sake of their blood, nor to strangle them; but in
killing them for food, to let out their blood and
spill it upon the ground,
Gen. ix. 4, and
Levit. xvii. 12, 13. This law was ancienter
than the days of
Moses, being given to
Noah
and his sons long before the days of
Abraham:
and therefore when the Apostles and Elders in the
Council at
Jerusalem declared that the Gentiles
were not obliged to be circumcised and keep the law
of
Moses, they excepted this law of
abstaining
from blood, and things strangled as being an earlier
law of God, imposed not on the sons of
Abraham
only, but on all nations, while they lived together
in
Shinar under the dominion of
Noah:
and of the same kind is the law of
abstaining from
meats offered to Idols or false Gods, and from fornication.
So then,
the believing that the world was framed
by one supreme God, and is governed by him; and the
loving and worshipping him, and honouring our parents,
and loving our neighbour as our selves, and being
merciful even to brute beasts, is the oldest of
all religions: and the Original of letters, agriculture,
navigation, music, arts and sciences, metals, smiths
and carpenters, towns and houses, was not older in
Europe than the days of
Eli,
Samuel
and
David; and before those days the earth
was so thinly peopled, and so overgrown with woods,
that mankind could not be much older than is represented
in Scripture.
* * * *
*
CHAP. II
Of the Empire of Egypt_._
The Egyptians anciently boasted of a very great
and lasting Empire under their Kings Ammon,
Osiris, Bacchus, Sesostris, Hercules,
Memnon, &c. reaching eastward to the Indies,
and westward to the Atlantic Ocean; and out
of vanity have made this monarchy some thousands of
years older than the world: let us now try to
rectify the Chronology of Egypt; by comparing
the affairs of Egypt with the synchronizing
affairs of the Greeks and Hebrews.
Bacchus the conqueror loved two women, Venus
and Ariadne: Venus was the mistress
of Anchises and Cinyras, and mother of
AEneas, who all lived ’till the destruction
of Troy; and the sons of Bacchus and
Ariadne were Argonauts; as above:
and therefore the great Bacchus flourished
but one Generation before the Argonautic expedition.
This Bacchus [235] was potent at sea, conquered
eastward as far as India returned in triumph,
brought his army over the Hellespont; conquered
Thrace, left music, dancing and poetry there;
killed Lycurgus King of Thrace, and
Pentheus the grandson of Cadmus; gave
the Kingdom of Lycurgus to Tharops;