wherein all the reason and philosophy of atheism is confuted, and

Chap. IV. neverthehfs a Monarchijl. 299all his fables of the gods to be deep myfteries and alJegories, which hadfeme arcane and recondite fenfe under them ; and therefore had a high venerationfor him, as one who did aArjS/s-c-fo'j ^iQXoyin (as Alhenagoras writes »)mors truly theologize than the reft, and was indeed divinely infpired. Infomuch,that Celfus would rather have had the Chriftians to have taken Orpheus fore. Celf. I. 7.a god, than our Saviour Chrift, civ^oi. ofj.oXoyiiJ.ivug oa-lu x,^r,TXjji,i'jov TniCy.a';,^ j^/. 367.ai-iv (3»ai'aj cctto^x'jo-jIx, as being a man unquefticnably endued with a holy fpirit^and one, ti'ho alfo (as well as the Chriftians Jefus) died a violent death.But that Orpheus, notwithftanding all his polytheifm or multiplicity ofgod«, acknowledged one fupreme unmade Deity, as the original of all things,may be firlt prefumed from hence, becaufc thofe two moft religious philofophickfeds, the Pythagoreans and Platonifts, not only had Orpheus in greatefteem, he being commonly called by them Q-oXoyo?, the iheologer, but werealfo thought in great meafure to have owed their theology and philofophy tohim, as deriving the fame from his principles and traditions. This hathbeen already intimated, and might be further proved. Pythagoras, as we areinformed by Porphyrius and Jamblichus *, learned fomething from all thefefour, from the Egyptians, from the Perfian Magi, from the Chaldeans, andfrom Or;)i'f«j, or his followers. Accordingly, Syrianus makes 'Ofipixai 'b ms Ce// Ca-Ilu^xyociy.tx] clo^xi, the orphick and pythagorick principles to be one and the Ca'nt.f. n^.'fame. And as we underftand from Suidas % the fame Syrianus wrote a book [In Comentitled,'Z-ju.(p'^vtx''Oo