sunt quidam, fas non fuiffe plebi uti, ne quidem ad libros Legis defcribendos: alii veros licitum quidem fuiffe, fi quis voluiffet; verumtamem ob fingularem ejus fan&titatem & venerationem, quam illi tribuebant, ab ejus ufu abftinuiffe. Efram vero, poft folutam, captivitatem Babylonicam, hujus fcripturæ facræ ufum non tantum promifcue, Judeis omnibus permififfe, fed etiam injunxiffe. Hanc autem Samaritanis, cen apoftatis; ut profa-. nam & communem reliquiffe & ex judeorum ufu fuftuliffe. For all this there is not one fufficient authority, and the great enmity which subsisted between the Jews and the Samaritans, particularly after the latter had built a temple on mount Gerazim, the mount of bleffings, might have occafioned the Jews to heap a load of calumnies on the Samaritans, and alfo to depreciate their copy of the law, which they alledge to be corrupted; and have by their artifice been able to influence and prejudice the minds of many men, as Hortinger, Ufher, Patrick, Lightfoot, Prideaux, &c. but they were all mistaken, which the learned and laborious Kennicot has fully demonstrated in his fecond differtation on the Pentateuch, to which I refer the reader. Suffice it to take notice, year notice, that Walton, in his Proleg. 3, 32, and Syncellus, who lived in the of Chrift 792, mentions the Samaritan copy to be a true and a most ancient copy; his words are, To apaΤο Σαμαβίντων αρχαιότατον (αντιγράφον) και τους χαρακτηρσι διαλλατίον. ὁ και ΑΛΗΘΗΣ είναι και ΠΡΩΤΟΝ, Εβραιοι καθομολογεσι. If there fore the Jews (as Syncellus obferves) confeffed fo much in his time, to what muft we impute the change of fentiment we now find among them, and which they ridiculously attempt to vindicate, but to the profpect of feeing the Samaritan copy rife in reputation above the Hebrew. It is the opinion of Montfaucon, Chifhul, and many others, that the Greek letters, as to shape and numerical value, were derived from the Phoenician: that the Cadmean letters were more fimilar to the Samaritan, than the prefent Hebrew from hence it is, with very ftrong evidence, concluded, that the Samaritan character is much more ancient than the Hebrew. Phoeniciis characteribus olim omnes Chananei ufi funt, & Hebræi & adhuc Samaritani ufi funt. Formerly all the Chananites and Hebrews made ufe of the Phoenician letters, as the Samaritans ftill do.--Harduin in Plin. Nat. Hift. lib. 7. A mere inspection of the old Phoenician alphabet will evince, that most others have been But been derived from it, in which charader Mofes is faid to have written the law. it does not appear that either Mofes, or * Cadmus, (who taught the Greeks the use of letters) was the original inventor of them. It appears rather, from fuch proofs, as a fubject of fuch vaft antiquity will admit of, that before Mofes or Cadmus the art of writing in alphabetical characters was known; and this feems to have been the refult of hieroglyphics. Mofes himself refers to a written authority, older of consequence than his own, in the twenty-firft chapter of the Book of Numbers: Wherefore it is written in the book of the wars of the Lord, what he did in the Red Sea, and in the Brooks of Arnon:" in which place a reference is made to an historical fact, which had been recorded in a written hiftory. It is ridiculous to find learned men endeavouring to explain this away in a manner to which common fenfe muft give the name of duplicity. Thus Cle יאסר בספר ricus would explain the words Jea mer bfepher memorantur narratione :— a * Cadmus ut putatur tempore Joshuæ annis ante Chriftum 1500 Græcis literas tradidit. Montfaucon. Newton, p. 13, and 210, makes Cadmus live in the year A. C. 1945. Usher in the year 1455 A. C. of the world 3259. forced forced and ridiculous interpretation: for the prefix in, and 30 fepher, the book, are explanatory of the fenfe in which the word יאסר, Jeamer, ought to be taken. For if the relation had been expreffed of verbal, or oral tradition, the laft word would have been intirely omitted, or fome other chofen in its place; but in the Septuagint, it is rightly tranflated 6.6now. εν That the invention of letters was the refult of hieroglyphics, I am well perfuaded; writing in fymbolic representations being found uncertain, and not fufficiently expreffive of subjects which required minute investigation, rendered fuch an invention effential to the preservation of arts and sciences. It does not appear confonant with reason, to suppose, that a variety of learned fubjects, philological, theological, moral and political, could have been difcuffed by mere animal and fymbolic reprefentations, which fometimes appear fcarcely tolerable in the best drefs which Horus Apollo, Clemens Alexandrinus, Epiphanius and Polyhyftor give us, by means of their written embellish ments. As for example: I have taken the following from Horus Apollo, of Horapollo, as he is called by fome : Πως Πως αςατον. Τινά δε αφατον και μη μένοντα εν ταυτω άλλ. οτε μεν ισχυρον καὶ θρασον, ότε δε αθένη και δειλον βελομενοι σημήναι ἐαιναν ζωγραφουσία αυτη γαρ οτε μεν άρχην γίνεται, οτε δε θήλεια. "To represent an unstable man, When they mean to represent any unftable person, not perfifting in the fame purpose, who is at one time robuft and daring, and at another, feeble and timid, they paint an Hyæna, for fhe is fometimes male, and fometimes female. The abfurdity of this needs no comment." Epiphanius, who imitates this mode, has been guilty of many abfurdities; his reprefenting the fall of Adam, to an Elephant deceived by the female, is extremely ridiculous, and what is worse, indecent, and therefore I shall not infert it. The Egyptian fymbols, deftitute of letters and words to express their meaning according to the mode ufed by Epiphanius and Polyhiftor, especially as they had many meanings, must be liable to great uncertainty, and not capable of being applied to the fubjects which they are faid to express. And we may certainly collect from Philo, and Clemens Alexandrinus, that the fcience of hieroglyphics D |