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Envy, is often difcernible in the Writings of those who otherwise are the best natured Men; when they think themselves to be the freeft, and the most unbiass'd, they are many Times the most deeply tinged; and when they are so, like Icteric Perfons, they fee every Thing dy'd with that Colour with which their Eyes, and not the Objects, had been before infected.

Thefe, Sir, are melancholy Reflections, and fuch as keep back a World of People from labouring to excel in any Part of Learning that does not bring in immediate Profit. Whoever would do that, must be contented to bear with

the Jefts of those who set up for the great Mafters of polite Learning, and who by the Help of Dictionaries, Prefaces, Tranflations, and Abridgements, (which are a fort of Hot Beds to raise Scholars in) dictate to those who know lefs than themselves, and fo pafs for able Men.

But I confefs it has been a Rule with me, that Truth, as fuch, without any View to the immediate Application, is worth knowing; and tho' I am not obliged to take Pains to know it my felf, yet I praife thofe that do, and defire them to commit their Obfervations to Writing; for tho' perhaps I can make no Ufe of them, yet others may. I am confirmed very much in this Opinion, by a Story I heard many Years ago of the famous Galileo, which I fhall here take the Freedom of telling you.

Galileo

Galileo being one Day at Mafs, and not very attent at his Devotions, obferved that a ftrong Guft of Wind, fet the Branches, which hung in the Church at feveral Lengths and of feveral Magnitudes, to hold the Candles during the Service, in Motion to and fro with fome Violence, and, as he thought, with different Velocities, according to the Length of the Rods by which they were faftened to the Roof of the Church. This Meditation employed him whilst he was at Mafs, and when he went home he faftened Threads of feveral Lengths at one End to fmall Balls of Wood, and at the other End to a Pole which went crofs his Chamber, and then put them into Motion in Order to ob ferve the Times of their Vibration. And from many Experiments of the Vibrations of thofe Pendulums of different Weights and different Lengths he discovered at laft fuch Propofitions relating to ofcillatory Motions, as enabled Mr. Huygens, and the Artificers to whom he first gave the Hint, to bring thofe Engines by which we measure Time with so much Accuracy, Pleasure and Advantage, to that furprizing Exactness in which we now fee them.

Now I would ask most Men, if they had by Chance furpriz'd Galileo toffing those Balls faftened by Strings of various Lengths to a long Pole cross his Room, and obferving their feveral Vibrations, whether they would not have thought him mad. The graveft Spectators

would

would have believed themselves to be very candid, if they had pafs'd it off with a Smile. And yet we see what thofe Play-Things, fit only, as one would think, to amufe Children, produced.

I expect now, Sir, that you fhould afk what all this tends to; I will tell you: Your Collection of Lord's Prayers in fo many different Languages, fome dead, fome living, fome ancient, fome modern, which fo few Scholars, comparatively speaking, would judge to be worth the Pains, and Study and Expense that you have been at to collect, led me to think that the famous Problem concerning the Confufion of Languages that happened among the Workmen of the Tower of Babel, might by comparing many Languages together, be determined even to a Demonftration; and that by knowing the Succeffion of those Tongues, with which we are in fome tolerable Measure acquainted, and comparing their feveral Characteristicks by which they are effentially and formally distinguished from one another, we may come to know, whether God did then miraculously create new Tongues, and fo confequently force thofe Workmen to separate for want of understanding what each other faid, or whether he only made them quarrel, and thereby induced them to part, and fo leave their Work unfinished. The first of these Solutions is most agreeable to the Text; and is for that Reafon embraced by the Generality of

Inter

Interpreters both Chriftian and Jewish, and the latter has been efpoufed by feveral very good and religious, as well as very learned and ingenious Men; who look upon it to be equally the Work of God, whether they quarrelled with one another by his Command, or parted for want of Understanding one another's Speech.

The former of these Opinions is what I fhall endeavour to make good. If I do it, it will, as I apprehend, be no Differvice to Religion, for Reasons which I fhall at large deduce in the Detail of this Difcourfe.

To fave the Labour of turning to the History in the xith of Genefis, I fhall set it down at Length. And the whole Earth was of one Language, and of one Speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the East, that they found a Plain in the Land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they faid one to another, Go to, let us make Brick, and burn them throughly: And they had Brick for Stone, and Slime had they for Mortar. And they faid, Go to, let us build us a City and a Tower, whofe Top may reach to Heaven, and let us make us a Name, left we be scattered abroad upon the Face of the whole Earth. And the LORD came down to fee the City and the Tower, which the Children of Men builded. And the LORD Jaid, Behold the People is one, and they have all

a Vide Johannis Buxtorfii F. Differtationem de Linguae Hebraeae confufione, & plurium Linguarum origine.

one

one Language; and this they begin to do; and now nothing will be refrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their Language, that they may not understand one another's Speech. So the LORD fcattered them Abroad from thence, upon the Face of all the Earth; and they left off to build the City. Therefore is the Name of it called Babel, because the LORD did there confound the Language of all the Earth; and from thence did the LORD featter them Abroad upon the Face of all the Earth; Gen. xi. I,-- 9.

Among others, Mr. Le Clerc ftrenuously oppofes the Opinion for which I declare, and fays that the Hebrew Word now Shaphah, which we render Language (or Lip as it is in the Margin of the Bibles) does not neceffarily imply Language, but rather Agreement or Confederacy and Partnership, and that the latter was more neceffary than the former. This

b Notum eft Labium fignificare hic & in feqq. Sermonem? quod Labia non minori fint ad loquendum usui, quam Lingua. Vide & Ef. xix. 18. Erat certe una, tunc temporis, Lingua, fed an illa paria hic potiffimum fpectetur, non liquet. Forte haec verba homines concordes egiffe ante omnia fignificant, quia ad unam civitatem condendam, haud paullo magis neceffaria eft concordia quam Sermonis fimilitudo; nec Hebraicae Linguae idioma hanc interpretationem refpuit. Sic ad fignificandum Chananaeorum, in propulfandis bello Ifraëlitis, confenfum, Jof. ix. 2. Atque una convenerunt, ait facra Hiftoria, ad bellandum cum Jofua, & cum Ifraële, ORE

he

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