known, how could it be received as true? If it was copied from a known pre-existing document, how could it be received as being itself the original? Besides, it is natural for the spectator of events to connect every circumstance with the place where it happened. An inventor of fiction would not venture upon this, as it would facilitate the detection of his falsehood; a compiler long subsequent would not trouble himself with it, except in some remarkable cases. The very natural and artless manner in which all circumstances of this nature are introduced in the Pentateuch, increases the probability of its being the work of an eye-witness who could introduce them with ease, while to any body else it would be extremely difficult and therefore unnatural, since it would render his work much more laborious, without making it more instructive.

All these things bespeak a writer present at the transactions, deeply interested in them, recording each object as it was suggested to his mind by facts, conscious he had such authority with the persons to whom he wrote, as to be secure of their attention, and utterly indifferent as to style or ornament, and those various arts which are employed to fix attention and engage regard, which an artful forger would probably have employed, and a compiler of even a true history would not have judged beneath his attention.

The frequent repetitions, too, which occur in the Pentateuch, and the neglect of order in delivering the precepts, are strong proofs that it has come down to us precisely as it was written by Moses, at various times, and upon different occasions, during the long abode of the Israelites in the wilderness. Had the Pentateuch been re-written by any later hand, there would in all probability have been an appearance of greater exactness; its contents would have been digested into better order, and would not have abounded with so many repetitions. To these considerations we may add, that no other person than Moses himself could write the Pentateuch; because, on comparing together the different books of which it is composed, there is an exact agreement in the different parts of the narrative, as well with each other as with the different situations in which Moses, its supposed author, is placed; and this agreement discovers itself in coincidences so minute, so latent, so indirect, and so evidently undesigned, that nothing could have produced them but reality and truth, influencing the mind and directing the pen of the legislator.

The account which is given in the book of Exodus of the conduct of Pharaoh towards the children of Israel, is such as might be expect

large, but had frequent access to the court of its sovereign; and the minute geographical description of the passage through Arabia, is such as could have been given only by a man like Moses, who had spent forty years in the land of Midian. The language itself is a proof of its high antiquity, which appears partly from the great simplicity of the style, and partly from the rise of archaisms, or antiquated expressions, which in the days even of David and Solomon were obsolete. But the strongest argument that can be produced, to show that the Pentateuch was written by a man born and educated in Egypt, is the use of Egyptian words, which never were nor never could have been used by a native of Palestine; and it is a remarkable circumstance, that the very same thing which Moses had expressed by a word that is pure Egyptian, Isaiah, as might be expected from his birth and education, has expressed by a word that is purely Hebrew."*

SECTION I.

INFIDELS object against the credibility of the books of Judges, Kings, and Chronicles, that they are anonymous, therefore of no authority. They also assert of the books of Joshua and Samuel, that they are not their genuine writings, therefore they also, being anonymous, are without authority. There is a great difference between the authenticity and the genuineness of a book. The term authentic is applied to any record which relates what are facts or truths; but the term genuine is applied to a book when it is known by whom it was written, but has no reference whatever to its being a book containing facts or truths. A work may be truly genuine, that is, every word contained in it may be written by the person whose name it bears, yet it may consist altogether of falsehoods. Infidels, however, in their zeal against the Scriptures, wantonly confound the term genuine with the word authentic. If a book contains the truth, it is not important who wrote it; therefore the fact of its being anonymous does not destroy its authority. Doomsday-book is anonymous, and it was written upwards of seven hundred years ago, yet the English courts of law do not hold it to be without authority as to the matters of fact related in it. The American Almanac, the Reviews, &c. are all anonymous, yet they are not considered of no authority. On the contrary, they are now admitted, and in after ages they will be

⚫ Horne's Introduction to the Study of the Scriptures, pp. 59-62.

received as authoritative evidence of the civil, military, and literary history of America and Europe. Therefore, with the exception of such books as, by the writers of the Scriptures themselves, are ascribed to certain individuals, it is of no importance who wrote the historical books of the Old Testament.

All the objections of any importance, in relation to the authority of the books named above, the reader will find fully answered in the replies to the objections urged against the genuineness of the Pentateuch, with one exception, that is, an objection against the genuineness of the book of Joshua, founded on the occurrence in that book in several instances of the term unto this day. Thus, in chap. viii. 28, it is said, "And Joshua burned Ai, and made it an heap forever, a desolation unto this day;" and in the 29th verse of the same chapter, where speaking of the king of Ai, whom Joshua had hanged and buried at the entering of the gate, it is said, " And he raised thereon a great heap of stones, which remaineth unto this day." From this Mr. Paine infers, that the book must have been written long after the death of Joshua. When it is considered that Joshua lived twenty-four years after the burning of Ai, if he wrote his book in the latter part of his life, and no evidence can be adduced to the contrary, with every propriety he might say, Ai is still in ruins, or Ai is in ruins to this very day. A young man who had witnessed the funeral of Gen. Washington, twenty years after that, speaking of the fact, might with propriety say, his remains are in a tomb on the bank of the Potomac to this day. But what utterly destroys the force of Mr. Paine's objection is, that in the narrative of the destruction of Jericho it is said, "Joshua saved Rahab the harlot alive, and her father's household, and all that she had; and she dwelleth in Israel even unto this day," that is, unto the day or time when this passage of the book of Joshua was written.

