Such I do believe the holy Scriptures; yet were it of man, I could not
choose but say, it was the singularest, and superlative piece that hath
been extant since the creation; were I a Pagan, I should not refrain the
lecture of it, and cannot but commend the judgment of Ptolemy, that
thought not his library complete without it. The Alcoran of the Turks (I
speak without prejudice) is an ill-composed piece, containing in it vain
and ridiculous errors in philosophy, impossibilities, fictions, and
vanities beyond laughter, maintained by evident and open sophisms, the
policy of ignorance, deposition of universities, and banishment of
learning, that hath gotten foot by arms and violence; this, without a
blow, hath disseminated itself through the whole earth. It is not
unremarkable what Philo first observed, that the law of Moses continued
two thousand years without the least alteration; whereas, we see the laws
of other commonwealths do alter with occasions; and even those that
pretend their original from some divinity, to have vanished without trace
or memory. I believe, besides Zoroaster, there were divers that wrote
before Moses, who, notwithstanding, have suffered the common fate of
time. Men's works have an age like themselves, and though they outlive
their authors, yet have they a stint and period to their duration. This
only is a work too hard for the teeth of time, and cannot perish but in
the general flames, when all things shall confess their ashes.
Rest not in the high-strained paradoxes of old philosophy, supported by
naked reason, and the reward of mortal felicity; but labour in the ethics
of faith, built upon heavenly assistance, and the happiness of both
beings. Understand the rules, but swear not unto the doctrines of Zeno
or Epicurus. Look beyond Antonius, and terminate not thy morals in
Seneca or Epictetus. Let not the twelve but the two tables be thy law:
let Pythagoras be thy remembrancer, not thy textuary and final
instructor: and learn the vanity of the world, rather from Solomon than
Phocylydes. Sleep not in the dogmas of the Peripatus, Academy, or
Porticus. Be a moralist of the mount, an Epictetus in the faith, and
christianise thy notions.