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We most fincerely recommend this excellent pamphlet to the perufal of all our contending divines.

Art. 48. A brief and difpaffionate View of the Difficulties attending the Trinitarian, Arian, and Socinian Syftems. Occafioned by the fierce Controverfies now on foot in divers Parts of the Kingdom refpecting those Subjects; and defigned to aflift the candid, hum ble, and modeft Inquirers in their Searches after Gospel Truths. By Jofiah Tucker, D. D. Dean of Gloucefter. 8vo. 3d. Gloucefter printed, and fold by Rivington in London. 1774.

This little pamphlet breathes the fame Chriftian temper which has generally marked the writings of the dean of Gloucefter. Art. 49. An Addrefs to Proteftant Diffenters, on the Subject of giving the Lord's Supper to Children. By Jofeph Priestley, LL. D. F. R. S. 8vo. Is Johnfon. 1773.

Dr. Priestley tells us, that the fubject of his addrefs was almost as new to himself, as it can be to any perfons who meet with his publication. But having been more converfant with the ancient Chriftian writers, and alfo having met with Dr. Peirce's effay on the fubject, he fays, he is now, on mature confideration, fully fatisfied, that infant communion, as well as infant baptifm, was the most antient custom in the Chriftian church, and therefore that the practice is of apoftolical and confequently of divine authority.'

After endeavouring to fhew that this was the ancient and early practice of the church, he inquires how it came to be laid afide; and he concludes, that the denial of the cup to the laiety, and refufing the Lord's fupper to infants, had their rife from the fame caufe, and took place about the fame time, and not till the doctrine of tranfubftantiation was fully established, which was about the twelfth century.

As children are early brought by confiderate and ferious parents or governors to attend public worship, by which means their minds are betimes impreffed with a notion of its obligation and importance, their future attendance is fecured, and their rational and voluntary attachment to it accelerated; the fame advantages, the Doctor apprehends, muft arife if they were early brought to the Lord's fupper: Children, he supposes, would by this means become more the objects of attention both to their parents and the governors of churches; and young perfons would probably be more established in the belief of christianity: Having been from their infancy conftantly accustomed to bear their part in all the rites of it, they would be more firmly attached to it, and lefs eafily defert it-When the practice of every thing external belonging to christianity is become habitual, the obligation, fays he, to what is internal, will be more constantly and more fenfibly felt.'

Art. 50. The Works of the late Reverend Mr. Robert Riccaltoun, Minifter of the Gospel at Hobkirk. 8vo. 3 Vols. 15 s. bound. Edinburgh printed, and fold by Dilly in London. 1772.

The firft of these volumes contains Effays on human Nature, and on several of the doctrines of Revelation. The second confifts of a Treatife on the general plan of Revelation; and, the Chriftian Life, or a differtation on Gal. ii. 20. The third contains Notes and Obfervations on the Epiftle to the Galatians. A variety of fubjects are

treated

treated in these volumes. The doctrinal parts feem chiefly formed on the Calvinistical plan. There are several fenfible obfervations, as well as pious and useful reflections, which will be attended to with pleasure by the well difpofed reader.

Art. 51.

L A W.

51. Reflections on the Law of Arrefts in Civil Actions: Wherein is particularly confidered the Cafe of Lieutenant-General Ganfel; and a faithful Report contained of the Judgment of the Court of King's Bench, pronounced Jan. 27, 1774, upon the General's Motion. 4to. I S. Wheble.

The cafe of the General above-named, having excited much attention, fomebody has undertaken to furnish a pamphlet by controverting Lord Mansfield's opinion pronounced on his fecond arrest. But as the objector is the reporter, and who he is, nobody but his publisher knows; he may poflibly buffet his man of ftraw at his pleafure, without any body concerning themselves in the quarrel.

WE

CORRESPONDENCE.

