The Antiquity of Temples.
Whether there were any before the Sanctuary made by Moses.

WE read in the Old Testament, of Altars very [...]arly and frequently, without any Temples. Implyed in Cain and Abel's Offerings unto the Lord, Gen. 4. exprest, of Noah's building an Altar unto the Lord, Gen. 8.20. so Abraham, Gen. 12.7. Isaac, Gen. 26.25. and Jacob at Bethel, Gen. 35.7. Elias likewise in his Contention with the Priests of Baal, 1 Kings 18.32. And in the New Testament, of the Heathens Altar at Athens, Acts 17.23. (the Story whereof is related by Diog. Laertius in the Life of Epimenides, and L. Vives on Austin de C. D. l. 7. c. 17. and others) And Walafridus Strabo Writes, That at first both the Worshippers of God, and of the Devil, per­formed their Service in the open Air; but when they be­gan to make Idols, then, and not till then, and upon that oc­casion, they began to build Temples. I shall not trouble the Reader with a multitude of Authours, that have written of the Original and Progress of Idolatry. I think Mercerus judgeth right, that there was none before the Flood: And though some Rabbins I know, and also Tertullian thought, there were Idols and Idolatry in the old World; yet Cyril l. 3. against Ju­lian, and Epiphanius in's Panarium, with many others, the con­trary. And that the Sin of those days, which provoked God to drown the World, was Irreligiousness and Prophaneness, ra­ther than Superstition and Idolatry. For the cause of the Flood is mentioned in general, that all Flesh had corrupted their ways. It was very general, and therefore the Lord re­solved to corrupt the Earth. In Enoch's days, it seems by his Prophesie mentioned by Jude, that prophane Persons did spite­fully speak, and practise against God's Servants; with which reproachful carriage, carnal Men being overcome, became pro­phane also; and the good being taken away by death, there was a general defection. In special we read, that the earth was full of violence; and this increased upon the degenerate condi­tion of God's People. For the sons of God saw the daughters of Men that they were fair, and they took them Wives of all that they [Page 6]liked, Gen. 6.2. which provoked the Lord in an high degree, vers. 3. And hereupon there were Children born unto them, which were mighty men, and men of r [...]. Then Carnal Security was ve­ry great, as our [...] signifieth Luke 17.26, 27. which pro­ceeded from [...] contempt of God's Word; and also of his Pa­tience, and long suffering in his Works. For he bare with them an 120 years, and [...] Noah a Preacher of Righteous­ness unto them; thus the Goodness of God led them to Re­pentance both ways, but they were disobedient, 1 Pet. 3. and thereby treasured up wrath against the day of wrath, and the Flood came and swept them all away, save eight Persons. In all this we have no Evidence of any Sin of Idolatry committed by them; and had that been their sin, it is unlikely the Holy Ghost would have pretermitted the mention thereof.

2. After this the experience of God's wrath breaking forth into so sore a Judgment, and causing so great a Devastation, as to lay a whole World wast; this I say might justly work in them the fear of God, and make them generally become the more devout, while the remembrance of so general a Deluge remained; and this might well be continued for so many years as they survived who had seen the Flood. Now we read that Noah lived 350 years after the Flood, and Sem his Son 498 years. How long Ham and Japhet survived after the Flood is not ex­pressed. This Devotion proceeding only from a natural cause, as in all Persons unregenerate, could prove but natural, and therefore the more apt to be corrupted with Idolatry: as in­deed it was very timely, even in the days of Terah Abraham's Father, as we read Josh. 24. though Noah himself, the Father of them all, survived a 128 years in the very days of Te­rah; Abraham the Father of the Faithful being born but the third year after Noah's death; Sem yet living 152 years after this, as who died but ten years before Jacob and Esau the twin Sons of Isaac and Rebeckah were born. This Jacob with all his Children went down into Egypt, whither Joseph was gone many years before, and in all the Sacred History con­cerning Egypt, and the Children of Israel's dwelling there, and the Egyptians vexing and oppressing of them, until the Lord's wonderful Deliverance of them, though we read of the Gods of Egypt, Exod. 12.12. Numb. 33.4. as also how the Children of Israel were corrupted with their Idols, Ezech. 20.7. yet we read of no Temples they had. And Pharaoh, though he would [Page 7]have had them Sacrifice to their God, in the Land of Egypt, yet he knew full well they had no Temple for this; and when he promised to give them leave to go into the Wilderness to Sa­crifice there, provided they went not far, he knew there was no Temple for them. But the third month after their coming out of Egypt, at Mount Sinai, the Lord took order for the building of a Sanctuary, saying unto Moses, Let them make me a Sanctuary that I may dwell among them, Exod. 25.8, 9. And I am apt to be perswaded, that hereupon the Devil wrought up­on the Gentiles his Vassals, to build Sanctuaries and Temples for their Idols, as places for their habitation and dwelling among them.

3. For the Devil is commonly said to be God's Ape, he doth affect to imitate God. Mr. Mede hath observed this in setting down his opinion concerning the first plantation of America, which he conceives to have been wrought originally by the Devil, by his persuasions drawing a Colony thither out of these Northern Parts, and that long since the preaching of the Go­spel began, yea, not very many hundred years ago: The Spa­niards not finding by any means of Tradition from the Father to the Son, that they had been planted there above 400 years before their coming amongst them, as the Mexican History doth testifie. And like as when Idolatry at the first began to spread, and to corrupt the Family of Terah Abraham's Father, the Lord called him away from thence into another Country, who followed him, not knowing whither he went: So the Devil, when he saw what a strange alteration was made in the World, by the preaching of the Gospel, and fearing lest he should be turned out of all; he projected a course of drawing some of his Disciples into a new World out of all danger, from the sound of the Gospel, that so he might rule the more safely over them without all controul; as indeed he did, and that in such sort as never in the like manner before, since the time that Mankind first fell into his clutches.

In all Ages, ever since his Fall, his practise hath been to draw Man from his Maker. Cupiunt perditi perdere (saith Cypri­an) & depravati errorem pravitatis infundere, & cum sint ipsi pae­nales, quaerunt sibi ad paenam comites. And accordingly as he finds them, by one way or other, most apt to be led away from God; so his practise is to work upon them agreeably to their Natures. If he finds them profanely disposed, his course [Page 8]is to confirm them therein, until he hath brought them to ve­ry Atheism, if God permit him so far to prevail: but in case he find them awed with fear of a Divine Providence; then he laboureth to work them to the service of himself; wherein he plays the part of a Thief as well as of an Ape, labouring by all means to rob God of his Glory, as the Apostle sheweth in 1 Cor. 10.20. where he faith, Know ye not that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to Devils and not to God. For whether he draws them to worship the Sun, Moon and Stars, and all the Host of Heaven; or their deceased Ancestors, he draws them from God the Creator, unto the Creature; or un­der the pretence of these, to worship the Evil Spirits themselves, especially when by giving forth his Oracles in such places, where the Images of their Ancestors were worshipped, he had so infatuated them, as to think that such Places were inhabi­ted by God himself; and thus the Oracles there given forth with great subtilty and collusion, were received as Divine. Thus hath the World beén drawn from God, and the Worship which is due to him, bestowed upon the Devil his profest Enemy, and as opposite unto him as Darkness is to Light.

4. Now as for Inward and Spiritual Worship most proper to the Nature of God, these Angels of Darkness know full well wherein it consists; as which was sometimes performed by themselves, even then, when God laid the Foundation of the Earth, and the Angels were newly created as God's first Work­manship. For even then we read, Job 38.7. The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy. And this Worship by Prayer, Praise and Obedience due to God, he pra­ctiseth to draw to himself: that Man made after the Image of God, may conform himself to the will of the Devil. But as for Outward and Corporal Worship, herein the Devil is to seek. For to prescribe that, is meerly at the pleasure of God, and according to his Wisdom, which is unknown to the Crea­ture. As namely, the worshipping of God by Carnal Sacrifi­ces, according to all the Variety thereof, as by offering Incense and sweet Odours; Meat-offerings and Drink-offerings; Burnt-offerings of certain kinds of Creatures, Sin-offerings, and Trespass-offerings; and lastly Peace-offerings, according to all the several kinds of them. No Angels reason, whether of Darkness or of Light, is able by convincing Evidence to con­clude that any such Service is a thing pleasing and acceptable [Page 9]unto God in it self; and unless God himself shall think sit to prescribe it congruous in reference to such ends as shall be in­tended by him. Rather Natural Reason is against it, God him­self being a Spirit, and therefore Spiritual Worship, and a rea­sonable Service stands in best congruity to his Divine and Spi­ritual Nature: otherwise he could not be worshipped by An­gels, which are meer Spirits without any Bodies. The like may be said as concerning a Temple, where all such Rites and Sacrifices are to be performed; for albeit the Actions of Men cannot be performed, but in time and place, yet this is to be understood of time and place natural. And indeed there is no time but natural; but place is not only natural but artifi­cial; as Houses built to dwell in, and the use hereof, came not into the World, but by the Sin of Man, whereupon his Body grew exposed to the Injuries of Wind and Weather, whereto Angels are not: which is one end also of the use of Garments to cloth us. And we know well, that albeit Sacrifices had their course by God's Ordinance (as it seems) immediately af­ter the Fall of Man, and that Promise made concerning the Seed of the Woman, namely, that it should break the Serpent's head: yet these Sacrifices continued to be offered for some thousands of years on Altars, without any Temples erected for this, as appears by the Sacrifices of the Patriarchs. And after their building, how different were they in their Figure, some round, others long, &c. as also in their site, the Gentile Ido­laters worshipping the Sun, had them towards the East; the Romans at first towards the West, which they changed before Augustus's time to the East, as Vitruvius l. 4. c. 5. How much more the ordering of Temples according to the parts thereof, and Utensils and Furniture, and Ornaments of all those parts, no wit (I think) of Man or Angel, can conclude that any such thing becomes God to dwell in, or there to hear Prayers, and accept the Service performed to him, more than in other places. Unless himself shall be pleased, to confine himself for such purposes, to one place rather than another; which in Scripture phrase is to place his Name there, 1 Kings 8.16. or to record his Name, Exod. 20.24. or make the memorial of his Name, which Piscator understands, de illustribus Dei patefactio­nibus, as God should be pleased to manifest himself, in illustri­ous manner, in one place more than another. And we know full well, that when such Ceremonies and Place for the per­formance [Page 10]performance of them were appointed by God; they were ap­pointed in all the parts of them, for mysterious Prefigurations; and therefore are called shadows of good things to come, Col. 2.17. Heb. 10.1. Yea and some of them, tending to the extream con­fusion of Satan, and his Kingdom, yet such as should be brought to pass by Satan's own Counsel and Practises: as name­ly the betraying and crucifying of the Son of God: and there­fore the Lord saw it sit that the preaching and practising of such Mysteries, which in due time should be revealed, should be carried in the mean time in the Clouds of Types and Fi­gures, so that Satan himself should not be able to discover the depth of them, until the time came wherein they were ac­complished. And indeed, there is no greater glory of God that manifests it self, in the course of his Providence, than the glory of his Wisdom; 1 Cor. 1.10, 20. and this is most seen in taking the Wise in their craftiness, and going beyond them throughout, and making their Devices vain, that it may appear, the wisest of them are but fools in comparison of him, not only amongst Men, but among the Angels also. For the holy Angels are ta­ken with a great desire to peer into these Mysteries, and hereby is made known unto them the manifold wisdom of God; 1 Pet. 1.12. Eph. 3.10. Rom. 11.33. O the depth of the riches, both of the knowledge and wisdom of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. For who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his coun­sellor.

