Jews. Though at first the Law prohibited the Jews from fo much as naming the Objects of the Worship of the Heathens by their Names; and tho' lower down we find a Decree among the Jews to excommunicate fuch as should study the Philofophy of the Gentiles; and tho' no doubt the Gentiles had Laws to prohibit the Study of the Jewish Books; and tho the Heathen had us'd Characters which had Reference to the Parts of their Worthip, and so could not use the Characters of the Jews, but made their own Characters, Letters each in their own Language, which besides their Ufe as Letters or Representatives of Sounds retain'd their mystick Meanings, and were alfo Representatives of the Things or Actions they had fignified in the Attributes of their Gods, or the Rites of their Religion : There may be some good Reasons to allow Explanations, from what we can know of such Words in Books of those Languages writ afterwards. As we have no other Books preserv'd which were writ by those who perfectly understood the Language of the first Books of the Bible; each of the Authors of the Paraphrafes, or Translations preserved, save what they had by Tradition, had but the fame same Rules as we have, that is, to compare the several Passages where each Word was us'd in the Sacred Books; and those who followed successively after, to compare them also with the Thoughts of the Authors who, as aforesaid, in the Declenfion of that Language, had paraphrafed upon these Books, or of their Cotemporaries in neighbouring Languages, or of those who had used the fame Words in human Writings. If it happen'd that the first Paraphrafer or Tranflator by Mistake or any Opinion of his own, or otherwife, happen'd to fix a wrong Tranflation upon any Word, or a wrong Sense upon any Sentence, or, but one, where the Word has feveral coherent Senfes, which the Word or Sentence could tolerably bear; they or the next would be inclin'd to apply the fame Signification, as near as poffible, where the fame Word or Words occurr'd; and I am afraid there might be other Reasons than Ignorance, or Mistake, for Defects, particularly concerning the Words I am endeavouring to fet right: If the Jews who return'd from the Chaldean Captivity, or those of their Pofterity who writ the Targums, &c. understood the Meaning of the Jewish Worship, that it was directed to keep them out of the Crimes they suffer'd for; 'tis no wonder that they evaded explaining the Meaning of the Particulars, and the Meaning of the Objects, and Forms in their falfe Worship, to hide as far as they could the Bafeness of those of their Fore-fathers who had offended. ''Tis as improper to confult with any one of that Race, about the natural Powers, which the Heathens and fome of their Fathers took for God, about the Idolatry, Forms and Manners of the Worship of that false God, or of the Signification or Intent of their Law which was adapted, or of the Scripture which was most of it writ to cure them of those Crimes; as 'tis to confult with the Perfons in any of the Cases stated by the Author of Ecclefiafticus, xxxvii. 11. & feq. And while they were under the Dominion of the Chaldean Governors, or afraid of their Power, if they had been inclin'd to give an Account of their Gods, befides that it was expofing those of their Fathers, who had been guilty, they durft not infert any thing which exprefly ridicul'd that false Worship; and if any fuch Books were writ before or then, no doubt but the Chaldeans would do what they could to destroy them; and the Cafe would be the fame, when they were un der der the Grecians and the Romans: Nay, if the Bible had been writ, or the LXX. had explain'd it openly with respect to their particular Gods, they without a continu'd Interpofition of fupernatural Power must have been destroy'd; so to explain them now, we must, together with Mofes's Relation, first confider the Names and Attributes which the Natives of Canaan, &c. gave to their God, which are recorded in Scripture, left standing, Hebrew, or as they pleas'd to point and pronounce them in our Tranflations; and which the Lexicons from the Jewish Rabbies have made this, or that, or any thing; and try to explain them by the Ufage of those Words in Scripture, and by the Claims which Gods made of those Names and Attributes, first to himself, and secondarily to the Agents, which he claims by Creation and Formation; because it will appear, that a great part of their Religion and their Philofophy was the same; and that though their Religion was false and disapprov'd, their Philosophy was true, and approv'd by God, and fo will discover an unknown Treafure; and though it be not the Business of this Part to meddle with those Points of Worship; and though I shall chiefly pursue the Title; yet as they and it are thus coupled together; I shall be forced to en ter ter a little into them, because together, by degrees, they will shew us, that there had been a Revelation of the Powers and Motions in this System from the Beginning, or before Mofes, without writing: That acknowledging, that God created and form'd the Parts of the Heavens into a Machine, so as of its felf to continue Motion, and each of its Powers; and so as to move some Things, produce other Things, &c. and that it acts as fuch without any other, or incommunicable Power, and is still subject to God, inwardly in the Heart, and outwardly by proper Emblems, Actions, or Words, was the first and natural Service, or Religion, prior, and of a Nature infinitely superior to the moral Law: And amongst those where the Knowledge was retain'd, and the Revelation loft, or rejected, acknowledging in the Manner aforesaid, that this Machine acted as independent of God, or that it had some incommunicable Powers in its self, would be Religion without a God, and in that Senfe Natural Religion; and was the Religion of the ancient Gentiles or Heathens; and that the ceremonial Law or Religion of the Jews was to inculcate the first natural Service, and to oblige them to perform the Acknowledgments to |