76 



the edition of the Asclepian Dialogue by Ficinus, as he ap- 

 pears to have had a more correct manuscript in his posses- 

 sion than any that have been consulted by more modern 

 editors. Of this the learned and at the same time philo- 

 sophic reader will be immediately convinced, by comparing 

 this extract with the same part of that dialogue in the most 

 modern editions of it. In the second place, that this dia- 

 logue is of genuine antiquity and no forgery, is, 1 think, 

 unquestionably evident from neither Lactantius nor Augus- 

 tin having any doubt of its authenticity, though it was their 

 interest to have proved it to be spurious if they could, be- 

 cause it predicts, (which is the third thing especially deserv- 

 ing of remark,) that the memorials of the martyrs should 

 succeed in the place of the temples of the Gods. Hence 

 Augustin concludes this to be a prophecy or prediction made 

 instinctu fallacis spirittis, by the instinct or suggestion of a de- 

 ceitful spirit. But that this prediction was accomplished, is 

 evident, as Dr. Cudworth observes in his True Intellectual 

 System of the Universe, p. 329, from the following passages 

 of Theodoret, which I shall quote as translated by the 

 Doctor. " Now the martyrs have utterly abolished and 

 blotted out of the minds of men the memory of those who 

 were formerly called Gods." And again, " Our Lord hath 

 now brought his dead (i. e. his martyrs) into the room and 

 place (i. e. into the temples) of the Gods ; whom he hath 

 sent away empty, and bestowed their honour upon these his 

 martyrs. For now, instead of the festivals of Jupiter and 

 Bacchus, are celebrated those of Peter and Paul, Thomas 

 and Sergius, and other holy martyrs." Antoninus the philo- 

 sopher #lso, according to Eunapius, predicted the very same 

 thing, viz. that after his decease the magnificent temple of 

 Serapis in Egypt, together with the rest, should be demo- 



