Langage, as the Roman Catholicks do their, in that dead Language we call Latin, in the several Countries where other Languages are spoken.

Other People, who had Correfpondence with, and had been among the Ifraelites in the Wilderness, after this Revelation, would learn what they could of that new Discovery; and when they returned to their re fpective Places, they would report what they knew of it to their People, and they to those they had any Correfpondence with, and so on; and they, and all who knew or heard of it, would, fome fooner, fome later, attempt each to make Ufe of it for themselves. What Difficulties each would meet with, in forming their respective Characters and Alphabets, and applying the Letters to Words, will appear below. What Obftruction it might meet with from their respective Priefts or States, is not eafy to determine: But how long it was before they brought the feveral Attempts to a common Concordance in each respective Country, fo as to be applied to common Ufe, and be understood that any Thing worth preferving was writ, will, in fome Measure, appear below.

Whether the Canaanites had made any Advances in this new Difcovery, before VOL. IV.

D

the

the Ifraelites came there, does not appear; and 'tis likely they were under an immediate Terror of being deftroy'd or difpoffefs'd by them, fo had fomething else to think of, and would hate any Thing which came from them. But forty Years after, when the Ifraelites came into Canaan, certainly all the People of the Nations which they conquered, did not fall by the Sword; but as 'tis exprefs'd, Jos. xiii. 6. xiv. 12. xxiii. 5, 9, 15. Jud. i. 19. They were driven out, and many of them would fly, fome to among their Neighbours, and fome to greater Distances, where there was more Room for them, and would carry with them what they had heard or learned of that Science. Pet. Texell. p. 315. "Eupolemus in his Book of the Kings of Judea P. 343. faith, that Mofes was the first Wife Man or Philofopher.- Eufebius in his Evangelical Preparation, B. ix. cap. 26, p. 431, faith, that Eupolemus records Mofes to have been the first Philofopher, and to have firft delivered Letters to the Jews, from whom the Phenicians had them, as the Greeks from the Phenicians." And it appears pretty plain, that many of them, at feveral Times, filed and fettled Weftward. There are many Infcriptions expreffing the Flight of the Canaanites from Joshua, into

Africa, &c. in Bochart's Geogr. Sac. of Canaan, at p. 510, 520, 547, 548. But whether these Infcriptions were writ by those who fled from Joshua, or by others who were driven out and fled thither, when Writing was better understood in Judæa, is not certain: And as they carry'd their Language with them, many of the Names of Places were Phenician, ibid. 430. "The old Tongue was Phenician, whose Language the Words Samos, Cabiri, &c. are. And 'tis certain, that the Countries on the oppofite Side of the Mediterranean Sea, and the Islands in it, were then not much inhabited, and many would fly thither, because (as I faid) but four hundred, nay, three hundred Years before this Expulfion, in the Time of Abraham, Ifaac and Jacob, the main Land was very thinly peopled; whence we have fo much of the Phenicians, and the Knowledge which they brought thither. Bochart. ib. 410. &c. Pliny, B. v. c. 12. "The Phenicians were in great Reputation for the Invention of Letters, Aftronomy and Naval and Warlike Arts And Withius, in his Ægyptiaca, p. 203, & al. by many Autho rities fools Sir John Marsham, for attributing the Knowledge of thefe, and much higher Objects, to the Egyptians, and o

thers. If those who have afferted that the Jews, in Oppofition to the Samaritans, rejected their own facred Letters because the Samaritans used them, had afferted, that upon the Antipathy that was between the Canaanites and the Ifraelites, and fuppofing that the Canaanites had acquired the Knowledge of their Letters, that they rejected them, nay, their own Language, becaufe the Ifraelites used the one and spoke the other, it had been infinitely a more likely Story.

'Tis a corroborating Proof, that the Discovery of Letters was by divine Revelation, That no People or Nation who fe parated from thofe at Babel, or after, Eastward, Northward, or Southward, to fuch a Distance as to have had no Correfpondence from them, ever found out the Ufe of Letters, as far as our Difcoveries have reached. For tho' others before Letters, or the Chinese writ, none of them had any Knowledge of Letters.

When Mofes had used, and others attempted to make Ufe of this Discovery, each Body of People among themselves, fome, 'tis like, by publick, fome by private Direction, inftead of fixing the Hebrew Tongue, which was then common to all,

as

as Mofes had by divine Affiftance among the Ifraelites, it produced a quite contrary Effect among them; each Body form'd a Language for themselves, and fo a Confufion of Tongues.

Whether Strangers had an Opportunity of having Copies of the Hebrew Characters upon the first Notice of the Discovery, or before the Covenant was writ upon Stones, directed Deut. xxvii. and executed Jos. viii. 23. and Deut. xxxi. 12. and directed to be read every feven Years to all the Peo-ple, executed Jos. viii. 34. fo that any Native or Stranger might take a Copy of the Manner of the Writing and Character ; or each Nation, because of their Difference in Religion, each being directly oppofite to the Ifraelites, and each differing in many Things from each other; or each had made Ufe of fome of the Marks they chose for Characters, in the old Way, or hieroglyphical Writing; or each had made Ufe of thofe Marks for Numbers, it happening very furprisingly, that exactly the fame Number of Marks which was used in the Alphabet, was alfo neceffary to describe the Extent of Numbers which Man had any Occafion to ufe; or the Ambition in each State moved each to ufe a diftinct Character; or there was a Hand of ProviD 3 dence