jects; to protect the dignity and authority | open war against all religion: others admitof kings, to preserve the public tranquillity, ted indeed the existence of God and of and to promote the civil virtues. To the religion, but obscured the truth rather than second class must be referred the religions threw light upon it. Of the former class of the northern nations. For all that was were the Epicureans and the Academics. inculcated among the Germans, Britons, The Epicureans maintained that the world. Celts, Goths, and others, respecting the arose from chance; that the gods (whose gods and the worship due to them, was existence they did not dare to deny) evidently suited to awaken and to cherish neither did nor could extend their provifortitude, bravery, and contempt of death. dential care to human affairs; that the soul A careful examination of these religions was mortal; that pleasure was man's ultiwill fully verify these statements. mate end; and that virtue was to be prized only for its subserviency to this end. The Academics denied the possibility of arriving at truth and certainty, and therefore held it uncertain, whether the gods existed or not; whether the soul is mortal or survives the body; whether virtue is preferable to vice, or the contrary. These two sects, when Jesus was born, were very numerous and influential; being favoured by men of rank especially, and by nearly all the opulent.4 22. To the second class belong the Aristotelians, Stoics, Platonics; none of whom 19. No nation was so rude and barbarous as not to contain some persons who had sagacity to discern the absurdity of the popular religions. But some of these men lacked the power and authority, others the disposition, and all the wisdom necessary to produce a reformation. This could scarcely be better illustrated than by the attempts to reform the vulgar superstitions made by the Greek and Roman philosophers. They advanced many tolerably correct ideas respecting the divine nature and moral duties; and, with some success, they exposed the errors of the prevailing religion; but all was so intermixed with wild and baseless speculations, as clearly to show that it belongs to God only, and not to men, to teach the truth free from corruption and error. 3 2 The ambiguity of the word pleasure, has produced many disputes in the explication of the Epicurean system. If by pleasure be understood only sensual gratifications, the tenet here advanced is indisputably monstrous. But if it be taken in a larger sense, and be extended to intellectual and moral objects, in what does the scheme of Epicurus, with respect to virtue, differ from the opinions of those Christian philosophers who maintain that self-love is the only spring of all human affections and actions ?-Macl. [Epicurus distinguished between corporeal pleasure and mental. But he accounted both sensitive; because he held the soul to be material. His conceptions of pleasure did not exsupposed to be a calm and tranquil state of mind, untend beyond natural pleasures, the chief of which he disturbed by any fear of God or any solicitude about His system, therefore, denied the very idea of moral or religious pleasures, and it required atheism as its foun230, &c. Hanov. 1822, 8vo.-Mur. dation. See Stäudlin's Geschich. d. Moralphilos. p. the future, and attended with freedom from bodily pain. 3 The Academics, or Platonists, became indeed scep 20. Among the more civilized nations, at the time the Son of God appeared, two species of philosophy prevailed; namely, the Grecian, which was also adopted by the Romans, and the oriental, which had many followers in Persia, Syria, Chaldea, Egypt, and even among the Jews themselves. The former was appropriately called philosophy: the latter, by such as spoke Greek, was called yvos, that is knowledge, namely Eou, of God; because its followers pretended to restore the lost knowledge of the tical; especially those of the Middle Academy. Some real Pyrrhonists, likewise, assumed the name of AcadeGod.1 The advocates of both mics. Still it is probable, the great body of Academics, kinds of philosophy were split into numer-like Cicero, who is accounted one of them, merely held ous contending sects, yet with this dif- short of certainty; that of course we are obliged, in all that all human knowledge is imperfect; that is, falls ference, that all the sects of oriental cases, to act on probabilities, of which there are different degrees.