5. Therefore it stood Satan upon it to observe what course the Lord would be pleased to take for his outward Service, that so he might use his best endeavour to oppose it: either by alienating the minds of men from that kind of Service, or by corrupting it, drawing their hearts from God, and working them to bestow that Service upon the Creature. An instance of the first kind, we may observe in the Egyptians, in whom he wrought an extream alienation from the Hebrews, for such was their Superstition that they might not eat with the Hebrews, Gen. 43.32. for that was an abomination to the Egyptians. These Hebrews were the People of God, so called from the Patriarch Heber, who was great Grandfather to Abraham's great Grandfather, Serug. This Heber lived Nineteen years in the days of Jacob, who came down into Egypt. It seems he had a numerous Po­sterity, and that might make him and his the more known in the World, even to Pharaoh and the Egyptians in Jacob's days: [Page 11]For one of his Sons, Joktan by name, had Thirteen Sons, as the Scripture doth express. And Sem, that holy Patriarch, is peculiarly noted in Scripture to be the Father of the Sons of He­ber, though he were Heber's great Grandfather. And this no­tion had a mystery in the signification of it, as Moulin con­ceives. For [...] faith he, is as much as Passengers. 1 Pet. 2.11. And such is the condition of God's Children here; they are but Strangers and Pilgrims. It is afterwards said, Gen. 46 34. that every Shepherd was an abomination to the Egyptians Vid. Cunaeus de rep. Hebr. l. 1. c. 5.. This we must understand aright, namely of such Shepherds only as the Hebrews were, who did kill and eat Sheep, or kill and sacri­fice them. For it is apparent, that the Egyptians themselves kept Sheep; and therefore when Joseph bought their Cattel of them for Bread-corn, these are reckoned up to have been, not their Horses and their Asses only, but their Flocks and Herds also. And Exod. 9.3. God threatens to lay his hand upon their Sheep to destroy them; but the sacrificing of them, this was it which the Egyptians accounted abomination. And therefore when Pharaoh called for Moses and for Aaron, and said, Exod. 8.25, 16. Go ye and sacrifice to your God in the Land; Moses forthwith answered and said, It is not meet so to do: For we shall sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians to the Lord our God. Lo, shall we sacrifice the abo­mination of the Egyptians before their eyes, and will they not stone us? Nor the sacrificing of them only, but to kill them for Food was an abomination to the Egyptians. And therefore whereas we read Gen. 39.6. that Potiphar left all that he had in Joseph' s hands, save the bread which he did eat: this both Junius and Schindler render thus, save the meat that he did eat; and Shin­dler gives the reason why he would not have Joseph meddle with that, to wit, because he was Carnis Esor, an Eater of Flesh, Quia eo tempore Egyptij non comedebant carnem, nec lac, Schindler on the Root [...] nec macta­bant oves, & borum pastores, & comestores abominabantur: The Egyptians in those days did not eat Flesh nor Milk, nor killed Sheep; and the Keepers and Eaters of Sheep were an abomi­nation unto them. And Eusebius in the Second Book of his Evangelical Preparation, p. 49. Graeco-Lat. makes an enumeration of the Creatures which are Sacred amongst the Egyptians, a­mongst which are Sheep; and adds, That if any man do pur­posely kill any one of them, morte damnatur, he is put to death. These Superstitions were very ancient among the Egyptians, even in the days of Moses, and in the days of Joseph, before [Page 12] Jacob's coming down thither, and how long before I know not.

6. Nevertheless, the Devil being not able to expectorate out of the hearts of all men, that Opinion which had taken deep root, namely, That as there was a God, one or more, which governed the World, and who brought sore Judgments upon them for their sins, so this God or Gods, were to be appeased by some course or other, and no such course for this as Sacri­fices, a course whereof was derived from Noah to all his Poste­rity. Therefore the Devil had another way to dishonour God, by drawing them to Sacrifice to Idols, and to Creatures, instead of the Creator; yea, and to the Devil himself (being deluded by his Oracles) and that in most barbarous manner: for at length he brought them to Sacrifice Men, Women and Chil­dren unto him, and that under great shew of Devotion, where­of we read largely in very many Authors, both Ancient and Modern. I will only mention one notable Story in Pansanias; How when a Temple became polluted, by the impure courses of a young Man and Maid, the Devil gave forth by his Ora­cle, that this Prophanation was to be expiated by Sacrifice; and no Sacrifice would serve the turn but this: Every year a young Man and Maid must be sacrificed to that God, whose Temple had thus been defiled. And this barbarous course con­tinued for certain years; only they bestowed a denomination upon this God of theirs, calling him [...], the rigid or cruel God. And accordingly I am of opinion, that like as Satan had never brought any to serve him by Sacrifices (the ancient Heathens by Light of Nature, discoursing against the unreasonableness of such a Service, as we read in Diodorus Sicu­lus) if God had not gone before them in this, instructing Adam and the Patriarchs, even till the days of Noah, after this man­ner to serve him; and Noah leaving this course by tradition to his Posterity, as Augustine writes to the like purpose, Ep. 49. ad Deo gratias. Hoc sanè praetereundum non est, this is not to be omit­ted, Had not the Devils, those rebellious Angels, conceived that Tem­ple, Priesthood, Sacrifices, and all other things pertaining thereunto were due to one, that one true God, they would never have urged their Worshippers to ordain any of these things to them. In like sort the Devil had never brought them to build Temples for this use and service, if God had not taken order with his People to build a Sanctuary unto him that he might dwell amongst them. [Page 13]And accordingly, though Heathens had Temples before Solo­mon built that Temple at Jerusalem, (for this appears both by the high places which King Solomon built for his outlandish Wives, 1 Kings 11.7, 8. and by the Philistims, who had an House for Dagon, 1 Sam. 5.2. and Judges 16.27. and 9.27. we read how the People went into the House of their God, and did eat and drink and cursed Abimelech: and vers. 46. of the house of the god Berith, and Judg. 8.33.) yet I do not find sufficient evidence of any Temples in use with any before the Sanctuary was made, and that to this end, that God might dwell among them, Exod. 25.8. And as Schindler writeth on the root [...] that was aedificium instar templi ex lignis confectum atque it a con­stitutum ut dissolvi in partes ac rursus compingi, ac quocunque liberet deferri posset; a structure Temple-like made of Timber, in such sort as it might be taken asunder, in all the parts thereof; and again compacted together, that so it might be removed from place to place, whithersoever it pleased God to have it carried. A notable instruction, that God would be a Sanctuary unto them, and dwell among them in all places whithersoever they should come, Ezek. 11.16. And among other Temples of the Gentiles, whereof we read in History, one was portatile, a portable Temple, and removed from place to place, [...], a Temple borne or drawn by certain Yoke of Oxen, and that in Phoenicia, which is the Country of Palestine. This Eusebius te­stifies in the first Book of his Evangelical Preparation, and Chap. 10. And such a Tabernacle the Scriptures often call by such a word, as is usually rendred by Temple, as 1 Sam. 1.9. and 3.3. and 2 Sam. 6.17. and in the Psalms of David's enditing it is found very frequently. For we know that in his days, there was no other Temple, than the Tabernacle. For though it was sometimes in the heart of David to build a House to the Name of the Lord God of Israel, 1 Kings 8.17, 18, 19.2 Sam. 7.2. when as yet the Ark of the Lord remained amongst the Curtains: yet we know that the Lord answered him, He took it well that he was so minded (yet he had consulted with the Prophet Nathan first, about the matter, before he grew to a Resolution thereupon) Nevertheless thou shalt not build me an House, saith the Lord; but thy son that shall come out of thy Loyns, he shall build the House to my Name. So that till Solomon's reign, there was only a Tabernacle for the Ark of God, wherein was the Mercy Seat, and there the Lord is said to have dwelt, and that in a Cloud, Lev. 16.2. [Page 14] Between the Cherubims. Neither have I yet found any evidence to the contrary, either in Scripture or elsewhere. Before the Flood no evidence of any; though Mercer observes, they had a place of Meeting for the Service of God: as upon Gen. 4. where we read of Cain and Abel's Offering, and God's accep­tance of the one, and disregarding of the other, and that (as it seems) in a visible and sensible manner: For hereupon Cain was provoked against Abel. Likewise upon the birth of Enosh, when it is said, That men began to call upon the Name of the Lord, Mercer makes the same observation. Neither can we promise less unto our selves of Adam's care for the disciplining, and insti­tuting of his Family, and Seth's after him: and the like may be said of all the holy Patriarchs. Gen. 6. This also is manifest by the distinction made between the Sons of God and Daughters of Men, until the degenerate condition came on, and the parti­tion Wall was broken down by promiscuous Marriages. But in all this, not any evidence of Temples separate, and set apart for this.

7. After the Flood, when Noah came out of the Ark, there he built an Altar unto the Lord, and offered a Burnt-offering of every clean Fowl and Beast: After this, in the Story of Genesis, the Genealogies being dispatched, and the dispersion of the People, by the occasion of Confusion of Tongues, we have the erecting of the two first Monarchies, the Babylonian by Nimrod, and after the same time the Assyrian by Assur, who built Niniveh, so called (as it is thought by very probable conjecture) from the name of his Son Ninus: For it is appa­rent in Scripture, that Places had their names from the names of some chief Persons that dwelt there. Thus Egypt is called Misraim, from Misraim the Son of Ham, and the Land Canaan from Canaan, and so Jonia from Javan, and Assyria from Assur, After these particulars dispatched in brief, we have the Story of Abraham his Peregrination, who built Altars, where the Lord appeared unto him, and so did Isaac and Jacob; but we find no Monument of any Temple or separate House they had for God's Service; Gen. 24.63. but we read of Isaac's going abroad into the Field to pray. Likewise when Abraham went down into E­gypt, we find not the least indication of any such thing there, nor among the Philistims, whilst Abraham sojourned a good while with them, and Isaac after him: No nor among the Ca­naanites, though we read of Melchisedek the Priest of the most [Page 15]High God, and good Correspondency between Abraham and him; yet no mention of any Temple or House of God, where­in he performed any Religious Duties to that great God, pos­sessor of Heaven and Earth, whose Priest he was. Indeed if we should credit some uncertain Relations of fabulous Writers, we may find Temples much earlier mentioned. Albertus Cog­natus in the fourth Book of Narrations (cited by Hospinian Tr. of Images) ascribes the beginning of Idolatry to Nimrod, who as he pretends upon the loss of his first-born Belus, to asswage his grief, caused his Image to be made of Gold, which he set up in a Temple built by him, and worshipped it, and ossered Sacrifices unto it. Aventinus writes, that Ninus the Son of Be­lus Jupiter (the second King of the Babylonians the Son of Nimrod) caused his Fathers image to be made in the midst of Babylon, and a Temple also, and Divine Honours to be done unto his Father. Both which are fabulous, and all of this kind, in Pliny and Victor Massiliensis. As also in the Apocryphal Be­rosus, that Ninus adorned Nineveh, and was the first who built a Temple, and erected Statues to his Father Belus, and his Mo­ther Juno, and his Grandmother Rhea. For we have no cer­tainty of those early times, but from Scripture, which acquaints us, that Nimrod was the Son of Gush, and Grandchild of Ham, and Founder of the Babylonian Monarchy: as Ashur was the Son of blessed Shem, and built Nineveh, the Metropolis of the Assyrian Monarchy. Which though considerably later, yet soon overtopt the Babylonian, and continued its Primacy for the greatest part of many Ages, and in the time of Esarchad­don, after Babylon had revolted, reduced it again, and carried Manasses thither, 2 Chron. 33.11. Though shortly after, about ten or eleven years, Nabopollasar (or Nebuchadonasor) having taken Nineveh, and assuming his Son Nebuchadnessar to reign with him, the Babylonian Monarchy started up again, and o­vertopt the Assyrian, through the effeminateness of their Prin­ces, as is plain in History, and the manner thereof in Aristotle's Politicks: which Revolution, was the immediate cause under God, of Manasses Restoration. But leaving these Relations mentioned by the by, Gen. 47.28. let's proceed in the infallible History of Truth. From the time of Joseph's going down into Egypt at Seventeen years of Age, to the time of his first standing before Pharaoh, the year before the Seven plentiful years began, at what time he is said to be Thirty years old, and after Jacob's [Page 16]coming down into Egypt, with his whole Family, until his death, who dwelt in Egypt Seventeen years, and hence until Joseph's death, who dwelt in Egypt, an Hundred years wanting seven; in the Story hereof I find no evidence of Temples a­mong the Egyptians. Nor from the birth of Moses, who was born (about Forty six years after the death of Levi, who was his Grandfather by the Mother, and great Grandfather by his Father) until his leading the Children of Israel out of Egypt, the space of Fourscore years, we find no mention of any Tem­ple or Temples there. You will say they had Gods, for the Lord said, Exod. 12.12. He would execute judgment upon all the gods of Egypt; and so it came to pass, Numb. 33.4. But I answer, So Laban had his gods, which Rachel stole away from her Fa­ther, and sate upon them to hide them from him, Gen. 31.30, 34. and in the days of Terah, Abraham's Father, they served o­ther gods: this we read; but of any Temples they had, we read not. If you say these gods that Terah and Laban had, were Houshold gods, and some room in their private Houses might serve for them, and for the Devotions performed unto them: but the gods of Egypt spoken of, were for Publick Use and Pub­lick Service; and therefore they had their Priests also. To this I answer, Pausanius in Corin­thiacis, p. 54. That we read often in Pausanius of Arae Jovis pluvij, which I understand of Images of Jupiter, standing open with­out any covering. And p. 58. he writes that in the Court of Priamus the Son of Laomedon, there stood the Image of Jupiter Paleus sub Divo, under the open Heaven, and that to his Altar Priamus sled when Troy was taken. And Alexander ab Alexan­dro writes, that the House of Jupiter Pulverinus, in the Country of Attica, had no Roof, but was open above; this he hath in his second Book of Genial Days, and Chap. 22. So the Image of Minerva Pavia was, sab Divo, in the open Air, as Pausanius te­stifies in his Laconica, p. 90. & 95. The same Author tells us, that in a small Island were the brazen Figures of Castor and Pollux, sub Divo in the open Air, nibilo pedalibus majora of a foots length and no more; such belike were the Puppets Rachel sate upon, called Laban's gods; and a number of such he men­tioneth standing in the open Air; and sometimes he makes re­lation of certain Delubra, Temples which had no Roof, but were open above towards the Heavens, as in his Boeoticis, p. 260. And p. 264. He makes mention of a Chappel of Ceres, sirnamed Europa, where there is sub Divo Jupiter pluvius, rainy Jupiter, [Page 17]standing in the open Air. Coelius Rodigimus l. 10. p. 355. Jovi Fulguri, Soli, Lunae, Coelo, Hypaethra, id est subdialia constitui debe­re Templa proponimus. Add unto this subdiales statuas Levit. 26.30. as Junius renders it. And having Altars at such Images where they offered Sacrifices, no marvel if they had Priests al­so. Melchisedeck, we know, is called the Priest of the most High God, and King of Salem; but I do not think any Man will a­vouch, that he had a Temple there. Abraham was a Prophet, Gen. 20. and was he not a Priest also? it is clear he offered Sa­crifice to the Lord, Gen. 12. and Isaac, Gen. 26. so Jacob, and that by God's commandment, Gen. 35. And whereas some are of opinion, that when Jacob vowed unto God the Tenth of all that God should give him in Mesopotamia, Gen. 28. and here­upon a question is moved, To whom he should pay the Tenth of all, that is, to what Priest? knowing no better Answer, are of opinion that he paid it to himself, supposing him to be a Priest, and capable of receiving Tythes. I willingly confess such a Devotion is very profitable as to Temporals: but I see no ne­cessity that casts us upon such conceits: For he might well Sa­crifice unto God the Tenth, or the worth of the Tenth, and all that he possessed. As yet the Priesthood was not confined to one Family, and till then, Moses himself was a Priest as well as a Prophet, even to the erecting of the Tabernacle, which by Archb. Ushers computation, was in the year of the World 1514. But let us proceed further, and take into consideration what we find in profare Histories concerning Temples.

