Yo

Tutor.

OU are now arrived at an age, in which, I promife myfelf, you will be able to receive and digeft those inftructions, which fhall not be confined to Grammar or Criticism, or to any particular fcience; but to form your judgment, and to regulate your future conduct in life, upon a jult reprefentation of paft events.

Scholar. I am fatisfied it will be my intereft, as well as duty, to conform myfelf to your directions. But how are these events to be reprefented? T. By an historical narration, which will unveil to you the examples of all preceding ages; fhew you how em pires and governments have decayed and fucceeded one another; and how religion, in its various fates, has fupported itfelf from the beginning of the world, down to our days. By which I propofe to discover to you the power of paffions and interefts; the importance of times and conjunctions, and the confequences of good and evil coun'els and examples.

S. I then perceive that you purpose to lay before me a univerfal fyftem, or history of all nations, both ancient and

modern.

T. You take me right I intend fo

to do.

fections, which have been pointed out in the course of your studies: or at moft, you from thence have learned to diftinguish times; the men under the law of nature, or under the law of Mofes, from these under the gospel; the Perfians conquered by Alexander, from thofe victorious, under Cyrus; the various fortune of the Grecians, under Philip and under Themistocles or Miltiades; and the slavery of the Romans under their Emperors, from their freedom under the Confuls. But left thefe hiftories, and thofe you have yet to learn, fhould confuse one another in your mind, I judge it highly neceffary to fet before you the feries of all ages in as diftinct and concite a manner as poffible; and, I doubt not, but you will find this kind of Univerfal Hiftory is to the hiftories of each country and people, what a general map is to particular ones. For as in particular maps you fee the whole contents of a kingdom, or a province, in itself, and in general maps you learn to fituate thofe parts of the world in their whole; you fee what London, or Middlefex, is in the kingdom, what the kingdom of England is in Europe, and what Europe is in the world; fo particular hiftories, in like manner, reprefent the series of events, that have happened in their respective nations. or to a people; but in order to underftand the whole, it is neceffary to know the relation each history bears. to others which will be effected, if

you

you diligently attend to the following fyftem.

S. I am convinced of the usefulness of your intention ; but I fear my memory will never be able to retain fo long a feries.

T. I have taken care to obviate this objection, which is a very natural fuppofition by one, that fees all things in confufion. For as it is found neceffary to help the memory in the knowledge of places, to mark certain principal countries, around which we place others, each at its proper diftance; fo in the order of ages, I fhall diftinguish certain times by fome great event, to which Epocha we may refer all the rest; and, as at a refting-place to the memory, ftop to confider all that happened before and after; which you will find will prevent all fort of error, which creates a confufion of time.

S. How many Epocha's or stops are we to make in this history of all nations? T. Thofe that have been principally regarded in ancient hiftory, are at the creation of the world, Noah's flood, the confufion of tongues, and difperfion of the nations; the calling of Abraham, or the beginning of God's covenant with men; the law given by Mofes; the taking of Troy; the finifhing of Solomon's temple; the building of Rome; the restoration of the Jews by the command of Cyrus; the eftablishment of the Roman empire; the birth of Chrift; the establishment of the Chriftian church under Conftantine; the Hegira, or Mahometan computation; the fall of the Roman, and establishment of a new empire, under Charlemagne; befides the particular Epocha's of every diftinct country and people, whofe hiftories always take their date from their foundations, and give us time to paufe at every revolution, or remarkable transaction in their ftate or religion. As for example, in England, we ftop at our conqueft by the Romans, by the Saxons, the Danes, the Normans; at the reformation in religion; the refloration; the revolu

tion; and at the union with Scotland. By which means, thefe inftructiors will be fo far from over-loading or confounding your memory, that whatever parts of history you read, all will turn out to your advantage, And as I will take upon me, that no fact shall pafs without pointing out the confequences, I doubt not of your admiration at the train of God's providence and councils in every age and nation; of your perceiving the concatenation of human affairs; and from thence of forming a right judgment in the management of yourself, and fuch affairs, as may providentially come under your direction hereafter.

S. At which of these Epocha's muft we begin?

T. At the creation of the world. S. What am I to understand by the creation of the world?

7. That the whole univerfe was produced out of nothing by an infinitely powerful, wife, and good God, who, being felf-exiftent, is the original cause of all things.

S. How can that be? When I have read in A iftotle (de Cœlo, l. i. c. 10.) That not only the matter of the heavens and earth was eternal, but that even mankind, and all the fpecies of animals, male and female, have fubfifted from everlasting, by a perpetual courfe of generation, without any original beginning or production; and that the earth hath for ever been adorned with trees, plants, flowers, minerals and other productions, as we now fee it to be.

