_Maccabees_, (though he had seen the first in Hebrew,) and the third and fourth of _Esdras_, for _Apocrypha_. Of the canonical, Josephus, a learned Jew, that wrote in the time of the emperor Domitian, reckoneth _twenty-two_, making the number agree with the Hebrew alphabet. St. Jerome does the same, though they reckon them in different manner. For Josephus numbers _five_ Books of _Moses_, _thirteen_ of _Prophets_ that writ the history of their own times, (which how it agrees with the prophets’ writings contained in the Bible we shall see hereafter,) and _four_ of _hymns_ and moral precepts. But St. Jerome reckons _five_ books of _Moses_, _eight_ of _Prophets_, and _nine_ of other Holy Writ, which he calls of ἁγιόγραφα. The Septuagint, who were seventy learned men of the Jews, sent for by Ptolemy, king of Egypt, to translate the Jewish law out of the Hebrew into the Greek, have left us no other for Holy Scripture in the Greek tongue, but the same that are received in the Church of England. [Sidenote: Their antiquity.] As for the Books of the New Testament, they are equally acknowledged for canon by all Christian churches, and by all sects of Christians, that admit any books at all for canonical. Who were the original writers of the several Books of Holy Scripture, has not been made evident by any sufficient testimony of other history, which is the only proof of matter of fact; nor can be, by any arguments of natural reason: for reason serves only to convince the truth, not of fact, but, of consequence. The light therefore that must guide us in this question, must be that which is held out unto us from the books themselves: and this light, though it show us not the writer of every book, yet it is not unuseful to give us knowledge of the time, wherein they were written. [Sidenote: The Pentateuch not written by Moses.]