very well known, to write upon. This is a matter of fact so that there needs not be much faid to prove it. Herodotus, who lived above four hundred years before our Saviour's time, mentions it as a very antient custom among the Ionians; "The "Ionians," fays he "have for a long time called their books, "fkins, because in the fcarcity of (Egyptian) paper, they "made ufe of goat-skins, and sheep-fkins; nay, and even in "our time, many foreign nations write upon fuch skins." Suidas cites out of fome antient author an account, probably older than the time of Herodotus, in these words "; " Hermion, દ writing down their determinations upon skins, sent them to "the enemy." Pliny indeed, out of Varro, gives us an account of the original of this fort of writing on parchment a long time afterwards, viz. in the time of Eumenes; which I think was near three hundred years before our Saviour's time. The account is this; that there being an emulation or ftrife between Eumenes and Ptolemy concerning their libraries (viz. whofe should be the largest), the latter being the King of Egypt, forbad the exportation of the Egyptian paper; whereupon Eumenes, King of Pergamus, first invented the use of parchment, and fo from Pergamus that material for writing was called Pergamena. The fame account, a little more full, is given us by Alexander ab Alexandro, in the place before cited. I fhall not now difpute concerning the time and antiquity of this invention: if it was even fo late as Varro's account, it is fufficient for my present purpose; for as soon as • Καὶ τὰς βίβλες διφθέρας και λέεσι ἀπὸ τὸ παλαιῦ οἱ Ἴωνες, ὅτι κοτὲ ἐν σπάνει βίβλων ἐχρέωντο διφθέρῃσι αἰγειησί τε καὶ οἰέησι· ἔτι δὲ καὶ τὸ κατ' ἐμὲ πολλοὶ τῶν βαρβάρων ἐς τοιαύτας διφθέρας γράφωσι. 1. 5. c. 58. I tranfate ἐν σπάνει βίβλων, in the fcarcity of Egyptian paper; because the word commonly fignifies fo, and nothing else can be meant. So the Latin tranflator paraphrafes it: Bílawv, i. e. Scirporum; per Biblum videtur potius intelligenda papyrus Ægypti; though this overthrows Varro's account, that this material for writing was found out, when Alexander was in Egypt. αὐτῶν γράψας ὁ Ερμίων ἔπεμπε τοῖς * Εἰς διφθέρας γὰρ τὰς διανοίας πολεμίοις. Suid. ad Διφθέρα. c Mox æmulatione circa bibliothecas regum Ptolemæi et Eumenis, fupprimente chartas Ptolemæo, idem Varro membranas Pergami tradidit repertas. Plin. Nat. Hift. 1. 13. c. II. Genial. Dier. 1. 2. c. 30. it was found out, the use of it became very common2; although I rather incline to think, Varro's story not to be true, as to the time, as Polydore Vergil has well obferved; and Dr. Edwards, and after him Dr. Prideaux & have more largely proved. 2. When they had wrote upon these skins of parchment, they were wont to faften them together, and roll them up. They did not cut the parchment into small pieces, as we now do our books; but all the book was wrote on one long continued page, confifting of several skins faftened together. To the end of the skins was faftened a large ftaff or stick, round about which they rolled up the fkins: this, when fo rolled up, they called Volumen, a volvendo, i. c. a volume or roll, and the staff about which it was rolled, they called Umbilicus. And hence we fo frequently in the Roman authors meet with Membranæ, for the material on which they wrote, Volumen, for the book itself when wrote, and ad Umbilicum ducere, to come to the end of the book. So Martial, in the laft epigram of his fourth book, fpeaking to his book, says, Obe jam fatis eft, obe Libelle, Fam pervenimus ufque ad Umbilicos. And, in another place, fays of his book, So also when he is speaking to a plagiary, that had stole his poems, he tells him, he fhould have rather made choice of a more obfcure book; I will not be at the pains to collect any more inftances, for the proof of this matter. It is fufficiently known to those, who are verfed at all in antiquity, and will more fully appear, when we confider, 3. That the Jews, long before our Saviour's time, did write their books after this manner. There cannot be the leaft doubt, but the Jews, as well as other nations, did make use of the skins of feveral animals to write upon, long before that period we mentioned; for Ariftaas, in his History of the Translation of the Bible by the Seventy, tells us, that Ptolemy fent messengers to Eleazar the high-priest for the Jewish Law, because they had it wrote in fkins, or parchment, in Hebrew letters. Jofephus alfo, who relates the fame history, tells us, that when the feventy-two elders were come down to Egypt, they came with presents to the King, and the parchments, in which they had the Law, wrote in letters of gold; that when they were unfolding the books, and fhewing them to the King, he was furprized at the fineness or thinness of the parchment, and that they were fo fewed or fastened together, that it was impoffible to perceive the feams, or the place where one skin was faftened to another. Whether the hiftory of Ariftaas, and this chapter of Jofephus, be true or not, I need not enquire; the world has been sufficiently troubled