8. Diodorus Siculus l. 1. c. 1. reports, that in the opinion of some, the Ethiopians were the first of Men, and he gives reasons for it, but in a most atheistical and unreasonable way, feigning Men to have been [...] born of the Earth and Air, in a natural manner, as Mice and other things of equivocal Gene­ration. And how this came to pass, he prosecutes in a most absurd and brain-sick Discourse, without taking notice of any Creator, who of one blood made all mankind to dwell upon the face of the earth. And adds, that the worship of God was first found out by them. Sacraque insuper, pompas, celebritates, aliaque quibus diis honores impenduntur, ab iis fuisse reperta. And what manner of Gods must they needs be, who are worshipped by those who acknowledge no Creator? St. Paul tells us that the eternal power and Godhead is known from the Creation, considered in his works. His best proof for this is out of Homer, who brings in Jupiter, [Page 18]and the rest of the Gods with him, going in Progress into E­thopia, both to the Sacrifices there made unto them, and for the sweetness of the odours there. And surely it is most con­gruous, that such Gods as are devised by the fancies of Men, and made at their pleasures, should be well content to be served and worshipped according to the Fancies of Men, and at their plea sure: for undoubtedly Man hath as much power to devise a Divine and Religious Worship, as to make a God; any Ser­vice being good enough, and too good, to be bestowed upon the work of their own hands, yea or upon their own Fancies either. Yet the truth is, there was a time when the Bride­groom of God's Church was pleased with bodily Sacrifices of­fered with good hearty, and had his abode in the Mountains of Spices. Cant. 8.14. Make haste my beloved, and be thou like unto a Roe, or to a young Hart upon the Mountains of Spices. But this was only for a time until the day did break, and the shadows fled away, Cant. 2.17. The Lord Christ now adays is the most sweet smelling Savour, both to God the Father and us; by whom alone the Father is satisfied, and our Souls sweetly refreshed. Indeed I read that Hesiod and Homer, were Primi Deorum opi­fices apud Graecos, the first Crafts-masters in coining Gods among the Grecians, in Herodotus lib. 2. p. 124. Graeco-Lat. Hesiodus atque Homerus, (qui quadringent is non amplius annis ante me extitere) fuere, qui Graecis Theogoniam introduxerunt, eisque & cognomina, & honores, & diversa artificia, & figuras attribuerunt. And p. 166. Ipsi Aegyptij extiterunt principes conventus, & pompas & concilia­bula factitandi, & ab iis Graeci didicerunt. Cujus rei hoc apud me argumentum est, quod illa constet priscis temporibus: Graecanica ve­rò recens fuisse institua. And we know Homer lived after the Wars of Troy, some say 80 years, some 100, others 140, others 180 years after the taking of Troy. Nay, there are that make him 200 years, yea 240 later than that, yea some 400, others 500 later; as Talianus gives instance in several Authors, thus tar differing about the time of Homer, as any may read in Eu­sebius his Evangelical Preparation, Book 10. p. 492. Graeco-Lat. We by the Word of God are brought acquainted not only with the Creation of Man, but of the World also, and how in 1656. it was drowned, and all Flesh perished by the Waters of a general Deluge, in whom was the breath of Life, except those four couple, eight persons in all, who were reserved for a Seed to sow the World anew, and preserved in the Ark which [Page 19]setled in Ararat, commonly conceived to be a Mountain in Armenia (though some think otherwise) and from those parts near adjoyning, and particularly from Babel, after the Consu­sion of Languages, began the dispersion of the People. And as the Lord by his extraordinary Providence, provided both for the making of the Ark, and bringing all sorts of Creatures thereinto, and maintenance for them, and their preservation there, did make himself known unto them, (after a degene­rate time that came upon all) both as a God of Vengeance in destroying others, and also as a God of Mercy and Salvation in preserving them from that common Destruction; promising withal never to destroy the World so again: so from them, and by them, was the knowledge of God propagated to their Po­sterity; which about 101. years after the Flood, began to be dispersed over all the World. And upon Nimrod's Usurpation, Rebel-like, his Nature answering to his Name, it seems that both his Father and Grandfather, and many of them separated themselves from him, Cush into Ethiopia, Misraim into Egypt, Canaan into Palestine, where we find Sidon a principal City by the Sea. And as Egypt is called in Scripture the Land of Ham, so by as good reason Ethiopia also. Lydiat is of opinon concern­ing Ham, that he was the eldest of Noah's three Children; and by the younger Son of Noah, Gen. 9.24. is meant Canaan No­ah's Grandchild; (for even our Grandchildren we count our Children) and Noah's Curse we know, passed not upon Ham, but upon Canaan: which makes it probable that the lewd prank which gave such offence to Noah, and he sound out by exami­nation, was play'd by Canaan; and by him his Father Ham came to the knowledge of it, who told his two Brethren there­of, Sem and Japhet. And thus indeed the Egyptians and E­thopians, and whole house of Ham, may be accounted the eld­est House of the World, if he were elder than his two Brethren Sem and Japhet. But in this Lydiat is almost alone, most Au­thors being for Sem, or Japhet (which is more likely) being the eldest, as may be seen at large in Usher's Chronol. Sacra. c. 4. Ja­phet separated towards the North, both East and West, but chiefly towards the West. Sem's Posterity continued in the East towards the South; Assur his Son having erected a Mo­narchy in Niniveh. But as yet no testimony for Temples any where.

9. Diogines Laertius an approved Writer, in his fifth Book of the Lives of Philosophers, in the Life of Epimenides, saith of him, That Construxit apud Athenienses phanum verendorum Deo­rum, ut ait Lobon Argivns in libro de Poetis. Fertur etiam primus domus atque agros expiasse delubraque erexisse. This Epimenides of Crete built a Temple to the Gods, call'd [...], Dij reverends, some that deserved to be reverenced (as he thought) more than all the pack, and he alledgeth Lobon of Argos, in his Book of Poets, testifying this. This Epimenides also is said to have been the first that shewed a course for the expiation of Houses and Fields, and that erected Temples. The expiation here spoken of, was by Sacrifice, as appears by the Story mentioned a lit­tle before: For having mentioned how the fame of this Man flying throughout all Grece, he was reputed a Man most dear to God; thereupon an Instance thereof is given thus: The A­thenians were sometimes visited with a sore Pestilence, who thereupon asking counsel hereabouts, as their manner was, at the Oracle of Del­phos, Pythia the Nun Priest answered them, That the City of A­thens was to be expiated. And they being ignorant, how this was to be performed, dispatched Niceas the Son of Niceratus by Ship into the Island of Crete, to Epimenides, to intreat him to come over unto them. Upon their intreaty he came, and expiated or purged their Ci­ty after this manner: He took Sheep, some white some black, and brought them to Mars his Street, and there let them go whither they would, sending some after them, to observe where they lay down; and wheresoever any of them lay down, there he gave charge they should be sacrificed peculiari cuipiam Deo, to some peculiar God. [...], saith Laertius, to a fit God: his meaning was, to the God that plagued them; but who it was they knew not. And therefore Laertius addeth, That even in his days there were to be seen in the Streets of Athens, Altars without a Name, as a me­morial of that expiation, and hereupon he saith that the Plague ceased. And in all likelyhood the Altar that St. Paul observed as he went in one of the Streets of Athens with this Inscription, [...], to the unknown God, was one of those Altars Laertius writes of, though the Inscription might be defaced in his days; for in Causabon's judgment, Laertius lived not until the year 200. after Christ, that is about the time of Tertullian; yet Altars with such Inscriptions were nothing strange; such a one being mentioned by Pausanias in his Eliacks, p. 162. Adjacet ei ignoto­rum Deorum ara. Now this Epimenides came to Athens about this [Page 21]business, by Laertius's accompt in the 47th Olympiad, and others reckon him to be coaetaneus to Pythagoras, who lived in the time of Servius Tullus, the fifth King of Rome from Romulus. Now Rome it self had its Foundation laid, but in the days of Jotham King of Judab, by Lydiat and Usher's accompt, and the very year after Nabuchodonosor had inchoated his Kingdom of Babylon, which was a Type of Romish Babylon.

10. Janus was a King in Italy long before Romulus; and un­to him, a certain Writer, Xenon by name, in the first Book of his Italica, ascribes the first building of Temples, as Macrobius testifies in the first Book of his Saturnals, Chap. 9. Now the beginning of Janus his Latin Kingdom, Lydiat reckons to be 150 years, before Aeneas his coming into Italy in the days of Latinus, the fifth King after Janus; Aeneas his arriving there being the third year after the taking of Troy, which yet by Ly­diat's accompt was 60 years after the death of Othniel, the first Judge of Israel after the death of Joshua, and 120 years after the Children of Israel's coming out of Egypt. Now this Janus was the Man that entertained old Saturn, when he fled from his Son Jupiter into Italy, and admitted him in Societatem Regni, to reign with him. Thence Italy came to be called Latium, as Ovid Writes, saying, ‘Et dicta est Latium terra latente Deo.’

And Virgil in his Aeneids 8.

where I observe the Poet's wisdom, affecting to grace his Coun­try; for he feigns Saturn not to come thither flying from the Isle of Crete, but from Heaven forsooth, to salve the Reputati­on of his Deity, and the Honour of his own Country; and adds, that his days were the time of that golden Age of the World, as Ovid and other Poets feign: His words are these; ‘Aureaque, ut perhibent, illo sub Rege fuere.’ [Page 22]In the days of Saturn was the golden Age of the World. Now this fairly may revive the remembrance of a Note made by Ser­vius upon a Passage in Virgil, describing the goodly Temple that Queen Dido was building, when Aeneas, after the taking of Troy, came thither, being cast by a Tempest upon those Parts.

