versally admitted; and as such an incident could never be according to the ordinary course of nature, it would be the height of folly to impute it to chance. Our author had before told us, that "they came to Judea in six days ;" and again, that "Moses ascended a mountain, betwixt Arabia and Egypt, called Sinai; was concealed there forty days; and that, when he came down, he delivered the law to the Jews." I would ask him if it is possible for such a body of men to march over so vast a desert in six days, and to subsist forty days in a place that afforded neither bread or

water.

His explanation of the origin of the word Sabbath is frivolous to the last degree of ignorance and insolence; for the word Sabbo and Sabbath, are widely different from each other. The word Sabbath, in the Hebrew language, denotes, rest from all sorts of work but the word Sabbo, as he affirms, denotes the name of the Egyptian disease. This is the novel account which the Egyptian Apion has given us concerning the Jews' departure out of Egypt, and is nothing more than a contrivance of his own. But why should we wonder at his misrepresenting the origin of our fathers, when he affirms then to have been Egyptians, when he errs intentionally concerning his own? He was born at Oasis, in Egypt, but renounces the place of his nativity to be thought an Alexandrian, which shows what an opinion he had of the Egyptians; for that name he gives to all whom he would represent in an odious light; and this is the cause for which he takes such pains to disguise his ex

traction.

Those that glory in the dignity of their country, deem it a point of honour to make good their title, and maintain the rights and privileges belonging to it. This is the case of the Egyptians with respect to us. Either they claim country and kindred with us to aggrandize themselves, or to involve us in their own infamy. But Apion seems to vent his splenetic passion against us merely to gratify the Alexandrians for the privilege they allowed him of being a fellow citizen with them, apprised of the ill will the Alexandrians bear those that are in reality their fellow citizens; and yet, though he pretended to expose only one sort of Jews, the poison of his detraction extended to the whole race.

Let us now attend to the abominable crimes which Apion charg

es with so much rancour upon the Alexandrian Jews. They came (he says) out of Syria, and inhabited the spot along the sea coast at a place within the wash of the tide; but there is no port at hand for a vessel to ride in." Was not Apion highly censurable for reproaching a country he so much gloried in (how vainly and falsely, however,) as the place of his nativity? For that quarter is a dependency upon Alexandria, and universally reputed a most commodious habitation. If the Jews took it by force, and so maintained it against all opposition, the more it redounds to their honour.

But, to be candid and ingenuous. It was Alexander the Great that put the Jews in possession of that place, and granted them the same freedoms and immunities with the Macedonians themselves. Nor can I devise what Apion would have said, had their residence been allotted them at Necropolis, instead of that royal city, and their tribes been called Macedonians to this day. If Apion had read the epistles of king Alexander, of Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, and the succeeding kings of Egypt, the inscriptions which the mighty Cæsar caused to be engraven upon the pillar at Alexandria, in memory of the privileges by him granted to the Jews; had he, I say, known these records, he must have been lost to all sense of shame, thus to have perverted truth, and opposed the conviction of his own mind.

When he affects surprise at the Jews being called Alexandrians, it is a proof of the greatest ignorance or prejudice. Is it not notorious that all colonies take their names from the first founders? Need we seek for foreign instances, when we have so many near home? The Jews of Antioch we call Antiochians, because Seleucus, the founder of the city, vested them with the privileges belonging thereunto. In like manner the Jews of Ephesus are called Ephesians; and those of Ionia, Ionians; to which right they stand entitled by the successive privileges of former grants. This is a favour which the Roman state hath vouchsafed not only to paricular persons, but to whole provinces and nations; for the ancient Iberians, Tuscans, and Sabines, are now called Romans. If Apion rejects this way of obtaining the privilege of a citizen of Alexandria, let him renounce the title of an Alexandrian. For what pretence hath any man, according to his maxim, who was

born in the inland part of Egypt, to call himself an Alexandrian, and especially an Egyptian, those being the people of the whole world to whom the masters of it, the Romans, refuse this privilege? But an envious historian, being deprived of title to this advantage, vents his spleen at those who are in rightful possession of it.

In the erecting of this city, Alexander made use of the assistance and service of the Jews; not for want of men, but in testimony and approbation of their fidelity, and with a design to show them honour and respect. For, as Hecatæus says, "Alexander honoured the Jews to such a degree, that, for the equity and fidelity, which they gave proof of, he permitted them to hold the country of Samaria free from tribute." Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, acted in the same manner, with respect to those Jews who dwelt at Alexandria; for he intrusted the fortresses of Egypt in their hands, in cofidence of their valour and allegiance; and for his better security, he planted Cyrene, and other cities of Libya, with these people.

