PREFACE. Other Heathen People. Yet, by the ge

neral Confent of our beft Hiftorians and Chronologers, it may fafely be affirmed, that till the Greeks were Mafters of Letters, no fuch Thing was to be found as a confiftent Series of regular History, excepting the facred Records of the Jews. And the Reafon of this is very obvious, viz. that they had no Memorials of antient Times but from Tradition, or Hieroglyphical Characters, faving what they had written fince they had learned Alphabetical Characters, and therefore fince the Age of Mofes.

The old Phenicians feem to have been as polite a People as any in the World at that Time. They abounded in Arts and Wealth, by means of their great Trade by Sea, in which they probably exceeded all others. So foon as fuch a People as this once understood that their new Neighbours, the Jews, had an Art of registering whatever was faid or done, by themselves or others, with fo great Exactnefs that they could rehearse it many Months or Years afterwards, in the very fame Words, as if it had been done or faid in the fame Minute that it was rehearsed; and of having their Thoughts conveyed to each other, at never fo great a Distance, with

as

as great Certainty as if they were both PREFACE. bodily present in the fame Room, they could not but be very impatient under the want of this Art. And it may be justly believed, that they left no Means untried, till they had drawn the Knowledge of this Secret from them by Rewards, or forced it from them by Severity. They could never want Opportunity of inviting fuch of the Jeres as beft knew this Art to teach it them for good Pay; or when any fuch Jews were by them taken Prifoners of War, they might extort the Knowledge of Letters from them by Terrors or hard Ufage. And it is generally affirmed, by the most judicious Writers, that the Phenicians communicated this Art to the Greeks. Common Sense will not permit us even fo much as to fuppofe, that the Phenicians had Letters before the Jews were fettled in the Land of Canaan; because Mofes had actually writ the History of the Pentateuch before this Time; whereas Sanchoniathon, the first Writer of the Phenician Nation, is by Porphyry, his moft zealous and able Advocate, fet not much higher than the Trojan War, and is by fome judicious Moderns believed to have been of the fame Time with Manetho and Berofus, that is, after the Translation of the Pentateuch into

PREFACE. Greek. For it is juftly thought, that the Publication of the Hebrew Antiquities, in the most Universal Language, fet all these three Writers at Work, to fhew their own feveral Nations the Phenicians, Egyptians, and Chaldeans, not inferior to the Jews in Point of Age, or Origin, or any Thing else that was valuable.

If we allow Sanchoniathon to have been as old as Porphyry would have him, that is, fomewhat before the Trojan Wars; yet this will make him much younger than Mofes, and will prove that the Greeks did foon learn the Skill of Writing and Reading from the Phenicians. For there are fome good Grounds to believe, that Epiftles were written, and fome Infcriptions made by the Greeks, about the Time that Sanchoniathon wrote his Hiftory, that is, before the Trojan Wars, according to the prefent Suppofi

tion.

The three Hiftorians laft mentioned, give us a ftrong Proof of the natural Defire that is in all Men of a great Genius, to fhew and illuftrate the Antiquities, and great Acts, and Gifts of their own Nation. The fame Emulation which prompted these Men_to_vie with the Jews in thefe Particulars, would have excited fome of the more

antient

antient Phenicians, Egyptians, and Chal- PREFACE. deans to have given us ample Hiftories of their Origins, Government, Wars, and Managements, if they had not wanted the Means of doing it, that is, the Art of Letters. And the very fame Spirit that disposed the firft Writers to enterprize fuch a Work, would have inclined others in fucceeding Times to keep, and read, and be making Additions to them. But now look into what Parts of the World you pleafe, you fhall find no certain Footsteps of any fuch credible Histories, or Records before the Age of Mofes, and nothing but confufed Traditions, or Inventions, for two or three hundred Years after. And this Confideration carries a violent Prefumption with it, that there was no Knowledge of Letters earlier than Mofes.

1

The old Egyptians had a Reputation equal at leaft to any other Nation then in the World for Knowledge of all Sorts; and we cannot doubt but they had as many Domeftic Affairs worthy to be tranfmitted to Pofterity, as any People of the Heathen World. Their Pyramids ftill remain the Wonder of all that fee, or hear of them. It is natu ral to fuppofe that, whatever other Ends the Builders had in erecting them, their principal Aim was by this Means to im

mortalize

PREFACE. mortalize their own Names. If a Man could have been then found that could have made an Infcription in Alphabe-. tical Letters, or that was able to write the Names of the Builders, we cannot in Reason doubt their Memory had been preserved in legible Characters. But now on the contrary, we are fure that, 2200 Years ago, Herodotus could not get any Information concerning the Names of the Builders, but from uncertain Report or Tradition. And if thefe Pyramids were built of the Bricks made by the Ifraelites under their Servitude, and juft before their Deliverance from it, then it points to that particular Time of which I have been hitherto difcourfing, and fhews, that the Egyptians had not the Ufe of Letters, when Mofes led the People out of Egypt. And though I would not be understood to deny that the Egyptians had an Alphabet before they were fubdued by the Macedonians, or even as foon as the Phenicians; yet I dare affirm, that they made little use of it for the most proper End, that is, the Information of Pofterity in Things of Moment. The very thin, imperfect Account we have of the Transactions of Egypt before this Time, is a very full Proof, that the Egyptians, when they were conquered,

were