Now whereas Virgil hath aerea limina, brazen Thresholds, Servi­us maketh a question of the reason why he calls the Threshold brazen; it seeming unlikly that they should be made of, or co­vered with Brass: his answer is, That Virgil delivers it, allusione facta ad Saecula tunc temporis aerea, in allusion to the condition of those times, the brazen Age being then on foot. Though for ought I see, it might go for an Iron Age well enough, when such ado was made in the World, such Wars raised for 10 years continuance at Troy, and all for the Recovery of a Whore, if it be a true History, and not a Poetical Fiction, as some con­ceive. In those days there were Temples, I nothing doubt, and before; for the Trojans had theirs, as the same Virgil men­tions in the person of Aeneas,

we poor Creatures made that day, a Festival day in our Tem­ples; which alas was to be our last day, their Funeral follow­ing immediately after. And not in the brazen Age only can we well admit that Temples have been, but in the golden Age also, as namely in the days of Saturn, which yet will be found 160 years after the Children of Israel's coming out of Egypt. And if Saturn were the chief of Heathen Deities, surely Moses is much more ancient than they all; how much more anci­ent than Temples made to them. It is true Cicero makes menti­on of three Jupiters, one the Son of Saturn and Ops King of Crete, whose Sepulchre is there found; which Callimachus is im­patient to hear, and therefore brands them for lyars, saying, [Page 23]

The Cretians are always lyars, for they have built a Sepulchre to thee, O King, whereas thou diest not, but livest for ever-The other two, Cicero saith, were born in Areadia; the Fa­ther of the one Aether, of whom came Proserpina and Liber, or Bacchus; the Father of the other Coelum, and he begat Miner­va. In like sort Japetus is said by Hesiod to be the Son of Coe­lum & Terrae, of Heaven and Earth; as much as to say, they could not tell who was the Father of them, and therefore they feigned them to have been brought forth by the Heaven and Earth, and Sea and Rivers. But Virgil confounds these Jupiters which Cicero distinguisheth, and feigns Saturn the Father of Ju­piter Cretensis to have come ab Aethereo Olympo, that is, from from Aether and Heaven. And Japetus we see how plainly it sounds Japhet, one of the Sons of Noah, as Mercer upon Genesis, and many others observe. And as Hesiod relates very strange things of Saturns dealing with his Father Coelum; so the Jewish Rabbins relate as strange things (yea the very same) of Ham's dealing with his Father, supposing they have some ground for it in the Scripture. And sure we are, that Noah himself had no Children after the Flood, and this Ham was Japhet's Brother; and both better known to the World than their Father Noah, who with his Son Sem (as it seems) lived a private life; whilst his Children, and Childrens children divided the World among them, calling the several Regions of it, after their own Names, and erecting Monarchies; Nimrod in Babylon, and Assur at Ni­niveh. Horace makes mention of A [...]dax Japeti genus, his Po­sterity were bold Creatures, that d [...]st venture in a Ship to make a way through the Sea, which fairly refers to the Poste­rity of Japhet, of whose Children, the Isles of the Gentiles were divided in their Lands, every one after his tongue, Gen. 10.5. and after their Families in their Nations. And all the three Sons of Noah it's likely were imployed by their Father, in building the Ark; and by them their Posterity might easily be instructed in that Art, the Lord himself first instructing Noah. Especially con­sidering how long both Noah and Sem lived after the Flood: Noah 350 years, that is, not only after the Babylonian and Assy­rian Kingdoms erected by Nimrod and Assur, 235 years; but [Page 24]after the Posterity of Misraim began to reign in Egypt, in seve­ral Principalities, 89 years; and after Ogyges built Thebes in Grece, 41 years; and after Aegialeus the first King of Sicyonians in Peloponnesus his beginning to reign, 23 years; and died but two or three years before Abraham was born. And Sem li­ved 150 years after his Father Noah; and Sem died but 10 years before Esau and Jacob were born, according to Lydiat's Chronicle, which I take to be most accurate. And for ought I know to the contrary, both Ham and Japhet, might live as long as Sem, and the Grecians, and Isles of the Gentiles, might be well known to be Japeti genus. Though I deny not but others of his Posterity might be called by his name, like as we read of two Kings of Athens, each called by the name of Cecrops, the one of Cecrops major, and the other of Cecrops mi­nor; and the younger of them divers Ages after the elder. And the name of Iphitus, who was but one Age before the Wars of Troy, doth plainly carry the same Radical Letters that Japetus doth. But to proceed.

11. The Pelasgians are accounted by Strabo in his fifth Book, Populi Graeciae vetustissimi, the most ancient People of Greece. And these He and Hesiod, and Pausanias in his Arcadicis, testifie to have proceeded from Pelasgus. Ac primum omnium Pelasgum memorant Arcadi in illa terra extitisse; The Arcadians report, that Pelasgus was the first of Men in that Country: which rela­tion Pausanias modifies thus, That he was the first King there, to wit, in Arcadiae; and who first brought the rude People there, to build Cottages, to defend themselves from the Inju­ries of the Weather. Lycaon was his Son, and him Pausanias makes coetaneous to Cecrops, meaning Cecrops major, which Ce­crops is commonly accounted coetaneous with Moses; especial­ly Eusebius in his Tenth Book of his Evangelical Preparation, Chap. 19. and he adds this as a thing confessed by all, Nemo non fatetur. Lycanon's youngest Son was Oenotrius, who went with a Colony into Italy, and from him that Country of Italy was called Oenotria. Yet there were no Temples till the days of Janus by the Testimony of Xenon formerly mentioned, out of Macrobius his Saturnals, lib. 1. cap. 9. And this was the first of all the Grecian Colonies in the opinion of Pausanias; and he adds also, That neither had he found any Transmigration made by the Barbarians before this. But therein we know Pausanias mistakes, and that Grece and all Europe, after the Universal De­luge, [Page 25]was first inhabited by those of the Posterity of Noah, and specially of Japhet, who came into the Western Parts from the East. And the Iones, a People so well known both in Asia the less, and in Grece, do fairly manifest by their very Name, that they were descended from Javan, one of the Sons of Japhet. Now Janus, the first erector of Temples in Italy, was near about 200 years after Cecrops began first to reign in the Region of Attica. Yet I confess that Jupiter is said to have gotten Lyca­on's Daughter, Calisto, with Child; and besides Jupiter of Grece, Cicero makes mention of two Jupiters born in Arcadia; I doubt one of them might be Lycaon's Brother, for such incestuous Generations were too too frequent amongst those Heathen called Gods.

12. But consider we what Pausanias writes in his Eliacis pri­oribus of Saturn, Saturnum primum omnium Coeli Regnum obtinuisse. That Saturn first of all obtained the Kingdom of Coelum, which we commonly render Heaven; but it might be the name of a Country in Crete, like as Olympia was a Country in Grece, where the hill Olympus was, which word Olympus is com­monly used by Poets to signifie Heaven. Ei in Olympia ho­mines eos (quod aureum genus nuncupatum est) Templum de­dicasse; To him the Men of the golden Age dedicated a Temple in Olympia. After this Jupiter being born, his Mo­ther committed him to the Dactyles of Ida to be kept; these were four Brethren, of whom Hercules, called Idaeus, was one, long before Hercules the Son of Amphytruo. This Hercules as the same Pausanias writes, was great Grandfather to Clymenus, who coming out of Crete, first instituted the Olympian Games, 50 years after Deucalion's Flood. Now if we accompt 30 years to an Age, as Lydiat doth, and that according to Clemens Alexan­drinus, if I mistake not; and that Clymenus was 30 years old at the institution of these Olympian Games, from thence to the Birth of Hercules, the sum of years ariseth but to 120. Now by Lydiat's accompt Moses led the Children of Israel out of E­gypt but 30 years after Deucalion's Flood; that is, 30 years be­fore Clymenus his institution, at what time Moses was 80 years old. Hence it follows, that Hercules was not born above 20 years before Moses, nor this Saturn neither. For that Hercules to whom the tutalidge of Jupiter was committed, might well be as old as Saturn himself, yet this Hercules Idaeus had his name from the Hill Ida in Crete; and therefore in all likelyhood Saturn [Page 26]his Father, was the same that fled into Italy, and there was en­tertained by Janus, many years after Moses. And whereas Pausanias gives much credit to Homer concerning Matters of Grece, why should we not give as much credit to Virgil concern­ing the Story of Italy? Yet that of Saturn's Entertainment by Janus is a Story very commonly received. Yet I confess Dio­dorus Siculus makes mention of a Saturn, and a Jupiter, and an Hercules, and Curetes Dactyli in Phrygia; but upon what ground I know not, for Pausanias doth not; and it seems from Curetes by Contraction came Cretes, and thence that Island of Crete might have his Name; but I stand not upon this: Nay, I yield rather that it had its Name from one Cres, who reigned there at the same time that Inachus reigned at Argos in Grece. It may be then the Curetes were the same with Cretes. But it is nothing strange the Grecians should be found to run wild some­times in their Accounts of times, considering that Cadmus was the first, who coming out of Phoenicia to Thebes, taught Greeks the use of Letters, as Eusebius writes in his Evangelical Prepara­tion, lib. 10. cap. 5. and Clemens Alexandrinus in the first Book of his Stromata, p. 306. Graeco-lat. Though I know Diodorus Siculus minceth the matter, saying that he brought amongst them only a new Character, belike for the Honour of the Greek Nation, being loth that the World should take notice that they were beholden to the Phoenicians for this.

13. Before I have shewed out of Clemens Alexandrinus, that such Structures as were first the Sepulchres of the Dead, after­wards, being enlarged to a greater Magnificence, came to be called the Temples of gods: And Arnobius, lib. 6. Quid quod multa ex his templa quae Tholis sunt aureis, & sublimibus elata fastigiis auctorum conscriptionibus comprobatur, contegere cineres at (que) ossa & defunctorum esse corporum sepulchra. Nonne patet & in promtu est, aut pro Diis immortalibus mortuos vos colere, aut inexpiabilem fieri numinibus contumeliam, quorum delubra & templa, mortuorum superlata sunt bustis? What shall we say to this, that many Temples which are built with golden Arches and lofty Roofs, do cover Ashes and Bones, and that they are the Sepulchres of Men deceased, as it appears by the Writings of divers Authors? Is it not manifest and prone to conclude hereby, that either you worship dead Men instead of gods, or that you do the gods an Injury that cannot be expiated, in that you build their Temples upon the Sepulchres of the dead? Now the first In­stance [Page 27]given in this kind by Clemens Alexandrinus in his Admo­nition to the Gentiles, I find to be of the Temple of Minerva, which was the Sepulchre of Acrisius. Now this Acrisius was the 14th King of Argos, by the Account of Appion the Gramma­rian, alledged by Tatianus, and represented by Ensebius, in the [...]th Book of his Evangelical Preparation, p. 493. Graecolat. And in the Fourth Generation after Danaus, who came out of Egypt unto Argos in Grece, upon the Confusion caused in Egypt, partly by the Slaughter of the First Born, and part­ly by the Destruction of Pharaoh and his Egyptians in the Red Sea, when Moses led the Children of Israel through it, towards the Land of Canaan; by the Account of Mr. Lydiat in his Emendation of Times. And that which Appion writeth hereof, was out of Piolimaeus Mendesius. Pausanias in his Boeoti­ca speaks of a Temple dedicated to Hercules; but whereas some imagine, or might imagine that it was a Temple dedicated to Hercules, the Son of Amphytrion, he professeth that it was mul­to vetustius, much more ancient than so; and therefore he con­ceives rather, the Dedication of it ought to be ascribed to a more ancient Hercules, who was one of the Idaei Dactyli, com­monly called Hercules Idaeus. Now these Idaei Dactyli were those Curetes to whose Care the Education of Jupiter was committed; to wit, Jupiter Cretensis, the Son of Saturn, who flying out of Crete and coming into Italy, was there entertained by Janus; which Janus reigned in Italy long after Moses, as formerly hath been shewed. The same Pausanias in the first of his Eliacks, affirms, Pelops was the first that erected a Temple to Mercury in Peloponnesus; and in his Boeoticis reports that one Myron By­zantius, a Writer of Heroick Verses and Elegies, had deliver­ed that Amphyon was the first of all Men that dedicated an Al­tar to Mercury. Now Pelops is accounted but of the same time with Acrisius King of Argos, the Fourth King after Danaus, by Eusebius in his Evangelical Preparation, lib. 10. p. 493. Graecolar. And the same Tatianus in the same place of Eusebius, maintains Moses to have been before Amphyon. But of all the Temples known to Pausanias, the most Ancient he professeth to have been the Temple of Apollo Thearius, which was the Troeze­nians. For albeit he takes notice of two other Temples which were very ancient; yet this, he saith, was much more ancient than they, and was reported to have been built by Pythius, and as it was built by him, so it was adorned by him also. Now [Page 28]what time Pythius lived, he sheweth forthwith, when he saith, that Bellerophon coming to Troezene, where Pithias reigned, he required of him Aethra to be given him to Wife; but Aegeus married her King of Athens, and she became the Mother of Thesous, as Robert Stephanus writes; and Pellerophon was deprived of his Kingdom of Ephyra by Praetos King of Argos, as the same Author writeth. Now this Praetus was the third King of Argos after Danaus, by Tatianus his account related by Eusebius, Praeparat. Evangel. lib. 10. and Danaus is by Lidiat's Account somewhat after Moses.

