Tradition : Principally with Reference to Mythology and the

THE TRADITION OF THE HUMAN RACE. 127
The fragments of Sanclioniatlion here referred to are
found at 4earlier
date than Eusebius, having been copiously
extracted by Philo (vide Bunsen's " Egypt ").
Sanchoniathon was to Phoenicia what Berosus was to
Assyria ; that is to say, the earliest post-diluvian compilers
of history when tradition was becoming obscure.
Let us scrutinise his testimon. We are here told " t
the first men consecrated the plants shooting out of t
th, &&& judged them gods." . . . " Next they relat
t of t generations of men, that
in the first generation the nay was found out of taking
food from trees" Here, I submit, that we have plainly
and unmistakably a tradition of that first commencement
of evil, the first man and woman plucking the
apple from the tree, thinking they would become as gods
(Gen. iii. 4, 5), ... " and the serpent said ... for
God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat
thereof . . . and you shall be as gods, knowing good
and evil."
Then follows the succession of ages (vide infra, ch. xiii.),
of which there is a curious parallel tradition in Hesiod
and Apollodorus, and partial correspondences in the tra-
ditions of India, China, and Mexico (infra, ch. xiii.).27
It will be noted, however, that whilst running into
the tradition of Hesiod on the one side (in Hesiod and
in the Chinese tradition there is trace of a double tradition,
ante and post-diluvian), Sanchoniathon still more
closely runs in with the narrative of Genesis on the
other, thus connecting the links of the chain of tradition.-8
27 Vide Grote, i.
" Chronicles of Egypt" (vide ch. vi.) If the reader will refer to chap, i,
he will there find a learned and exhaustive exposition of the ages of Sanchouiathon,
identifying them with Scripture on the one side, and Egyptian
tradition on the other.
ca