E have received P. A.'s Letter, dated from Newton, near Middlewich, Cheshire, and have read it with attention; but do not think that it requires any particular answer. Were we to enter into controverfies with every Gentleman who may happen to differ from us in judgment, our Review would be employed in a manner very inconfiftent with its real nature and defign. With regard to the inftance in which P. A. finds fault with us, we fee no fufficient reafon, at prefent, to retract our opinion. We recommend it to him to deliver his fentiments, on the subject of his letter, from the prefs. The matter will then come properly before us; and if he fhould convince us of the truth of the doctrine for which he contends, we fhall not hesitate in making a public acknowledgment of fuch our conviction.

Through a mistake of the prefs, the lines intended to have been taken from Mr. Jerningham's poems, were imperfectly copied. In juftice, therefore, to the Author, whofe poetical character might fuffer from fuch mutilation, we now give the verfes entire :

EPITAPH, fubjoined to Mr. Jerningham's poem, entitled, The Nunnery.

By Death's ftern hand untimely fnatch'd away,

A youth unknown to Fame these vaults infold:

He gave to Solitude the penfive day,

And Pity fram'd his bofom of her mould.

With lyre devoted to Compaffion's ear,

Oft he bewail'd the veital's hapless doom,

Oft has yon altar caught his falling tear,

And for that generous tear he gain'd A TOMB.

The three lines and half printed in Italics, were all that we intended to transcribe in our laft month's Review; as, containing a characteristic sketch of the penfive Mufe who ufually prefides over Mr. Jerningham's poetical amusements.

* See Review for laft month, p. 408.

TO THE

MONTHLY REVIEW,

VOLUME the FIFTIETH.

FOREIGN LITERATURE.

ART. I.

De Gebelin's Monde Primitif ;-or, Ancient World analyfed, and com. pared with the Modern, continued from our last Appendix.

E have already made our readers acquainted with those

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himself in the investigation of his great idea. We fhall, therefore, after a brief account of his plan, proceed to what may be more generally interesting, and explanatory of the defign,fpecimen of the execution.

The work, fays M. De Gebelin, divides itself into two distinct parts or claffes, the first relating to words, the fecond to things. The treatifes arifing under the first class would be numerous, but, for the fake of being fomewhat concife, are reduced to the ten following:

I. The Principles of Language, or an Inquiry into the Ori gin of Languages and Letters.

II. Univerfal Grammar.

III. Dictionary of the primitive Language.
IV. Comparative Dictionary of Languages.

V. Etymological Dictionary of the Latin Language.
VI. Etymological Dictionary of the French Language.
VII. Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language.
VIII. Etymological Dictionary of the Greek Language.
IX. Etymological Dictionary of proper Names of Places,
Rivers, Mountains, &c.

X. Etymological Library, or an Account of the Authors who have written on all these Subjects.

The fecond clafs, relative to things, is divided into two principal branches, the first on ancient allegory, the fecond on ancient history.

APP, Rev. Vol, 1,

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Under

Under the first of these two general heads are the following differtations:

I. On the Symbolical and Allegorical Genius of Antiquity. II. Mythology and religious Fabling.

III. Cofmogony and Theogony.

IV. Symbolical Paintings and Heraldry.

V. Symbolical Doctrine of Numbers.

VI. Hiftory of Hieroglyphics, and of Emblems, with their Figures.

Under the fecond general divifion, relating to ancient hiftory, are comprehended thefe fubjects;

I. The Geography of the primitive World.

11. Its Chronology.

III. Its Traditions, or Hiftory.

IV. Its Manners and Cuftoms.

V. Its Doctrines,

VI. Its Agricultural Laws.

VII. Its Calendar, Feafts, and Aftronomy.

VIII. Its Arts, amongst the reft, on the Origin of its Poetry. Such are the grand outlines of this comprehenfive and magnificent work, in which the folution of ancient allegory, and the comparison and investigation of the radicals of language appear to us to be two capital objects.

We fhall give a fpecimen of the manner in which the ancient allegory is inveftigated and explained from the Author's obfervations on the hiftory of Hercules by Diodorus.

