The 8th and last chapter presents a view of the defects of the evidence in favor of the Moha.nmedan Religion.-After having offered many pertinent remarks on this subject, and having shewn, by quotations from Gibbon and the Koran, the futility of Mohammed's pretensions, Mr. M. sums up in an eloquest manner the preponderating evidence in favor of Christianity, and terminates with these impressive words: It is impossible to close this account of the doctrines and conduct of the celebrated Impostor, without remarking the fatal and decisive evidence which the che..mstances of his death supply, in direct contradiction to his pretensions. A Jewish female of Chaibar, being desirons to ascertain the truth of these pretensions, placed' before him at supper a poisoned dish, of which one of his companions, eating greedily, imaedately died. The pretended Prophet, who partook of it in less abundance, nevertheless only found his fate deferred. His heath was so much injured by this successful essay of curiosity and reve ge, that, after languishing three years, he died in consequence of thus tai ing to realize his claim to that prophetic knowledge, which he so arrogantly asserted. These facts, which are confessed by his warmest admirers, surely place in the charest point of view the fallacy of his declarations, and expose that imposture, which he had been labouring bat too successfully to place beyond the reach of hu nan discernment. If therefore we fally consider the circumstances under which the religion of Mahomet prospered, taking into account the manner in which it was propagated, and the form it continues to assume, surely it does not appear, that any argument can be derived from i.'s success, to affect in the slightest degree the Christian religion; but as certainly it does appear, that an Impostor of the most acknowledged abilities and the most undaunted courage, undertaking his designs at a juncture the most favourable, could not plan a scheme of such a nature and extent, without betraying tokens of fraud the most gross and palpable; nor without laying himself open to the view of all, who unite a spirit of candour with a desire of accurate inves tigation. Christianity appeared in a most enlightened age; it has attracted the notice, and challenged the scrutiny, of the acute and intelligent; yet in the space of eighteen centuries, no one decisive mark of fraud has been fixed upon as affecting the conduct or doctrines of it's founder. On the contrary, the more accurate the search, and the more piercing the scrutiny, into it's authority, the characters of truth have appeared with undiminished, nay, increased, lustre. If the revolution of so many ages has failed to reveal one indubitable trace of fallacy in the origin of our Holy religion; if the labours of so many intellects have been baffled in the attempt to stig matize it as indebred to fraud or enthusiasm for it's success, is it probable that a few more ages rolling on shall unfold the hitherto Palisovered sc.ct of it's humta birth? Are the sages yet unborn, wh shall probe to the quick the latent wound, which has so long raulle 1, without Lattaying one symptom of unsoundness ? Ce3 Until such exalted spirits shall appear, and such wondrous ages arrive, why may we not content ourselves with believing that, which is so far from having been proved incredible, that it has on the contrary been found to possess all the marks of credibility, which in any similar question the human understanding can require? Surely, in the religion of Jesus, there is sufficient evidence to warrant our faith, sufficient authority to regulate our conduct, and sufficient encouragement to elevate and sustain our hope.' On the whole, we have received great satisfaction from the present work; and we recommend it to all, as a valuable accession of strength to that rock on which the Christian must build his faith. In the Latin exercises annexed to this treatise, the Thesis, and the Concio ad Clerum, wewere much gratified by observing that Mr. Maltby stands distinguished not only for his attainments in sacred literature, but as a correct and well-informed classical scholar. Such an union of talents and acquirements, therefore, as this volume evinces, cannot fail to give the public a high opinion of the author's merits; and when they find these qualities conspiring in the cause of truth and the promotion of piety, they will wish to see them rewarded as they de serve, and exerted from a station which will give additional consequence to their inherent power. ART. X. An Inquiry into the Origin of the Constellations that compost IN the preface to this volume, the author mentions some of the motives which induced him to undertake the present investigation; together with the reasons that first led him to suspect the origin of the Zodiac to be older than it is generally