I860.] On certain Mediceval Jpolo/jues. 11 



are now no longer to be mapped out by the historian. Nor can we 

 trace the course which any particular apologue took, as it found its 

 way from land to land ; too often it acts per saltum in its progress, 

 and its intermediate history is concealed between its two appearances 

 in two different epochs and countries. The stream rises to the sur- 

 face in the far East and the far West, but its main current runs 

 underground. 



The first instance which I shall offer is one too well known to be 

 dwelt upon at length, but it is one too remarkable to be wholly omit- 

 ted in the present sketch, — I refer to the story of Abraham and the 

 Eireworshipper, which Jeremy Taylor subjoined as a colophon to his 

 Liberty of prophesying,* expressly adding that he found it "in old 

 Jewish books." I am not aware, however, that it has ever yet been 

 traced to the Rabbinical writings, and its spirit of toleration is wide- 

 ly different from the usual bigotry of the Talmud ; and Bishop Heber 

 has very plausibly suggested that Jeremy Taylor's memory deceived 

 him and that he had really seen it as a quotation from Sadi's Bostan. 

 It is thus quoted by Gentius in his preface to a translation of a 

 Hebrew History of the Jews published at Amsterdam in 1651 ; and 

 it is singular that it was added to the second edition of the ' Liberty 

 of Prophesying' published in 1653 — the first, published six years be- 

 fore, and therefore earlier than Gentius' work, not containing any 

 allusion to it.f 



Still any one who has seen the voluminous stores of mediaeval 

 Jewish writings, which fill the shelves of the Bodleian Library, can- 

 not but feel a lingering suspicion that Taylor in his omnivorous read- 

 ing may have met with the story as he states, — and that it may yet 

 be found by the Rabbinical student in some mediaeval Jewish book. 

 Bishop Heber in his note remarks that a learned Jew, Mr. J. D'Alle- 

 mand, professes to have a strong impression on his mind that he has 

 seen it in a Jewish commentary on Genesis xviii. 1. It is a favourite 

 story in the East, — it occurs in the Subhat ul Abrar of Jami as well 

 as the Bostan of Sadi,— and it may very probably be found in 

 Arabic, whence the Rabbis may have derived it as they derived the 



* It was here no doubt that Benjamin Franklin found it, though lie borrowed 

 it without acknowledgment. 



t See Bishop Heber's edition of Jeremy Taylor's works, vol. i. note xx. 



C 2 



