nce of death on the
Manicheans, and Quarto-decimans all prove this." (Chambers's Encyclo.,
art. Theodosius.)

[447:3] Quoted in Taylor's Syntagma, p. 54.

[447:4] Gibbon's Rome, vol. iii. p. 81.

[448:1] Gibbon's Rome, vol. iii. pp. 91, 92.

[448:2] All their writings were ordered to be destroyed.

[448:3] Gibbon's Rome, vol. ii. p. 359.

[448:4] Ibid. note 154.

[449:1] Julian: Epistol. lii. p. 436. Quoted in Gibbon's Rome, vol. ii.
p. 360.

[449:2] "_Thing_"--a general assembly of the freemen, who gave their
assent to a measure by striking their shields with their drawn swords.

[449:3] See Mallet's Northern Antiquities, pp. 180, 351, and 470.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE ANTIQUITY OF PAGAN RELIGIONS.

We shall now compare the great antiquity of the sacred books and
religions of Paganism with those of the Christian, so that there may be
no doubt as to which is the original, and which the copy. Allusions to
this subject have already been made throughout this work, we shall
therefore devote as little space to it here as possible.

In speaking of the sacred literature of India, Prof. Monier Williams
says:

"Sanskrit literature, embracing as it does nearly every branch
of knowledge is entirely deficient in one department. It is
wholly destitute of trustworthy historical records. Hence,
little or nothing is known of the lives of ancient Indian
authors, and the dates of their most celebrated works cannot
be fixed with certainty. A fair conjecture, however, may be
arrived at by comparing the most ancient with the more modern
compositions, and estimating the period of time required to
effect the changes of structure and idiom observable in the
language. In this manner we may be justified in assuming that
the hymns of the Veda were probably composed by a succession
of poets at different dates between 1500 and 1000 years B.
C."[450:1]

Prof. Wm. D. Whitney shows the great antiquity of the Vedic hymns from
the fact that,

"The language of the Vedas is an _older_ dialect, varying very
considerably, both in its grammatical and lexical character,
from the classical Sanscrit."

And M. de Coulanges, in his "Ancient City," says:

"We learn from the hymns of the _Vedas_, which are certainly
very ancient, and from the laws of Manu," "what the Aryans of
the east thought nearly thirty-five centuries ago."[450:2]

Tha