CHAP. XX.

A third general reflection. Idolatry gathered strength among the nations, as they grew in learning and politeness. Religion, in several respects less corrupted in the ruder and more illiterate than in the politer ages. The arts and sciences made a very great progress in the heathen world yet they still became more and more addicted to the most absurd idolatries, as well as to the most abominable vices; both of which were at the height, at the time of our Saviour's appearance.

ANOTHER important reflection, which may help to cast farther light on the present subject, is this, that superstition and idolatry, instead of being corrected and diminished, rather increased and gathered strength among the heathen nations, as they grew in learning and politeness. Any one that considers the accounts which are given us of the progress of arts and sciences, how from rude beginnings they were still advancing to greater perfection, and that as the nations became more knowing and civilized, these were continually improving, will be apt to think, that so it must have been with religion too. It is natural to suppose that, as their knowledge was more extended, and their understandings better cultivated, and exercised in the arts of reasoning, they must have more clearly seen the absurdity of superstition and idolatry, and have attained to higher improvements in religion, and in the knowledge and worship of the one true God, as well as in other branches of science. And yet, if we consult fact and experience, we shall find that the religion of the Gentiles in the most ancient times was in several instances more pure and simple, less encumbered and corrupted with idolatry, than in succeeding ages, when the arts and sciences had made a considerable progress. This seems to show that the knowledge men had of God, and religion, in the first ages, was originally owing, not merely to the efforts of their own reason, which was then little cultivated and improved, but to a divine revelation made to the first of the human race, and from them communicated to their posterity. It might have been hoped

that this tradition, which, when duly proposed, is agree able to right reason, would have been preserved with great care, especially when learning and knowledge were improved: but it soon began to degenerate, and became the more corrupt the farther it was removed from its original. The true primitive theism, which was the most ancient religion of mankind, became soon adulterated with mixtures of polytheism, still preserving for the most part, amidst all their corruptions, some obscure idea of one supreme Divinity, till at length it was almost lost and confounded amidst a multiplicity of idol deities.

*

It has been already shown that themost ancient idolatry and deviation from the worship of the one true God, was the worship of heaven and the heavenly bodies. But the first idolaters, as Eusebius observes, did not erect statues or images to them, but contented themselves with fixing their eyes upon the visible heavens, and worshipping what they beheld there. This is agreeable to the representation made of it in the ancient book of Job, where it is intimated that those who then worshipped the heavenly bodies were wont to do it by lifting up their eyes towards heaven, and bowing and kissing their hands to them, when they appeared in their splendour. That holy man, to clear himself from all suspicion of idolatry, which was then making a progress in those parts, in his admirable apology expresses himself thus: "If I beheld "the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness" and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth hath "kissed my hand; this also were an iniquity to be punished "by the judge: for I should have denied the God that is "above." Job xxxi. 26, 27, 28. And Moses seems to inti

mate the same thing, Deut. iv. 19.

"Lest thou lift up thine

66 eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the "moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be "driven to worship and serve them." And he distinguisheth

* Præpar. Evangel. lib. i. cap. 6. p. 17. Paris, 1628.

this from the idolatry of image worship, which he had forbidden just before.

It is another observation of Eusebius concerning the idolaters of the most ancient times, that they made no mention of that multitude of hero deities which were afterwards worshipped both among the Greeks and barbarians. There was

among them no theogonia, or fabulous account of the generation of the gods. The numerous rabble of gods and heroes, with the monstrous fictions relating to them, were of later date, and had their rise among the Egyptians and Phoenicians, and from them were propagated to the Greeks.* It was among the Chaldeans, Phoenicians, and Egyptians, that imageworship, as well as that of hero gods or deified men, seems to have first obtained. The first approach towards image worship among the nations was, as some learned men probably suppose, their erecting stones and pillars in honour of their deities. This seems to have been an abuse of a custom that was originally used by the worshippers of the true God, who were wont to erect large stones as monuments in places where, in those ancient times, there had been remarkable divine appearances: and there they erected altars and offered sacrifices. Of this we have a memorable instance in that good man, Jacob. Having, at the end of his first day's journey towards Mesopotamia, had a divine vision, in which God was pleased to appear to him in a visible glory, attended with his holy angels, and repeated those promises to him which he had before made to his pious progenitors, Abraham and Isaac, he took a large stone, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it, and thereby consecrated it to a religious use; and this probably in conformity to ancient custom. And he called the name of that place Bethel, "the house of God," Gen. xxviii. 18, 19. At the same time he made a solemn vow, that if he returned in safety to his father's house, this stone which he had set up for a pillar should be God's house, that is, the place where he would erect an altar to the only true

* Euseb. ubi supra, cap. 9. p. 29, 30.

