under the impressions prevalent in their times, which impressions we have it in our power to correct by more ancient, and, what is the highest, by Scriptual authority.
To controvert this assertion of Josephus, that there were in his time but two tribes subject to the Romans, while the other ten were still beyond the Euphrates, we have another writer to refer to, whose authority cannot be denied by the most strenuous admirer of Josephus, inasmuch as the latter quotes him by name, adopts his statements, and, in fact, gives an exact abridgement of his work. This writer has undoubtedly been pronounced an apocryphal one by some learned persons of later times, whose opinion may be admitted to be correct, without invalidating our argument; though I cannot but think that his interesting narrative may be substantially correct, notwithstanding it may be somewhat overstated. The author to whom I allude is Aristeas, or the person who under that name has left a history of the circumstances attending the translation of the Scriptures known by us as the Septuagint. He professes to have taken a prominent part in effecting it; and, except for the sake of magnifying his own merits, or of gratifying Ptolemy Philadelphus, it would be difficult to guess what motives could have induced him to write it, if it be a falsity. It has been said, that his object was to enhance the character of the translation, as if to represent it as made under divine aid; but this is only a construction given to his narrative from the high estimation in which the translation was afterwards held, and not from any statements of his own; while the objections made to them as false, on account of the enormous payments said to have been made by Ptolemy, may easily be explained as dependent upon the value of the money then in circulation in those countries, of which we really have now no knowledge. This work of Aristeas is still extant, and appears to me to possess intrinsic marks of authenticity. If this opinion be correct, the work must have been written about 250 years before our era; and there is not perhaps another ancient work in whose favour so many corroborative testimonies may be adduced. His story we find referred to by Aristobulus, who flourished in the 125th year B.C., and repeated, with additions, by Philo, who was contemporary with our Saviour. As before mentioned, Josephus himself, towards the end of the first century, agrees entirely with Aristeas, whom he quotes by name, and from whom he gives an account, which is in reality nothing more than an abridgement of his original. Justin Martyr, Eusebius, and a number of other ancient Christian writers, have followed in the same track,
