the world, the most desirous of seeing them? And would not the Jewish priests, always looking out for proselytes, have been most happy in obliging them; nay would they not have given them copies of their books? And here it must be remembered, that both Ezekiel and Daniel were in Babylon during the captivity, and that the latter wrote his prophecies there; one of which we have seen in the second chapter to have been so particular, that any person, whether Jew or Babylonian, could have calculated the time of the Messiah's coming within a year. These then, that is, the books of the sacred writings just mentioned, were, I presume, the “antiquæ sacerdotum litera" of Tacitus, or ancient manuscripts of certain priests and prophets, from which the report came, which according to Tacitus was so current in the East, that some great personage should come out of Judæa, who should be Lord of the whole Universe.

The next captivity of the Jews was by Ptolomæus Lagi, who took Jerusalem by storm on a Sabbath-day when the inhabitants would not leave their worship to fight, and carried away many thousands of them, and settled them mostly in Egypt. But it will not be necessary to say much concerning this, but only, perhaps that as

the Egyptian took place more than 300 years after the Babylonish captivity, all the books of the Old Testament, or, all the "antiquæ sacerdotum literæ" of Tacitus must have been then out *; and if so, then, as the Jews would take their sacred books with them into captivity in Egypt, the Egyptians could not but have gained from thence the same expectations of an extraordinary person about to appear upon earth at the time predicted, as the Assyrians and Babylonians, and hence the whole east would have imbibed the same notion.

The Septuagint version of the Old Testament had then appeared and its contents were then consequently laid open to the whole world.

W

CHAPTER V.

On the particular way in which some of the enlightened Romans acquired their knowledge on this subject.-By means of the prophecy of the Cumaan Sybil.-Substance of this prophecy as taken from Virgil.

I stated in the first chapter, that it was supposed by many enlightened persons at Rome, a few years before Jesus Christ was born, that some great personage was to make his appearance upon earth, who should hold universal dominion, and whose reign should be a reign of righteousness, or a reign in which the guilt of sin should be expiated, and men restored to the innocence and happiness of the golden age. I am now to enquire where these Romans acquired such an extraordinary notion.

I shall answer the enquiry at once by saying, that they gathered it from the Sybilline oracles, or, as these are often called the prophecies of the Cumæan Sybil. These oracles were deposited

in the capitol at Rome as early as in the days of the second Tarquin and placed under the care of two of the nobility of those times; and here they continued till the time of Marius and Sylla, when the capitol was burnt down and when they perished in the flames. All Rome was in consternation at this event and the senate partaking of this feeling sent ambassadors into Ionia, Lybia, Greece and other countries, namely, to those places where the most ancient temples existed, with a view, if it were possible, of replacing them. [Tacit: Annal: Lib: 6. c. 12.] Also Lactantius, Instit: Divin: Lib. 1. c. 6. At length the ambassadors returned, bringing back with them copies of about a thousand verses in all, containing the most ancient oracles. From these, the most learned of the augural college in Rome, selected those which they deemed the most authentic and then deposited them in the temple of the capitol which had been rebuilt. It was from these copies that the enlightened Romans gained their information and formed their notions on this subject.

But it may be said that the fifteen keepers of these Records, who alone were permitted to have access to them, were bound not to divulge their contents; and it may then be asked, if this

were the case, how could any other persons or any great number of persons have become acquainted with them? To this I may reply by saying that secrets are not always kept, and that in Cicero's time, many people in Rome, beside the Quindecemviri were acquainted with parts of their contents, and particularly with that part of the verses, which related to the coming, about that time, of some extraordinary potentate upon earth, nay, Cicero himself once discussed this part of the verses in the Senate. Among those, who had acquired this knowledge, was the poet Virgil, who was so much pleased and interested with it that he made it the subject of his fourth Eclogue. In this Eclogue, he took the opportunity of paying a compliment to his friend Pollio, who was then consul, for he addressed the poem to him as to the person, during whose consulship the child was to be born, who was to do such glorious things for the world.

Having said thus much by way of introduction, we may now inquire what this prophecy was, that is, what were the particular words in which it was expressed, that we may form our own judgment upon it. But alas, all inquiry here will be to no purpose! for the Sybilline Books having survived three centuries or more