God, and offer sacrifices to him. And this accordingly, he afterwards did by the divine command:, but he first took care to purify his family, and put away the strange gods which were among them; some of his numerous family having privily introduced idolatrous usages. Gen. xxxv. 1-4. Some: learned persons, particularly the famous Joseph Scaliger and Bochart, have ingeniously conjectured that, from the stone erected into a pillar by Jacob, and his calling the place Bethel, came the word Cara used among the heathens, and especially the Phoenicians, to signify those rude stones which were consecrated as symbols of the Divinity, and in which they thought some divine power resided.* These were worship

ped by them, as statues and images were afterwards. And in this, as well as other instances, the rites and usages, which were. originally designed in honour of the one true God, were in process of time misapplied to the worship of idol deities. In, the Chron. Alexand. p. 89. it is said that the Assyrians were the first who set up a pillar to the planet Mars, and worshipped it as a god. Herodian mentions a pillar or large stone erected in honour of the sun, and called Eligabalus. And Pausanias, in Arcadicis, observes that, in the most ancient times, universally among the Greeks, instead of images, rude stones had divine honours rendered; σε ἄντι ἀγαλμάτων εἴχον agyoi Xícarías.” These were succeeded by statues and images, which at first had little workmanship, bestowed upon them; but as the arts began to flourish, and the worship of hero gods and goddesses became more in fashion, they were wrought up with great art and beauty. It was because pillars were so much abused to idolatrous purposes, that the religious use of them, as well as of statues and images, was expressly forbidden in the law of Moses. Levit. xxvi. 1. Deut. xvi. 22. The word in the Hebrew, in both these places, is Matzebah, rendered by our translators "a standing image," but, by the

* Scaliger Animadvers. in Euseb. p. 198. Bochart. Canaan, lib. ii. cap. 2. + Shuckford's Connect. of Sacred and Profane History, vol. I. p. 328, 329. VOL. I. Z z

Septuagint, ornn, "a pillar," as it is also in the margin of our Bibles; and thus it is understood by the Jews, as Mr. Selden has shown.*

Lucian, de Dea Syria, says, that the Assyrians derived the temples and statues of the gods from the Egyptians; but that anciently the temples of the Egyptians were without statues.+ It is certain, however, that the worship of images in the form of men, and other animals, had obtained in Egypt and the neighbouring countries, before the days of Moses, as appears from the prohibition of them in the second commandment, and which is more particularly expressed, Deut. iv. 16, 17, 18. But still there were several nations that did not as yet, nor for a long time after, worship images. Such were the ancient Persians, for which we have the testimonies of Herodotus, Xenophon, and Strabo. Clemens Alexandrinus informs us that the first image which was set up among them was a statue of Venus, by Artaxerxes, who, as Dr. Shuckford probably conjectures, was Ochus, in the latter times of the Persian empire. Bardesanes, as quoted by Eusebius, says that the Seres, a famous nation in India, had a law among them forbidding all worship of images. The same author observes concerning the Indian Brahmins, that, according to a tradition derived from their ancestors, they abstained from image worship. At what time images were first introduced among the Greeks, we have no certain account. But the use of them probably came into Greece from Egypt.

*De Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. ii. cap. 6.

† Lucian. Opera, tom. II. p, 657. Amstel.

According to Diodorus Siculus, the Egyptians began with the worship of the sun and moon, and thence proceeded to worship the elements, the earth, water, fire, and air; and at last came to worship animals and reptiles. Thus idolatry still grew and increased amongst them. And the abuse of the hieroglyphical characters and sacred symbols, which were in early use in Egypt, contributed not a little to it. Thus, under pretence of superior wisdom, the purity and simplicity of the ancient religion became more and more corrupted,

Shuckford, ubi supra, p. 346.

Euseb. Præpar. Evangel. lib. vi. cap. 10. p. 274, 275.