14. But we proceed from the Grecians to the Egyptians, be­cause they are supposed by some to have found out and commu­nicated to others, the Names of Heathenish Gods, and first erected Temples and Altars to them, for so writes Caelius Rodi­ginus, l. 18. c. 37. Traditur porro Aegyptios primos Deorum exci­tasse aras, conflasse simulacra, & Templa construxisse: But this learned Antiquary (which is his usual fault) tells us not his Au­thors. Probably Herodotus, lib. 2. Aegiptii primi & Deorum cognomina in usu habuere, & ab illis Graeci fuerunt mutuati. Item primi Diis & aras, & simulachra & delubra statuere. And Pau­sanias in his Atticis testifies, that amongst the Grecians, the Athenians went beyond all others in Devotion towards the Gods. Athenienses Deorum cultu, studioque Religionis longè caeteras omnes civitates anteire: And the Athenians had this from their King Cerops major, as Lidiat writes, Emend. temp. p. 18. Erat vero etiam Cecrops Magnus auctor superstitionis ac Idololatriae. This Cecrops was called Diphyes, because he was genere partim Aegyp­tius; by Parentage an Egyptian, and Coquaeus out of Eusebius relates this of Cecrops, That primus Jovem appellavit, simulacra re­periit, aram statuit, victimas immolavit, nequaquam istiusmodi re­bus in Graecia visis, Coqu. in Augustin. de Civit. Dei, l. 18. c. 8. Porphyry, that enemy of the Gospel, was wont much to mag­nify a certain Historian named Sanconiatho: His History was much commended by one Philo Biblius, who added a Preface thereunto, wherein he writes, Barbarorum Antiquissimi Phoenices imprimis & Aegyptii, (a quibus caeteri deinceps populi morem illum accepere) in maximorum Deorum loco eos omnes habuere, qui res ad vit am agendam necessarias invenissent, qui (que) beneficium aliquod in ge­nus humanum contulissent. Eos nimirum, quod sibi plurimorum bonorum autores esse persuaderent, Divinis honoribus coluere; ac tem­plorum usu, quae jam ante constructa fuerant, hoc ad munus officium (que) [Page 29]traducto; columnas insuper statuas (que) ligne as ipsorum nomine consecra­runt, eo (que) precipue religionis cultu prosecuti; festos illis quoque dies longè celeberrimos dedicarunt. In quo eximium illud fuit, Regum su­orum nomina universi hujus elementis, ac quibusdam corum quibus divinitatem ipsi tribuebant imponerent. Naturales vero Deos Solem, Lumam, reliquasque Stellase errantes, cum Elementis & caeteris cum ei [...]sdem affinitate conjunctis, solos ex omnibus agnoscebant; ut morta­les quidem alios, alios autem immortales cos haberent. Where ob­serve four things: 1. That the first Founders of Idolatry are noted to be Phoenicians and Egyptians, who were the posterity of Ham by Misraim and Canaan. 2. That Temples were not at first built for the Gods, but having been formerly built for other uses, were afterward turned to this use; and if you ask for what use they were at first built, I have nothing to answer but that of Clemens Alexandrinus, namely, that they were at first built for some great Persons to lie interr'd in after their decease. 3. That the first Gods adored by them, which he calls natural Gods, were the Lights of Heaven, especially the Planets and the Elements; all which makes up the number of eleven, and they had but twelve in all; now who might the Twelfth be? was he the first mover of all? Aristottle I am sure, so inter­preteth the Divinity of his Forefathers, as if by Sun and Moon, and the rest of the Planets, they meant those pure Minds which he calleth Intelligences; and whom he conceived to be the Movers of these Orbs; but withal he acknowledgeth a first Mover, in the Contemplation of whom the Perfection of all the rest consisted. That was his Device by his Philosophy to make the best construction he could of the religious ways of his Ancestors. But might not Pan be one of their Deities, and that a principal one? yet this seems to denote the whole Uni­verse: For it is too too true, that soon they fell away from the Acknowledgement of the Creator to worship the Creature. And Eusebius saith Praeparat. Evangel. l. 3. c. 9. That as Orpheus took his Discourse of the Gods from the Doctrine of the Egyptians; so he would have the world to be God, compounded of many Gods, according to the several parts of the World. Lastly, They came about to worship their deceased Ancestors with religious Ado­ration. And might not these be represented by the Images of those Beasts which were consecrated by them? This surely is one special Interpretation, which Diodorus Siculus makes of those Beasts, which were so religiously, or superstitiously ra­ther, [Page 30]esteemed and reverenced by the Egyptians. And Dioge­nes Laertius, concerning the Devotion of the Egyptians this ve­ry way, saith in the Proem to his Book of the Lives of Philo­sophers, Statuas praeterea & fana a se fabricari fatentur quod ig­norent effigiem Dei: They make Images and Temples because they know not the Shane of God. Gansabon, though he ac­knowledgeth the Sentence to be defective, yet he persecteth it only thus; [...], they make Images and Tem­ples to them, that is, to the bruit Creatures which they wor­ship, because the Images of God they could not, forasmuch as they knew not the Shape of God. And indeed, no man hath seen God at any time, Joh. 1.18. No, not God's own People, Joh. 5.37. Ye have not heard God at any time, nor seen His shape, He is commended unto us as [...], the invisible God, 1 Tim. 1.17. Heb. 11.27 Thales Milesius was reputed wise in his time, Diogenes Laertius writes that he had no Master, Nisi quod AEgyptiis Sacerdotibus, cò profectus, familiariter adbaesit: He was very familiar with the Egyptian Priests. Himself professeth as much in his Epistle to Phericides; and I willingly consess two things were delivered by him concerning God very wisely; the one concerning his Providence, for being demanded, whe­ther a Man doing Evil might be hid from God, made this An­swer, Ne Cogitans quidem, No not so much as touching his Thought. The other concerning the Nature of God: For being demanded what God was, he made this Answer, Quod initio & fine caret; That which is without beginning and with­out end. And indeed thus St. Paul seems to describe the God­head; namely, by his Eternal Power, when he saith, The eternal Power and Godhead hath been known from the Creation, be­ing considered in his Works, Rom. 1.20. And Bradwardine maintains that the first Attribute of the Divine Nature is Ne­cesse Esse, of Necessary Being; as much as to say, Eternal, without Beginning and without End. Add to this what Euse­bius writes, Evang. Preparat. l. 10. p. 451. Graecolat. Athenienses Aegyptiorum Coloniam habitos esse, cum alii tum Theopompus in tri­careno confirmat: That the Athenians were a Colony of the Egyptians, both others and also Theopompus confirms in his Book entituled Tricarenum.

15. Come we then to the Egyptians: Now Eusebius alledg­eth the former Passage out of Philo Biblius his Preface to San­coniatho, to prove that at the first, the very Heathens had no [Page 31]other Gods, but the very Stars and Planets appearing and mo­ving in the Heavens: And that the Name of [...] (God) at the first was [...], a currendo, from moving or running, the Planets and Stars compassing all in the Course of Twenty Four Hours. He adds, that the very Scriptures do justifie this, shewing what was the Course of Gentiles in their Religious De­votions; namely, to worship the whole Hoste of Heaven: And we know what Lesson the Lord reads to his own People, Deut. 4.19. Take heed lest thou lift up thine eyes to Heaven, and when thou seest the Sun, and the Moon, and the Stars, with all the Hoste of Heaven, shouldst be driven to worship them, and to serve them; which the Lord thy God hath distributed to all people that are under the whole Heaven. As much as to say, the Lord hath made them thy Servants: Nay, the Servants of all Men under the Cope of Heaven; therefore take heed thou beest not carried away in the Course of Heathenish Blindness and Su­perstition, as to make them thy Lords and thy Gods. In the same place the Lord gives them a Caveat, and admonisheth them that they corrupt not themselves, and make not a graven Image, or representation of any Figure, whether it be the Likeness of Male or Female, the Likeness of any Beast that is on Earth, or Likeness of any feathered Foule, or the Likeness of any Fish that is in the Waters beneath the Earth; which gives shrewd Presumption, that some such Creatures were worshipped among the Egyptians from whence they came, or in the Land of Ca­naan whither they were traveling. And Eusebius, Prepara. Evangel. l. 2. p. 49. Graecolat. Rehersing out of Diodorus Sicu­lus, the several Creatures which were consecrated by the Egyp­tians, makes mention of Apis and Muevis Sacri Tauri, holy Bulls, and of Bosfemina a Cow; as also of Sheep; yea, of the Goat, and Dog, and the Wolfe, and the Cat; and amongst Birds, of Ibis, and the Hawke, and the Eagle, and of the Crocadile that lives in the Waters: And that it was a capital Crime among them to kill any of these. And p. 52. he adds out of the same Diodorus, that the Grecians Theolo­gy began from Cadmus, whom he saith to have been after the days of Moses, and that he saith may be clearly and evident­ly confirmed; and hence concludes that all the Gods of the Grecians were brought to light after the Days of Moses.

But concerning the Antiquity of Temples among the Egyp­tians, Diogenes Laertius in the Life of Cleobulus writes, that he was of Lindus, or as some said, of Carea, and that he restored the Temple of Minerva built by Danars; the Passage is some­what imperfect, but made compleat by Causabon, with refe­ence to that which Diodorus Siculur writes, lib. 5. cap. 13. where he writes, Danaus ex Aegypto cum filiabus aufugiens in Lin­diam Cypri appulit, susceptus (que) ab incolis, erecto Minervae Templo, statuam ingentem dedicavit. He adds, that Cadmus about the same time being sent to Sea to seek Europa, did perform his Vows at the same Temple: Now Lidiat accounts Cadmus his leaving Phaenicia and sailing into Grece, to have been at the same time that Joshua entered the Land of Canaan with his If­raclites, and on the same occasion, affrighted with the Invasi­on made by Joshua; and that Danaus his Expulsion out of Egypt by his Brother Aegyptus, was originally derived from the Con­fusion that was brought upon the Land, by reason of the slaugh­ter of the First Born among them, and the Destruction of Pha­raoh and his Hoste in the Red Sea. And in all likelihood this brought great Consusion in Egypt, and amongst the Seed Royal, whereupon fore Contentions might arise, the issue whereof was as some prevailed, so the expulsion of the Opposites: Ae­gyptus himself being driven out afterwards, as he had been a means of driving out Danaus before. For so Pausanias writes in Achiacis, Patrae and Aroe are all one. Aegyptum Aroenvenisse tradunt Patrenses filiorum luctu confectum cum ipsum Argorum nomen exhorresceret, & imprimis à Danao sibi plurimum metneret. And after this there were two Temples of Serapis built, and in one of them was erected a Monument of Aegyptus the Son of Belut. Herodotus ascribes the building of this Temple at Lindus to Danaus his Daughters, about the end of his Second Book. And whereas Diodorus Si­culus reports the Temple to have been built in the Island of Cy­prus, Stephanus Bizantinus acknowledgeth no other City of Lindins or Lindia, but that at Rhodes.

16. Eusebius in his 9th. Book of his Prepar. Evangel. and cb. 23. Writes, that two Temples, one at Athens, another at Heli­opolis in Egypt, were built by the Children of Israel in the time of their Bondage there. But this he writes not according to his own Judgment, only sets down the narration hereof out of one Artapanus an Heathen Author. Now we have no Rea­son to give Credit to his Relation in this particular; for albeit [Page 33]the Children of Israel were oppressed with sore Bondage, and had Cruel Task-masters set over them, who urged them to the making of Brick in abundance: Yet the Scripture expresly tells us to what use these Bricks were employed, Exod. 1.11. They did set Task-masters over them, and they built the City Pithom and Raaemses for the Treasures of Pharaoh. Thus they made them weary of their Lives by sore Labour in Clay and in Brick, and in all Work in the Field, with all manner of Bon­dage, which they laid upon them most cruelly, as v. 14.

