what things our Scriptures tells us of the Miracles of Christ and his Apostles are all Fictions and Tales This he saith more than once And yet he doth not pretend to prove the Writers of them were Lyers or to shew any Inconsistence either in the Miracles themselves or in the Accounts that are given of them So that he expected Men should take his Authority for this But why so He could say nothing of these matters on his own Knowledge for he writ in the Emperour Hadrian's time or something later and that was at least 50 years after any of those Miracles that are mentionâ—d in our Scriptures Nor doth he pretend to have any ground to say this either upon hear-say or from what he found in former Writers If he had referr'd us to other Writers it would have been very great News For of all that have written in the times of Christ and his Apostles there is none Iew or Heathen that makes any mention of their Miracles which is a plain sign they knew not what to say against them Otherwise they would have spoken as spitefully of them as they spared not to do of Christ himself But how could Celsus answer this to his own Conscience that whereas of the Miracles wrought by Christians in his own time he saw there was no denying the matters of fact and therefore he affirmâ—d that these Miracles were wrought by Invocation of the Devil which was the same in effect that by his own telling the Iews said of the Miracles that were wrought by Christ and his Apostles he should nevertheless have the Impudence to say that these were Fictions and Tales as if He knew Christ and his Apostles better than the Iews in whose Country they liv'd and whose Ancestors were conversant with them or as if Christ himself could not work as true Miracles as were done in Celsus's time and to his own knowledge by Christians that wrought their Miracles in his name This learned man took surely a likelier way to disparage the Miracles of Christ to the unthinking part of Mankind by likening the great things that are said of Christ to those that we read of Aristeas Proconnesius and of Abaris in Heathen Writers But they that Think what they read will consider that of the former of these the first account we have is from Herodotus and he tells it only by Hear-say He says they say that Aristeas died at Proconnesus and appear'd there again 7 years after and having made some Verses disappear'd but that two or three hundred years after he appear'd again at Metapontum where by special direction from Apollo he was worshipped as God Of Abaris Celsus tells us himself that he had such a Power or Faculty that he rode about upon an Arrow through the Air over Mountains and Seas in his Travels out of Scythia into Greece and back again into Scythia as both Porphyry and Jamblichus tell us at large These things Celsus tells us without any Censure as if he believ'd them to be true And so they are as much as his Book is a true Discourse which is the Title he gives it Whoever considers these Stories I think will not much regard the Iudgment that He passeth on the Miracles of Christ and his Apostles But the Way that he took to bring them in disgrace by ranking them with those incredible Fables this took mightily with the learned Heathens that came after him And therefore I doubt not it was that both Philostratus writ the life of Apollonius Tyaneus and that Porphyry writ the Life of Pythagoras which led me into this Digression They seem to have been written both of them with this design I am sure they are both of them made use of to this purpose to shew that all the great things that are told of our Saviour in the Gospel were equall'd if not out-done by these Heathen Philosophers As for Porphyry his hatred of the Christian Religion he shew'd sufficiently in writing 15 Books against it the Loss whereof though some of our Deists complain of yet they may be assur'd for their comfort they will not want the help of any of our learned men to bring them to light We want them indeed on many accounts but especially to shew them that as they have Porphyry's malice so if they had his great Learning too both these join'd together would not hurt the Christian Religion We should want his Books the less if we had any of those Answers that were written against him by three learned Christians Methodius Eusebius and Apollinaris But as Holstein well observes the Roman Empire being turned Christian within very few years after the writing of these Books as the Emperors took care by their Edicts to keep them from coming into the hands of the Vulgar so for learned men they had now no occasion to transcribe them or preserve the copies that were written Of the time of Porphyry's writing these Books we have nothing certain save that we are told they were written when he was in Sicily And the time of his coming thither as he tells us himself wâ—s about the 15th of Galienus the Emperour that is about the year of Christ 267. He acknowledgeth that being in Rome at that time he had a mind to kill himself which Plotinus discover'd and upon his chiding him for it he left him and went away into Sicily What it was that enraged Porphyry to that degree that he must needs kill himself he doth not say Probably it might be out of