This essay was originally written by John Cam Hobhouse while at Trinity College, Cambridge. It was the Hulsean Prize Essay of 1808 and published in 1809. This is an incomplete manuscript copy over 8 folios. It largely contains the text that appears in the 1809 published version on pages 18-32, although there are some differences between the manuscript and published text.

Incipit : "... the same of the Canaanites; but it is impossible to penetrate the dark recesses of remote antiquity except when we are conducted by the light of the scriptures ..."

Explicit : "... the expiatory sacrifices of the Jews are to be viewed in any other light than as a religious observance by which was preserved a constant dependance upon and submission to the Almighty as the punisher ..."