Herodotus makes relation of one Menon the first King of Egypt who built Memphis, and therein Templum Vulcani a Temple to Vulcan great and memorable. And this I confess was most A­cient, and long before the days of Moses, if it be true which there is reported to him from the Priests of Egypt; namely, how they rehearsed to him out of a Book, the names of three hundred and thirty Kings, beginning from this Menon, and ending with Mevis the Father of Sesostris, who is supposed to be Shishak King of Egypt, mentioned in Scripture, who came to Jerusalem with a great Army and took it, and carried away all the golden Shields that King Solomon had made. The Pro­vidence of God being very remarkable herein, as it is com­mended unto us 2 Chron. 12.5, 6, 7, 8, Now Shishak's Depo­pulation of Judea, came to pass in the fifth year of Rehoboam and Jeroboam, the year of the World 3029. by Lydiat, and 3033 in Usher. Yet this Shishak was the Successor of Mevis, the last of those three hundred and thirty Kings in Egypt, whose names were related to Herodotus by the Priests of Egypt. And this Menon King of Egypt in Herodotus, is made all one with Amosis by Lydiat. Euseb. Prep. Evangel. l. 10. c. 9. I do not here mention how Porphyry makes Moses more ancient than Inachus, who is more ancient then this Amosis; nor how Africanus placeth him as Coaetaneous to Ogyges. Nor how Appion the Grammarian makes him of the same time with Amosis, Ibid. c. 10. as in whose days he led the Children of Israel out of Egypt. Though in truth the Pastoral Nation, which Manetho that Egyptian Historian mentioneth to have gone out of Egypt, and planred themselves in the Neighbour-Country of Syria about Jerusalem, were rather the Philistines, who came of the Caslucheans and Caphtoreans, who were of the Egyptian Nation, and seized upon Palestine, and Maritime Coast of Judea; whose Trade also was the keeping of Sheep. [Page 34]And to these refers that of Herodotus in the beginning of his History, namely, that the Phoenicians came from the Red-Sea, by Phoenicians understanding Strians dwelling by the Sea Coast from Cassiolis the border of Egypt. But these things are more clearly and truly shewn by Usher in his Annals from A.M. 2114. & seq. And how this was done in the days of Abraham, many hundred years before Moses. But if any Man shall hence con­clude, that therefore Temples were in Egypt many hundred years before Moses, by the Testimony of Herodotus. I answer, That Herodotus's Testimony proceeded upon the Faith of the Egyptian Priests and their Registers, which deserve no Credit with us Christians; they making the King Menon to be many years more ancient than the World. Yet Lydiat shews how to salve their Credit in a tolerable way; namely, by supposing that the first reigning in Egypt (which he takes to have been sixty years after the Dispersion of the Gentiles, which is a hun­dred sixty one years after Noah's Flood) by the Computation made by George and Constantine Manasses (out of the Fragments of ancient Historians, and set down in their Chronicles) all were not governed under one King; but look how many Cities so many Kings; like as Joshua found it in the Land of Canaan, when he entred among them with the Israelites: And the Years of the Reigns of each King might be reckoned as succeeding one another, whereas indeed they reigned together in several Dynasties at the same time. As that which followeth in the Relation of those Priests made to Herodotus; namely, That in that vast space of time the Sun changed his Course four times; as having twice risen where now he sets, and twice set where now he rises; to astonish their Hearers with legends of great Admiration. They had an addition also, which was, That, before all these Kings, their Gods reigned, conversing familiarly with Men, and the last of them was Orus the Son of Osiris. The same Herodotus writes, That the Egyptians much differed from the Grecians in the Estimation of their Gods: For whereas among the Grecians, the last of their Gods were Hercules, and Dionysius, and Pan: Contrariwise, among the Egyptians Pan was Vetustissimus, the most Ancient, even of the number of the first Rank, which were but eight; (and Latona was another of them, as elsewhere he tells us) Hercules was one of the second Rank, which were twelve in number; [Page 35]and Dionysius of the third Rank, which contained such as were begotten of the former twelve: This Dionysius is Osiris, as he saith, whose Son Orus was the last of the Deities regnant among the Egyptians.

17. Of this Osiris, Diodorus Siculus writes, which is also re­lated by Eusebius in his Preparat Evangel. l. 2. c. 1. That babuit Jovi Junonique parentibus sacram aedem, item Diis caeteris aurea Templa, which carry a very ill Accent, that to Jupiter and Juno his Parents, he should dedicate a Holy House only, and to other Gods golden Temples. And withal he adds, That what­soever was indeed verified of Osiris the Egyptian, that Orpheus the Poet transferred unto Bacchus for the Honour of the Gre­cians; even to that Bacchus whom Jupiter begat of Semele Cad­mus his Daughter; as if Osiris were no ancienter than so; but that Cadmus might have been his Grandfather. Whereas we have very good Ground and Testimony, concerning the Anti­quity of Cadmus, as a Man unknown to the Grecians, till he left Phoenicia, which was at the time that Joshua entered the Land of Canaan with his great Host of Israclites. And I do not think the Gods of the Egyptians were a making in those days. He was a great and a proud King that oppressed Israel, and we know what Mischief befel him and his People. Manetho makes mention of one Amenophis King of Egypt, whose For­tunes were, to be devoured of a Sea-Horse: Probably this was that Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red-Sea. Great Benefactors while they lived, were honoured by Heathens with Divine Honour after their Death; but this Pharaoh was a Plague to the whole Land and People, and nothing likely that any of his Posterity came to be deified by the Egyptians; and a long time after great Confusion seized upon that Nation, witness Danaus flying out of Egypt into Thebes in Greece, from the Fury of his Brother Aegyptus; and after that Egyptus him­self leaving Egypt, and coming into Patre in Greece, mourning for the loss of his Children. And we read in Scripture of the Gods of Egypt while Israel lived under them, yea, and how they were corrupted by them. Osiris was a great Euergetes, or Be­nefactor, chiefly for the Invention of Tilling of the Ground, and Planting of Grapes, that of Virgil Georgic. 1.— Uncique puer monstrator aratri; touching the first Inventer of the Plow. It was well, saith Servius, that he mentioned not his name, but [Page 36]in general saith, The Boy that found it out. For it was not one Body that acquainted all the World with the Plow, but divers Persons in divers Places. And if you ask who is chiefly meant here: His answer is, That some say Triptolemus, others Osiris, Which is the truer of the two in the Judgment of Servius. So Sabinus Pliny relates, That Bizeser the Athenian some that Triptolemus did this: But the Tradition is, That Osiris was the first of all Mortals who Plowed with Oxen, in memo­rial whereof, two Oxen are honoured of the Egyptians, Apis in the City Memphis, and Meuris in Heliopolis; and in the Offices of Isis Ears of Corn are carried before, and in the time of Harvest Ears of Corn are consecrated unto her. Now Isis was the Sister of Osiris, saith Pomponius, though that by the way is but a Figment, and Probus confirms the same. Nevertheless some have seemed to smell a Mystery in this. And Coelius Ro­diginus, lib. 5. c. 12. observes, That before the Temples of the Egyptians was wont to be placed the Figure of Sphinx, to sig­nifie thereby, that the Wisdom of their Theology was obscure, and vested in Fables; and that in the City Sais there is a Tem­ple of Palles (which some think to be Pallas) that hath this In­scription in the Face of it, I am that which was, and is, and shall be; my Veil no Mortal Man hath ever unfolded. Yet I con­ceive these to be but Illusions of Satan, to blanch and set a fair Face upon foul things, under the Pretence of Mysterious Signi­fications. Coelius adds the Opinion of some to have been, That by Osiris is meant no other thing than the River Nilus, the over­flowing whereof, and the Mud which it brings soiling it, is a great means for the enriching of that Land. The same Inter­pretation is made by Eusebius, Preparat. Evangel. l. 3. c. 10. p. 115. And Suidas on the word Serapis writes, Hunc Deum alii Jovem esse dixerunt, alii Nilum propter modium quod in capite habet, & cubilum, mensuram aquae scilicet, alii verò Joseph. And in Forste­rus there is a fair Derivation of Osiris from the Hebrew [...] bos ille; for under such a shape he was worshipped; and [...] is in Hebrew the usual name of the River Nilus, by reason of the blackness of the Mud which it brings with it. Others con­ceive Osiris and Isis to signifie the Sun and Moon; and first, these natural things being glorious to behold, were adored and invoked by them, according to that in Virgil,

Here Liber and alma Ceres are no other than the Sun and Moon; and Isis and Ceres are all one, Euseb. Preparat. Evangel. l. 2. c. 1. and the same things are attributed to them in their kind by the Martia­nus in Nup­tiis ad So­lem, Te Se­rapim Ni­lus, Mem­phis vene­ratur Osi­rim. Poet, which are usually attributed to Osiris and Isis in their kind by Historians. Namely, the Prospering and Maturating of Corn and Wine, according to their several pro­per Seasons, wherein they are to be Sown or Planted, and the Fruit thereof to be expected. But leave we the Mysterious Signification, and come to the Historical Truth. Lydiat thinks that Menon the first King reigning over all Egypt, by what va­riety of names soever called (wherein there is found very great Variety as he shews) was the Man that married Isis, and com­monly received to be Osiris, or Serapis; for these two are both one. But others conjecture, that Serapis being represented bearing a Bushel upon his Head, doth fairly signifie Joseph, who was so great a Benefactor to the whole Land of Egypt, and to King Pharaoh himself; and that especially in providing Corn for them against the seven sore years of Famine; and that by a wise managing of the abundance of the seven plentiful years. And this hath peculiar reference to that very particular which made Osiris so renowned, namely, the Provision of Corn; and he was married to Asenath, which taking away the last Syllable, founds very near to Isin; the Daughter of Potipherah Priest of On, and the last two Syllables of his name comes near to Phorom the Argive, whose Sister as some say, or Daughter as others say she was; and that from Pharoneus the Argive, the Kings of Egypt took the name of Pharaoh, Lydiat conjectures, Schindler saith it signifies immunem esse, to be free from Taxes and Impo­sitions, which is the Prerogative of Absolute Kings; and it may seem to some, that in the seven plentiful years, Pharaoh took up the fifth part of all their Increase throughout the Land, by vertue of his absolute Regal Prerogative. I am not ac­quainted with the manner of the Government of Egypt in those [Page 38]days: But that the fifth part was rather bought by the King, to his singular great Advantage (as appeared by the event) Corn being little worth in those plentiful years; I have this reason out of the Holy Text. For we read, that when the years of Dearth came, the Egyptians were at length driven to sell their Land, after they had sold their Castle, and all means sailed them: And Joseph bought all their Land for the King pro­viding them Corn for their present Necessity, both for Food and Sowing their Land; and the Bargain was this, They should have the use of the Land still, only the fifth part of their Increase they should pay unto the King. Now if he had but a fifth part of the Harvest after the Land was his, and he gave them the use of it; How unlikely is it, that by vertue of his Royal Prerogative, he either could or did take the same Pro­portion when the Land was none of his, but theirs, for in this case it had been but a very ill Purchase, if hereby he had no more than he had formerly right unto, when as yet he had paid nothing for it. And this is the more unlikely, considering what course was taken to make the Purchase good; and that no Man might plead Right of Inheritance thereunto; for he changed their Habitations, so that albeit they might have as much Land as they had before; yet they had not each one the same Land which he enjoyed before.

18. Eusebius saith, that Serapis had upon his Head discum, as the Latin renders it: But Alexander ah Alexandro, l. 4. c. 12. of his Genial days, Aegyptii Serapidi modium apponunt supra caput. The Egyptians represent Serapis with a Bushel upon his Head, but like enough both took it from Suidas, and it is mentioned by Ludovicus Vives upon Aust. de Civit. Dei, l. 18. c. 5. and the truth is in Coquaeus upon Austin de Civit. Dei, l. 18. c. 5. writes the same in these words, Nonnulli Serapin esse volunt Joseph con­secratum, immani Sepulchro & fano exornatum, in quo bos nutrieba­tur in agriculturae Symbolum, quod famem septennem singulari pruden­tia ab Aegyptiis detulisset. And this might be a very congruous Memorial of Osiris, of whom it is written by divers, that pri­mus mortalium boves aratro junxit; the first who taught the World to Plow with Oxen: And for this cause the Oxe Apis, might be a fit Emblem of him, and of all such who ever since have provided the People with Bread. Like as Menenius Agrippa (if my Memory fail me not) was the Man who for the like [Page 39]Service was honoured by the Romans, with making Coins in his name, and the Inscription of an Oxe upon one side of it: And in this respect (as Dr. Reynolds observes) might the Isra­clites think to represent God in the form of a young Bullock in the Wilderness, to notifie thereby, that God who provided Manna for them in the Wilderness. And it is like enough, that if the Egyptians had an Apis in those days, some Oxe or other which they worshipped, they by the Egyptians might be acquainted with the meaning of it, as a Memorial of Osiris who taught them to Plow their Ground with Oxen, that so with greater ease they might have Corn yearly in abundance. Yet I deny not but Joseph deserved to be in everlasting remem­brance with them for this very cause. But the Text saith, A new King arose that knew not Joseph; and though all Israel de­served well at the Egyptians hands for Joseph's sake; yet we know how proudly they dealt with them, and how barbarously they carried themselves toward them, not only oppressing them with Burthens, but causing their Male children to be cast into the River Nilus, even Joseph's, who was a greater Blessing to them, and to their King especially, than ever the River Nilus was; and the People of Israel might have been so still, had they used them well; for ten Persons such as Lot had saved Sodom; how much more 600000. And truly Pineda upon Job is of Opinion, that this Pharaoh was that Busiris King of Egypt, of whose Barbarousness in Sacrificing Strangers that came into his Country, the World so much talkt of. Surely had they made a God of Joseph, they would not have plaid the Devils; yea, such arrant Devils with his Posterity. But the Lord, to make them amends in a congruous way, first turned the Water of Nilus into Blood, a fair means to revive the remembrance of their Merciless Course in Drowning the Hebrew Children; but when that would not serve the turn to bring them to Re­pentance, the Lord drowned Pharaoh and his Host in the Red-Sea: So perish all thine Enemies, O Lord, but Grace, and Peace, and plenteous Redemption ever be upon the true Israel of God.