supposed to be. As several authors have given an explanation of the signs of the Zodiac, it was to be presumed that Dr. Barrett would attempt to demolish their theories, before he advanced his own; and accordingly, his first pages contain an examination of the systems of Macrobius, La Pluche, and La Nauze. In opposing these hypotheses, Dr. B. is more happy than in establishing his own; for, though endowed with much learning, and qualified by much research, he has fallen into the wildest and most fanciful conjectures. He has distorted the meaning of the plainest passages; and by the torture of his learning and comment, he has forced the most innocent things to conform to his system. system. We shall quote a few examples, and hope to be excused the unnecessary trouble of animadverting on them. The first passage, in which there appeared to us a manifest contortion of the plain meaning of a sentence, is in page 10; where, in order to confute the opinion of Epiphanius, that the Pharisees translated the names of the signs from the Greek into the Hebrew, Dr. Barrett insists that two of the signs are expressly mentioned by Isaiah; "Behold the nations are as the drop of the bucket, and the small dust of the balance."-To our minds, the bucket and balance here meant are a common bucket and balance; and such must be the acceptation, unless we are desirous of banishing all beauty from the remark. In the 3d chapter, the author gives his explanation of the signs. Aries, the Ram, is with him the symbol of the Diyine Being; and the proof, a part of which will probably satisfy our readers, is as follows: Scripture every where represents the relation of men to God, as that of his people and the sheep of his pasture, and this where it celebrates him as the Creator of the world and the Lord who hath made us. Vide Ps. xcv. 7, &c. c. 3. In Ps. xxiii. 1, 2. David calls the Lord his shepherd, who makes him lie down in green pastures. And when he goes astray, Ps. cxix. 176. describes himself as a lost sheep. Under which image Isaiah, liii. 6. describes the degenerate Jews; and Christ says the same thing, Matth. x. 6. xv. 24. The Lord is the shepherd of Israel who leads Joseph like a flock, Ps. lxxx. 1. Christ is the shepherd that was to be smitten and his sheep scattered, Zech. xiii. 7.; and that lays down his life for the sheep, John x. And his pastoral office is described by Isaiah in nearly the same words. We ought next to consider who is the natural shephera of the real sheep, and whom has the Author of Nature made the Father of the flock and invested with the tender office of leading them to green pastures, and of watching over them; and who is it whom they all naturally follow after, in same manner as the human race ought to observe and obey their father in heaven; and who is this but the RAM? Therefore, in the language of nature and scripture combined together, the relation of the author of nature, the God and Father of us all, to all his creatures, the works of his power and productions of his wisdom, will be the same as that of the ram to the sheep and consequently the RAM will be the symbol thereof.' The Bull is the symbol of the Ocean; and the proof is this: That the earth was originally in a liquid state in a great measure, is a truth, which revelation assures us of, and all our researches in Natural Philosophy fully discover. Now the attributes of the Ocean are strength, impetuous motion, an immense extension, and a bellowing noise, (Ps. xlvi. 3.-lxv. 7.-Job xxxviii. 8-11.) all of which seem to be properly expressed by the Bull. Virgil has his fortes invortant Tauri: and Horapollo, L. 1. p. 58. witnesses thus of the Egyptians. Fortitudinem innuentes, Taurum pingunt. For the Cc 4 Hebrew Hebrews we find fortis, et synecdochice Taurus; whence per haps the God Apis derives his name, only by a change of the best letter. The epithets of the sea generally relate to the noise of its waves, and Neptune is stiled Mun, i. e. Mugitor.-Plutarch, Questiones Græcæ xxxvi. "Poetæ dicunt bubulo pro magno, sc En Poeta dicit magnis oculis præditam, Suzaior qui gloriose se jactat." Here the Bull denotes any thing great; and the Ocean is confessedly the greatest object on the earth. The poets paint Oceanus with the head of a Bull, and Euripides styles him Taugingavos, Orest. 1380. Both Homer and Hesi d'style Ocean Taμds; and all poets represent rivers with the heads and horns of Bulls. Horace has Tauriformis Aufidus; and Virgil, Rhenus bicornis. One commentator says, Touggous vocant famina Græci, quæ cum cornibus pinguntur, qu'a mugitum habent velut Boves. And Festus, Taurorum specie simulachra fluminum quia' sunt atrocia velut Tauri.-hurnutus.