The uniformity of the Hebrew myths with those of nations belonging to other races only becomes an obvious fact when we apply the method of modern mythological enquiry to Semitic stories. But, even without the help of this method, the mere outside of the Hebrew stories attracted the attention of many enquirers. It occasionally gave rise to the absurdest aberrations, which even now shoot out into a fresh crop of mischief. One answer, of course, was always at hand—that Greek and Egyptian narratives and ‘theogonies’ were bad translations or ‘diluted’ versions of the Hebrew; or else, as it has often been attempted in recent times to prove, the Egyptian was the original, from which everything else had flowed. The eighteenth century was especially rich in literary productions of the first species, following the lead of Gerhard Johann Voss, Huet,[7] Bochart, and others whose labours had prepared the way. G. Croesius published at Dort, in 1704, ‘Ὅμηρος Ἑβραῖος, sive Historia Hebraeorum ab Homero Hebraicis nominibus ac sententiis conscripta in Odyssea et Iliade,’ and V.G. Herklitz at Leipzig two years later, 1706, ‘Quod Hercules idem sit ac Josua.’ At Amsterdam a book was published in 1721 entitled ‘Parallela τῆς χρονολογίας et Historiae Sacrae,’ having the same object; and in 1730 a book in two volumes, of similar tendency, by Guillaume de Lavaur, an _avocat_, was published at Paris in French, and translated into German by Johann Daniel Heyden (Leipzig, 1745).[8] But it was reserved for the end of the century to produce the most curious specimen, in the work entitled ‘Histoire véritable des Temps Fabuleux: ouvrage qui, en dévoilant le vrai que les histoires fabuleuses ont travesti et altéré, sert à éclaircir les antiquités des peuples et surtout à venger l’histoire sainte,’ by the Abbé Guérin du Rocher. I have not seen the original edition of this work, but have consulted a later edition prepared by the Abbé Chapelle, an admirer of the author (Paris and Besançon, 1824), in five volumes, of which the first three contain the original work, and the fourth and fifth are taken up by the editor with a recapitulation of principles and a defence against the attacks of antagonists, who count among their number such men as Voltaire, De la Harpe, De Guignes, Du Voisin, Dinouart, and Anquetil du Perron. The author undertook to prove that the entire ancient history of the Egyptians and other nations is only a repetition of Biblical narratives: that thus what is related of Bothyris, Orpheus, Menes, Sesostris, and others, is identical with the Biblical history of Abraham, Jacob, Lot, Noah, and others; even the Egyptian Thebes is not a city, but Noah’s ark. The influence which this sensational book exercised on the learning of the period is very characteristic of the times. Dr. Asselini, vicar of the diocese of Paris, who had to pass judgment on it for the censorship (1779), regards it as a vindication of the Bible. The