19. Yet I rather think Osiris to have been more ancient than Joseph; Sure I am they had their Gods in the days of Moses, Exod. 6.26. by whom the Children of Israel were corrupted; and Hebrew Shepherds were an Abomination to the Egyptians, Gen. 46.34. not only in [Page 40]the days of Moses, but in the days of Joseph. And Herodotus. writes, Non eosdem Deos similiter colunt universi Aegyptii praeter Isidem & Osiridem quem Bacchum esse aiunt, Hos peraeque universi colunt. Herein they all agreed in worshipping Isis and Osiris not so in the worshipping of other Gods. So that I am con­tent to tread in Mr. Lydiat's steps, that the first King of Egypt Menon, or Ammon, or Amosis, or Amuris, or Amenophis, to have been the Egyptians Osiris, whose Memorial was an Oxe; be­cause he was primus omnium mortalium qui boves aratro junxerat, the first that taught Men to Plow with Oxen; and thence might his name be derived, namely from [...] bos, as Forste­rus conceives; and Serapis, which at first was Sorapis, from [...] and Apis; for as Suidas saith, Sepulchrum bujus Apidis in quo est ejus corpus conditum, Alexandriam translatum est; after­wards by Corruption it came to be called Sarapis, and last of all Serapis; and that Isis his Queen was Io Argiva, the Story of whom the Poet calls Argumentum ingens in Virgil, where­with drawn to the Life, he feigns Turnus his Buckler was flou­rished, when he came into the Field against AEneas; and that because he was the Progeny of Acrisius and Inachus Kings of Argos;

For whereas Poets feign, that Io was turned into an Oxe by Jupiter being found by Juno, the truth seems to be no other than this; Osiris was that Jupiter, and being represented by Bos mas; no marvel if hereupon she becoming his Wife, they feigned her to be turned into Bos foemina. And whereas it is further feigned, that Argos was set by Juno to watch her; this Argos fairly represents Osiris also her Husband, under another Notion, namely, as in an Hieroglyphical Interpretation he is taken for the Sun. For such was the Oxe representing Osiris full of white Spots, and whose Hair was towards the Head; to signifie the Sun's proper Motion from West to East, con­trary to the general Motion of the Heavens from East to West, (though Astronomers think otherwise in these days.) And the Stars of Heaven, by Aristotles Doctrine, receive their Light [Page 41]from the Sun. Afterwards Poets feign that by Juno's means she was Oestro percita, plagued with an Hornet, and driven to fly into Egypt; the Truth whereof was no other than Ostris his marrying of her, and carrying her over with him into Egypt, and there, saith Servius, she was turned into Isis: Aug. de Civit. Dei, l. 18. c. 3. Jo filia I­nachi. this is that Argumentum ingens Virgil speaks of, in reference to the true Story obscurely carried, and drest by the Wits of Poets. But some rubs I find lying in the way, to hinder us in the Acknowledg­ment of so great Antiquity of Isis and Osiris. For whereas Dana­us that fled from his Brother Egyptus out of Egypt unto Argos in Grece, is stiled by Mr. Lydiat, à Belo Egyptio oriundus, by this Belus meaning Osiris; as from whom Danaus was derived, but afar off, as who is accompted but the 10th King of Argos, be­ginning from Inachus: Egyptus the Brother of Danaus I find sti­led Beli filius the Son of Belus, in a Monument of him erected, in a Temple of Serapis the City of Patrae, or Aroe a City of Achaia, as Pausanias relates in his Achaicis. Yet this is not of force to take me off from following Mr. Lydiate in this. I understand filius here in a larger sense than to take it for a Son begotten of Belus, and that it is no more than à Belo oriundus, one that was derived from Belus. For it is not credible that Pharaoh, whom the Lord drowned in the Red-Sea, or any of his Posterity, or his Father was Osiris the great God of the Egyptians, as before hath been argued. As also that the Gods of Egypt in Moses his days, were not the same with the Gods of Egypt in the days of Joseph. Another rub is cast in the way by Ludovicus Vives up­on Austin, de Civit, Dei. lib. 18. c. 3. Pausanias affirmeth, (saith he) that she was the Daughter of Jasius the sixth King of Argos. Yet he confesseth, that Valerius Flaccus in his Argonautes, lib. 4. calls Jovem Inachidem; but withal he takes notice that he calls her Jastam virginem; as much as to say, the Daughter of Jesius; yet she might be called Inachides nevertheless, because she de­scended from Inachus, who was the first Founder of that King­dom, and Author of their Nobility. He gives also another Reason drawn from the Testimony of Eusebius both in his Chronicles, and in his tenth Book of Evangelical Preparation, testifying, that this Jo lived in the days of Triapas the seventh King of Argos, 400 years after Inachus. And indeed thus I find it in Pausanias in his Corinthiacks, 58. that Triapas had two Sons, Jasus and Agenow; and that Jo was the Daughter of Jasus, and [Page 42]so two Ages after Triapas, and but one before Danaus, who was after the time of Moses his leading the Children of Israel out of Egypt, which I willingly confess is nothing probable; and though this be to my greater advantage in this present Argu­ment, yet I choose rather to hold with Mr. Lydiate still; so utterly improbable and unlikely it is t [...]a [...] Pharoah, who was drowned in the Red-Sea, or his Father, either was Osiris, the times of Moses and of Joseph are so congenerous as touching the same Saperstitions in course among the Egyptians. And as touching Pansanias this I find; that howsoever he writes thus in his Corinthiacks, yet in his first Book called Attica, reckoning up the Statues which were found in the Town of the Atheni­ans, two were of Women, Jo the Daughter of Inachus, and Ca­listo the Daughter of Lycaon; whose Fortunes, he saith, were represented to be much the same, both as touching Jupiter's Love and Juno's Wrath, and the Metamorphosis of each, the one into a Cow, the other into a Bear. But then you will say, the more antient Osiris was, the more evident it is that Tem­ples were in use long before Moses, yea divers hundred years. Whereto I answer, though I grant the greatest Antiquity as­cribed to them, and do not help my self with Testimonies out of the antient Fathers, as Clemens Alexandrinus, lib. 1. Stromat. Tertullian in his Apology, cap. 9. Justinus in his Oration against the Gentiles, and Tatianus in his Oration against the Greeks, and Epiphanius in his first Book against Heresies, yea and of divers prophane Authors alledged by Eusebius in his tenth Book of Evangelical Preparation, and third Chapter, all testifying that Inachus King of Argos reigned in the days of Moses: be­cause Inachus, by the computation of times, was much elder, for which v. Usher, A.M. 2174. Yet Diodorus his Testimony, of a Temple built by Osiris himself, deserves no credit; for he doth but relate what he heard from the Priests of Egypt, who told Herodotus, that between Orus his Reign, and that ancient Amosis we speak of, (Contemporary to Inachus) there were no less than 15000 years. And as for Jupiter and Juno, we know such Deities received by the Egyptians, were no other than Osiris and Isis themselves, which all the Egyptians worshipt, as Herodotus testifies; so did they not any other God. And if there were any such building of Temples in Egypt in those an­cient times, when the Israelites were so much imployed in ma­king [Page 43]of such store of Brick, in all likely hood these Bricks would have been imployed about such sacred uses; but the Scripture testifies that they were imployed about the building of certain Cities, to be made Store houses for the King. It is true, Cle­mens Alexandrinus was to seek whether Phoroneus or Merops was the first Founder of Temples: Phoroneus, we know, was the Son of Inachus, and second King of Argos, and Brother to Jo or Isis; but who Merops was, I have had much ado to find, from the word [...] to divide, and [...] a voice; of [...] we read in Homer, as an attribute of Men, who alone of all bodily Creatures distinguish the Voice, into Words, Syllables, and single Letters; whence it is called articulate, consisting as it were of several joints, as Coelius Rodiginus writeth; who by the way tells of a Cardinal ( Ascainus by name) who had a Par­rot which cost him 100 Crowns, that could repeat the Apo­stles Creed distinctly and accurately. I wonder of what Spirit he was, that took such pains to teach a Parrot such a lesson: I presume he was none of St. Francis his Auditors, a part of whose Legend it is, that he would preach the Gospel even to bruit Creatures, so great was his desire of the Salvation of all. The other Interpretation Rodiginus gives of the former Etymo­logy is in reference to the Division of Languages, upon the Building of Babel for years after the Flood; and both of them are very ingenious in my judgment. But concerning any Per­son whose proper name was Merops, I find nothing in Coelius, nor in divers others. But in Stephanus Bizantinus [...], I find Merops himself, said to be the Son of Triopas, and from him the People of Coos called Meropes, and that Island Meropis; and so, much about the time of Jo the second, whom Eusebius ob­serves to have lived in the days of Triopas, as Ludovicus Vives relates upon the 18th Book of Austin, de Civitate Dei, and the third Chapter. Antoninus Liberalis, in his Metamorphoses, makes this Merops to be cooetaneous to Jupiter, for thus he writes, Num. 36. as it is translated (for he is a Greek Author;) Jupiter postquam Titanibus pulsis, Saturno regnum ademit, Aegem (quae mammam ei praebuit) immortalitate donavit, & ejus imago extat in astris: aureum autem canem Templi Cretensis custodiae, prae­fecit. Hunc suffuratus Pandareus Meropis filius in Sipylum adduxit, Custodiendum (que) dedit Tantalo Jovis & Plutus filio; cum autem ali­quanto post tempore Pandareus in Sipylum venisset, canem (que) reposceret: [Page 44]Tantalus depositum ejuravit. So that the Son of Merops by this Author's accompt was but cooetaneous to Tantalus, who was the Father of Pelops, Grandfather to Agamemnon, chief of the Grecians at the Trojan War. Now touching Clemens Alexandri­nus, he was to seek whether it were Phoroneus or Merops, or some other, qui eis posuerunt templa, who erected Temples. Be­like he had some evidence that made him incline to think, that Phoroneus was the first; other evidence that swayed him ano­ther way, and made him think Merops was the first; and third­ly, he had some ground to conceive that neither of these but some other, after both these, was the first. Now of these Evi­dences we can say nothing by way of examining them, because we do not know them. Arnobius in his sixth Book specifies three by name, in question about the primacy of building Temples, and they are Phoroneus not Argivus, (of whom I understand Clemens Alexandrinus to have delivered his mind in this Argu­ment) but Phoroneus Egyptius; the other two mentioned by him are Merops, mentioned by Clemens Alexandrinus; and the third and last Aeacus, who as he is placed after the former two, or­dered according to their Age; so it seems he was later than both the former. And for the last of the three to be the first in this kind of Devotion, he alledgeth no meaner Author than Varro; who was commonly accounted the most learned of all the Latins. Now AEacus was but the Grandfather of Achilles, and so but two Generations before the Wars of Troy, which in common accompt, is not above 66 or 67 years; whereas Mo­ses led the Children of Israel out of Egypt above 300 years be­fore the Wars of Troy. Therefore when Varro writes, as Austin reports him, de Civit. Dei, lib. 18. cap. 3. that the Sicyonians did sacrifice at the Sepulchre of Thurimachus, the 7th King of the Sicyonians; surely at that time there was no Temple built at that Sepulchre, for ought Varro found in all his reading. And again, when Austin saith, in the same place, that when Phegous the Brother of Phoroneus was dead, there was a Temple built at his Sepulchre, by reason (as he guesseth) that Phegous was a devout Prince, and had in his time erected Chappels for Divine Service, he had not this from Varro; nay Varro acknow­ledgeth no Temples until many years after. Not to mention that both Clemens and Arnobius thought it more likely that Pho­roneus rather than his Brother was the first Erector of Temples, [Page 45]yet neither of them had any sure and certain grounds for their Opinions.

