in sacred history, that memorable event by which sin and death were introduced into the world. The account which Moses has given of this transaction is extremely concise; and hence several learned men, finding a difficulty in interpreting his statement, have been inclined to believe that all which is contained in Scripture on the subject ought to be taken in an allegorical sense, and not according to the strictness of the letter. They allege that the ancients, particularly the eastern nations, had two different ways of delivering their divinity and philosophy, one popular, and the other mysterious; that the Scripture uses both occasionally, sometimes accommodating itself to the capacities of the people, and at other times to the real but more veiled truth; and that, to obviate the many difficulties which occur in the literal history of this sad catastrophe, the safest way is to understand it as a parabolical story, under which the real circumstances are disguised and concealed, as a mystery not fit to be more explicitly declared.

FALLING Sickness, or EPILEPSY. See MEDICINE.