kings of Israel, from Jeroboam to Hosea, has a good character given him by the historians; and their history is indeed that of assassinations, treachery and war:' for all were apostates from God, and idolaters, and most of them cruel and murderous usurpers. The tyranny and persecution of Ahab and his family had been so detestable; that if a Brutus had stabbed any of them; or a modern convention had doomed them to the scaffold; the deed would have been applauded by men of Mr. P's principles: but when God employed Jehu to execute his righteous vengence on them, it becomes murder and assassination,

Ahab's seventy descendants, whom Mr. P. speaks of as smiling infants,' were most of them at least grown men: and they were slain by the elders of Jezreel, who had been Jezebel's instruments in the murder of Naboth and his sons. We are no more required to vindicate the conduct of Jehu, in these transactions; than to insist on the virtue of the executioner, in justifying the punishment of a murderer. (2 Kings x, 29-31; Hos. i, 4.)

In Judah, from David to Josiah inclusive, comprising nearly four hundred and fifty years, the throne was filled with David's posterity in lineal descent: nor was there all the while, one revolution, or civil war; and but one short interruption by Athaliah's usurpation. The reigns of David, Solomon, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Jotham, Hezekiah, and Josiah, amount together to three hundred and thirteen years of this period; to which may be added the year of Joash, during the life of Jehoiada, with the latter years of Manasseh by far the greatest part of these years were passed either in profound peace, or remarkable prosperity. Of the whole number of kings, two were slain in battle, (2 Kings ix, 27; xxiii, 29.) three were murdered by their own servants, none of whom succeeded to the throne, all the rest died natural deaths. (2 Chr. xxiv, 25; xxv, 27; xxxiii, 24, 25.) Let any impartial man, then, compare the state of Judah, from the accession of David, to the death of Josiah, with the same term of years in the history of Greece or Rome; and he will be constrained to allow, that the condition of Judah was far preferable. How many revolutions, usurpations, murder of reigning kings, and civil wars carried on with savage cruelty, occur in the history

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of England, during the space of four hundred and fifty years? yet who thinks this a sufficient reason for indiscriminate railing against the English nation.

The wickedness of the nation of Israel was doubtless very great; and was severely punished, as directly contrary to their holy law and peculiar obligations. It decisively proves the depravity of human nature: yet when compared with the conduct of other nations, even Greece and Rome, it suffers nothing by the comparison. But the crimes of idolaters are concealed or excused: while those of God's professed worshippers are painted in the most horrid colours, that ingenuity and malignity can devise, and aggravated by palpable and shameful misrepresentations: and all this, in order to expose the scriptures to obloquy and contempt!

Mr. P. asserts that the genealogy from Adam to Saul takes up the first nine chapters of Chronicles:' but he who will for himself examine them, will see how little Mr. P. knew of the subject, and how entirely incompetent he is for his bold attempt.

The books of Chronicles are not, as many inadvertently suppose, a repetition of the books of kings: but consist in a considerable degree of history, not contained in those books. The second book of Chronicles especially contains the history of Judah exclusively, from the revolt of the ten tribes under Jeroboam, and gives a much more copious narrative, than that found in Kings. The latter resembles a history of England and Scotland carried on together, with continual transitions from the one to the other. The books of Chronicles resemble the history of England alone; in which the affairs of Scotland are only mentioned, when connected with those of England.

What does Mr. P. mean, by reviling the historians as 'impostors and liars,' because they do not relate exactly the same events? Had they written the history of the same kingdom, they surely would have selected the peculiar facts, which they deemed it proper to record: for no historian can record every thing. But the writer of the Books of the Chronicles had nothing immediately to do with the affairs of the kingdom of Israel. He who writes the annals of England is not bound to relate the edicts and

I

acts of the French convention: and should some writer, in future ages, on this ground assert that the historians of England and France did not believe one another, they knew each other too well;' he would not obtain much credit, either for his candour, or his penetration. Now the instances adduced by Mr. P. as omissions in Chronicles, belong to the history of Israel, not of Judah. The other objections to these books, are too frivolous to need any answer. Ezra and Nehemiah.

Mr. P. speaks of Ezra and Nehemiah, as if they_reEturned with the first Jews from Babylon. He says, 'The book of Ezra was written immediately after, or about five hundred and thirty-six years before Christ, and Ne“hemiah was another of the returned persons, who wrote an account of the same affair. This only shews his consummate ignorance of the contents of these books. The temple, after many delays, was completed some time before Ezra arrived at Jerusalem; which occurred, in the judgment of the most competent chronologers, nearly eighty years after Cyrus's decree. Nehemiah obtained his commission thirteen years afterwards, and relates none of the same events. The difficulties, concerning the genealogies, however solved, are no proof that the whole history is false, or uncertain.