20. Thus much concerning the Graecians and Egyptians; some­thing remains to be added concerning the Assyrians and Babylo­nians, and the Original of Temples amongst them also: Dio­dorus Siculus, lib. 2. cap. 4. writing of Semiramis and her building of Babylon, adds that, In vrbis medio templum Jovi erexit quem vocant Babylonii Belum; In the midst of the City she built a Temple to Jupiter, whom the Babylonians call Belus: But with­al he saith that of this Temple, Nihil certi pronuntiari potest, cam & Scriptores discordent, & opus ipsum vetustate collapsum sit; No­thing can certainly be affirmed, considering that Writers dif­fer, and the Work it self is fallen to decay through Age. He­rodotus also makes mention of the Temple of Belus, but he makes no mention of him that built it; and as for Semiramis, Hero­dotus makes her to precede Nitocris but five Ages, which is short of 200 years; for three Ages makes an 100 years by his Ac­compt. And Nitocris he writes to have been the Mother of Labynitus, against whom Cyrus waged War. No Cyrus we know took Babylon whilst Belshazzar reigned, who also was slain that night wherein Babylon was entred into by the Persians, through the Channel of the River Euphrates, whose stream was turned another way by the Army of Cyrus; yet we confess the Babylonian Monarchy was far more ancient than this Simi­ramis Herodotus writes of, (and that by Scripture evidence) having been founded by Nimrod, that mighty hunter before the Lord, whom some conceive to be Belus Babylonius; and I nothing doubt but the remembrance of so great a Man, and the first Monarch, might be preserved by figures made of him, and these figures become Idols; like as in the days of Sem, yea, and Noah, also Idols were among the Posterity of Sem, in the Family of Terah. The beginning of Nimrod's Monarchy is placed by Lydiat and Usher the 14th year after the Dispersion of the Peo­ple through the confusion of Tongues, that is 115 years after the Flood, 185 before the Death of Noah, and 335 before the Death of Sem; which they ground on the Babylonian Antiqui­ties, searcht into by Callisthenes the Philosopher, and Follower of Alexander in his Persian War: for he found by his Calculation of those Antiquities, that the Babylonian Monarchy began 1903 years before Babylon was taken by Alexander. A little after [Page 46]the Assyrian Monarchy began, as Scripture testifies, Gen. 10. for Moses having mention'd the beginning of Nimrod's Kingdom to have been Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calne in the Land of Shinar, vor. 10. he forthwith adds, that out of that Land (to wit the Land of Shinar) went Ashur and built Nineveh, and the City Rehoboth, and Calab. This Ashur was the Second Son of Sem, ver. 22. It is thought his Eldest Son was Ninus the First, from whose Name was the Name Ninive given to the City built by him; and Ninive I find is all one with Ninus, in Herodotus, whose King­dom began 1360 years before Lycurgus gave Laws to the Spar­tans, according to the Computation of George the Monk, men­tion'd by Scaliger, with one years only difference, provided we understand Ashur to have reigned 60 before his Son Ninus; and from the first of Ninus, to Lycurgus his giving Laws, are 1300 years. And which Act of Lycurgus was 97 years before the Account of Iphitus his Olympiads began. Now this was 1485 years before the Reign of the latter Belus Babylonius, Be­ladan, or Nabonazar by Name, who in all likely hood was that Belus which Herodotus speaks of, and Diodorus Siculus. For this Baladan, or Nabonazar, the second Babylonian Belus, began his Reign but the twelfth year of Iotham King of Iudah, a little before the Foundation of the Walls of Rome was laid by Romulus. But whereas Scaliger conceives there were two Dinasties in Ba­bylonia, one succeeding the other 368 years before the most an­cient Belus, whom yet he accounts more ancient by 125 years than the Computation of Calysthenes doth reach unto: This Lydiat conceives to have no colour of Truth. And thus I have dispatched this Enquiry about the Antiquity of Temples, according to my Power, and present Leisure.

Yet I deny not, but that as Men, before there were any Temples, did worship their deceased Ancestors, and offer Sa­crifices at their Sepulchres; as Augustine testifies they did, ac­cording unto Varro his Observations, de Civit. Dei, lib. 18. c. 3. Apud sepulchrum septimi sui Regis Thurimachi; sacrificare Sicionois solere, The Scythians were wont to sacrifice at the Sepulchre of their Seventh King. Thurimachus, which Thurimachus is said to have reigned amongst the Sicyonians before Inachus reigned amongst the Argives; thô others make Inachus, the First King of Argos, to be more ancient than AEgialcus. First King of the [Page 47] Sicyonians, as Ludovious, Vives relates, upon the 18th. Book of Austin. de Civit. Dei, chap. 3. And Pausanias, in his Corinthiacks, pag. 54. shews where was the Sepulchre of Phoroneus; and adds, Phoroneo quoque nostra etiamnum aetate parentant, to this day they do offer Sacrifice to Phoroneus, to wit, at his Sepulchre: And no marvel if they were of their Opinion, who knew no other Gods, than the Ghosts of Dead Men, from whom they received Answers, lying over their Graves, as Melo and others write of certain People of Afriea, call'd Augitae. Likewise, I deny not, but that in process of time, the Sepulchres of great Men were fair Houses or Structures, built to no other end, but that the Bodies of great Personages might lie therein, as it were in State. Such were the Mausolaea Regum Sepulchra, faith Caelius Rodigimus, l. 9. c. 10. the Sepulchres of Kings; the first of them, Mau­solaeum, having its Name from Mausolus (as the same Author writeth, l. 23. c. 6.) King of Halicarnassus, as Pausanias relates in his Arcadia; and he adds, that it was built ea operis magnitu­dine, atque omni ornamentorum magnificentia, ut Romani rei mira­culo adducti, magnificentissima quaeque apud se monumenta, Mausolea appellarint; So great, and so adorned, that the Romans admiring it, afterwards called all such magnificent Monuments by the Name of Mausolaea: And he writes strange things of the Se­pulcher of one Helena an Hebrew Woman in Ierusalem, before it was destroyed by Adrian. And Lilius Giraldus, in his Book de Vario Sepeliendi ritu, writes, that Temples and Churches had their Original from hence; his words are these, Fuit verò usque adeò antiquis sepulchrorum cura, ut non aliundè templorum & sacra­rum aedium originem deductam, diligentissimi scriptores tradant, Eu­sebius & Lactantius. Qua de re & Clemens Alexandraeus in adbor­tatione ad Graecos, si ita rectè [...] interpretamur sic scriptum reliquit; Superstitio (inquit) Templa condere persuasit quae enim prius hominum sepulchra fuerunt, magnificentius condita Templorum appel­latione vocata sunt. Nam apud Larissaeam civitatem in arce in Templo Palladis Achrisii sepulchrum fuit quod nune sacrarii loco cale­bratur. In arce queque Atheniensi ut est ab Anticcho in nono Histo­riarum scriptum, Cecropis, sepulchrum fuit. In Templo verò Palladis jacet Erichthonius. Ismarus autem Eumolpi atque Dairae filius in Eleusine una cum Celei natabus sepultus, & reliqua, quae multa Clemens collegit & ab eo Eusebius quae in Latinis codicthus non ba­bentur. He adds, That as Temples, so Images and Idols (as [Page 48]touching the publick use of them) took their Originals from Sepulchres also, and he alledgeth Diophantes the Làcedemonian, in his Books of Antiquities, for the Proof of this. But whether there were such in Egypt in the days of Ioseph, or Moses, I am very uncertain: Suppose they had their Bull Apis, severed and kept in a Placè by himself; this required only Septum, a Place compassed about with a Wall, where might be asso some Place of Succour, with a Covering to resort unto in time of Rain, Hail, Storm, or Tempest; though we read not so much as this, of those ancient Times. Only we read of those Times, that some Creatures were accounted Sacred by the Egyptians, and it was not lawful to kill such; nay, it was Abomination to sacrifice any such. Or suppose they had Images of those Gods whom they worshipped, yet Temples were not necessary for this; for, as I have shewed before, many such, together with Altars also, were erected sub Divo, in the open Air. I will conclude all with that which Alexander ab Alexandro writes in his genial days, lib. 4. cap. 7. Persae nec Deorum imagines habent, nec Templa erigunt (crant enim aedium sacrarum & simulacrorum eversores) sed in loco mundo & excelsorum, praecatione Diis victimas immolant, quod à plerisque usitatum invenimus. Nam Carmeli Deus colebatur, cui nec Templum erat nec simulachrum, sed ara tantum & divinus cultus. Iudaei mente sola, unum numen colunt, ideo nulla apud eos simulachra non modo Templis, sed nec urbibus insunt. Germani queque nullam humani oris speciem Diis, prae eorum magnitudinè dederunt, nec Tem­pla dicarunt: sed lucos & nemora Deorum nominibus appellant; illa velut sacra templa venerantur. And in his 2 d. Book, cap. 2. Nulla ficta apud Lycurgum vel picta imago fuit: quippe hominum aut ani­malium species Diis tribui vetuit. Templum verò in quo colebatur desuper patens foramen habuit, quia nefas duxerunt Terminum Deum pacis & justitiae custodem, sub tecto conspici. Sic Iovi, Soli, Lunae, & Deifidio in aperto mundo, Templa hypaethra & sub divo veteres extruxere, quod à Graecis saepe factitatum novimus, ut his Diis hy­paethra templa constituant, sicut aedes Iovis Pulverii in Attica, semper sine tecto erigebatur. Graeci verò Minervae in summa parte aedium sine victima sacrificant; AEsculapio in montibus. Apud Persas nulla dicabantur templa diis, quia cum solem praecipuun numen, & Deorum maximum colant, mundum universum illi Templum esse dixerunt. A Bithynis usurpatum legimus, ut adoraturi montium cacumina conscendant, & sine templis Iovem Pappam salutent, sicut Scythae Pap­paeum. [Page 49]Quae etiam Diogenis opinio fuit, qui mundum fanum Dei sanctissimum existimavit. Fucre autem Termini, atque Fidei Templa juxta aedem Iovis optimi maximi, in capitolio primum a Numa con­structa, cui sacrum fest Terminalibus in agris, sexto ab urbe mil­liario, sub patente caelo fieri solebat. With the Englishing of this I mean to set a period to this Discourse, &c. The Persians have neither Images of Gods, nor do they erect Temples (rather their course was to pull down to the ground Holy Houses and Images) but in a clean Place, in high Places, with Prayers they did sacrifice to the Gods, which we find to have been in use with many. For at Carmel God was worshipped, where was neither Temple nor Image, but an Altar only, and Divine Worship. The Iews in their minds only worship One God, and therefore with them are no Images, neither in Tem­ples nor in Cities. The Germans also give no shape of Man to the Gods, by reason of their Greatness, nor dedi­cate Temples to them; but Groves and Woods they call by the Names of Gods, and they reverence them as holy Tem­ples. Lycurgus ordained no painted or graven Image, as who forbad to express the Gods in the shape of Men, or other Crea­tures. And as for the Temple wherein God was worshipped, that was open at the top, as thinking it unlawful that the God Terminus, the Preserver of Peace and Justice, should be seen under a Roof or Covering. In like sort, Men of ancient Times built Temples to Iupiter, Sol, Luna, and to Deus Fidius, in the open Air, which they called Hypoethra, as much as to say, under the cope of Heaven, open; which was the Graecians usual course, as the House of Iupiter Pulverius in Attica was always without a Roof. And the Graecians sacrisiced to Minerva on the tops of their Houses, without slaughter made of any Beast; and to AEsculapius upon the Hills. Amongst the Persians, no Temples were consecrated to the Gods; beeause being of Opinion that the Sun was the chief Power Divine, and the greatest of Gods, they said the whole World was his Temple. We read it to have been the Bithynians Practice, that when they worshipped, they went to the tops of Hills, and there saluted Iupiter Pappas without any Temple, as the Scythians did Pappaeus. Such also was the Opinion of Diogenes, who maintained the World to be the most holy Temple. As for the Temples of the God Ter­minus, and the God Fides, they were by the House of Jupiter [Page 50]optimus Maximus, in the Capitol, which were first built by Numa Pompilius; to whom Holy (or religious) Office was performed on the Terminal Feasts in the Field, and under the open Heaven, six miles distant from the City.

I might add our Learned Antiquary Inego Iones's Opinion, concerning that strange Structure of Stoneheng on Salisbury-Plain, that it was originally no other than Templum sub Divo, a Temple all open at the top, (such as are mentioned by Alexander ab Alexandro;) but I reser the curious to his Book, and conclude this first Disseratation.