2. It was the opinion of Sir William Jones, that a great nation of Blacks[1] formerly possessed the dominion of Asia, and held the seat of empire at Sidon.[2] These must have been the people called by Mr. Maurice Cushites or Cuthites, described in Genesis; and the opinion that they were Blacks is corroborated by the translators of the Pentateuch, called the Seventy, constantly rendering the word Cush by Ethiopia. It is very certain that, if this opinion be well founded, we must go for the time when this empire flourished to a period anterior to all our regular histories. It can only be known to have existed from accidental circumstances, which have escaped amidst the ruins of empires and the wrecks of time.
Of this nation we have no account; but it must have flourished after the deluge. And, as our regular chronological systems fill up the time between the flood and what is called known, undoubted history; if it be allowed to have existed, its existence will of course prove that no dependence can be placed on the early parts of that history. It will shew that all the early chronology is false; for the story of this empire is not told. It is certain that its existence can only be known from insulated circumstances, collected from various quarters, and combining to establish the fact. But if I succeed in collecting a sufficient number to carry conviction to an impartial mind, the empire must be allowed to have existed.
3. The religion of Buddha, of India, is well known to have been very ancient. In the most ancient temples scattered throughout Asia, where his worship is yet continued, he is found black as jet, with the flat face, thick lips, and curly hair of the Negro. Several statues of him may be met with in the Museum of the East-India Company. There are two exemplars of him brooding on the face of the deep, upon a coiled serpent. To what time are we to allot this Negro? He will be proved to have been prior to the god called Cristna. He must have been prior to or contemporaneous with the black empire, supposed by Sir William Jones to have flourished at Sidon. The religion of this Negro God is found, by the ruins of his temples and other circumstances, to have been spread over an immense extent of country, even to the remotest parts of Britain, and to have been professed by devotees inconceivably numerous. I very much doubt whether Christianity at this day is professed by more persons than yet profess the religion of Buddha. Of this I shall say more hereafter.
4. When several cities, countries, or rivers, at great distances from each other, are found to be called by the same name, the coincidence cannot be attributed to accident, but some specific cause for such an effect must be looked for. Thus we have several cities call Heliopolis, or the city of the Sun; the reason for which is sufficiently obvious. Thus, again, there were several Alexandrias; and on close examination we find two Ethiopias alluded to in ancient history—one above the higher or southern part of Egypt, and the other somewhere to the east of it, and, as it has been thought, in Arabia. The people of this latter are called Cushim in the Hebrew text of the Old Testament, and Ethiopians by the text of the Septuagint, or the Seventy. That they cannot have been the Ethiopians of Africa is evident from a single passage,[3] where they are said to have invaded Judah in the days of Asa, under Zerah, their king or leader. But the Lord smote the Cushim; and Asa and the people that were with him pursued them unto Gerar; and the Ethiopians were overthrown, and they (i. e. Asa and his people) smote all the cities round about Gerar, &c. Whence it plainly follows, that the Cushim here mentioned, were such as inhabited the parts adjoining to Gerar, and consequently not any part of the African Ethiopia, but Arabia.
