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deep. Yet the deep, mysterious sentiment looks ever to One above the Nymph, the Sun-God, the Ruler of the Sky and Sea. Hence polytheism is based on a belief in the One God. In the twilight of idolatry, there are gleams of the Light which has once shone, and is to reappear. "God is one," says the oldest book of the Bramins; "everlasting; the creator of the world-all. Like a ball, he hath neither beginning nor end. By everlasting and everchanging laws, he governs the world. Mortal, inquire not thou too far, in searching the essence or the nature of the Eternal. It is enough for thee to examine Day and Night; the greatness of his works; his wisdom; his power; his goodness." The name of this being is Ekhumesha, "the one who always was."*

Now, if this doctrine of the divine unity did not form the primitive belief of all nations; if even it were not known to the Hebrew nation before the time of Moses, how could his miracles impart the idea? What force could they add to his argument? If his doctrine was true, it needed not the support of miracles; if false, no miracles could make it true. We have always been pleased with the remarks of an old Jewish writer upon this point. "The Hebrews did not believe our father Moses, on account of the miracles he wrought, for, in the mind of the believer, there might be a suspicion in regard to the miracle. It might have been that some wrought the miracle by incantation, or sorcery. But all the miracles of Moses in the Desert, he wrought through the necessity of the occasion, and not to establish the proof of his mission as a prophet; for a man may work a miracle and show a sign, and yet be no prophet." In another place he adds that Moses was never believed on account of his miracles. Moses himself makes

This is extracted from a book adjudged to have been written (?) in its present form, (?) 1600 B. C. (?) See Rhöde religiöse Bildung, Mythologie und Philosophie der Hindus. (Leip. 1827. 8vo.) Bd. I. § 115-121, 434 et seq.

+ Maimonides de fundamentis legis, viii § 1.

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the doctrine, and not the miracle, the test of inspiration.

If a man have not a true conception of the unity of God, how can a miracle help him to form that conception? A command, it is true, may be uttered by the Most High, in words in the Hebrew tongue, but will this impart an idea of the one true God? Dr. Palfrey thinks this truth could not be ascertained without miracles to authenticate it; and maintains that such miracles were granted only to the Jews. If other nations did not know this truth, they must necessarily be idolaters, since they must worship something. Yet for this idolatry, according to our author, they were destroyed; were punished for their ignorance of what they could not know. Idolatry is always denounced as a sin in the Scriptures. This shows plainly that man has power, without supernatural aid, to arrive at the truth.

Among two classes of men, we find that a belief in the unity of God, like that of the immortality of the soul, will prevail; among the simple, who trust the native religious instinct of the heart, and among those who have learned to see the identity of spontaneous sentiment, and the sublimest conclusions of the intellect. Between these two, there is a large class, neither simple enough to trust the heart, nor sufficiently wise to discover this truth with the mind.

Now let the doctrine in question be announced to this middle class, -announced by the very voice of the Almighty, with all the apparatus of clouds, and thunder, and darkness, and lightning, and trumpets, and gorgeous mountain scenery, which the most obdurate critic claims for Moses, and it will not be understood. Let these miracles be repeated till they cease to be miracles, (according to Dr. Palfrey's ingenious theory,) still the doctrine will not inhere in the material mind. The history of the Jews proves this assertion. To enlighten the nation, and to purify their hearts, were the only methods of rendering them monotheists. Miracles repeated never so often cannot

effect this. If then we admit the authenticity of these books, the strangest problem is presented, "authenticating" miracles are profusely wrought, the people take little heed thereof: they refuse to receive the truth miraculously authenticated as it is; they fall down and worship a golden calf, while Moses veiled in the most awful pomp, before their eyes, holds communion with God, face to face. They were nourished by the "supernaturally increased production of a natural product," watered and clothed, guided and governed by miracles,-yet refused to believe in the power, or listen to the authority of Him who wrought these miracles, for the sake of producing this belief. Such is the importance of miracles to work conviction upon eye witnesses. Abraham, in his simple heart, had believed this doctrine, though not taught by miracles, six centuries before. In later times, when the people had made farther advance in civilization, after the Babylonian exile, we hear of no farther relapses into idolatry, though there was no "open vision," and no miracles were wrought.