T. Not only Ariftotle, but Plato, and other heathens, have fallen into, and defended this erroneous doctrine: an error into which they ran for want. of revelation and for which they were rejected by their cotemporaries, and are now despised by the greatest Philofophers. Was an argument to be decided by vote, I could produce a great majority for the origin of the world; though, perchance, their accounts might prove as erroneous, as B 2

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the philofophy of thofe that contend for its eternity. I need only remind you of Ovid's chaos, who, no doubt, founded his opinion of a beginning of the world, upon the more ancient traditions of other poets and philofophers, in oppofition to Ariftotle and his difciples. But, the Phenicians, whofe cofmogony is tranfmitted to us by Sanchoniatho, one of their own writers, believed, that the first principle of the univerfe was a dark and fpiritual (or windy) air, or a spirit of dark air, and a turbid obfcure chaos, which, for many ages, had no bounds. But, after the fpirit conceived a love for its own principles, and a mixture followed, that conjunction was called Defire. This, they faid, was the beginning of the formation of all things. And from this conjunction of the fpirit was begotten mót, or mud, a corruption of a watery mixture: and from hence came the feed of all creatures, and the generation of the univerfe: that there were certain animals which had no fenfe, from which proceeded all intelligent or rational animals (or mankind) called Zaphasemin, which, in the Phenician or Hebrew, fignifies, as Ariftotle defines a man, the animal that looks up to the heavens, being all formed alike in the fhape of an egg: immediately mot, with the fun, moon, lars, and larger conftellations, fhone forth that the air being intensely enlightened by the violent degree of heat communicated to the fea and earth, winds were generated, and clouds, and great defcents and defluxions of the heavenly waters; and when they were separated, and drawn from their proper place, by the heat of the fun, and then met all again in the air, and dafhed the one against the other, thunders and lightnings were engendered; and that at the noife of the thunders, the abovementioned intelligent and rational creatures awoke, and being terrified by the found, fought for their proper elements in the earth and

in the fea, male and female keeping together.

The Egyptians and Grecians give us another account of the manner how the world began. For, if we can credit Diodorus Siculus and Eufebius, they believed, that when the universe first coalefced; heaven and earth, their nature being blended together, were of one form but that afterwards, as bodies feparated, the world took on it the entire difpofition wherein we now behold it; and the air began to have a constant motion; upon which its fiery parts flew to the upper regions by virtue of their own levity, which gave a rapid circular motion to the fun and other ftars: on the contrary, the muddy and turbid matter, being incorporated with the humid, fell by its own weight into one place; where, being agitated with continual internal volutations, the fea became formed of the watery parts, and the earth of the more folid; though for fome time it remained flimy and very foft, till ftiffened by the rays of the fun, with whofe heat the furface began to ferment; and fome of the humid parts fwelled, and rofe by degrees into putrid puftules, covered with thin membranes: that the humid matter, thus fecundated by the genial heat, received nutriment from a night mist, and grew more folid by the warmth of the fun every day; till at length the inclofed brood, being arrived at perfect maturity, and the membranes burnt up and þurft, all kinds of creatures were produced; of which those that had imbibed the greater degree of heat became volatiles, and flew upwards; thofe in which the earthy concretion prevailed, were confined to the clafs of reptiles, and other terref trial animals; and the creatures that chiefly confifted of a watery nature, defcended to a congenial element, and were called fib: and that at length the earth being conftantly hardened by the heat of the fun, and by

the

the winds, fo as not to be able to caft forth any of the larger animals, they began to propagate their feveral fpecies by generation. The Babylonians believed and taught that there was a time when the univerfe was dark nefs and water, where frightful monftrous animals of compounded forms were generated that the Governess of all thefe monsters was a woman, named Omoroca, which is interpreted the moon or the fea that their god Belus came and divided this woman in two, and called the one half Earth, and the other half the Heaven; by which the animals that remained in her perished. But Berofus, who records this romantic faith, adds, that this is only an allegory. For the world being humid, and animals generated therein, Belus took away the woman's head, and the other gods mixed her body, which fell down, with the earth, and formed man; for which reason they are intelligent, and partake of divine wisdom. That Belus, whom they interpret Jupiter, cutting the darkness in the midft, divided the earth and the heaven from each other, and reduced the world into order : whereupon the animals, not bearing the force of the light, became extinct: but Belus feeing the country defert, though fertile, commanded one of the gods to cut off his own head, and to mix the earth with the blood that if fued thence, and of that mixture to form men and beaft, that could endure the air and that Belus perfected the stars, the fun, the moon, and the five planets.

These are the most ancient accounts of the world's origin in heathen story; and if we compare the fables of the Pagan poets, it will be alfo found, that Orpheus, Homer, Hefiod, Ovid, c. are only fo many copies from thefe originals.

