170 A N T I E N T M E T A P H Y S I C S. Book IL 



mitted, I think there can be little doubt, that the oracles, afcribed to 

 them, did truly proceed from them. But as the Greeks had no 

 Gods, fuch as thofe of the Egyptians, neither had they any Das- 

 mons, who uttered oracles to them. Their oracles, therefore, we 

 cannot fuppofe to have proceeded from any fupernatural power, but 

 from mere men, fome of them, 1 think, of very fuperior under- 

 ftanding. Such was the oracle that was given to the Athenians, 

 when they confuked the Delphic God what they fhould do, when 

 they were attacked by that prodigious army of Perfians commanded 

 by their King Xerxes. The advice they got was, to trujl to their 

 •wooden ivalls; given, like mofl of the oracles, in ambiguous terms ; 

 and which accordingly was mifunderftood by fome of the Athenians, 

 who thought it applied to fome wooden walls of their Citadel ; but 

 being rightly interpreted by Themiftocles, to mean theiry7j//ii, it faved 

 Greece, and, I think, I may add, all the arts and fciences that we have 

 wot from Greece, which I believe would have been loft if Xerxes had 

 then conquered that country. At the fame time, 1 am of opinion, that 

 there was a good deal of prieftcraft and impoflure in thofe Greek ora- 

 cles, particularly in later times, many of which were deteded about the 

 time of our Saviour's coming, and which 1 believe was the true caufe 

 of their ceafing at that time *. But with refpcdl to the Egyptian 

 oracles, there is not the lead evidence of any impoflure in them, 

 though it may be true, that all their refponfes might not be ex- 

 adly true ; for the Daemons were not infallible : Nor does it ap- 

 pear, that thofe, who had the diredlion and fuperintendence of thofe 

 oracles, had any Intereft to falfify thein, fuch as the Priefts of Delphi, 

 and of other oracles in Greece, had., who were generally very v^^eli 

 paid for their refponfes. 



With refped, therefore, to the Egyptian oracles, a material part o£ 

 their religion, by which they were dlreded in the condud of their 



public 

 J Sec Fontonelle's work before quoted^ 