madness to see That Emperour's favour to Christians whom his Father Valerian had done all he could to destroy If that was the reason of this Philosopher's being weary of his life he had some ease within a few Months in the death of that Emperour and then a Succession of others that wanted only a fit season for the renewing of the Persecution And it might be as well to quicken them to that Woâ—k as to ease his own passion that he set himself to the writing of these Books Wherein as all that quote from them observe he out-did all others in virulent Railing and Scoffing at the Christian Religion As for his Arguments it cannot be imagined that there was any thing of strength in them more than what Julian the Apostate took into the work that he writ afterwards on that Subject And to our comfort as well as the Deists That work is not lost It hath been often published with Cyril's answer to it but never so much to the Reader 's advantage as now lately in the excellent Spanhelm's Edition Whether it was before or after these Books that he writ the life of Pythagoras we cannot certainly know for the life it self is imperfect both at the beginning and the end and the whole Book is but a part of his History of the lives of Philosophers But whereas these lives of his as Holstein observes were all made up of
Patches taken out of the ancient Writers and so is this among the rest yet here after all the heap of stuff that he hath collected from others concerning the life of Pythagoras at last he brings in those stories of Miracles wrought by him part of which are in no other Writers and the rest he hath made his Own by vouching for them as I have shewn This I cannot imagine why so wise a man should do but in pursuance of his malicious design against the Christian Religion by making his reader believe that the Miracles of Christ upon which the credit of our Religion is built were of no greater credit themselves than those which were wrought by Pythagoras That I am not mistaken in this the Reader will see in the following instance of Hierocles who writing some few years after Porphyry had so highly advanced Pythagoras set him up in Competition with our Lord Iesus Christ as I shall presently shew Hierocles being chief Iudge at Nicomedia in Diocletâ—an's time was a chief Instigator of that bloody Persecution that was then against the innocent Christians And to justifie this he writ two Books against the Christian Religion which he publish'd under the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a lover of Truth No doubt by these means he won the heart of the Emperour Galerius who was the first mover of that Persecution and therefore by him he was advanced to the most profitable Government of Alexandria in Egypt There also he went on in his butcherly Trade till an end was put to it by the wonderfull Providence of God which by Constantine's means brought Christianity to be the Imperial Religion Then Hierocles betook himself wholly to Philosophy and among other things writ his Commentary on the Golden Verses that bear the name of Pythagoras which I mention to shew how much he was addicted to the honour of Porphyry's Saint Of his two Books against the Christians it seems that Eusebius saw but One and of that he tells us the most part was stollen out of Celsus and was long since answer'd by Origen It appears that in that work of Hierocles to pull down the honour of Christ he first set up Aristeas as Celsus had done next he sets up Pythagoras and lastly Apollonius Tyaneus All this we learn out of that Fragment of Hierocles which is publish'd in the end of his Works and also at the end of Eusebius's answer to his Book though Eusebius medleth only with that part which concerns Apollonius because that was all that was New in this Controversie In this piece Hierocles having magnified Apollonius Tyaneus for the great things that were recorded of him by Philostratus in his life and having vilified our Lord Iesus Christ whom the Christians as he saith on the account of his doing a few 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 call a God he concludes in these words It is worth the considering that those things of Iesus are brag'd of by Peter and Paul and some others of that sort of men Liars and Illiterate and Impostors but for these things of Apollonius we have Maximus and Damis a Philosopher that lived with him and Philostratus men eminent for their Learning and lovers of truth What a Lover of Truth Hierocles himself was we are to judge not by the title of his Books but by the things contained in them And though his Books against the Christians have been lost many Ages since as those blasphemous Books of Porphyry were yet here we have a kind of Summary of them in this Fragment For here we see in short what he had to say against the Apostles of Christ and what to say for the Evangelists of Apollonius whom he sets up against him and it cannot be denied that on either side the truth of the matters of fact is to be judged of chiefly by the sufficiency and the honesty of the Witnesses Therefore knowing what he has to say of them we know in effect the validity of all that is contained in his Books First In his charge against the Apostles