-Mur. philosophy set out with one fundamental principle, and therefore were agreed in regard to many points of doctrine; but the Greeks disagreed about the very first principles of all wisdom. Of the oriental philosophy, we shall give account hereafter: of the Grecian philosophy and its sects, notice will be taken here. supreme 21. Some of the Grecian sects declared 1 St. Paul mentions and disapproves both kinds of philosophy; namely, the Grecian, Colos. ii. 8. and the oriental or yvwots, 1 Tim. vi. 20. Mosheim has been censured for his confident assertions in regard to the existence and prevalence of an oriental philosophy, going under the name of yvwors, so early as the days of Christ and his apostles. On this subject more will be said hereafter.-Mur. 4 The Epicureans were the most numerous of the two. See Cicero, de Finibus, lib. 1. cap. vii; lib. ii. Hence Sunt in fortunæ qui casibus omnia ponant, Et nullo credant mundum rectore moveri, Natura volvente vices et lucis et anni: Atque ideo intrepidi quæcunque altaria tangunt. Mosheim, in these sections, is giving the dark side of pagan philosophy. Like his other translators, therefore, I would aim so to soften his pictures, that the less informed reader may not be misled. This, I am persuaded, Mosheim would himself approve, as may be inferred from the following long note, inserted apparently for such a purpose, in the parallel passage of his Commentarii de Reb. Christ. pages 17, 18. "I cannot agree with those who maintain that every one of the philosophers of those times, even such as discoursed well on religious subjects, were hostile to all religion. I think those learned moderns have gone too far, who spoke of God, religion, and moral duties, in a manner to be of much service to mankind. The god of Aristotle is like the principle of motion in a machine. He is a being regardless of human affairs and happy in his own contemplations. Such a god, differing but little from the god of Epicurus, we have no reason either to love Whether this philosopher held the soul to be mortal or immortal is at least doubtful. Now what solid and sound precepts of virtue and piety can that man give, who denies the providence of God, and not obscurely intimates the extinction of the soul? or to fear. 23. The god of the Stoics has a little more of majesty; nor does he sit musing supinely above the heavens and the stars. Yet he is described as a corporeal being, united to matter by a necessary connexion, and moreover as subject to fate, so that he can neither reward nor punish. That this sect held the extinction of the soul at death, is allowed by all the learned. Now, such doctrines take away the strongest have endeavoured to prove that every sect of the philosophers, either openly or covertly, aimed to rip up the one of the many great and worthy men of those times, however free from ill intentions, was so fortunate as to make a proper use of his reason? Must all those who professed theism, and spoke sublimely of the divine perfections, be regarded as impostors, who said one thing and meant another? Yet the celebrated and acute Bp. Warburton, to mention no others, lately expended much ingenuity and learning to bring us to such conclusions. See his very elaborate and noted work, entitled The divine legation, &c. vol. i. p. 332, &c. and p. 419, &c. He would have us think that all the philosophers who taught the immortality of the soul, secretly denied it; that they held nature to be the only deity; and human souls to be particles, severed from the souls of the world, to which they return at the death of the body. But not to mention that he cites only Grecian philosophers, while other nations had their philosophers also, differing widely from the Grecian; the renowned author depends not on plain and explicit testimony, which seems requisite to justify so heavy a charge, but merely on conjectures, on single examples, and on inferences from the doctrines held by certain philosophers. If this kind of proof be allowed, if single instances and inferences are sufficient to convict men of duplicity, when no shadow of suspicion appears in their language, who will be found innocent? Though but an ordinary man and far inferior to Warburton, yet I could prove that all the theologians in Christendom disbelieve utterly what they teach in public, and that they covertly aim to instil the poison of impiety into men's minds, if I might be allowed to assail them in the manner this learned writer assails the philosophers."