utes of Arianism. The historian may therefore be permitted
respectfully to withdraw the veil of the sanctuary; and to deduce the
progress of reason and faith, of error and passion from the school of
Plato, to the decline and fall of the empire.

The genius of Plato, informed by his own meditation, or by the
traditional knowledge of the priests of Egypt, had ventured to explore
the mysterious nature of the Deity. When he had elevated his mind to the
sublime contemplation of the first self-existent, necessary cause of the
universe, the Athenian sage was incapable of conceiving how the simple
unity of his essence could admit the infinite variety of distinct and
successive ideas which compose the model of the intellectual world; how
a Being purely incorporeal could execute that perfect model, and mould
with a plastic hand the rude and independent chaos. The vain hope of
extricating himself from these difficulties, which must ever oppress
the feeble powers of the human mind, might induce Plato to consider the
divine nature under the threefold modification--of the first cause, the
reason, or Logos, and the soul or spirit of the universe. His
poetical imagination sometimes fixed and animated these metaphysical
abstractions; the three archical on original principles were represented
in the Platonic system as three Gods, united with each other by a
mysterious and ineffable generation; and the Logos was particularly
considered under the more accessible character of the Son of an Eternal
Father, and the Creator and Governor of the world. Such appear to have
been the secret doctrines which were cautiously whispered in the gardens
of the academy; and which, according to the more recent disciples of
Plato, * could not be perfectly understood, till after an assiduous
study of thirty years.

The arms of the Macedonians diffused over Asia and Egypt the language
and learning of Greece; and the theological system of Plato was taught,
with less reserve, and perhaps with some improvements, in the celebrated
school of Alexandria. A numerous colony of Jews had been invited, by the
favor of the Ptolemies, to settle in their new capital. While the bulk
of the nation practised the legal ceremonies, and pursued the lucrative
occupations of commerce, a few Hebrews, of a more liberal spirit,
devoted their lives to religious and philosophical contemplation. They
cultivated with diligence, and embraced with ardor, the theological
system of the Athen