with that dispute already. There have been fome, who have even made the place of Jofephus now cited, an argument against this history. Rivet, for inftance, would persuade us, that the Jews never would write their Law in golden letters: and the very learned Chamier calls the ftory of Ptolemy's ad affutus; vel umbilici extremitates, quæ, complicatis in volumen membranis, utrinque apparent, cornua appellantur, ebore, argento, vel auro crnantur. Farab. ad loc. Sες alfc I. 5. Epig. 6. a d See Διὰ τὸ γράφεσθαι παρ' αὐτ τοῖς ἐν διφθεραῖς, ̔Εβραικοῖς γράμ pao. In init. * Τῶν διφθερῶν, αἷς ἐγεγραμμένες εἶχον τὰς νόμες χρυσοῖς γράμ μασιν ὡς δ ̓ ἀποκαλύψαντες τῶν ἐνειλημάτων ἐπέδειξαν αὐτῷ, θαν VOL. III. 1 miring the finenefs of the parchment, a λεπτολογία Οι μικροφιλο Tía; he means that it is an idle ftory, which deserves no credit. But, as I faid, I need not difpute the truth of the ftory; I take it for granted that Ariftaas, or whoever he was that was the author of that history under his name, lived before our Saviour's time. Dr. Hody a himself owns it, and has endeavoured to prove it; and if fo, let the history be supposed never fo false, yet it cannot be fuppofed a person would write of a cuftom, which never had been. The fame may be said also of the paffage cited out of Jofephus; viz. that he believed this was the method of writing among the Jews, in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, almost three hundred years before our Saviour's time. It is worth our obferving, that the moft antient Jews, as well as Jofephus, were of this opinion, that the old way of writing the Law was upon parchment; hence the Chaldee Paraphraft, supposed by the Jews to be Jonathan (who wrote the Targum on the Prophets, and lived in or before our Saviour's time), fays in his tranflation of these words, Deut. xxxi. 24. that Mofes wrote the Law 5 by upon parchment. Whether this be so or not, is very uncertain. Dr. Prideaux, it seems, is of the fame opinion; "It muft," says he, "be acknowledged, that the authentick copy of the Law, " which Hilkiah found in the Temple, and fent to King Jo"fiah, was of this material, none other used for writing being ." of fo durable a nature, as to laft from Mofes's time till then, "which was eight hundred and thirty years." However the matter of fact be, I will not now enquire; only obferve, by the by, the infufficiency of the Dean's argument; for 1. It is far from being evident, that the book, which Hilkiah found, was that which was wrote by Mofes. We are told expressly, that when Solomon, at the dedication of the Temple, brought up the ark, there was nothing found in it, but the two tables of ftone, which Mofes had put there, 1 Kings viii. 9. 2. Suppofe it was the book wrote by Mofes, it does not fol a Contra Hiftor. Arifteæ de LXX. Interpret. cap. 20. b Connect. of the Hift. of the Old Teft. Part 1, b. 7. in fin. low low that it was of parchment, because it lafted fo long; for the other materials of writing, made ufe of by the antients, were no less durable than this. A deep incifion into brass, lead, ftone, or perhaps wax, was, if duly preferved, likely to laft as long as any fort of ink on parchment. Mofes's tables of stone, we are affured, were in being at the dedication of the Temple, 1 Kings viii. 9. (which was the space of almost five hundred years), and very probably continued to the destruction of it; and other monuments of antiquity have continued legible a much longer time. But to return, it is evident from what has been faid, that the Jews before our Saviour's time did write upon parchment, or the skins of animals. I am now further to fhew, that they made their books after the manner that has been defcribed, viz. by rolling the skins upon a staff, when they were fastened together. Now inasmuch as we have few (if any at all befides the Canonical ones of the Old Testament) of the books of the Jews, that were wrote before our Saviour's time, it is impoffible to give fo clear an account of their way of writing, as of the Heathens, whofe books we have. Befides those testimonies of Jofephus, Ariftaas, and Jonathan, I know not any. Some intimations of this matter in the Old Testament indeed there are, which, if duly confidered, will evidence to us the manner of their writing. For inftance, it is apparent that the Jewish books were rolled up, from the name given them in the Old Teftament: as the Romans made ufe of the word volumen (a volvendo, from its being rolled up), to denote a book; fo the Jews made ufe of the words han and prsa, which fignify the very fame as volumen, derived from 5 to roll. The laft of these words we find, Ifai. viii. 1. God commands the Prophet to take ba mha, a large roll, and write therein, &c. The former we meet with feveral times in the Prophets, fometimes joined with the word E, a book, and fometimes not. It occurs once in the Pfalms, viz. xl. 7. as it is written concerning me in the volume of thy book, ban, i. e. in convolutione libri, or according to a very com a Jer. xxxvi, 2. 14. 20, &c. Ezek. ii. 9. and iii. 1, 2, 3. Zech. v. 1, 2 $ 2. mon |