have been very apt to omit, and he inclines the more to believe that it was in the copy from whence the Greek translation was made, because the word with the addition of this letter, though not improperly translated "gatherings," might with equal propriety have been translated "the preacher." It is in fact the self-same word, he says, which in the book of Ecclesiastes is translated "the preacher." The learned Bishop therefore is of opinion that the Samaritans, who must have had some of the oldest and best copies of the books of Moses in their possession, could not but have expected the Messiah to come into the world as a teacher of religion to all nations.

They would collect also that he would come in this character from another prophecy in the Pentateuch, which will be found in the second, third, fourth, and fifth verses of the Song of Moses before his death; (Deut. c. 33.) which the same learned prelate translates thus.

"Jehovah came from Sinai;

"His uprising was from Seir;

"He displayed his glory from Mount Paran;
"And from the midst of the myriads "(of attendant

angels)" came forth the Holy One,

"On his right hand, streams of fire.

"O'loving father of the peoples!

"All the saints are in thy hand,
"They are seated at thy feet

"And received thy doctrine.

"To us he" (the Holy One) "prescribed a law."

(the Law of Moses)

"Jacob is the inheritance of the preacher.

"He" (the preacher) "shall be King in* Jeshurun
"When the chiefs of the peoples gather themselves
together

"In union with the tribes of Israel."

Thus says the learned Bishop, "it appears that in this prophecy of Moses, if we have rightly divined its meaning, the Messiah is explicitly described under the character of a preacher, in whose spiritual kingdom Jews and Gentiles shall be admitted as the subjects of a common Lord."

* Jeshurun, not the name of a place; it signifies the whole body of the justified.

CHAPTER IV.

The particular way in which the people of the East acquired their knowledge on this subject.

I have already said that a belief also prevailed in Arabia, Chaldæa, Babylonia and other parts of the East, that about the time when Jesus Christ came into the world, there should arise in Judæa one, who should rule the whole world. I stated also that this was grounded on the authority of Tacitus and Suetonius, and I made an extract from each of these authors to prove the point. Indeed I might have cited others to the same purport. The question then now is, How did the Arabians, Babylonians and all those people, which were known by the Romans, in the time of these authors, as the people of the whole East, get their knowledge on this subject? One of them, Tacitus, whose work "de moribus Germanorum" will always be a monument of his

faithful representations of what he heard and saw (for from that book we may trace most of the feudal customs of our own ancestors) tells us, that this belief was founded on "antiquis sacerdotum literis," that is, certain ancient records or writings, which some priests had left behind them. But who were the priests living in these countries before Tacitus, whose records thus survived them? As they are not named by him we must give the best answer we can ourselves. We may say therefore, that these could be only the Magi, (the higher order of priests) or the common priests of the country, or certain priests or prophets of the Jews, who with their countrymen were carried captive at three different periods into three different parts of the East. Now it is not likely that God would employ heathen-priests, who were daily sacrificing to devils, to communicate any of the glad tidings relative to his son, when he had established a chosen line ever since the days of Abraham, by whom his gracious designs were to be made known. We may therefore consider it as certain, that the records, alluded to by Tacitus, must have been the writings of the Jewish Prophets, which they carried with them when they went into captivity, or wrote while they were there,

and from which the Magi or priests of the country had made extracts.

The above is unquestionably my own opinion, nor do I see how any other person, acquainted with Jewish History, could come to any other conclusion on the subject. I find that Dr. Echard, in his Ecclesiastical History entertains pretty nearly the same opinion as myself; and as he was a man of learning and laborious research, I shall transcribe what he says upon it. "Thus

was God pleased," says he, "to make way for his only son among his peculiar people; but as this great blessing was designed for the benefit of the Gentiles as well as Jews, and for all that should believe in him, so providence was no less careful to make way for him in the Pagan world, and this was effected by divers measures, but more especially by means of several dispersions of the Israelites and Jews."-" And now it was, that not in Jewry alone was God known, but he, whose name was great in Israel, did make way for the knowledge of himself among all the nations of the earth. In order to this the nation of the Israelites, the great store-house of divine knowledge, which before was an inclosed garden, was now thrown open, and great numbers of the inhabitants transplanted into foreign and remote