of the prefent inquiry; much therefore does CHAP. not remain to be faid upon that fubject. The IV. celebrated Ogdoas of the Egyptians, confisting of eight perfons failing together in the facred Baris, was not entirely unknown to other ancient nations. Among the Chinese, the hieroglyphical character, by which they expreffed a fhip, confifted of a boat, a mouth, and the number eight. Two of these characters, the eight and the mouth, added to that by which water is defignated, presented to their minds the idea of a proSperous voyaged.

The mountain in Armenia, upon which the ark refted, was not only called Baris by the inhabitants, but likewife Thamanim, or eight; and the city built at its foot, and the country around it, bore the fame name; thus inconteftibly proving the accuracy of the Mofaical account.

XII. I fhall conclude this difquifition XII.

d Bryant's Anal. vol. iii. p. 9.

• Ibid. Xenocrates may perhaps have derived his eight deities from the fame fource. He fuppofed them to be regents of the heavenly bodies; a notion eafily accounted for, when we recollect the frequent union of Sabianism and hero-worship in the ancient fyftems of mythology. CICER. de nat. Deor. lib. i. c. 13.

N 2

with

Reprefentation of the deluge on

the sphere.

SECT. with noticing the fingular manner in which I. the history of the deluge feems to be pourtrayed on the fouthern hemifphere of the celeftial globe. The greatest part of this divifion of the sphere is occupied with various aquatic animals; and water is reprefented as ftreaming upon it in almost every direction. In the midft of the waves appears a fhip, called by the Greeks indeed Argo, according to their ufual custom of adapting the traditions of other nations to their own history; but which most probably was originally delineated by a more ancient people, upon a more ancient sphere. Near the fhip is a dove, which seems to be flying towards it; and at a small distance from it is a raven, perched upon the back of the fea ferpent. In this laft group is delineated a cup, proper for facrificial libations. Farther on, as if he had lately left the fhip, is the figure of the centaur, so much celebrated in Grecian ftory: he is piercing with his lance fome kind of animal, which by modern aftronomers is called a wolf, and bearing it to an altar, the smoke of which ascends towards a triangle.

The identity of Noah and the ancient

See Maurice's Hift. of Hind. vol. i. p. 344.

centaur

IV.

centaur seems to be fufficiently established. CHAP. To use the words of an eminent Analyst, "It is faid of the Patriarch, after the de

luge, that he became 787 'N, a man "of the earth, or husbandman. This cir"cumstance was religiously recorded in all "the ancient hiftories of Egypt; and it "was upon this account, I imagine, that "the ox, fo useful in husbandry, was made

an emblem of the Patriarch. Hence we "find many pieces of ancient sculpture, 66 upon which is to be feen the ox's head, "with the Egyptian modius between his "horns, relative to the circumstances of "this history "."

The very name of Centaur h is a manifest allufion to fome perfon, who was fkilled in husbandry. Chiron, the primitive centaur, is faid to have been born of a cloud, and to have been intimately connected with the Argonautic voyager's; having inftructed them in the fcience of aftronomy, and having contrived a fphere for their use All thefe circumstances accord with the hiftory of Noah; and the mytho

8 Bryant's Anal. vol. ii. p. 417.

A goader of oxen.

i Bryant's Anal. vol. ii. p. 477.

N 3.

logical

I.

SECT. logical birth of the centaur forcibly reminds us of the second birth of the Patriarch, his defcent from the ark, furrounded, as it had been during the prevalence of the deluge, with fogs and clouds.

The account, which is given of the fhip Argo, will serve as an additional key to the history delineated upon the sphere. We are informed by Eratofthenes, "that the afterifm of the Argo in “the heavens was there placed by Divine "wisdom; for the Argo was the first ship "that was ever built: it was moreover "built in the most early times, or at the

86

very beginning; and was an oracular "veffel. It was the firft fhip that ven"tured upon the feas, which before had "never been paffed: and it was placed in "the heavens as a fign and emblem for "thofe who were to come after." Plutarch is yet more exprefs; he afferts, "that the constellation, which the Greeks "called the Argo, was a reprefentation of "the facred fhip of Ofiris." Hence it appears, that the Argo was in fact the Egyptian Baris, which contained their celebrated

1

k Cited by Bryant, Anal. vol. ii. p. 495.

1 Ibid.

Ogdoas,

Ogdoas, and which was clearly a repre- CHAP. fentation of the ark of Noah, containing IV. within it that Ogdoas, from which the whole poft diluvian world was afterwards peopled.

That part of the picture, which to a Christian is the moft ftriking, is the afcent of the fmoke from the altar, towards the figure of a triangle; a circumstance, from which one can fcarcely help concluding, that the framers of that sphere had fome obfcure notions of the doctrine of the Trinity but concerning this, let each perfon judge as appears to himfelf moft probable.

From the evidences, which have been adduced, it is fufficiently clear, that the history of the deluge was by no means unknown to the heathens; but that, for the most part, their traditions bear a striking resemblance to the Mofaical account of

that event. This fubject has been frequently handled before by a variety of authors, fo that it cannot be faid entirely to poffefs the charms of novelty. The defign of the prefent difquifition has been to comprefs into fmall compafs, and to bring together into one point of view, those va