might have been expected from the style and composition.

But I have not the same advantage in the present work, the choice of the subjects not being entirely at my discretion. In a connected history, an author is often obliged to relate a great many things that are not always very interesting, especially with regard to the origin and rise of empires; and these parts are generally over-run with thorns, and offer very few flowers. However the sequel will furnish matter of a more pleasing nature, and events that éngage more strongly the reader's attention; and I shall take care to make use of the valuable materials which the best authors will supply. In the mean time, I must entreat the reader to remember that in a wide extended and beautiful region, the eye does not every where meet with golden harvests, smiling meads, and fruitful orchards; but sees, at different intervals, wild and less cultivated tracts of land. And, to use another comparison, furnished by Pliny, some trees in the spring emulously shoot forth a numberless multitude of blossoms, which by this rich dress (the splendor and vivacity of whose colours charm the eye) proclaim a happy abundance in a more advanced season; while other trees, of a less gay appearance, though they bear good fruits, have not however the fragrance and beauty of blossoms, nor seem to share in the joy of reviving nature. The reader will easily apply this image to the composition of history.

To adorn and enrich my own, I will be so ingenuous as to confess, that I do not scruple, nor

* Arborum flos est pleni veris indicium, et anni renascentis; flos gaudium arborum. Tunc se novas, aliasque quàm sunt, ostendunt, tunc variis colorum picturis in certamen usque luxuriant, Sed hoc negatum plerisque. Non enim omnes florent, et sunt tristes quædam, quæque non sentiant guadia annorum; nec ullo flore exhilarantur, natalesve pomorum recursus annuos versicolori nuntio promittunt. Plin. Hist. Nat. 1. lxvi. c. 25.

† As the fig-trees.

am ashamed, to rifle from all quarters, and that I often do not cite the authors from whom I transcribe, because of the liberty I occasionally take to make some slight alterations. I have made the best use in my power of the solid reflections that occur in the second and third parts of the Bishop of Meaux's * Universal History, which is one of the most beautiful and most useful books in our language. I have also received great assistance from the learned Dean Prideaux's Connection of the Old and New Testament, in which he has traced and cleared up, in an admirable manner, the particulars relating to ancient history. I shall take the same liberty with whatever comes in my way, that may suit my design, and contribute to the perfection of my work.

I am very sensible, that it is not so much for a person's reputation, thus to make use of other men's labours, and that it is in a manner renouncing the name and quality of author. But I am not over fond of that title; and shall be extremely well pleased, and think myself very happy, if I can but deserve the name of a good compiler, and supply my readers with a tolerable history; who will not be over solicitous to enquire whether it be an original composition of my own or not, provided they are but pleased with it.

I cannot determine the exact number of volumes which this work will make; but am persuaded there will be no less than ten or twelve. Students, with a very moderate application, may easily go through this course of history in a year, without interrupting their other studies. According to my plan, my work should be given to the highest form but one. Youths in this class are capable of pleasure and improvement from this history; and I would not have them enter upon that of the Romans till they study rhetoric.

* Mons. Bossuet.

† Former editions of this work were printed in ten volumes.

The judg

ment we

ought to

form of

It would have been useful, and even necessary, to have given some idea of the ancient authors from whence I have extracted the facts which I here relate. But the course itself of the history will naturally give me an opportunity of mentioning them.

In the mean time, it may not be improper to take notice of the superstitious credulity with which most of these authors are reproached, on the subject of the augu- auguries, auspices, prodigies, dreams, and oracles. ries, pro- And, indeed, we are shocked to see writers, so judigies, and oradicious in all other respects, lay it down as a kind of law, to relate these particulars with a scrupulous accuracy; and to dwell gravely on a tedious detail of trifling and ridiculous ceremonies, such as the flight of birds to the right or left hand, signs discovered in the smoking entrails of beasts, the greater or less greediness of chickens in pecking corn, and a thousand similar absurdities.

cles of the

ancients.

It must be confessed, that a sensible reader cannot, without astonishment, see persons among the ancients in the highest repute for wisdom and knowledge generals who were the least liable to be influenced by popular opinions, and most sensible how necessary it is to take advantage of auspicious moments; the wisest councils of princes perfectly well skilled in the arts of government; the most august assemblies of grave senators; in a word, the most powerful and most learned nations in all ages; to see, I say, all these so unaccountably weak, as to make to depend on these trifling practices and absurd observances, the decision of the greatest affairs, such as the declaring of war, the giving battle, or pursuing a victory, deliberations that were of the utmost importance, and on which the fate and welfare of kingdoms frequently depended.

But at the same time, we must be so just as to own, that their manners, customs, and laws would not permit men, in these ages, to dispense with the

observation of these practices: that education, hereditary tradition transmitted from immemorial time, the universal belief and consent of different nations, the precepts, and even examples of philosophers; that all these, I say, made the practices in question appear venerable in their eyes and that these ceremonies, how absurd soever they may appear to us, and are really so in themselves, constituted part of the religion and public worship of

the ancients.

This religion was false, and this worship mistaken; yet the principle of it was laudable, and founded in nature; the stream was corrupted, but the fountain was pure. Man, assisted only by his own light, sees nothing beyond the present moment. Futurity is to him an abyss invisible to the most keen, the most piercing sagacity, and exhibits nothing on which he may with certainty fix his views, or form his resolutions. He is equally feeble and impotent with regard to the execution of his designs. He is sensible, that he is dependant entirely on a Supreme Power, that disposes all events with absolute authority, and which, in spite of his utmost efforts, and of the wisdom of the best concerted schemes, by raising only the smallest obstacles and slightest disappointments, renders it impossible for him to execute his measures.

This obscurity and weakness oblige him to have recourse to a superior knowledge and power: he is forced, both by his immediate wants, and the strong desire he has to succeed in all his undertakings, to address that Being who he is sensible has reserved to himself alone the knowledge of futurity, and the power of disposing it as he sees fitting. He accordingly directs prayers, makes vows, and offers sacrifices, to prevail, if possible, with the Deity, to reveal himself, either in dreams, in oracles, or other signs which may manifest his will; fully convinced that nothing can happen but

by the divine appointment; and that it is a man's greatest interest to know this supreme will, in order to conform his actions to it.

This religious principle of dependance on, and veneration of, the Supreme Being, is natural to man it is imprinted deep in his heart; he is reminded of it, by the inward sense of his extreme indigence, and by all the objects which surround him; and it may be affirmed, that this perpetual recourse to the Deity, is one of the principal foundations of religion, and the strongest band by which man is united to his Creator.

Those who were so happy as to know the true God, and were chosen to be his peculiar people, never failed to address him in all their wants and doubts, in order to obtain his succour, and to know his will. He accordingly He accordingly vouchsafed to reveal himself to them; to conduct them by apparitions, dreams, oracles, and prophecies; and to protect them by miracles of the most astonishing kind.

But those who were so blind as to substitute falsehood in the place of truth, directed themselves, for the like aid, to fictitious and deceitful deities, who were not able to answer their expectations, nor recompense the homage that mortals paid them, any otherwise than by error and illusion, and a fraudulent imitation of the conduct of the true God.

Hence arose the vain observation of dreams, which, from a superstitious credulity, they mistook for salutary warnings from heaven; those obscure and equivocal answers of oracles, beneath whose veil the spirits of darkness concealed their ignorance; and, by a studied ambiguity, reserved to themselves an evasion or subterfuge, whatever might be the event. To this are owing the prognostics with regard to futurity, which men fancied they should find in the entrails of beasts, in the flight and singing of birds, in the aspect of the planets, in fortuitous accidents, and in the caprice