from their venerable antiquity. The most learned of the
Ptolemies, who was surnamed Philadelphus, an accomplished prince,
by the advice of Demetrius Phalareus, obtained a copy of these
holy books. It may be found at this day in his library. The
divinity of these Scriptures is proved by this, that all that is
done in our days may be found predicted in them; they contain all
that has since passed in the view of men.

Is not the accomplishment of a prophecy a testimony to its truth?
Seeing that events which are past have vindicated these
prophecies, shall we be blamed for trusting them in events that
are to come? Now, as we believe things that have been prophesied
and have come to pass, so we believe things that have been told
us, but not yet come to pass, because they have all been foretold
by the same Scriptures, as well those that are verified every day
as those that still remain to be fulfilled.

These Holy Scriptures teach us that there is one God, who made
the world out of nothing, who, though daily seen, is invisible;
his infiniteness is known only to himself; his immensity
conceals, but at the same time discovers him. He has ordained for
men, according to their lives, rewards and punishments; he will
raise all the dead that have ever lived from the creation of the
world, will command them to reassume their bodies, and thereupon
adjudge them to felicity that has so end, or to eternal flames.
The fires of hell are those hidden flames which the earth shuts
up in her bosom. He has in past times sent into the world
preachers or prophets. The prophets of those old times were Jews;
they addressed their oracles, for such they were, to the Jews,
who have stored them up in the Scriptures. On them, as has been