called the Mercy-Seat is the Base of two winged Images, which in our Mother Tongue are called Cherubim, which the Greeks interpret Much-Knowledge. Some, from the oppofite Pofition of their Faces, make them Symbols of the two Hemifpheres, the one above, the other below the Earth; for the whole Heaven or Air is in a conftant Rotation. But I understand by these Figures the two most antient and fupreme Potentates of him who is ; the one the Framer, the other the Governor of the World. The one named God, by whom he created and framed the World, the other the regal Potentate, called the Lord, by whom he rules over his Creatures by his Will and Pleasure: As he alone exifts, he is in reality the Creator of all things, for he brought them into Being, when they had no Being: And he is King by Nature, or naturally, for none can have a jufter Right to rule the Creature, than the Creator." Let us hear what his Commentators fay, of whom two in the fame Words, Sybilline Oracles, &c. p. 308. and Spencer of the Laws of the Jews, p. 764. (construing 27" the powerful and great one, and Might, and Strength,") fay, "That Philo confirms this Conftruction, p. 465. who delivers it as his Opinion (and

no

no doubt but he had it from the Jews) that the Cherubim reprefent the two Potentates of the Effence, the creative and the regal: And that the Mercy-Seat was the Symbol of the merciful Power or Potentate of God: We have therefore great Reason to believe the Word Cherub had, among the antient Hebrews, the Signification of Power, &c."

After all the Pains our Author has taken to allegorize this to nothing, his two Powers or Potentates, and his Word the Conciliator on the Mercy-Seat between them, will not anfwer. For though 'tis certain the real Word appeared emblematically upon the Mercy-Seat, his other two Potentates do not at all correfpond with what was exhibited in these two Figures: Though, in attempting to evade what they exhibited, and to make us believe they were what he pretends, he tells us some Spirit ('tis certain, if any, fome evil Spirit) told him; and he pretends to fancy he could make us believe what they were; the two Figures are exactly like each other; cach had one Body, and four Heads or Vifages, which are not a Sign of much, or many Intelligences, but of only four. They and the Propitiatory Seat were of one entire Piece of Gold. The Figure at one End H 2 had

had two of the four Faces or Intelligences, fuppofe thofe of the Lion and the Man, inward; and the other Figure had the other two Faces or Intelligences, the Ox and the Eagle, inward; fo that two beheld two, and all four the Mercy-Seat. And the other two Faces in the firft Figure, the Ox and the Eagle, muft look outward; and in the fecond Figure, the Lion and the Man must look outward; fo all four look outward to the Walls of the House, emblematically behold all other things. And though what he fays, that one of these Potentates is reprefented as taking Revenge, and another very beneficent, and that that fhews us he knew the Design of this Exhibition, yet he wants two Intelligences in cach Figure. And, if we take in his Word, there will still want one, a Man in each.

-But though he was not fo honest as to give us them all here, he has in his Way told us how many there were elsewhere. P. 464."The Chief is the creative Power or Potentate, by which the Creator framed, the World; the next is the regal, by whom by Virtue of Creation he rules his Creatures. The third, the propitious or merciful Potentate, by whom the Maker has Pity on his Creatures. The fourth the legiflative, by whom what is not fit to be

done,

done, is prohibited. P. 1140.-The first regards the Effence exifting, the fecond the Word of that Effence, who is called (Berith, Diathekee) the Covenant; the third the wife-one, the fourth the proficient *."

That we may avoid the Objections merry Mortals may make; suppose it be true that fuch a Covenant as we mention was made in the highest Heavens, and that they were pleased to exhibit it here, before Writing was, for the Information of Man, and for a Memorial, as the Bow in the Cloud. Man could not fee them, they could not use the Archtype in Miniature, because those three have no Faces. Angels could not be seen; and if any Figures had been agreed on to reprefent them by, that would have fhewn them Parties to the Covenant,

From this Specimen, gentle Reader, you may form a Judgment of Philo, whom the learned Dr. Mangey, after wearying his Brain and his Subscribers Patience for upwards of twenty Years, has lately published: And recommends to the World as an Author much fuperior to the Jewish, and little inferior to Chriftian Writers, who has faid nothing concerning the divine Word or Logos, but what the Authors of the Gofpels have confirmed; and who, before the Writings of St. John, St. Paul, and St. Luke, has given us almost the very fame Ideas of this Mystery as they do. Does not the Man who afferts this plainly evince that he underftands neither what the infpired Writers, nor what his own Author means? And when Perfons take upon them to be Teachers of Divinity fo ill qualified, not to harangue, but to give the true Senfe of Scripture, no wonder the People halt between God and Baal.

1

which was impoffible.. 'Tis faid 1 Pet. i. 12. that the Angels have defired to look into these things; but none fave Parties had any Bufinefs. The Figures of Men could not be used; because one of them was to be a Party, fo he was really exhibited. But, if the other three had been like Men, the Figure would not have been exhibited, the taking of Man into the Effence. So the Bull, the chief of the tame kind; the Lion, the chief of the wild kind; and the Eagle, the chief of the winged kind, themfelves Rubbim, were properly used. If these three had only been exhibited, they, though Types, might have been called Aleim: But as the Man was taken in, and made one of them, they could not be called Aleim, the Names; nor by any other Word which is only used for the Perfons of the Effence. Indeed, in Ezekiel they are faid to be instead of the Aleim. Since the firft Exhibition at Paradife the Heathens made these three the Emblems of their Trinity; the Ox Fire, the Lion Light, the Eagle Spirit; which they, as I have fhewed, called Rubbim, which three are appointed Rulers; and under thofe Names many things in Scripture are not only faid of them, but of the eternal Three. And in that phyfiçal Senfe the Names, or Appearance of

thefe