29- 



ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



their Shajla^ the Unity of God is maintained ; at the fame time they 

 believe in the dodrine of the Trinity, as well as the Egyptian Priefts 

 did, from whom Plato no doubt learned it: And the Indians have a 

 type of the Trinity, which I do not think improper. It is a triangle 

 infcribed in a circle *, where we have reprefented the three in one^ 

 and the one in three. They maintain alfo the Providence of God, 

 and his Government of the world, by inferior fpirits, particularly by 

 one fpirit, whom they call Bi'ama, from whom, he fays, the Bra- 

 mins have their name. In this book is alfo maintained the free will 

 of Man, and his abufe of that free will by his rebellion againfl God, 

 which produced his fall, as well as that of the Angels, from a hap- 

 py ftate to the ftate he is in at prefent ; and this fall of man is alfo 

 a docSlrine of Plato, and wJiich, I am perfuaded, he likewife learn- 

 ed in Egypt. To his prior happy ftate, he cannot be reftored without 

 going through feveral ftages of purgation and purification : So that 

 here we have, laid down, both a pre-exiftant ftate of Man, and a future 

 ftate of rewards and puniihments. In his ftate of purgation Man 

 paffes through the body of feveral other animals, till he comes into the 

 body of a cow f ; and from thence he pafles again into the body of 

 a man. Now, this dodlrine of Metempfychofis^ or Trail/migration^ 

 was an Egyptian do£lrine, as Herodotus informs us, and came from 

 Egypt to Greece, where it was adopted by fome philofophers, par- 

 ticularlv by Plato. And there is one thing of their popular reli- 

 gion, which they have alfo taken from Egypt ; and that is the Phal- 

 los^ which, as Herodotus tells us, was worihipped and carried about 

 in proceflions in Egypt : And the fame adoration is paid to it at this 

 day in the kingdom of Bengal:]:; and I have no doubt, but, by 

 the wife men of both countries,, it has been confidered as a type or 



fymbol 



* La Croze's ChrLftianlty of India, p. 294, 



t Hohvell, p. so.— 5 1. See alio Dow's Hiftory of India concerning Tranfmigration, 



P- 43- 



X See Dow's Hiftory of India. 