of Christ to say that Paul was Illiterate this was certainly an impudent Calumny For beside his knowledge of the Greek that was his native Language wherein also we see he writ a large Epistle with his own hand and quotes the Greek Poets in several of his Epistles I say beside this he had the Hebrew Learning in great perfection being brought up at the feet of Gamaliel a Doctor in great fame among the Iews to this day And he gave such proofs of his Learning before the Roman Governour and King Agrippa that the Governour said too much learning had made him mad So far was He from calling him an illiterate Man Then to call him and Peter Liars and Impostors what occasion did they give him for this Only by their Preaching and Writing for the Christian Religion But did they believe that Religion or not If they did suppose they might err in this yet they could not be Liars and Impostors for they both knew and writ that all such are in a state of Damnation according to the rules of their Religion But if they did not believe it then indeed they might do wicked things for their Religion if that would recommend them to the Emperour's favour and so to get preferment as Hierocles did But they were so far from that the Government being against their Religion that they could get nothing by it but Dangers and Sufferings Those they met with in all places wheresoever they preach'd And they look'd for nothing else in this world but Sufferings and those to end in a cruel Death for Christ's sake This both of them declared in the last Epiples they writ And in this we see they were not mistaken For both of them suffer'd Martyrdom as Clemens tells us in his Epistle to the Corinthians which he writ within two or three years after their death the truth of which Epistle hath never been question'd by any learned man whatsoever But what shall we say of a man that was perfectly Blinded with Prejudice and Malice or with Ambition and Covetousness If Hierocles had not been so he could not but have seen that those two Apostles of Christ had nothing about them that would suit with those two ugly characters of Liars and Impostors But he had those in his eye that would certainly have been taken by those marks if there had been a hue and cry after them I can't think any learned man in his Age being asked Of all the Writers whose Works were then extant which was the greatest Liar would name any other than Philostratus I am sure he could not if he would speak impartially And yet this Philostratus and his two Authors Maximus and Damis known to none but himself are the men whom Hierocles calleth Learned Men and Lovers of Truth And for an Impostor if such a one had been enquired for I know not whom a learned man
greatest of them in his Age. These learned men no doubt had seen the Books that he publish'd namely his four Books of Iudicial Astrology and his Books of Sacrifices to shew what sorts of them would best please every God I find no other Books that he writ And these could not but confirm those Philosophers in their opinion of him We have these things and much more of this kind from Philostratus whom we have reason to believe in these things though not in many other for in these he agrees with him that lived nearest Apollonius's time Of all the Writers now extant the nearest to the time of Apollonius was Lucian as I have shewn And what opinion he had of him we may see in his account of another of the same Trade one Alexander a Famous Impostor Lucian tells us of this Alexander that being at first a handsome Youth he was abused by one of Tyana that made him his Catamite This execrable Sodomite being as Lucian saith not only a Countryman of Apollonius but also one of his Companions that knew all His way of acting the part of a Philosopher to make this young man the more passive to his Lust train'd him up to Magic and taught him the use of Charms and made him a great Proficient in all the other arts of Cheating in which he excell'd This is all that we have of Apollonius from Lucian And we had not known so much of him as this but that Lucian having occasion to speak of a Companion of his that set up at his Trade and took Apprentices at it thereupon brings him in as the Master-workman of his Age in all that way of Diabolical Practice This was the Reputation he had as it seems till above a hundred years after his Death Then outcomes this Book of his Life compos'd as I have shewn out of unknown Memoirs brought into the World by an unknown hand They are said to have been Brought to the Empress Julia as I have shewn That might be though they were first born in her Court She might as well order the first Devising as the composing of them inâ—o a History Philostratus owns that what he did was by Her order And she was her self a Philosopher as he tells us a great Intriguer all acknowledge No doubt she had very great reasons for such an extraordinary thing as this was to canonize a Magician a hundred years after his death and to advance him even to be a God Whether she had a mind this way to draw off her Son the young Emperor from the esteem he had of the Christians whom he favour'd on his Nurses account that was of that Religion or whether to do honour to a Disciple