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

438Varro'j natural "Theology^ Book I.fufpeUifJg, thai the God of the univerfe being about to make man, didthere befpeakthe other gods, (ici; ij-i^' ia-jriv iivTi^on; ^iv fj-iioinv Btri, which were fecondaryand inferior to him) after this manner. Let us make man according to our ownimage and likenefs. Which S. Cyril, and other Chriftian writers undeiftandof the trinity. Now thofe eternal gods of Plato, according to whofe imagethe world and man is faid by him to have been made, and wliich, (thoughone of them were properly called the Demiurgus) yet had all an influenceand caufality upon the making of it, were (as hath been already obf.rved)riot fo many independent and feif-originated deities, but all derived fromone firfl: principle. And therefore Cicero following PLito in this is not tobe fufpeded upon that account, to have been an alTertor of many independentgods, or partial creators of the world •, efpecially fincc in fo manyother places of his writings, he plainly owns a divine monarchy.We pafs from M. Tullius Cicero to M. Terentius Varro his equal, a manfamous for polymathy or multifarious knowledge, and reputed unqueftionably(though not the mod eloquent, yet; the moft learned of all the Romansat leaft as to antiquity. He wrote one and forty books concerningthe antiquities of human and divine things -, wherein he tranfcended theRoman Pontifices themfelve-s and difcovered thdr ignorance as to manypoints of their religion. In which books he diltinguifhed three kinds oftheology, the firft mythical or fabulous, the fecond phyfical or natural, andthe lafl civil or popular: the firft being moft accommodate to the theatueor ftage ; the fecond to the world, or the wifer men in it ; the third to citiesor the generality of the civilized vulgar. Which was agreeable alfo to thedodrine of Sca:vola, that learned Pontifex, concerning three forts of gods,poetical, philofophical, and political. As for the mythical and poeticaldeCi-vD^l. 6. /j. theology, it was cenfured after this manner by Varre ; In eo funt multa contra[P. 116. dignitatem ^ vaturam immortalium fiola. In hoc enim efi, ut Deus alius exTom. VII.capite, alius ex femorefil, alius ex guttis fanguinis natus. In hoc ut Dii fu-^'^^''^rati fint, ut adulteraverint, ut fervierint homini. Denique, in hoc omnia Dissattnbuuntur, quce non modo in homincm, fed etiam in contemptijfimum hominemcadere poffunt. That, according to the literal fenfe, it contained trany thingscontrary to the dignity and nature of immortal beings ; the genealogy of onegod being derived from the head, of another from the thigh, of another fromdrops of blood: fome being rcprefented as thieves, others as adulterers, &c,and all things attributed to the gods therein, that are not only incident to men,but even to the nwfl contemptible and flagitious of them. And as for the fecond,the natural theology, which is the true, this Varro conceived to beabove the capacity of vulgar citizens-, and that therefore it was expedient,there fhould be another theology calculated, more accommodate for them,and of a middle kind betwixt the natural and the fabulous, which is thatCrv. D. vvhich is called civil. For he affirm d, MuUa effe vera, qutc vulgo fcire nonI. "I.e. 31'. '/' «^'^^> ^ qucedam, qucs tametfi falfa Jint, alitor exiflimare fopulum expediat j[P. 87 ] That there were many things true in religion, which it was not convenientfor the vulgar to know ; and again, fomi things, which, thcuj:) falfe,yet it was expedient they fijould be believed by them. As Sees tola, the RomanPontifeXf in like manner, would not have the vulgar to know,that