Mr. P. seems to allow that Ezra and Nehemiah wrote the books ascribed to them: but he says, 'they are nothing 'to us.' Surely he forgets, that the prophecy of Jeremiah was extant when the book of Ezra was written, and the liberation of the Jews by Cyrus, was a declared fulfilment of Jeremiah's predictions. Ezra i, 1. We may also add, that these two books so constantly refer to all the preceding parts of scripture, at least from the days of Moses; that they fully prove these books to have been then extant, and received by the Jews as authentick records of divine authority and this concession fully confutes all his assertions and conjectures, about the time when the books of Moses were forged, and first known to the Jews.

Esther.

'If Madam Esther,' says Mr. P. thought it any honour

to offer herself as a kept mistress to Ahasuerus, &c.' Now where did he learn, that Esther thus offered herself to be the king's kept mistress?' Certainly, not from the history itself. Such calumniating, and groundless insinuations, too much resemble the conduct of hypocritical priests, who say, if the people chose to be deceived, let them be deceived.'

CHAP. III.

FROM JOB TO SOLOMON'S SONG.

Job.

a

Mr. P. speaks respectfully of this book; but tries to prove it of Gentile extraction. Certainly Job was not an Israelite, and probably the book was written before the promulgation of the Mosaick law. It coincides, however, so fully with the other Scriptures, both in its doctrines and standard of holy practice, that no part of the Old Testament speaks more strongly of human depravity, of the impossibility of man's justifying himself before God, of " "Redeemer who would stand at the latter day upon the "earth," and of the resurrection from the dead; or of the presumption of our reasonings against the works and ways of God: and the New Testament scarcely exceeds the delineation of that law of love, by which Job avowed that he had regulated his conduct: comp. Job xxix, xxxi, with Matt. v-vii; Rom. xii.—The word SATAN, is not mentioned,' says Mr. P. 'except in Job.' The reader may judge of the accuracy of this dashing writer, even in respect of the English Bible, by turning to the following texts. 1 Chr. xxi, 1; Ps. cix, 6; Zech. iii, 1, 2.

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He says Pleiades, Orion, and Arcturus' (Job ix, xxxviii, 31, 32.) are Greek names; and that the Jews were so ignorant of Astronomy, that they had no words answer" able to them.' And this also proves, that he is merely a reader of the English Bible, for the Hebrew contains no such words, but has Chima, Asp, and Chesil in the place of

them. Besides which, neither Job nor the writer of the book was a Jew.

Psalms.

If "the Spirit of God spake," by the Psalmist; most, if not all of those passages, which Mr. P. (following a number of less inflammatory objectors,) calls revengeful,' were prophecies, and denunciations of divine wrath, on the enemies of the promised Messiah; which have undeniably, and most tremendously been accomplished. Mr. P. considers the Psalms of David, to be nothing but a collection from different song-writers. Undoubtedly the book forms a collection of the most beautiful odes, and the most exalted strains of heavenly devotion extant in the world; compared with which, the odes of Anacreon, Pindar, and Horace, appear, in general frivolous, and in most things earthly, sensual, devilish."

The Psalms ascribed to David, so wonderfully coincide with his history, as recorded in the books of Samuel, that they reciprocally establish each other's authority. Several Psalms, however, were written by other prophets and no sober man ever thought that David wrote the 137th Psalm. But it serves the purpose of buffoonery thus to consider it; and gives occasion to the writer of declaiming against the imposition of the Bible, and of diverting his readers. with the whimsical fancy of a man's walking in proces'sion at his own funeral.' But is this becoming an enquirer after truths of the highest possible importance?

Proverbs.

At a time, when Mr. P. had no Bible, he decided, as he informs us, that the Proverbs of Solomon were inferior to those of the Spaniards, or to the maxims of Dr. Franklin! He now, however, allows that there is some wisdom in them. But as he considers the Psalms as a song-book; so he seems, consistently enough, to regard the Proverbs as a jest-book. It was the fashion of those days to make ' proverbs, as it is now to make jest-books.' If so, that was THE AGE OF REASON; and this is the Age of folly; for surely, wise Proverbs are more reasonable, than profane, obscene, and scurrilous jests, which abound in modern jestbooks.