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Dr. Palfrey believes Moses wrought real miracles in Egypt before Pharaoh, while the magicians were mere jugglers, who performed curious tricks by legerdemain. The king of Egypt could not distinguish the real from the pretended miracle. Is it not somewhat irreverent to state that the Almighty works miracles with a certain design, which cannot be distinguished by an eye witness from common feats of jugglery? It were as reasonable to believe with Dr. Doddridge, that the latter were "wrought by superior evil beings." These miracles in Egypt, it is to be observed, were not wrought for the same or a similar purpose with those in the wilderness. The former were to induce Pharaoh to "let Israel go," the latter to prove the unity of God. The former "did not propose to prove, even to the Jews, that their national God was the only God; *** still less were they designed to prove this to the Egyptians."

Here Jehovah is represented, "as the God of the

Jews only," says the author, who thinks this fact is an argument to prove the work written by the inspired Moses; a singular argument truly. He thinks there was a supernatural production of frogs, at the command of Aaron. But the magicians merely "used some substance to attract into a vacant space some specimens of an animal, whose habits are so well known."

He denies the "supernatural nature" of the firepillar and the cloud. But, as we have before observed, they become miraculous agents when occasion demands. He is ready to admit a miracle, when a miracle is necessary, that is, when it affords the easiest explanation of a passage. May we not say that a miracle is to our author, what " enchantment was to a certain knight, - the universal solvent of diffi

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The author sees an especial fitness in the magnificent scenery around Mount Sinai, in the "flaming and smoking top" of the mountain, in the awful drapery of clouds, in the thunder and lightning, in the midst of which the law was announced, to make a deep impression upon the minds of the people. We must confess there is "an abstract fitness," to use his own expression, in such a spectacle, but we ask him to tell us why it failed to make the anticipated impression?

Soon after, with similar pomp, to follow the text of Exodus, the whole nation promises to obey these laws. How solemn the scene; what a profound impression must it make! Soon they will clamor to return to Egypt; worship a golden calf. Singular result! Could no one "contrive to discern those thirteen most poor, mean-dressed men, at a frugal Supper, in a mean Jewish dwelling, with no symbol but hearts God-initiated into that "Divine depth of Sorrow," and a Do this in remembrance of me?*

The work fails to explain many difficult passages. In Exodus, xxiv. 9-11, it is said, that Moses and

* Carlyle's French Revolution.

seventy three others "saw the God of Israel, and under his feet, as it were, a paved work of a sapphire stone," &c. The explanation of the author is, "They saw a splendor in the sky, above all earthly things, and were made to know that there, in heaven, Jehovah, the God of their nation, had his place and government."— p. 184. Does this explanation remove the difficulty? This appears to be one of the passages of which he says, "a confession of ignorance is at once most fair, most modest, and most safe."

p. 229. The anthropomorphitic character of the Supreme Being in these books is but poorly explained. Nothing can be plainer to every reader, than this fact, that God is spoken of as having a body, and hands, and feet, throughout these books. The author admits the anthropomorphitic character of the representations of God, when it favors his argument, but again (p. 224 et seq.) he attempts, very unsatisfactorily, to explain it on another hypothesis.

It has usually been thought difficult to account for the fact alleged, Exodus xvii. 11, that in time of battle, when Moses held up his hand the Jews prevailed, but when his hand sunk his enemies were victorious, and, that to insure the victory, two of his attendants supported his hand. Our author finds "no difficulty in the matter." The universal solvent is at hand, a miracle. "When the people saw the banner of the Lord in his hand, *** always insuring to them victory, [?] as long as it was raised, [how could they know this?] and leaving them to defeat when it sank, they took an impressive lesson concerning the power, which he was authorized to exert over them, and the divine protection he enjoyed, shared by themselves as long as they yielded to his guidance."- pp. 159, 160. On the same principles (?) he explains the cures effected by the brazen serpent.*

Sometimes the author rises above these principles. Men, says he, "inquired of God," when they came to

* Numbers, xxi. 4-9.

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