-Mur. [It may be proper to add here, on occasion of this first reference to Mosheim's larger work, his Commentarii de Rebus Christianis ante Constantinum Magnum, that a large portion of it, nearly two-thirds, has been translated into English by the late R. S. Vidal, Esq. in 3 vols. 8vo, Lond. 1813-35.-R. foundations of all religion. Are we to believe that not See the notes on my Latin translation of Cudworth's Intellectual System, tom i. p. 66, 500, tom. ii. p. 1171, and Mourgues, Plan théologique du Pythagorisme, tome i. p. 75, &c. [See Note 1, p. 29, below.-R. 2 Thus is the Stoical doctrine of fate generally repre sented, but not more generally than unjustly. Their fatum, when carefully and attentively examined, seems to have signified no more, in the Intention of the wisest of that sect, than the plan of government formed origi motives to virtue; and accordingly the moral system of the Stoics is a body that is fair and beautiful, but without sinews and active limbs.3 24. Plato seems to have exceeded all the other philosophers in wisdom, and not without reason. For he held the world to be governed by an independent, powerful, and intelligent God; and he taught men what to fear, and what to hope for after death. Yet his doctrines not only rest on very slender foundations, and are exceedingly obscure, but they represent the supreme Creator as destitute of several perfections, and as limited to a certain place. His doctrine concerning demons and the human soul, is singularly adapted to produce and encourage superstition." will his system of morals command very high estimation, if we examine it in all its parts, and inquire into its first principles. Nor 25. As all these sects held many things inconsistent with sound reason, and were addicted to never-ending contentions and debates, some moderate and well-disposed men concluded to follow none of them inplicitly, but to glean from all whatever was good and consonant to reason, and reject the rest. Hence originated in Egypt, and particularly at Alexandria, a new mode of nally in the divine mind, a plan all-wise and perfect, and from which, of consequence, the supreme Being, morally speaking, can never depart. So that when Jupiter is said by the Stoics to be subject to immutable fate, this means no more than that he is subject to the wisdom of his own counsels, and acts ever in conformity with his supreme perfections. The following remarkable passage of Seneca, drawn from the 5th chapter of his book de Providentia, is sufficient to confirm the explication we have here given of the Stoical fate: "Ille ipse omnium conditor et rector, scripsit quidem fata, sed sequitur. Semper paret semel jussit."- Macl. [This fine apology will not bear a strict scrutiny. The Stoics themselves differed in opinion, and they generally had indistinct notions. But most of them held fate to be rather a physical than a moral necessity; though some of them, at times, confounded it with Jove, nature, or a pantheistic god, as Seneca does in the passage quoted.-Mur. 3 These remarks receive some illustration from my note on Cudworth's Intell. Syst. tom. i. p. 517. He ascribed to God neither omnipotence, nor omnipresence, nor omniscience.- Schl. [But Maclaine here enters his dissent. He says: "All the divine perfections are frequently acknowledged by that philosopher." I wish he had given proof of this assertion, if he was able to make it good.-Mur. 5 He believed that God employs good and evil demons, in the government of the world, and that men can have commerce with these demons. A person believing this may easily be led to regard idolatry as not altogether irrational.- Schl. 6 The defects of the Platonic philosophy are copiously, but not very accurately depicted by Baltus, in a French work, Défense des pires accusés de Platonisme. Paris, 1711, 4to. [Plato has, moreover been accused of Spinozism. For Bayle (Continuation des pensées diverses sur la Comète, &c. chap. xxv.) and Gundling, (in Otia, fasc. 2. and in Gundlingiana, sec. 43. 45.) tax him with confounding God with matter. But Zimmermann (Opuscula, tom. I. p. 762, &c.) and the elder Schelhorn (monitat. literar. tom. Ix. xii. and xiii.) have defended the character of Plato.