it will not be right to omit. The first is that fearful one mentioned in scripture, when the king of Moab, to avert a calamity, "took his "eldest son that should have reigned in his "stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall." The other shall be that of the great "mystical offering," as it was called, which we are told existed as a religious rite of the greatest importance and solemnity among the Phoenicians: and this cannot be laid before the reader, in a more interesting form, than that which the late analyst of ancient mythology has given it. After having shewn that the most approved sacrifices among the Phœnicians were those of men, yet that even among these they made a difference, and some were in greater repute than others, he proceeds to tell us, that the greatest refinement in these cruel rites was, when the prince of the country, or a chief person in any city, brought an only son to the altar, and there slaughtered him by way of atonement, to avert any evil from the nation at large.

Abp. Magee has also increased the number of authorities on these painfully interesting subjects in his inestimable work on the atonement. It is remarkable, in what a large proportion of cases, these inhuman sacrifices were connected with grove and garden worship in every part of the world.

This last was properly the mystical sacrifice. We are informed that the custom was instituted in consequence of an example exhibited by Cronus, who is said to have been a god, and likewise a king of the country. It appears that this deity was called by the Phœnicians, Il; and in other places he is spoken of as the principal god. He had by the nymph Anobret one only son, who for that reason was called Jeoud, which in the language of Phoenicia expresses that circumstance. This son, in a time of great danger, either from war or pestilence, Cronus is said to have arrayed in a royal vesture, and to have led him thus habited to an altar, which he had constructed, and there sacrificed him for the public weal, to his father Ouranus. Such is the history, in which, if there be no more meant, than that a king of the country sacrificed his son, and that the people afterwards copied his example, it is an instance of a cruel precedent too blindly followed; but it contains in it nothing of a mystery. When a fact is supposed to have a mystical reference, there should be something more than a bare imitation. Cronus is said to be the same as Il, which is the identical name with the El of the Hebrews; and according to St. Jerome, was

one of the ten titles of the true God.* Il, or El, was the same as Elioun, who is termed by Sanchoniathon, "the most high." He had no one superior or antecedent to himself, as may be proved from the same author. Cronus, therefore, could not, according to the principles of the very people appealed to, have sacrificed his son to his father; for he was himself the chief and original deity, and had no one above him to whom he could make such an offering. Ouranus, to whom he is erroneously thought to have exhibited this sacrifice, is the same as Il, or El, and Elioun; being another title of the same person. Thus it is clear who the deity was, whom the Phoenicians are supposed to have copied in this particular; and that nothing could have preceded for them to imitate, but that what they did was a type and representation of something to come. It is the only instance in the Gentile world of any sacrifice which is said to be mystical; and it is attended with circumstances which are very extraordinary. Cronus, we find, was the same as El, and Elioun; and he is termed Yoros The Most High, and

Youparios The Most Heavenly. He is more

Υψουράνιος

over said to have had the Elohim for his

* Hieron. Epist. ad Marcellam, 136.

coadjutors: he had no father to make any offering to, for he was the father of all, and acknowledged as Κύριος Ουρανe The Lord of Heaven, by the confession of the author, by whom the account is given. These sacrifices, therefore, had no reference to any thing past, but alluded to a great event to be accomplished afterwards. They were instituted probably in consequence of a prophetic tradition, which had been perhaps preserved in the family of Esau, and transmitted through his posterity to the people of Canaan. The mystical sacrifice of the Phoenicians had these requisites, that a prince was to offer it, and his only son was to be the victim and as it has been shewn that this could not relate to any thing prior, let us consider what is said upon the subject as future, and attend to the consequence. For if the sacrifice of the Phoenicians was a type of another to come, the nature of this last will be known from the representation, by which it was prefigured. According to this, El, or Il, the supreme deity, whose associates were the Elohim, was in process of time to have a son, ayannтov, well beloved, povoyevn, his only begotten; who was to be conceived and born of Anobret, which, according to Bochart, signifies of grace, or, according to another interpretation, of the

fountain of light. He was to be called Jeoud, whatever that name may relate to; and to be offered up as a sacrifice to his father, Xurpov by way of satisfaction and redemption, τιμωροις δαίμοσι, to atone for the sins of others, and avert the just vengeance of God; αντι της παντων φθορας to prevent universal corruption, and at the same time general ruin. And it is further remarkable, he was to make this grand sacrifice βασιλικώ σχηματι KEKOOμEVOS invested with the emblems of royalty. These, surely, are very strong expressions; and the whole is an aggregate of circumstances highly significant, which cannot be the result. of chance. Certainly, therefore, this mystical sacrifice was typical of something to come; and how truly it corresponds with that to which it is imagined to allude, must be submitted to the reader's judgment. It must necessarily be esteemed, at all events, a most wonderful piece of history.*

I would just observe, further, that in this

* Bryant, vol. vi. 323-333. See further, Bochart, Can. ii. 2. p. 790. Vossius de Orig. et Prog. Idol. i. 18. 143. Huet. Dem. Evang. p. 116. The three last learned authors all acknowledge the traces of the celebrated Abrahamic offering, Gen. xxii. Gale may be also consulted with great advantage.