And though the modern Perfians pretend that their philofopher, Zoroafires, taught that the world was created by God, yet their belief, as well

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as that of the Bramins and Chinese, who come nearest to the truth, is fo blended with idle inventions and palpable abfurdities, that they only ferve to convince us how fhallow the wif dom of man is without the affistance and grace of God, who himself has revealed the only true and authentic history of the cofmogony or creation of the world, in the book of Genefis, written by his fervant Mofes; which carries with it all the marks of truth and probability, infomuch, that the very relating of it is enough to confute all the former accounts: though we regard it no more than a human compofition, feparate from its divine authority for there we are rationally informed, that in the beginning God created the heaven, or the air or firmament, and the earth; which earth, after its immediate creation, remained for fome time a mixed and confused dark mass of folids and fluids, without any form of land or fea, continents, iflands, &c. and void or deflitute of all trees, plants, and herbs, as well as of animals: an unformed chaos or mass of matter, which in the fpace of the following fix days, received its diurnal motion, and was difpofed and reduced into its prefent form by the fpirit of the Almighty, which moved upon the furface of the faid chaos, and filled it with the feeds of all those things which were afterwards produced from thence. On the first day God created light, which hẹ alfo divided from the darkness; by which the regular fucceffion of day and night was fettled and established. On the fecond day God divided the waters above from the waters below, by an expanfion, which Mofes calls beaven, made in the midst of the waters. On the third day, God having drained the waters from the earth, and by collecting them into a feparate ftate, made the ocean or feas, &c. the earth appeared dry, and produced all forts of plants, herbs, and trees, bearing their feveral feeds and fruits, according

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to their various kinds. On the fourth day God gave the earth its annual motion round the fun, and the moon and stars their motion round the earth: for, though they were made on the first day, to divide the day from the night: they were not ordained to be for SIGNS; fuch as the changes and various phafes of the moon, and the folar and lunar eclipfes, which are fo many fenfible fions or indications to men, of the divine wisdom, power, and goodness; or for marks of diftinction betwixt one part and portion of time and another; to which purposes, the changes of the moon, the equinoxes, folftices, &c. are greatly useful: and for SEASONS, to produce, fpring, fummer, autumn, and winter for DAYS, either to make a difference in the length of days; or to diftinguish remarkable days for folemn feftivals, fuch as the first day of the year, and the first day of the lunar month, which were observed afterwards by the Jews; and for many other conveniencies in civil life to all nations and for YEARS, to meafure time by years, and cycles of years, which is of extraordinary ufe in the computation of time, and in keeping records or hiftories of human affairs: To RULE the day, by lengthening fome days, and fhortening others, and by difpenfing a greater quantity of light and heat to fome days than to others; and to RULE the night, by making fome nights light and others dark; en lightening only part of fome nights, fometimes the former part, and fometimes the latter and the ftars alfo were appointed to RULE the night, according to that of Pfalms cxxxvi. 7, 8, 9. and the great purposes of navigation, &c. to which they are properly adapted; till the fourth day of the creation. On the fifth day God filled the waters with fith, and the air with fowls, which he caused to rife out of the water only; and on the fixth day he created all the beafts of the forest and field; all cattle, and creeping things; and laft of all, he created

man out of the duft of the earth; into which fubftance he breathed a living and a rational foul: and out of his fide, being caft into a deep fleep, he took a rib, and made of it a woman, or helpmate for the folitary man.

This is the fubftance of the history of the creation of the world, which Mofes penned by God's command: and which we believe upon that authority: and which is fo agreeable to found philofophy, that all the other hypothefes, already mentioned, muft yield to its force and veracity. And therefore it is evident, that there was a time when this world had a beginning; and confequently has not exifted from eternity.

S Was the fubftance of the fun inclofed in the earth before light was made?

T. No: Mofes fays, that the earth was dark, which could not poffibly be, had the fiery matter of the fun, which far exceeds the quantity of earth in the globe, been contained therein. Befides, I would have you remember, that Mofes's cofmogony, chiefly regards the creation of the earth, and clearly intimates, that God created the fun, moon, and ftars, out of the other fubftances, or Chaotic maffes, in the fame manner, and at the fame time, as the earth was created. All which is fully demonftrated by the now undoubted property of the univerfal gravitation of matter; which is effential to the earth alone.

S. Does not Mofes give an account of two diftin&t creations of men? one general in Gen. i. 27, the other particular of Adam and Eve, Gen. ii, 1, 7, defcribing the origin of the Jews.

T. No there were no human race before Adam. For, whoever compares thefe texts with impartiality, he will confefs that the latter is no more than a recapitulation of the creation of the world in general, with the addition of a more minute account of the creation of the first man and woman, (To be continued.)

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