ginning, lays Orpheus (a), the Heavens were made by God, and in the Heavens there was a Chaos, and a terrible Darkness was on all the Parts of this Chaos, and covered all Things under the Heaven. This Position is very agreeable to that of Mofes: In the Beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth, and the Earth was without Form, and void, i. e. was a Chaos, and Darkness was upon the Face of the Deep. Orpheus did not conceive the Heavens and the Earth to have ever been in one Mass, for as Syrian (b) observes, the Heavens and the Chaos were, according to Orpheus, the Principia out of which the rest were produced.

The ancient Heathen Writers do not generally begin their Accounts so high as the Creation of the Heavens and the Chaos, they commonly go no further backward than to the Formation of the Chaos, into a World. Moses describes this in the following manner : The Earth was without Form, and void, and Darkness was upon the Face of the Deep, and the Spirit of God moved

(a) Suid. voc. Opo: Cedren. ex Timol. p. 57. Procl, in Tim. βιβ. σ'. ρ. 117. (b) Ariftot. Metaph. p. 2.

upon

upon the Face of the Waters. Anaxagoras, as Laertius informs us, began his Book (a), All Things were at first in one Mass, but an intelligent Agent came and put them in order; or, as Ariftotle (b) gives us his Opınion, All things, says he, lay in one Mass, for a vast Space of Time, but an intelligent Agent came and put them in Motion, and fo Separated them from one another. We have Sanchoniathon's Account of Things in Eufebius, and if we throw aside the Mythology and false Philofophy which those that lived after him added to his Writings, we may pick up a few very ancient and remarkable Truths, namely, that there was a dark and confused Chaos, and a Blast of Wind or Air, to put it in a Ferment or Agitation; this Wind he calls ἄνεμο. Κολπία, not the Wind Colpia, as Eufebius seems to take it, but ἄνεμC Col-Pi-Fah, i. e. (c) the Wind or Breath of the Voice of the Mouth of the Lord; and if this was his Meaning, he very emphatically expresses God's making all things with a Word, and intimates also what the Chaldee Paraphraft infinuates from the Words of Mofes, that the Chaos was put into its first Agitation by a mighty and strong Wind.

Some general Hints of these things are to be found in many of the Remains of the ancient Greek Writers. Thales's Opinion was, that the first Principle of all Things was ύδωρ, or Water (a). And this Tully affirms to (b) have been his Opinion; but it should be remarked from Plutarch's Observation, that Thales's ὕδωρ was not pure Elementary Water. The Successors of Thales came by degrees to imagine, that Water, by being condensed, might be made Earth, and by being rarified would evaporate into Air; and some Writers have hence imagined, that Thales thought Water to be the Initium Rerum, i. e. the first Principle out of which all other Things were made: But this was not Thales's Doctrine. The ancient Philosophers are said to have called Water, Chaos, from χέω the Greek Word,

(α) ̓Αρχιὼ τῶν πάντων ὕδωρ ὑπεςήτατο, Laert. (b) Lib de Natura Deorum 1. §. 10. Thales Milefius Aquam dixit effe Initium Rerum,

which signifies Diffusion, so that the Word Chaos was used ambiguously, sometimes as a proper Name, and fometimes for Water; and 'tis conceived, that this might occasion Thales's Opinion to be mistaken, and himself to be represented as afsferting the Beginning of things to be from Chaos, Water, when he meant from a Chaos. But take him in the other Sense, afsserting Things to have arisen from Water, 'tis easy to suppose him to mean, by Water, a fluid Substance, for this was the ancient Doctrine; and thus Sanchoniathon argues, from the Chaos he supposes מור or Muddy Matter to arife; and thus Orpheus (a), out of the fluid Chaos, arose a muddy Substance; and Apollonius (b), Out of the muddy Substance the Earth was formed, i. e. fays the Scholiaft, the Chaos of which all things were made, was a fluid Substance; this, by settling, became Mud, and that in time dried and condensed into folid Earth. It is remarkable that Mofes calls the Chaos,

(α) Ἐκ τῷ ὕδατο ἱλὺς κατέση. (6) Ἐξ ἰλῶ ἐβλάςησε χθὼν ἀυτή.

Water,

Water, in this Sense; the Spirit of God, he says, moved upon the Face of the Maim, Waters, or fluid Matter.

The Fragments to be collected from the Greek Writers are but few and short, the Egyptian are something larger. According to Diodorus (a), they affert, 1. as I have before hinted, That the Heavens and Earth were at first in one confused and mixed Heap. 2. That upon a Separation, the lightest and most fiery Parts flew upwards (b), and became the Lights of Heaven. 3. That the Earth was in time drained of the Water. 4. That the moist Clay of the Earth, enlivened by (c) the Heat of the Sun, brought forth living Creatures, and Men. A very little Turn would accommodate these Particulars to those of Mofes, as may be seen by comparing the Account of Diodorus that which is given us by the Author of the Pimander in Jamblichus. The ancient Philosophy had been varioufly comment

(a) Lib. 1. (b) This was the Opinion of Empedocles. Εμπεδοκλῆς πυρινὰ τὰ ἀτραὸν τὸ πυρώδες, ὅπὲρ ὁ αἰθὴρ ἐν ἑαυτῷ πεειέχων ξέθλιψε κατά τιώ πρώτω διάκρισιν. Plutarch. Placit. Phil. 2. 13. (c) Τὰ ζῶα ἐκ ἱ ἰλύΘ γεννηθῆναι, wας α Pofition embraced by Archelaus, and feveral other Greeks.

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