Chap. VII. A N T I E N T M E T A P H Y S I C S. 169 



The antient Chriflians, and even the mod learned among themj 

 iuch as Eufebius and Origin, believed that the antient oracles pro- 

 ceeded from Dacnrions, and were not mere prieftcraft and impofture ; 

 but that they had ceafed upon the coming of our Saviour*. That 

 the Egyptian oracles wrere the predidlions of Daemons, to whom it 

 vpas permitted to reveal future events, I have no doubt; and that they 

 were given by the fpirits of fome of thofe Demons, who had reigned 

 over them. Of thefe Herodotus has given us a catalogue ; they were 

 Hercules, Apollo and Minerva, Diana, Mars, Jupiter and Latonaf, 

 But I make a diftindion betwixt the oracles of the Egyptians 

 and thofe of the Greeks, as well as betwixt their Gods. The Gods 

 of the Greeks were men, and born of men, as Herodotus has very 

 plainly told us J : For they were men who had either come from 

 Crete, (originally I am perfuaded from Egypt), or were born in 

 Greece, to whom the Greeks gave the names and titles of Egyptian 

 Gods, and afcribed to them the attributes and adventures of thefe 

 Gods ; whereas I think I have proved, that the Egyptian Gods 

 were Dsemons, that is Beings fuperior to men. And if that be ad- 

 mitted, 



* See upon this fubjefl a very pretty little work of Fontenellc, entitled, Hijioire dt 

 Oracles. 



\ Lib. 2. chap. 83. 



X Lib. 1. cap. 131. The expreffion he ufes is '«»^j«Ti)?'t(E;{, an epithet he never ap- 

 plies to the Egyptian Gods, whom it is evident he thought to be Gods, or at lead 

 beings very much above men : And accordingly he every where mentions them with 

 rCTcrence, and obferves a religious filence with refpeft to their anions and fufftrincs : 

 Taara ftci 'iv^tcfix zariti, is his common cxprcffion upon that occafion. It appears that 

 he was defirous to conceal even that they were mortal beings : And accordingly he 

 does not mention the places where they were buried, though it is evident that he knew 

 them. The Egyptians, he tells us, had what they called hm/iXa, the name they gave to 

 their myjlerks, in which were reprefented the actions and fuffcrings of their Gods. 

 (Lib. 2. cap. 171,) In thefe I am perfuaded Herodotus was initiated, under the vow no 

 doubt cf fecre y, which made him obfcrve that religious filence with refpeft to thefe Gods. 



Vol. IV. y 



