Methods agree in one; That He and all the other Prophets have not only agreed in the fame Scheme, and ufed the fame Word for the fame Thing; but for every Thing that has the fame Idea in it, how unlike foever in other refpects. And that all Nature confirms that he and they understood every Thing, Power, and Action in it; and confequently who guided them.

Waggenfel. 502. "What puts the Authority of the Old Teftament out of Difpute is, that its Doctrine, was revealed miraculously; and when it was revealed, was confirmed by many and various Miracles; and therefore we must neceffarily allow it to be a Divine Revelation, or which is the fame Thing, that it is the Word of God, for God neither works Miracles himself, nor permits others to do fo without a Reason; nor did it become the wife Creator to depart from his own Laws without a Cause, and that a Caufe of Confequence. But no other Cause can be affigned for Miracles, than to ftamp an Authority on the Doctrine. It must be confeffed, that the Doctrine of the Old Teftament, which was revealed gradually, by Dreams, by Vifions, by prophetic Inspirations, by Angels, by Voices from Heaven, from the Top of

the

the Mount, from the midst of the Fire, from out of the Cloud, in fo many different Ages, to fo many different Men, I fay, no Man can deny this to be Miraculous. It would take up too much Time to go thro' with them all, let us confider Mofes only of the Old Teftament Writers. He gives us an Account of Miracles, many and extraordinary, done in Egypt, in the Red-Sea, in the Wilderness, during the Space of two and forty Years, which no one Ifraelite could be ignorant of the Truth of. He writ alfo and died in the fame Wilderness; and his Writings have been esteemed continually, not only as true, but as the moft Sacred by the whole Body of the Jews; nay, are looked on as fuch, even to this very Day, &c."

Befides the Miracles Mofes performed before he writ; the various States of the Ifraelites, their being delivered from the Egyptians, fuperabundantly proved by the various Evafions and Shifts the Heathens offer for it; which are better Evidence, for the Manner, from Enemies, than downright Confeffions; their .Paffages through formidable Countries, their conquering and expelling of the Canaanites, their fubfifting fometimes in great Glory for many Years, in a fmall Coun

try,

try, while they obferved Mofes's Law, between vaft Empires, which is exprefsly proved by the Writings of many Heathens; their Captivity for Difobedience, their Return, or at least of feveral Tribes, and Subfiftence till they refused to obey the Perfon Mofes directed them, and till their Crucifixion of him; the Destruction of their Country, their final Banishment, and above all their Difperfion, alfo predicted by Chrift, for near 1700 Years; their Obftinacy, &c. which all the World are Witneffes of, is fuch a complicated Proof of the Truth of what Mofes and the Apostles write, as never was, or has been, fo much as thought of for the Evidence of any Thing of that Nature, in the Universe.

'Tis not poffible to have any Account coeval with that of Mofes, from the Hea thens; the firft ufe of writing with Letters, among them, loft their Language and made a Chaẩm which defaced the Knowledge of all their Monuments, and most of their Tradition. The vaft Number of Heathen Writers, who mention him or his Actions, fufficiently confirm what he has faid. 'Tis not to be expected that they fhould have the fame Account by Tradition, among them, as Mofes has given us of his Actions. The Aleim, on each Side

then,

then, were fuppofed to be their Generals and the Trial was, which of them were strongest, those of Mofes, or those of the Heathens: So if the Heathens had owned the Circumstances of the Facts which Mofes has given us, it would have been giving up their Aleim. 'Tis enough, that they have owned, that he led the Ifraelites out of Egypt: Are we to expect Truth from the beaten Enemy? Will the French Hiftorians tell the Truth of the Victory at Winnendale?

As Mofes has given us an Account of the true Aleim, and their Institutions in Religion; fo has he of the false Aleim, and of the Heathen Religion. The Accounts we have of the Religion of the Heathens, from Mofes and the Prophets, fhew, as I have abundantly proved, that the Heathens made the Heavens, the Names, their Aleim; and applied the Services inftituted by Jehovah Aleim to the Names, their Substitutes; and ascribed the Powers to them, which Mofes has fhewed, were placed mechanically in them, to govern the material Syftem. The Writers of the latter Heathens fhew, that what they had retained of the Knowledge of their Aleim, by the Names they framed, in their new Languages, of the Powers in them, and of the Services to them, were

1

in Substance the fame; with greater Deviations, and with fome few farther Inventions, which they fuppofed tended to the fame End. All the Hiftories of the East and West-Indies fhew, that they all went upon the fame Scheme. The imperfect Scraps of Truth delivered by fome of the Philofophers, came all from this Root, either handed down, or stolen from Mofes's Account. Nay, the very Mahometans found their Religion upon false Conftructions of Paffages in Mofes's Works.

We have fhewed, and, by Comparison with most of the most ancient Authorities, proved, that Mofes has given us a fair, impartial, perfect Account of all the Objects of Worship, or Aleim that ever were in the World; and perfect Descriptions, as far as we can take them, of the true ones, and of the falfe ones: Of the Inftitution of all the emblematical Services in Religion, and what it was which each of them represented, and when, and why, and how they were mifapplied, or offered to the falfe Aleim; and a perfect Description of all the Situations, mechanical Powers, and Motions of natural Things: fo, that the whole World, Antediluvian and after, betwixt them and the Confu