that I have yet feen concerning this Matter prove in my Opinion any more than that a Dialect very nearly a-kin to the Biblical Hebrew, was the Language which was spoken till the Confufion.

2. The Notions which the Jewish Rabbins fuperftitiously efpoufe, of the peculiar Sanctity of the Hebrew Language, have no Foundation any where that I can find, either in Scripture or in good Senfe. And though we fhould fuppofe there were fuch an outward Sanctity (for intrinfic it cannot be) in the Hebrew above other Tongues, yet we can hardly date that Sanctity higher than its being fanctify'd by God's writing the Ten Commandments upon two Tables of Stone in that Language. For if that Holiness be owing to its being the Language which God taught Adam, then it is wonderful that it was not better preferved. For we have none of it left, befides what is contained in the fingle Writings of the Old Teftament. Nor do we know what Alterations it underwent from the Creation to the Confufion at Babel; and in a Thing of this Kind, any Alteration would derogate fo much from its primogenial Sanctity. But farther, is it not yet far more wonderful that the Ufe of it fhould be fuffered to be loft by the Jews, duing the Babylonish Captivity? Daniel was inftructed in the Chaldean Tongue, by the exprefs Command of Nebuchadnezzar; (Dan. i. 4.) and in that Language he penned many of

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his Prophecies. At Ezra's Return the Jews fpoke a Sort of broken Chaldee, which was degenerated in our bleffed Saviour's Time into that, Dialect which we now call Syriac. In that Language our Saviour and his Disciples difcourfed to the People. But what is most wonderful of all is, that the Writers of the New Testament, who we are fure were divinely inspired, in their Writings and Difcourfes to thofe Jews that spoke Greek, ufed the Translation of the LXX, and even St. Paul among the reft, who from his Childhood was bred up to understand the original Language, as well as the ancient Traditions and Cuftoms of his own Nation.

Befides, though the Difperfion was a Judgment upon those Builders who were thereby obliged of a fudden, and when they were unprepared, to feek new Habitations for themfelves; yet the affigning this Language to one Company among them, and that Language to another, feems not to be any Part of that Curfe. In Honour indeed to thofe earliest Defcendents from Noah, who ftill preserved the Worship of God entire, he might fo order it, that the Nations which were to plant nearest to those ancient Patriarchs should speak fuch Dialects as they might eafily learn, and that was all. Farther, I think, cannot certainly be collected concerning this Matter.

IV. But Mr. Reland fuppofes that fome Languages have been made by Agreement all at once. Thus he thinks that the Chinese, and

the Language of the Incas of Peru were at firft impofed upon those People, at the Command of the Sovereigns of those Countries, who might imagine, and not improbably, by this Means to keep their Subjects together, and to hinder them from mixing with other Nations. It is poffible this might be fo, and if it were, yet as I apprehend, it does not weaken my Argument. For unless we could fuppofe all thofe Languages which have none or very little Affinity with any other known Tongues, fuch as the Finnish, the Hungarian, the Virginian, and the like, were made at once by Agreement of the Nations that were to fpeak them, without fuch a gradual Alteration from fome other Dialects, as we find in English for the Purpose from King AElfrid's Time down to the prefent Age, it fignifies Nothing. Befides, fuch an Impofition of new Languages upon a whole People at once, as Mr. Reland fuppofes, can only obtain in a Monarchy, where the Sovereign is entirely abfolute, and where the People are disposed to pay a religious as well as an entire Obedience to all his Commands. That was the Cafe of the Chinefes, and Peruvians, and more fo perhaps, than of any other People in the World.

But was this the Cafe in Phoenicia, or Canaan, when Abraham lived there? Or in Arabia where the whole Nation lived in Tribes, without paying any Subjection to one Monarch till Mahomet's Time? Were not the Greeks and

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the Italians fubdivided into innumerable little Governments, till Alexander fubdued the one, and the Romans the other? Spain was governed in the fame Manner, till the Carthaginians firft, and after them the Romans brought it under their Subjection. Gaul was fo before Julius Caefar conquered it; and fo was Britain. in his Time, and downwards as low as Domitian, under whom Agricola compleated the Conqueft of all which the Romans were ever Mafters of in this Ifland. Ireland was governed by feveral Kings in Hen. II's Time, and was never under any one Monarch till it was fubdued by the English. In America the Europeans found no great Governments, indeed fcarce any fettled ones, except thofe of Mexico and Peru. Germany was always divided into feveral Dominions, and is fo ftill. And notwithstanding the mighty Boafts of the great Antiquity of the Swedish Monarchy, which one meets with among their Antiquaries, I question whether it was much otherwife in Scandinavia, till within thefe laft Thousand, or Thousand two Hundred Years. From all this put together then, it feems evident to me, that though we fhould allow the Chinese and Peruvian Monarchs to have impofed a new Language at once upon all Subjects, which I do not contradict; yet it will not in the leaft follow from thence, that in other Countries that were in the most ancient Times fubdivided into little Governments, and where the fame

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fame Language was in thofe Times spoken in them all, allowing for a small Diversity in the Dialect, as in Greece, for the Purpose, in Germany, or Britain, their Languages might not be formed out of fome original Tongues that were spoken by Mankind when the Tower of Babel was erected.

I have now but one Thing more to add, but it is what has great Weight with me, and it is this: That this Account of the Confufion of Tongues which God wrought at Babel would fcarce have been told fo particularly, and represented as God's own Act and Deed, if it had only arifen from a Quarrel among the Builders, which obliged them to leave off their Work, and fcatter themfelves into all Quarters of the Earth. God is defcribed coming down in Perfon and viewing their Work. Something almost as folemn as the Creation, full as folemn as the Denunciation of the Flood, when Noah was commanded to build an Ark, is certainly intended by that Expreffion. The Formation of new Languages is not only in itself more miraculous, but to the Imaginations of the Perfons upon whom it is wrought incredibly more aftonishing, than any Difagreement in Opinion, and Quarrel which might thereupon enfue, could poffibly be. "Nim" rod affembled Mankind to build a City, and " to erect a Tower. The Company being very numerous in Procefs of Time, whil "the Work was carrying on, fell out; and

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