and inâ—imate Friend of the Magi that were Noted to lie with their Mothers and thereby to countenance her wicked design of drawing her Son to her Bed These are but Conjectures But whatsoever the matter was it was She as Philostratus owns that set him upon the design of writing the Life of Apollonius at such a rate that whoever believ'd it could not but look upon him as a fit Rival for our Blessed Saviour Her and her Son Caracalla I take to have been the Emperours that order'd him to be worshipped at Tyana where he was born That Emperors did order this Philostratus tells us in a Chapter which I take to be an addition to the end of his Book And sure this could not be done by any Emperors before Lucian's time For if it had he durst not have writ those things that I have quoted from him Considering also that her Sister or Neice Mammaea the Mother of Alexander Severus was a Christian I do not wonder at that which Lampridius hath in this Emperors Life Where he saith he had the Images of Christ and Apollonius together in his Lararium Of his Mother he had his Birth and Education and it was his Aunt Julia that rais'd him to that Greatness in which being to furnish a Closet for his Devotion he thought to please them both in setting up his Aunt 's God together with his Mother's As the bigotted Heathens could not but be pleas'd with the Honour done to Apollonius in order to the Lessening of our Blessed Saviour so no doubt the Devil would promote it what he could And therefore I am inclin'd to be of Dr. More 's opinion that the Devil might make that appearance to Aurelian in the name of his Saint Apollonius to perswade that incensed Emperor to spare his City of Tyana for his sake Tho' otherwise it is not improbable that Vopiscus might Invent this part of his History For as my most learned Friend Mr. Dodwell shews he writ it in the first heat of Diocletian's Persecution and dedicated it to the Praefectus Urbis who had the same concern in this matter at Rome that Hierocles had at Nicomedia And by the high Encomium he gives Apollonius out of a Greek Book as he tells us which could be no other than his Life written by Philostratus it is plain he had the same wicked design with Hierocles namely to set up this Magician for a Rival to our Saviour and thereby to bring Contempt on his holy Religion and on all them that suffer'd and died for it in that Persecution But when Godâ—s time was come to set up the Kingdom of Christ three or four Emperors that Oppos'd it with the utmost Malice and Rage were successively taken away by the visible hand of God the Iustice whereof two of them at their death did acknowledge Then the Devil being thrown out of Heaven all his Angels fell with him Christianity came to be the establish'd Religion And Then to use the Phrase of a Gentleman that had more Wit than did him good Religion having taught the people to say Grace there was no more danger of the crooked Pin in the Pudding those palpable Lyes of Apollonius would not go down and so for ought I find Hierocles quite lost his labour Next Jamblichus who as Eunapius saith in his life was a greater Scholar than his Master Porphyry and who was no less a Hater of Christians yet living under Christian Emperors a she did all the time of his age for writing Books he durst not write Professedly against the Christian Religion But taking this to be a safe way he went on with his Masters design of setting up Pythagoras to be a Rival to our Saviour In order to this he took up all the stuff that Porphyry in his life of Pythagoras had gather'd ready to his hand He worked it over again his own way oftentimes making use of Porphyry's words Then for farther Embellishment he added out of his own Invention whatever he thought would either adorn his Subject or promote the design of his Writing His design was plainly to subvert the Christian Religion But so as not to run himself in any danger on that account
and therefore without ever mentioning Christ or Christians which he could not do in this Book without seeming to make some kind of reflection upon them he only endeavours to make Pythagoras and those of his Sect out-shine them in the Lustre that he gives them with his Eloquence such as it is Which together with other Services that he did to the cause of Heathenism against the Christian Religion did so far endear him to Julian that wretched Apostate that after he came to shew himself which was not till he took the Empire upon him he writ more Epistles to Jamblichus than to any other while He was living and after his Death never mentioned him but with the highest Encomiums calling him sometimes the Hero sometimes the Divine Jamblichus and one whom he admired next the Gods Julian having been sometime a Reader in the Church might very well understand him as I do in the following instances of his Book which I take to have been written in a kind of Abusive imitation of the Gospel Namely where he tells us how the Mother of Pythagoras being with Child of him which was more than her Husband yet knew was brought by him to the Oracle of Apollo Pythius at Delphi and there the Prophetess told him both the first News of his Wife's Conception and also that the Child she then went with