburg and Ferrara, as well as by other editors.

It is evident, from a general view of the descriptions produced in these verses, that much must have been added and interpolated after the promulgation of Christianity: and what was genuine in them, wherever it has reference to the facts and doctrines of Revelation, should seem to ha rowed from the Jewish Scrip traditions which they confirm As it must be considered impossible, to

* Cohort. a

c. 12. p. 828.

rate the

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spurious lines, we may observe of them collectively, that they treat of the existence of one Supreme and Eternal God, of the creation of man, and of his ejection from Paradise, of the building of Babel, and of the confusion of tongues *. They contain passages which resemble parts of the Jewish prophets, particularly of Zechariah and Hosea. They speak, as if prophetically, of the annunciation of the Blessed Virgin, and of the voice calling all to the straight path, and to baptism; of the incarnation of the Son of the great God, to be clothed in flesh in the similitude of man, having in his name four vowels and two consonants; of his coming to fulfil the law and not to destroy it; of the nativity at Bethlehem, and of the offering of gold, myrrh, and frankincense to Christ; of his being preserved and brought from Egypt; of his miracles minutely described; of his appearing on a foal, meek to all; of his being cut off by a man ensnared by a reward; of his sufferings and crucifixion, and

the peculiar circumstances of his death,

yl. orac. lib. iii. p. 223. Euseb. Præp. Evan. lib. ix. Theoph. ad Autolyc. lib. ii. p. 371. Bryant, Mythol.

10.

S