ON ABRAHAM†

{††Yonge’s title, A Treatise on the Life of the Wise Man Made Perfect by Instruction or, On the Unwritten Law,
That Is To Say, On Abraham.}

I. (1) The sacred laws having been written in five books, the first is called and inscribed
Genesis, deriving its title from the creation ( ) of the world, which it contains at the
beginning; although there are ten thousand other matters also introduced which refer to peace
and to war, or to fertility and barrenness, or to hunger and plenty, or to the terrible destructions
which have taken place on earth by the agency of fire and water; or, on the contrary, to the birth
and rapid propagation of animals and plants in accordance with the admirable arrangement of the
atmosphere, and the seasons of the year, and of men, some of whom lived in accordance with
virtue, while others were associated with wickedness. (2) But since of these things some are
portions of the world, and some are accidents, and since the world is the most perfect and
complete of all things, he has normally assigned the whole book to that subject. We have then
examined with all the accuracy that was in our power, in what manner the creation of the world
was arranged in our previous treatises; (3) but since it is necessary, to be consistent with the
regular order in which the sacred history proceeds to go on, now to investigate the laws, we will
for the present postpone the particular laws which are copies as it were; and first of all examine
the more general laws which are, as it were, the models of the others. (4) Now these are those
men who have lived irreproachably and admirably, whose virtues are durably and permanently
recorded, as on pillars in the sacred scriptures, not merely with the object of praising the men
themselves, but also for the sake of exhorting those who read their history, and of leading them
on to emulate their conduct; (5) for these men have been living and rational laws; and the
lawgiver has magnified them for two reasons; first, because he was desirous to show that the
injunctions which are thus given are not inconsistent with nature; and, secondly, that he might
prove that it is not very difficult or laborious for those who wish to live according to the laws
established in these books, since the earliest men easily and spontaneously obeyed the unwritten
principle of legislation before any one of the particular laws were written down at all. So that a
man may very properly say, that the written laws are nothing more than a memorial of the life of
the ancients, tracing back in an antiquarian spirit, the actions and reasonings which they adopted;
(6) for these first men, without ever having been followers or pupils of any one, and without ever
having been taught by preceptors what they ought to do or say, but having embraced a line of
conduct consistent with nature from attending to their own natural impulses, and from being
prompted by an innate virtue, and looking upon nature herself to be, what in fact she is, the most
ancient and duly established of laws, did in reality spend their whole lives in making laws, never
of deliberate purpose doing anything open to reproach, and for their accidental errors
propitiating God, and appeasing him by prayers and supplications, so as to procure for
themselves the enjoyment of an entire life of virtue and prosperity, both in respect of their
deliberate actions, and those which proceeded from no voluntary purpose.
II. (7) Since then the beginning of all participation in good things is hope, and since the
soul devoted to virtue pioneers and opens this path as a plain and easy one, being anxious to
attain to that which is really honourable, the sacred historian has named the first lover of hope,
Enos, giving him the common name of the whole race as an especial favour. (8) For the
Chaldaeans call man Enos; as if he were the only real man, who lived in expectation of good
things, and who is established in good hopes; from which it is evident that they do not look upon