But if they boaft fuch antiquity, how has it happened that Pliny fhould relate from Berofus and Critodemus, that the Babylonians had records of aftronomical obfervations only for the fpace of four-hundred and eighty years; a number fo much inferior to that of Califthenes. And this is the foundation upon which Sir John Martham grounds his objections to the testi-. mony of *Calisthenes, in order to establish his opinion of the more recent origin of Babylon; and says, that the above 480 years began in the era of Nabonaffer, to be counted down to the reign of Antiochus Soter, in the 13th year of which Berofus is faid to have written his hiftory. But that paffage of Pliny is evidently falfe, as muft appear to any perfon who will take the trouble of examining it minutely and attentively: This Harduin proves from the abovementioned quotations from Cicero. For Fliny was defirous of explaining the origin and antiquity of letters from the writings of different nations, especially of Affyria, or Babylon and Egypt; wherefore he premises, literas femper arbitror Affyrias, meaning, that letters were always esteemed of Babylonish original. For after the Affyrians were conquered by the Medes and Babylonians, these were called Affyrians.

The teftimony of Calisthenes is explained in Sketch V.

For

For it was an indifputable point among antient writers, that letters had their beginning with aftronomical observations: but that Pliny has mifreprefented the account of Berofus is evident from this fragment of Alexander Polyhiftor in Eufebius, vol. ii. p. 17.

Βηρώσος, &c. &c.

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;

Berofus, in his first book of Babylonian affairs, fays, that he was arrived at man's eftate at the time of Alexander the Great that many annals were with vast care preferved for the space of 15 myriads of years; that these annals or obfervations contained hiftories of the heaven and the fea, the first generation of the world, &c."

Thus it is evident, that the argument urged against the teftimony of Califthenes is false, being a mifreprefentation of Berofus; and that Pliny by doing fo, has invalidated his own.

In order to fatisfy the reader as much as, poffible on a subject of so curious a nature, it will be highly proper to ftate the arguments of two very eminent authors, Kircher and Bochart, both verfant in all the noted works of antiquity. Kircher, in order to favour and support an imaginary scheme which originated with himself, calls to his aid the affiftance of that ingenuity, which on similar

occafions

occafions he had exerted with vaft fuccefs : having argued and fhewn the probability that from hieroglyphic writing might have originated the invention of an alphabet, `he endeavours at once, to convince his readers, that he had found out the precife manner of this invention, a fpecimen of which is given in plate I. Thefe he declares to have been the firft elements of the Egyptians, whereby they usually held epiftolary correspondence; but under thefe were couched great and hidden myfteries, known only to the priests under fymbolical reprefentations. From hence he infers, that the Greek alphabet, introduced by Cadmus, was pofitively derived; how truly will better appear when we confider the opinion of Bochart, whofe candour has not been doubted. Plate ii.

This author fays, that Cadmus left in Greece a monument of himself more durable than brafs, the knowledge of letters, which almost all the Greek hiftorians teftify. Herodotus fays, that amongst other useful branches of literature, not before known to the Greeks, the Phoenicians who accompanied Cadmus, alfo brought the knowledge of letters; infoinuch, that according to Hefychius, the word Exponas, became a common term, fignifying to

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