- Schl. philosophising, called the Eclectic. One Potamon of Alexandria has been repre CHAPTER II. JEWS AT THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. sented as its author; but the subject has its THE CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS STATE OF THE difficulties.' That this sect flourished at Alexandria in the age of our Saviour, is 1. THE state of the Jewish people, among manifest from the Jewish Philo, who phi- whom the Saviour chose to be born, was losophised according to its principles.2 little better than that of other nations. These Eclectics held Plato in the highest Herod, whose crimes procured him the title estimation; but they unscrupulously modi- of the Great, then governed or rather opfied his doctrines by incorporating what pressed the nation, being a tributary king they pleased from the other philosophers.3 under the Romans. He drew on himself 26. It will be easy to see what inference universal hatred by his cruelties, jealousies, should be drawn from this account of the and wars, and exhausted the wealth of the lamentable state of the world at the time unhappy nation by his mad luxury, his of Christ's birth. It may serve to teach excessive magnificence, and his immoderate us that the human race was then wholly largesses. Under his administration Rocorrupt, and stood in need of a Divine teacher to instruct mankind in the true principles of religion and morality, and to recall the wanderers into the paths of virtue and piety. And it may teach those who before were ignorant of it, how great the advantages and supports, in all circumstances of life, the human family have derived from the advent of Christ and from the religion which he taught. Many despise and ridicule the Christian religion, not knowing that to it they are indebted for all the blessings they enjoy. 1 J. Brucker, Historia crit. philos. tom. ii. p. 193, has shown that in regard to the controversies maintained by Heumann, Hasæus, and others, respecting this nearly unknown Potamon, the probability is that he lived about the close of the second century; that is to be regarded as the founder of the Eclectic sect. Yet this will not forbid our believing what Brucker himself admits, that there were some Grecian philosophers, as carly as the time of Christ, who speculated very much as the Eclectics afterwards did, though the few followers they had did not merit the title of a sect. his speculations had little effect; and that Ammonius Schl. 2 For he philosophised in the manner of Clemens Alex. Origen, and the other Christian doctors, who were certainly Eclectics. For the most part he follows Plato; and hence many account him a pure Platonist. But he often commends the Stoics, Pythagoreans, and others, and adopts their opinions.- Schl. 3 See Olearius, De Philosophia Eclectica; Brucker and others. [On the philosophy as well as the vulgar polytheism of the ancient pagans, the best works for the mere English reader seem to be those already mentioned (in Note 3 p. 10) Leland's Adonntage and Neces sity of the Christian Revelation, [and Tholuck's Essay. The history of philosophy among the ancients has not been critically and ably written in English, nor by Englishmen. Stanley's Lives, &c. 1655, 4to, is full of mistakes; and Enfield's Abridgment of Brucker is quite superficial. The best general works are Brucker's Historia critica philosophiæ. Lips. 1741–67,6 vols. 4to, and the more recent German works by Tiedemann, 7 vols. 8vo, 1791-96; Buhle, 7 vols. 8vo, 1800; Tenneman, 12 vols. 8vo, 1798-1810; and Rixner, 3 vols. 8vo, 1822. The history of Moral philosophy, or ethics, is well treated by Meiners, krit. Geschichte, 2 vols. 8vo, 1800-1; and Stäudlin, Gesch. der Moralphilosophic, 1822, 8vo.-Mur. [To these works may be added the English translation, by Morrison, of Ritter's celebrated Geschichte der philosophie aller Zeit, in four volumes. Lond. 1844-6, 8vo. The student may also consult with profit Brouwer, Histoire de la civilization morale et religieuse des Grecs. Gron. 1833-42, 8 vols. 8vo; together with B. Constant, Du polytheisme romuin. Paris, 1833, 2 vols. 8vo.-R. man luxury with great licentiousness spread over Palestine. In religion he was professedly a Jew; but he copied the manners of those who despise all religion. 2. On the death of this tyrant the Romans allowed Archelaus, his son, with the title of Exarch, to reign over half of Palestine; viz. Judea, Samaria, and Idumea. The other half was divided between two other sons of Herod, Antipas and Philip. Archelaus copied the vices of his father, and was therefore, in the tenth year of his reign, publicly accused by the Jews before Augustus, and deprived of his crown." The countries he had governed were now reduced to the form of a Roman province, and annexed to Syria. This change in their form of government brought numerous troubles and calamities upon the Jews, to the ruin and final extinction of the nation. 