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apt to be too much influenced by them, commonly pretend, that the Hebrew Language was that which Adam, the firft Parent of Mankind, spoke. The most plaufible Argument for which Opinion, is deduced from a few Names and Etymologies; but tho' the Maintainers of it boaft, that they put the Matter beyond all Difpute, yet I am inclined to believe, they are not so Invincible as 'tis pretended. To which purpose twill be neceffary to hear the full Merits of the Caufe, before we proceed to give Sentence.

1. In the first place they alledge the Name of the first Man Adam, which in the Hebrew Tongue alone alludes to the word Earth, out of which his Body was form'd, for only the Jews call the Earth Adama. This Paronomafia or Similitude of Names, plainly appears in the fecond Chapter of Genefis verfe 7. Et formavit Jehova Deus Adam pulverem ex Adama, hoc est,

terrå. The Chaldees indeed have the word Adam, but then they call the Earth Arhah, which Term has no Affinity with the name of our first Parent.

2. For the fame reafon Eve's Name Hhavab is derived from the word Hhai, Living, because she was the Mother of all Hbai, Living, Gen. 3. 20. Now this Etymology is corrupted in the Chaldee, which renders it chol bne enafcha, of all the Sons of Men.

3. So in the fecond Chapter of Genefis, v.23. She, fays Adam fpeaking of his Wife, shall be

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called Ifchah,Woman, because Meifch, fhe is taken out of Man. Therefore fince this chiming of the words is to be found in no other Language but this, they conclude that it was unquestionably the very fame that Adam fpoke.

4. After Abel was kill'd, Seth was born to our firft Mother, Eve, whofe name fhe derives from a Radix in the Hebrew Tongue, Gen.4.25. She call'd his name Scheth; For, fays the, God has raised me up, Schath, another Son in the room of Abel.

Thefe and feveral other Names are brought by the Rabbies, to prove, as they imagine, that Hebrew is the Primitive Language; and they Burge them with that Affurance and Oftentation, as if 'twere down-right Obftinacy to contradict fo evident a Truth; but we have many weighty Reasons on our fide, to incline us to believe, that the Primitive Language was no more related to the Hebrew, than it was either to the Chaldee or Arabick. But that the Reader may better comprehend our Meaning, we own that Opinion feems to be moft probable to us, which maintains that neither Hebrew, Chaldee, nor Arabick, nor indeed any other Oriental Language, was that which Adam fpoke, because in procefs of Time, and by the Dispersion of Mankind, it was fplit into feveral Dialects of the Eaftern Tongues, and begot the above-mentioned Languages, and fome others nearly refembling them. Thus, for inftance, the Language of the Old Romans, is neither that which

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the Italians, French or Spaniards ufe, and yet it produced these three Languages, and has left feveral of its old Remainders in them. I know the Rabbins are of a different Opinion, who pretend that it was preferv'd unmixt and intire in the Family of Heber; but i fhall foon demonstrate, that this is precarioufly affirm'd, and wants Reasons to fupport it.

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As for what relates to the Argument borrow'd from the Etymology of Names, it is to be obferv'd in the first place, that fome of them, are not fo much proper Names given to the Children at their Birth, as Cognomina, or Sirnames by which they were known to Pofterity, and fo in procefs of time paffed for proper Names. For which reason they might fometimes be changed, and yet the Paronomafia of the Primitive Language be happily preferv'd at the fame time, as will evidently appear by the following Examples.

Adam, as all the World knows, is not a proper Name, but beftow'd on the firft Man na? xw, or by way of Pre-eminence, and fo our first Father might be thus call'd by the Hebrews, tho his Contemporaries call'd him otherwife. Nor is the Agreement of the words, which we confess falls out patly enough in the Hebrew Tongue, an Argument to the contrary, for therefore Man might be call'd Adam by the Hebrews, because they knew the firft Man's Body was form'd of Clay. Thus in the Latin Tongue, which I believe no Man in the World

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World ever dreamt to be the Primitive Language, we might fay that God call'd the first Man Homo, because he was form'd ex humo, ¿. e. out of the Ground. Befides the fame thing might accidentally happen in the words Ifch and Ifchab, as amongst the ancient Latins (a) vir and vira were in use.

We might here produce the frequent Alterations of Names, even of thofe we call Proper, but the Reader may find them in the Learned Grotius's Annotations on Gen. II. I. and in Huetius's Demonftratio Evangelica, Propof. 4. c. 13. §. 4. We fhall at prefent content our felves to give an Inftance or two, not taken notice of by them, of an Etymology happily expreffed in another Language. Every one has heard of a Famous City in Egypt, which the Greeks call'd nλso, which name (for 'tis of Greek Extraction) is rightly derived X 78 #nλ, from dirt, because it was built in a dirty place. For thus Strabo in his Seventeenth Book, Page 552. of the Geneva Edition put out by Cafaubon, Αυτὸ τὸ Πηλέσιον κύκλῳ περικείμενα ἔχει ἔλη, ἅτινες βάραθρα καλόπ και τέλματα. Ωνόμασαι δ ̓ ἀπὸ τὸ πηλά, και να τελο

μάτων.

(a) See what Feftus in Querquetulana vira fays, Fœminas antiqui quas nunc dicimus, Viras appellabant, unde adhuc permanent Virgines & Viragines. St. Ferom ufes this laft word, whom herein we had no mind to imitate, because Virago neither fignifies what Ifcha does in Hebrew, nor Vira in Latin, but a Woman of a Masculine Spirit.

Now

Now if the Books of the Hebrew Prophets were all loft, Who would not Swear that this City had no other Name? Who would not believe that it was built by fome Greeks that fettled there, or by the Pofterity of Lagus, and bore this Greek Name ever fince its beginning. However 'tis undeniable from Ezekiel 30.14,15. that it was call'd Sin by the Egyptians, which word fignifies dirt, as Bochart has obferv'd, Phaleg. 1. 4. c. 27.

The fame has happen'd in the name of another place not far diftant from Pelufium. Diodorus Siculus in the first Book of his Bibliotheca mightily commends Actifanes the Ethiopian who after he had conquer'd Ammofes King of the Egyptians, and fubdued the whole Country, neither put the Guilty to death, nor yet wholly difmifs'd them unpunifh'd, but carried multitudes of the Condemned, he thus uftd them, ̓Αποτεμῶν αὐτῶν τὰς μυκτήρας κατώκισεν ἐν τοῖς ἐχάτοις δ' ἐρήμε χώρας, κτίσας πόλιν τ ἀπὸ τὸ συμπτώματα Ρινοκόρεραν (οι Ρινικός λερον) προσαγορά θεῖσαν. Cutting of their Nofes, he tranfplanted them into the fartheft parts of a defart Region, and built a City, and called it from this accident Rinocolura. Strabo in his fixteenth Book makes the fame Remark, and fo does Stephanus upon this word. Now those Perfons that do not know, that the Egyptians at this time did not speak Greek, would easily fuffer themselves to be perfwaded, especially feeing it named among the Cities of B 4 Egypt,

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