Hercules, fays he, the hero of Greece, has been almost always looked upon as a perfon of real exiftence, whofe hiftory, in its traditionary progrefs, had been mingled with fable. If fome learned men have differed from this general opinion; and could perceive nothing more than mere allegory in the fory, thefe found but few abettors. Not that their opinions were unfupported by reafon, but the time was not yet come when fubjects of this kind were to be laid open by a feverer difquifition, and illuftrated by other dif

coveries.

It must be owned, indeed, that the manner in which these allegorical explications have been hitherto conducted, has been inju rious to their fuccefs. Those who published them, well knew that the fubjects they treated could admit of no other interpretation, but they did not take in the whole of the object before them; their explications were partial, and what they left unexplained appeared to be an unanswerable objection to their fyftem.

It is to avoid this inconvenience, that, after having endeavoured to demonftrate, in the hiftory of Saturn, and in that of Mercury, the perfect agreement that runs through all their circumftances taken allegorically, I now proceed to explain, upon the fame principles, the hiftory of Hercules. I mean to fhew that every thing relative to that hero, from his birth to his death, is abfolutely allegorical, and that not one of his labours, not one of the perfonages intro

daced

duced in the narrative of thofe labours, but was necessary to the beauty and completion of that entire allegory which the whole hiftory of Hercules comprehends. Nay, even the arrangement of the labours is of importance here: for, by difplacing one, you deftroy the harmony of the whole, and lofe the fenfe of the allegory itfelf. By this method we fhall not only find that the hiftory of Hercules prefents us with a finished allegory, but further we shall discover the propriety of his being called the general of Ofiris or Saturn, and the companion of Thot or Mercury, all thefe allegories referring to the fame origin, or being, properly speaking, fo many parts of the whole.

It is by no means furprifing that mankind fhould lose fight of the fense of these allegories, and even of the allegorical objects themfelves. Originating in the Eaft from the higheft antiquity, and ftill appearing under the form and features of real hiftory, related in a language that funk out of the general knowledge of men, in procefs of time they came to be received under no other idea than that of hiftory, and the memory of their origin was well nigh loft

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Thus, by the fame degradation, which made Saturn confidered only as a prince diftinguished for his brutal and unnatural cruelties, Hercules, in his origin prior to the Greeks, the chief of the eastern deities, the emblem of the omnipotent, the foul of vegetation, who had first his temples among the Phoenicians, was confidered by the Greeks merely as the fon of Alcmena, the first of heroes, and the lowest of the gods.

And as, even to this day, we have feen only with the eyes of the Greeks, our predeceffors and mafters, it was hardly poffible that Hercules fhould be reinftated in his primary character by us.

'It was to the East then that men must have had recourse to difcover the origin of things of this nature, but the general obscurity in which its ancient learning and language were involved, rendered the fearch almost desperate.

'Nothing can be more oppofite than the ideas which feveral learned moderns have formed of Hercules and his labours.

Vossius, in his learned work on idolatry, has employed a whole chapter to demonftrate that Hercules was the fun, and that his twelve labours sprung from the division of the Zodiac into twelve figns.

CUPERUS adopted the fame idea; Hercules, according to him, is the fun. His club denoted the obliquity of the ecliptic, his lion's fkin, the power and force of the fun in the fign of Leo, the golden apples which he ftole, the ftars difappearing under the fan's brightnefs; and the twelve labours the twelve figns.

Thus both thefe writers adopted the ideas of the fcholiaft of Hefiod, of Macrobius, and Porphyry, &c. who were all of the fame opinion, and allowed the fables of antiquity to be allegories preg nant with fenfe and inftruction.

ALEXANDER the younger had followed the fame ideas in his explication of the Heliac table.

But as thefe writers entered not into any fyftematical detail, what they advanced on the subject appeared rather ingenious than folid.

Thus the learned Le Clerc did not believe their doctrine. He rejected all these allegories, as having no foundation; and, in order

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