3. The Romans did not indeed wholly prohibit the Jews from retaining their national laws, and the religion established by Moses. Their religious affairs were still conducted by a high priest, with priests and levites under him, and by their national senate or sanhedrim. The exterior of their worship, with a few exceptions, remained unaltered; but the amount of evil resulting to this miserable people, from the presence of Romans among them who were in their view polluted and detestable, from the cruelty and avarice of the governors, and from the frauds and rapacity of the publiCans, is almost incalculable. Unquestionably those who were subject to the other two sons of Herod lived more comfortably. 4. But the measure of liberty and com 4 See Noldius, Historia Idumæa, in Havercamp's edit. of Josephus, tom. ii. pag. 333, &c. Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, tome 1. part i. p. 27, &c. Noris, Canotaph. Pisan. i. 6. Prideaux, Connexion, &c. part ii. book viii. Cellarius, Historia Herodum, in his Diss. Acad. par. 1. p. 207, and especially the Jewish historian, Josephus, in his Wars of the Jews. 5 Josephus, Antiq. Jud. lib. xvii. cap. xiii. and de Bell. Jud. lib. ii. cap. vi.-Schl. fort allowed to the Jews by the Romans, was wholly dissipated by the profligacy and crimes of those who pretended to be the guardians of the nation. Their principal men, their high priests (as we learn from Josephus), were most abandoned; they had purchased their places by bribes or by deeds of iniquity, and maintained their ill-acquired authority by every species of flagitious acts. The other priests, and all those who held any considerable office, were not much better. The multitude, excited by such examples, ran headlong into every sort of iniquity, and by their unceasing robberies and seditions, armed against them both the justice of God and the vengeance of men.' 6. The learned, who pretended to a superior knowledge of the law and of theology, were divided into various sects and parties, 5 among which three were most numerous and influential; namely, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes. The first two are often mentioned in the Scriptures: for a knowledge of the Essenes we are indebted to Josephus and Philo. These principal sects agreed, indeed, respecting the fundamental principles of the Jewish religion, but respecting questions of the highest importance, and such as relate to the salvation of the soul, they were engaged in endless contentions. The pernicious effects on the common people of these dissensions of the learned may be easily conceived. 7. They disagreed first respecting the law itself, or the rule which God had given them. The Pharisees added to the written law an oral or unwritten law, handed down by tradition, which both the Sadducees and the Essenes rejected, adhering only to the written law. They differed also respecting the import of the law. For while the Pharisees sought a double sense in the Scriptures, one the obvious and literal, the other recondite and figurative, the Sadducees held only to the literal sense of the Bible, the greater part of the Essenes dissented from them both, maintaining that the words of the law were of no authority, but that the things expressed by them were representations of sacred and divine things. To these contests concerning the law, others were added on subjects of the highest moment, and particularly respecting the pun 5. Two religions then flourished in Palestine, viz. the Jewish and the Samaritan, between the followers of which a deadly hatred prevailed. The nature of the former is set forth in the Old Testament; but in the age of the Saviour it had lost much of its primitive form and character. The people universally were infected with certain prevalent and pernicious errors, and the more learned fiercely contended on points of the greatest moment. All looked for a deliverer; not, however, such a one as God had promised, but a powerful warrior and a vindicator of their national liberties. All placed the sum of religion in an observance of the Mosaic ritual, and in certain external duties towards their own countrymen. All excluded the rest of mankind from the hope of salvation, and, of course, whenever they dared, treated them with hatred and inhumanity. To these fruitful sources of vice must be add-ishments and rewards declared in the law. ed various absurd and superstitious opinions concerning the divine nature, genii, magic, &c. partly brought by their ancestors from the Babylonian captivity, and partly imbibed from the neighbouring Egyptians, Syrians, and Arabians.1 1 See Josephus, De Bell. Jud. lib. v. cap. xiii. sec. 6; and Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, tome i. cap. xiv.