I58 ORIGIN OF MONACHISM. 



I The irrefiftible impulfe to folitude in Africa and 

 Alia, muft however firft be proved, before we enter on 

 the inveftigation of its proximate caufes. The manifold 

 and complicated occalions to it, muft be claffed ac- 

 cording td their firft rife and their inward effects; it 

 muft be fhewn, that fwarms of monks and hermits 

 originated in the defarts of iEgypt, as infects from the 

 impregnated mud of the Nile. Jews and chriftians, 

 heathens and mohammedans, poffefs in thofe countries 

 fo many qualities in common, that the extaftes of 

 divine infpiration are not eafily difcernible from human 

 enthuliafm and the tranfports of fanatical frenzy. 



Little republics of folitaries fprung up in early times 

 among the jews, after the venerable examples of Elifha 

 and Elijah, and the fons of the prophets ; who built 

 themfelves huts on the banks of Jordan, forfook the 

 noife and tumult of towns, and lived upon herbs: and 

 that of Jonadab, the fon of Rechab, and his children, 

 who all dwelt in the wildernefs. 



Fable or conjecture nearly fills the firft chapters of 

 every hiftory. It is thought, that, upon the firft 

 deftruction of the temple, fome fcattered jews took their 

 flight to wafte and folitary places; and there, on ac- 

 count of their privation of public worfhip, pafTed their 

 lives in contemplation, according to the much more 

 antient practice of the ^Egyptians, with which they 

 muft neceffarily have been well acquainted. Probably, 

 in procefs of time, thefe jews might come to believe, 

 agreeably to a maxim of long ftanding in iEgypt, that, 

 without temples and altars, in ferenity of mind and 

 cornpofure of heart, mankind might bring a pure and 

 acceptable offering to Jehovah their God. Probably 



this 