-Fluvios cornutos et tauricum intuentes pingunt. Pierius. Cornua fluviis tribuuntur ab eorum lapsibus flexuosis. Hence the Bull is the animal sacred to Neptune and the victim to be sacrificed to him, Homer. Odyss. iii. 4. Iliad xx. 404. Virg. n. iii. 118.' Again; the Doctor asks what hieroglyphic (that of the ox butting against an egg in the Temple at Meaco in Japan) could more aplly express the ocean; which, by being subj et to alternate flux and reflux, did thus strike on the solid globe, as the bull butts on the egg with his horns,' &c. Gemini, the Twins, are supposed to mean day and night; Cancer, the Crab, is a sign, according to the author, of much importance, and he labours to prove that it means the visible heaven, or starry firmament; and Leo, the Lion, denotes the The third part of the proof of this last conjecture will satisfy Sun. most realers: From the qualities or attributes of this anintal. These are Strength and Watchfulness. Now both these are also with the strictest truth attributed to the Sun, who is styled the Eye of the World by Mart. Capella. Pierius observes of the lion: Sclum hoc animal ex iis qui recurvos habent ungues, simul atque natum est, cernit: somni quoque parcissimi est, ita ut multi insomnes credide runt, et inter dormiendum oculos splendescentes habet." And as its foreparts are emblematical of strength, so are its hinder parts of weakness in which it again resembles the departing or setting us. And as the lion's presence causes the other animals to disappear, so the sun's rising makes the stars to disappear from the heavens.' Virgo, the Virgin, means the teeming Earth; and, as every thing depends, in Dr. Barrett's opinion, on the right interpre tation of this symbol, he strenuously endeavours to establish this point-how ingeniously and learnedly, let the following extracts shew: Both Both sacred and profane writers personify the earth. For the scriptures see Deut. xxxii. 1. Jer xxii. 29.-Numb. xvi. 20.-Lev." xvii 2-Job xii. 8.-P3. lxv. 13.---lxxxv. 12. For profane writers we may observe the epithets they bestow on her and the parts they mention of her. These are Gremium, Sinus, Uber, Viscera. Do not all languages impose on the earth a name in the feminine gender, and is she not represented as the mother of all? Hesiod represents T, the earth, as having produced the Heaven, and every thing else as produced by the mixture of these two. Virgil observes of her: Parturi almus ager: & tum partu terra nefando. Thus the earth by producing from he selt the vegetable world, which in the language of things is symbolical of the animal, (thus a tree stands for a man, Ps. i. 3 Matth. iii. 10. &c.) bears an analogy to the female of all animals, by whose mean the animal creation is contirued; and this analogy is a sufficient ground for making the female to be the symbol of the earth. Let us consider the appellatious all Languages bestow on certain portions of the earth; they are female, as Hibernia, Britannia, &c. and they use denominations which imply an allusion to the tuman body, and carry a reference to its several parts. Thus we call projecting points of land, Heads, or Headlands, or Capes; and in many languages they are termed Noss or Ness (from Nasus); Defiles are termed Fauces; and it is familiar with us to talk of the Face of a Country; in Scripture mountains are styled Horns, Is. v. 1. and Heads, Res. xvii. 9. and Shoulders, Deut. xxxii. 12. and they are said to be brought forth, Ps. xc. 2. which implies that the Earth was considered as a Femsie.-And is not man himself termed a Microcosm ?-All such expressions betray their origin, and shew that they are founded on a supposition, that the human figure is the proper emblem of the Earth., What can therefore more properly represent her than the figure on the sphere; where she appears with an ear of corn in her hand, to shew that she is mother of the vegetable worl!. Her being styled a Virgin, plainly denotes the dry land, which on the third day of creation produced fruits without cultivation, and, on the sixth, the various race of animals. We have the authority of holy Scripture, when we interpret an ear of corn to be the hieroglyphic of the year. But the year is that space of time, in which the Earth revolves about the Sun. Therefore the figure, which holds the symbol of the year in her hand, must be the Earth. And thus whether we consider the ear of corn in the literal sense as in the last argument, or in the symbolical as here, we are equally led to the same conclusior .'— Man having been created the principal Being on Earth, and appointed to rule over it; hence we may infer that a human being may be the proper symbol of the Earth: over which he was invested with dominion, and which he was formed for the purpose of cultivating. Agreeable hereto, John i. 29. the Baptist says of Christ, that he takes away the sins of the World: but what he took away was the sins of Man, therefore the World is substituted here for Man, a mode of expression familiar to ourselves.' |