- Schl. This is proved by Basnage, Hist. des Juifs, tome v. cap. x. That not only Pharisees, but all Jews, of whatever sect, both in and out of Palestine, were expecting a Messias, is shown by Mosheim, in his Comm. de Reb. Christ. &c. p. 40, from the following texts:-John i. 20, 25; x 24, &c.; xii. 34; Matt. i. 4-6; xxi. 9; xxvi. 63, &c.-Schl. [See also Bertholdt, Christologia Judæorum Jesu apostolorumque atate. Erl. 1811, 8vo. This expectation of a deliverer was prevalent even among the heathen. See Bp. Blomfield's Dissertations on the Traditional Knowledge of a Promised Redeemer, &c. Camb. 1819, 8vo, and a curious work, by Fred. Nolan, entitled, The Expectations of the Assyrians that a great Deliverer would appear, &c. Lond. 1826, 8vo.-R. 3 Hence other nations, not without reason, accounted the Jews as enemies of mankind. See the examples collected by Elsner, Observat. Sacr. in N. T. tom. ii. p. 274.-Schl. 4 See Gale, Observ. ad Jamblichum, de Myster. These, the Pharisees held, referred to both the body and the soul, and extended beyond the present life, while the Sadducees believed in no future retributions. The Essenes took a middle course, admitting future rewards and punishments, but confining them to the soul, holding that the body consists of a malignant substance, and is the temporary prison of the soul." Egypt. p. 206; and Sale, Preface to his English 5 Besides the three more noted sects, there were others unquestionably among the Jows. The Herodians are mentioned in the sacred volume; the Gaulonites, by Josephus; and other sects by Epiphanius and by Hegesippus, in Eusebius; all of which cannot be supposed to be mere fictions. [For further information on the minor sects among the Jews, particularly the Hemerobaptists, see Mosheim's Comment. de Reb. Christ. pages 33-5. Vidal's translation, i. 77--9. - R. 6 For an account of the three Jewish sects, see Trigland, Syntagma Trium Scriptorum illustrium 8. Notwithstanding these sects contended be presented to God, except that of a comabout points of such vast moment, it does posed mind, absorbed in the contemplation not appear that they molested each other of divine things, which shows that they put with any violence on religious grounds. an allegorical sense upon the whole Jewish But this forbearance and moderation, no law. one acquainted with the history of those times, will ascribe to sound and generous principles. The Sadducees were supported by the leading men of the nation, and the Pharisees by the common people. Neither sect, therefore. could rise up in hostility against the other without the most imminent hazard. Besides, the Romans on the least appearance of tumult or sedition would doubtless have punished the ringleaders with severity. We may add, that the Sadducees were of accommodating manners, and, from the principles of their sect, were averse from all broils and altercations.' 10. The Therapeuta, of whom Philo wrote a whole book,5 are commonly reckoned a branch of the Essene family, whence originated the popular distinction of practical and theoretical Essenes. But whether this classification is correct may be doubted. For nothing is discoverable in the customs or institutions of the Therapeute, which evinces absolutely that they were a branch of the Essenes, nor has Philo so represented them. Who can deny that other fanatical Jews besides Essenes, might unite together and form a society? But I agree entirely with those who regard the Therapeuta as being Jews claiming to be true disciples of Moses, and as being neither Christians nor Egyptians. In reality, they were wild and melancholy enthusiasts, who led a life incongruous alike with the law of Moses and with sober reason." 