It is amusing to observe how, in ancient times, the dark, enigmatical, and allegorical style was practised, particularly in the East, by all public teachers, both Jews and Gentiles. By this means they explained away the fabulous tales current regarding their gods, and discoursed on every branch of knowledge known to them. They deemed religion a mystery not to be publicly explained, and always delivered its dogmas clothed in dark allegories (_Oie. de Nat. Deor. lib. ii. iii.; Spencer de Legibus Heb., p. 182; Clerici Hist. Eccles.,_ p. 23). The Egyptians and Chaldeans were noted for their dark sayings (_Simon Hist crû. des Comment_, p. 4). Gale (_Opuscula Mythologica_) gives an account of several ancient books expressly written as instructions to interpret allegories. The Greek poets, Homer not excepted, are by their scholiasts regarded as treating of their gods in a mystical style. The Stoic philosophers dressed the whole heathen theology in allegorical language (_Cic. de Nat. Deor_., lib. ii.). The Pythagorean philosophy was taught in enigmatical expressions, the meaning of which was studiously concealed from the vulgar mind, and revealed even to the initiated only gradually as their years of maturity were thought to qualify them for its reception. Plato and his followers in the groves of Academia practised the same mode of teaching religion, especially theogony. The writings attributed to Paul the apostle, as has been shown, are replete with mystical and enigmatical expressions. This he confesses, saying that he spoke “the wisdom of God in a mystery,” “comparing spiritual things with spiritual” (1 Cor. 2: 7, 13). Accordingly, he regards the history of Isaac and Ishmael as an allegory (Gal. 4: 22-25), which he condescends to explain. The primitive Fathers of Christianity pursued the same mode of communicating instruction and of defending their religion against the pagans. Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Irenæus, Tertullian, Origen, all of them, were very expert in this occult system, in imitation of the heathen philosophers, by whom most of them had been educated. Eusebius (_Hist. Eccles_.y lib. vi. c. 19), citing what he is pleased to call the assertions of Porphyry, writes that Origen, having been educated in Greek literature, intermingled it with the fictions of Christianity, that he dealt in the works of Plato, Numenius, Cranius, Apollophanes, Longinus Moderatus, Nico-machus, Chæremon, and Cornutus, and that he derived from these pagan authors the allegorical mode of interpretation usual in the mysteries of the Greeks, and applied it to the Jewish Scriptures. Thus, Origen’s mode of teaching was identical with that of the pagans—a mode commended even by the learned Dodwell (_Letters of Advice_, etc., p. 208), who says that the pagan mystical arts of concealment are of use toward understanding the Scriptures. The Jewish rabbis also delivered their doctrines in the same