mi 



i« cavilling against revelations, the stone which he has laboured up 

 the mountain, falls back, to frustrate his weak efforts, and to crush 

 himself He tells us, * that the prophecies relating to the myste- 

 rious birth of the Messiah were mere effusions of metaphorical 

 poetry, and signify no more than " the sun rising in the constel- 

 '■' lation of Virgo ;" the twelve apostles were mere imaginary things, 

 meaning but the twelve signs of the zodiac ; and all " the pre- 

 " tended personages from Adam to Abraham, are mythological be-» 

 " ings, stars, constellations," and so on. 



Such is the self-delusion of sophisticated learning. But, let us-, 

 perceiving in what this wretched arguer would suppose to be 

 mere arbitrary establishment, its real bearing ; — acknowledging 

 it as the hieroglyphic of primaeval prophecy, thus gloriously 

 recorded — let us rank the extorted confession of this connexion 

 as a collateral proof of the truth of our general argument — such a 

 proof of truth, as the short-sighted perversion of infidelity will ever 

 amply afford. 



In putting together the foregoing coincidences, to form a chain 

 of circumstantial evidence concerning the allegory of this mystical 

 emblem, I hope I have succeeded in throwing some light upon an 

 interesting subject : if I have, the utility of this research does not 

 rest merely in an abstract inquiry into the nature of an obsolete 

 custom, or the explanation of an image no longer of any conse- 

 quence to mankind. It has aimed at nobler and more important 

 results— to elucidate the congruity which exists, not only 

 throughout God's establishments, but his sacred and revealed vo- 

 lumes—to bring Genesis, and the Apocalypse, (the books the most 



VOL. XIII. R 



• Ruins Ch. 22, &c. 