9. The Essenes could more easily avoid contention with the others, because they lived for the most part in retired places, and remote from intercourse with mankind. This sect, which was dispersed over Syria, Egypt, and the neighbouring countries, held religion to consist in silence and meditation; and they endeavoured, by a strict See Mosheim's note on Cudworth's Essay, De vera mode of life, and by various observances Notione cœnæ Domini, p. 4, subjoined to his Intellectual System. [Respecting the Essenes and the reasons borrowed it would seem from the Egyp-why they are not mentioned by the Evangelists, see tians, to raise themselves to higher degrees Burton's Lectures on the Ecclesiastical History of the of virtue. Yet they were not all of the first three Centuries, vol. i. 21-5. See also an Essay on the Essenes in Blackwood's Magazine, vol. xlvii. the obsame sentiments. Some lived in celibacy, ject of which is to show that the Essenes of Josephus and made it their care to instruct and edu- were the primitive Christians.-R. cate the children of others. Others married wives, not to gratify their natural propensities, but solely to propagate the human race. Those who lived in Syria held that God may be propitiated by sacrifices, yet that they must be offered in a very different manner from what was common among the Jews; whence it appears they did not reject the literal sense of the Mosaic law. But those who inhabited the deserts of Egypt maintained that no sacrifice should (viz. J. Scaliger, J. Drusius, and N. Serarius), De Judeorum Sectis, Delft, 1703, 2 vols. 4to. After these, Basnage, Prideaux (in their Jewish histories), the authors of Introductions to the books of the New Testament, and of works on Jewish Antiquities, and many others, have described these sects, some more and some less successfully.-Mur. [The various Biblical Dictionaries, such as Calmet's, Kitto's, Winer's Bibl. Realwörterb, &c. and the larger Church Histories, especially Neander's, likewise contain important information respecting them.-R. 1 See Comment. de Reb. Chr. p. 48, where Mosheim proves from Josephus (Antiq. Jud. llb. xviii. cap. i. and lib. xiii. cap. x.), that the Sadducees were all men of wealth; and (from his Bell. Jud. lib. 1. cap. viii.) that they had little sympathy for others. Mosheim thinks he finds the picture of a Pharisee in the rich man decribed, Luke xvi. 19.- Schl. ? See Holstenius, Notes on Porphyry, de Vita Pytha gora, p. 11, ed. Kuster. 3 See Josephus, De Bell. Jud. lib. ii. cap. viii. sec. 13.-Schl. 5 Philo, De Vita contemplatina, in his Works, p. 889. The principal writers concerning the Therapeutæ, toti orbi exor, cap. iv. p. 55. [A more ample account are mentioned by Fabricius, Lux Salutaris Evang. of the Therapeute is given by Mosheim, in his lowing abstract of writers on the subject has been comCom. de. Reb. Chr. &c. p. 55, &c. from which the folpiled by Schlegel :-" It is still debated whether these Therapeute were Christians, Jews, or heathen philosophers. Eusebius (Hist. Eccles. lib. ii. cap.xvii.) regarded them as Christian monks, established in Egypt by St. Mark; and many Romish writers, to support The whole of this controversy may be seen in the the high antiquity of monkery, defend this opinion. Lettres pour et contre la fameuse question, si les solitaires appellés Thérapeutes, dont a parlé Philon le Juif, étoient Chrétiens. Paris, 1712, 12mo. The chief advocates of this opinion are Montfaucon, in the Notes to his French translation of Philo, and M. le Quien, Christianus Oriens, tom. ii. p. 332. On the other hand, Scaliger, Chamier, Lightfoot, Daillé, the two Basnages, Prideaux, Ittig, Buddeus, Mosheim, Baumgarten, and recently Orsi (Hist. Eccles. vol. i. p. 77) and Mangey (Preface to Philo's Works), have maintained that they were Jews, and of the sect of Essenes. Lange, in a Dissertation published in 1721, maintained upon very slender grounds, that they were oriental philosophers, of melancholy temperament, who had imbibed some Jewish notions. Jablonski, in an Essay on the subject, accounts these solitaries Egyptian priests, addicted to astrology and other sacred sciences of the Egytians." Mosheim pertinently observes (Com, de Reb. &c. p. 50), "The Christian monks, who evidently originated in Egypt, borrowed their peculiarities from the practical Essenes, for nothing can be more similar than the rules and regulations of the ancient monks and those of the Essenes, as described by Josephus. On the other hand, the Christian solitaries called Eremites copied after the theoretical Essenes, or Therapeuta."-Mur. And |