Ptolemy Philadelphus succeeded Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, who not only set those of our nation free, but remitted them several duties; and, what is more extraordinary, had so great a desire of being instructed in our laws and customs, and in the sacred scriptures, that he requested interpreters might be sent him for his better information. For the more speedy advancement of the work, the care of it was committed to Demeterius Phalorus, Andreas, and Aristeus. Demetrius was one of the most learned men of the age; the other two were officers of rank, and belonged to his body guards. Can it now be reasonably supposed, that this prince could have had such a veneration for the Jewish laws and customs, and for the piety and wisdom of our forefathers, without a degree of affection and regard for the professors of those laws and customs? Apion must be little versed in that history, if he did not know that most of the kings of these Macedonians, whom he pretends to have been his progenitors, were well affected towards the Jewish nation.

The third Ptolemy, called Energetes, when he got possession of all Syria by force, did not offer thanksgiving for his victory to the gods of the Egyptians, but sacrificed, and returned thanks, to

the Almighty God of the universe, in the temple of Jerusalem, after the manner of the Jews.

Ptolemy Philometer, and his queen Cleopatra, committed the charge of the whole government to Onias and Doritheus, who were both Jews. Apion treats them with ridicule but he ought rather to admire their actions, and own his acknowledgment for the preserving that Alexandria of which he pretended to be a citizen for when Egypt was up in rebellion, and upon the brink of being irrecoverably lost, these two Jews interposed, and reduced the revolters to former obedience. Apion says, that Onias, soon after this, entered the place with a small army, in the presence of Thermus, the Roman ambassador. In this trite manner he recounts an exploit worthy of being celebrated by a much more candid and able historian.

Upon the death of Ptolemy Philometer, Ptolemy Physcon, his brother, marched out of Cyrene, and would have ejected Cleopatra, and her sons, out of the kingdom, that he might obtain it unjustly for himself. For this cause Onias undertook the defence of Cleopatra; nor would he desert the trust the royal family had reposed in him now they were in distress. Never was there a more remarkable demonstration of the Divine power and justice than upon this occasion. When Ptolemy Physcon had prepared for action with Onias, he caused all the Jews in Alexandria, men, women, and children, to be exposed naked, and in bonds, to the elephants, to be trampled to death; nay, the beasts were made drunk to inflame their fury. But the event proved contrary to his expectation; for the elephants left the Jews, who were exposed to them, turned their rage another way, fell violently on the friends of Physcon, and destroyed a great number of them. At the same time a horrid spectre appeared to Ptolemy, with a menacing precaution to leave off persecuting the Jews. His favourite concubine (by name called Ithaca, by others Hirene) joining her office of mediation, he not only complied with her request, but repented of what he had already done or intended to do. This is a circumstance so notorious, that the Jews of Alexandria keep, to this day, an anniversary festival, in commemoration of their deliverance. Yet such is the inveteracy of Apion, that common detractor, that he reproaches the Jews for joining in this war

against Physcon, whereas he should have extolled it as a most laudable action.

But the partial and perverse principles of Apion most flagrantly appear in the instance of Cleopatra, the last queen of Alexandria; for he applauds that most infamous woman for her ingratitude towards the Jews; whereas he ought to have reprobated her for every species of injustice and wickedness, with respect to her nearest relations, the tenderest of husbands, the Romans in general, and her imperial benefactors in particular. Did she not cause her sister Arsinoe to be put to death in the temple without a crime? Her brother to be taken off by treachery? Did she not rifle the temples of the gods of her country, and the sepulchres of her progenitors? Did she not receive her kingdom as a bounty from the hand of the first Cæsar, and afterward rebel against his adopted son and successor? Did not her seducing wiles render Antony a traitor to his country and his friends?

Besides these instances of her ingratitude, inhumanity, and avarice, I might enlarge on the infamous disposition she evinced at the naval battle of Actium, where she abandoned even her beloved Antony himself, who had been father of many children by her, and compelled him to resign his army and his honour to follow her into Egypt. In fine, I might add to all this, that upon Casar's taking Alexandria, she was fired to such a degree of rage, that she valued herself upon the score of merciless barbarity, and declared she would have esteemed it some compensation for the loss of the town, if she could have put all the Jews that were in it to death with her own hand. If Cleopatra, according to Apion's reproof, refused corn to the Jews in a time of famine, why does he charge that upon us as a disgrace, which in effect redounds to our honour? However, she at length met with the punishment she deserved.

But we can appeal for our own justification to Cæsar himself, to the public decrees of the Roman senate, and to the testimonials of Augustus Cæsar in his epistles. These, in general, bear witness of the true allegiance we have ever paid the empire, and particularly in the war against the Egyptians.

Apion, if he would have done us right, should have examined these authorities, and particularly the opinion that Alexander, all