should prove the greatest good to Mankind Thereupon he saith her Husband changed his Wife's name from Parthenis to Pythais and afterwards when the Child was born call'd him Pythagoras as being foretold by Apollo Pythius for so he saith that name signifies Jamblichus will not take upon him to say as he tells us some Others did that the Child was of Apollo's own getting but he saith none can doubt it was one of Apollo's Companions in Heaven that came down to be the Soul of that Child He should have said rather one of Pluto's Companions in Hell for the Soul of Pythagoras came then out of Hades if Pythagoras himself may be believ'd But Jamblichus was aware that Pythagoras overshot himself sometimes and did it particularly in his account of the Stages that his Soul pass'd thro' in it's Travels Therefore Jamblichus takes notice of no other but Euphorbus in whom that Soul formerly dwelt He smuggles all the other Names we have mention'd not only from his Master Porphyry but even from Pythagoras himself But however he saith it hath been affirm'd by many and that with great probability that Pythagoras was the Son of God Nay that he was one of the Heavenly Gods that then appear'd upon Earth for the Good of Mankind a greater Good than ever did come before or should ever come after His Disciples indeed could not agree among themselves what God he should be Some would have it that he was Apollo Pythius others that he was Apollo Hyperboreus others that he was Aesculapius others that he was one of the Daemons that dwelt in the Moon They that said he was Apollo seem'd to be the greatest number and they had the greatest Authority on their side even his Own for so Pyth. himself told Abaris to entitle himself to the Money as we have shewn that he was the very God himself and proved it by shewing him his Golden Thigh such as it seems Abaris had told him that the Image of his God had in Scythia But then lest Abaris should ask him what he made Here Pythagoras added that he put on human Shape that Men might not be afraid to Converse with him as they would if they knew the Excellence of his Person and so they would deprive themselves of the benefit of his Doctrine Such stuff as this runs through his Book which being written for the deifying of an Impostor plainly shew'd that the design of it was to Banter the Gospel of Christ. He begins like one of the Heathen Poets with invoking the Gods and Pythagoras to assist him in the Work How he ended it we cannot tell for his Book is imperfect But probably he continu'd it with an account of this Impostor's Disciples in imitation of the Acts of the Apostles In short as well for History as for Doctrinal matters from one end to the other it hath so much of the Devil in it that it seems to have been wholly written by his Inspiration But all this I do acknowledge to have been a Digression as well as all the rest of what I have written that doth not concern the Writers of Pythagoras's Life For it was my proper business to shew of what credit They are as to matter of History Now the two chief of these being Porphyry and Jamblichus who were great Philosophers themselves and such great Admirers of Pythagoras as they shew in the writing of his Life one ought to expect they would have taken care to gather all that was True of him out of all the former Historians and to have mingled nothing with it that was Inconsistent with the truth of History How well they have perform'd this in other respects I shall not take upon me to examin But I shall take account of it only as to matter of Chronology And that I think sufficiently sheweth how much at random it is that Jamblichus pretends to give the Years of Pythagoras's Life and his chief Actions and Events and also how grosly both He and Porphyry before him have abused their Readers in the accounts that they give us of his principal Disciples As to the years of Pythagoras's Life Jamblichus tells us that it was much about his XVIII year that he set out to Travel and that after some time which I take to be IV years spent in other Countries he came into Aegypt and there he stay'd XXII years He goes on and says that the Philosopher being taken there by Cambyses's Soldiers was carry'd to Babylon and there he stay'd XII years and then return'd home to Samos being now about LVI years old There he stay'd for some time it should seem for another IV years and then in Olympiad LXII he went into Italy There he says he govern'd his School XL years wanting I and lived in all very near C years So Distinct an account as this is of the years of Pythagoras's Life whereof there is not the least Item in any of the ancienter Writers did I confess not a little rejoyce me when I first met with it and so much the more because of two Certain Notations of time by which if they were true all those years might be reduced to the like certainty There is nothing better known in ancient History than the year of Cambyses's conquering Aegypt We are certain it was in the end of the third year or the beginning of the fourth of Olymp. LXIV So that according to Jamblichus this was the very year of Pythagoras's being carry'd to Babylon And the time of his going into Italy is as certain according to Jamblichus