Of the Pentateuch, Mr. Paine says: "The style and manner in which those books are written, give no room to believe, or even to suppose they were written by Moses, for it is altogether the style and manner of another person speaking of Moses. In Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers, (for every thing in Genesis is prior to the time of Moses, and not the least allusion is made to him therein,) the whole, I say, of these books is in the third person; it is always, the Lord said unto Moses, or Moses said unto the Lord: or Moses said unto the people, or the people said unto Moses; and this is the style and manner that historians use, in speaking of the persons

may speak of himself in the third person; and therefore it may be supposed that Moses did; but supposition proves nothing; and if the advocates for the belief that Moses wrote those books himself, have nothing better to advance than supposition, they may as well be silent." To this it has been justly observed in reply, that Zenophon, Cæsar, and Josephus use this manner of writing, when they relate the very transactions in which they were themselves the principal agents or parties. It is true that supposition proves nothing; but facts prove a great deal; and the writer of the Pentateuch evidently introduces Moses as "speaking of himself in the third person." The prophetical benediction of Israel is recorded in this manner: "And this is the blessing wherewith Moses, the man of God, blessed the children of Israel before his death." "And he," that is Moses," said, the Lord came from Sinai, and rose up from Levi unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them. Yea, he loved the people; all his saints are in thy hand, and they sat down at thy feet; every one shall receive thy words. Moses commanded us a law, even the inheritance of the congregation of Jacob. And he was king in Jeshurun, when the heads of the people and the tribes of Israel were gathered together," &c. Now without doing the greatest violence to language, we must necessarily suppose, that all that here follows the introduction is given, as contained in the address of Moses to the people.

As we have undoubted testimony that this manner of speaking was very ancient, no good reason can be given why it should not also be used in writing. Jacob, in his blessing, speaks sometimes in the first, and sometimes in the third person. The same mode of expression is attributed to Balaam; "Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he took up his parable and said, Balaam, the son of Beor, hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said," &c. Can any one doubt that Matthew and John wrote the Gospels ascribed to them, merely because they speak of themselves in the third person?

Mr. Paine proceeds: "But granting the grammatical right that Moses might speak of himself in the third person, because any man might speak of himself in that manner, it cannot be admitted as a fact in those books, that it is Moses who speaks, without rendering Moses truly ridiculous and absurd: for example, Numbers, chap. xii. ver. 3: "Now the man Moses was very meek, above all men which were on the face of the earth." If Moses said this of himself, instead of being the meekest of men, he was one of the most vain and

arrogant of coxcombs; and the advocates of those books may now take which side they please, for both sides are against them; if Moses was not the author, the books are without authority, and if he was the author, the author was without credit, because to boast of meekness is the reverse of meekness, and is a lie in sentiment.”

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The objection here urged by Mr. Paine, certainly comes with an ill grace from one, who was so careful to inform mankind of his great consequence, both as a political and as a theological writer, appears from the following passages: "I wrote Common Sense the latter end of the year 1775, and published it the 1st of January 1776. INDEPENDENCE was DECLARED the 4th of July following. I was seized with a fever. It was then that I remembered with renewed satisfaction, and congratulated myself most sincerely, on having written the former part of the Age of Reason. I have produced a work that no Bible believer, though writing at his ease, and with a library of church books about him can refute." Any reader can decide whether this language or that attributed to Moses, discovers "one of the most vain and arrogant coxcombs," especially if it be considered that he who was at such pains to record his own excellencies, and the great benefit resulting to society from his labors, did not give an equal evidence of his credibility by recording one of his errors.

The apparent self-praise in the statement of Moses, even had he made it, is no more an objection to his credibility, than his unexampled impartiality in recording his errors. They both must be attributed to inspiration; for if that self-love, which is natural to all men, and which prompts the generality of writers to draw a veil over their faults, did not hinder Moses from recording his own obstinacy, unbelief, sinful wrath, and judicial exclusion from the land of promise; it is unnatural to suppose that he was under the influence of this principle when he was expressing the singular meekness of his temper; especially as he must have viewed it as a gift of God, qualifying him for his arduous work, and therefore as no proper ground for boasting. But nothing is more common than for the adversaries of revelation to separate one part of its evidence from the other, although essentially connected.

But it appears that Moses made no such statement as attributed to him by our translators. Dr. Adam Clarke in his comment on the passage says, "The word is not rightly understood; anav, which we translate meek, comes from anah, to act upon, to humble, depress, afflict, and is translated so in many places of the Old Testament, and