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the numbers given by him are thoroughly and entirely unauthentic. The 
nations around Rome must have been more prolific than rats and mice, if the 
numbers are correctly represented. (Laughter.) The account is entirely and 
purely unbelievable. Go further back, and you find still the same thing. 
Take the invasion of Greece by Xerxes. Two eminent historians, Thirlwall 
and Grote, have analysed the numbers said to have been employed by 
Xerxes in his invasion. Now I apprehend that it is impossible that an 
invading army should vastly exceed the population of the country itself ; but 
it is stated that Xerxes carried with him 5,000,000 people, the whole num- 
ber of his fighting forces amounting to 1,800,000. How would it have been 
possible to have procured provisions for them? The moment Xerxes 
advanced beyond Thermopylae, he advanced into the native country of his 
enemy, and it would have been impossible to have got provisions. After the 
battle of Salamis, the whole number melts into the clouds, and the remnant 
is found to consist of a very small number indeed. The great difficulty would 
have been to advance such numbers at all, but after the destruction of the 
fleet I ask how was it possible in Thessaly to find provisions for such a vast 
number as between 300,000 and 400,000 ? These numbers show that, m all 
history constructed upon the mere accounts of popular tradition the universal 
tendency is to exaggerate enormously. Herodotus, who occupied the same 
position in point of age with regard to the Persian war that I should occupy 
with regard to the first American war, gives us an account of the Persian 
war ; and the numbers of the Persians engaged at another battle— the battle 
of Marathon— are according to him most incredible. He tells us that they 
were taken out in 600 triremes, which we know were inconvenient vessels for 
stowage. But I need not go further to show that there is a universal ten- 
dency amongst mankind greatly to exaggerate numbers when they cannot 
derive them from authentic documents. So with regard to the rapid mode 
employed by Xerxes for computing the size of his army. . According to 
Herodotus, space was made for 1,000 men, and he marched his men into it ; 
but who can tell whether they filled the space or not, especially as we know 
that in the late war, when the danger at sea was past, our ships were found 
to be not half manned, although on paper the number was swelled. I know 
in one case one person who was supposed to be in the navy fought all his 
battles in the parsonage-house of my own father. (Laughter.) I know the 
man who did it. I think I have established the fact that the tendency to 
exaggerate numbers is unquestionable. With regard to the sacred writers 
themselves, I think that certain portions of the sacred books have been 
actually composed out of other previously existing books. I think I take a 
safe ground in supposing that these numbers might probably have been 
merely transposed out of other then existing books, out of which the con- 
fusion has originated, those previously existing books having been composed 
not from authentic documents, or careful comparisons of numbers, which 
we know is very difficult, but from general or popular belief. That would 
account for some of the great exaggerations contained in the Scriptures. I 
will not go through all that 1)?. Thornton has given us. In the mam he has 
