Royal Declaration; a Declaration, which will by no means admit of the fubterfuges, to which many ingenious Writers have had recourse, to justify a fubfcription to Articles which they do not believe. It is the declared end of the requifition, to avoid diverfities of opinions, and to establish confent touching true Religion. In reference to this end, the, Royal Declaration prohibits the leaft difference from the Articles in the moft explicit terms, viz. We will that no man hereafter shall either print or preach to draw the Article afide any way, but shall fubmit to it in the plain and full meaning thereof; and shall not put his own fenfe or comment to be the meaning of the Article, but fhall take it in the literal and gram matical fenfe..

Towards the close of his Review of the Articles, Mr. Wilton considers the oppofition of the Bishops to the Diffenters Bill, and makes fome very pertinent reflections upon it.

For a further idea of this Writer, fee our account of his Apology for the Removal of an Application to Parliament by the Proteflant Diffenting Minifters. Review, vol. xlviii. p. 420.

ART. XI. Obfervations upon Lightning, and the Nethed of fecuring Buildings from its Effects, in a Letter to Sir Charles Frederick, &.. By B. Wilfon, F. R. S. &c. 4to. 2 s. 6d. Davis. 1773.

LTHOUGH electricians univerfally agree in opinion

A concerning the utility of metallic conductors, a fchifm

has for fome time paft fubfifted among them, with regard to the proper form in which the upper part of the conducting rod ought to terminate. Dr. Franklin, and, we believe, a very confiderable majority of thofe who have ftudied this queftion, give a decifive preference to pointed rods; on an expectation, feemingly founded on the jufteft analogy, that they may, in fome cafes, prevent a discharge, by filently attracting, or transmitting, the electric fluid, when a pofitively or negatively charged electric cloud comes within their influence: and that, in all cafes, they tend to diminish the magnitude or violence of an unavoidable explosion; while they are undoubtedly as well adapted as blunt conductors, to carry off its contents.

For these and other reafons, we apprehend, a committee lately appointed by the Royal Society, at the inftance of the Board of Ordnance, to confider of the beft method of fecuring his Majefty's magazines of gunpowder at Purfleet from accidents by lightning, recommended the erection of elevated and pointed conductors.

Mr. Wilson, on the contrary, has long contended that the upper part of a conducting apparatus ought to terminate in a knob, or flat furface. He maintains that, as fharp points folieit or invite the lightning, or electric matter, they must confe

quently

quently increase the magnitude of the explosion, and must likewife frequently occafion one that might otherwise have been avoided. The other arguments which he produces in fupport of his opinion are not unknown to those who are converfant in this inquiry; whom we muft refer to the prefent pamphlet for he further reafons which induced him to exprefs his diffent to the report of the aforefaid committee, of which he was a member.

We fhall however mention one curious obfervation on the effects of a thunder-ftorm, related in Mr. Wilfon's letter to Sir Charles Frederick, and in another addreffed to the Author by Mr. Delaval, who-concurs with him in the electrical herefy concerning points. From their united teftimony, and the evidence of Mr. Gould, verger of St. Paul's, it appears that the conducting apparatus fo lately put up at that cathedral, has already once manifeftly answered the purpose for which it was erected; and that on examination it evidently carried marks of its having conducted a large ftroke of lightning, proceeding from the great thunder-cloud in which the city of London was involved on the 22d of March 1772. On the following day it was found that the conductor, to the Eaft, particularly, where it goes into the water-trunk, fhewed evident figns that it had been red hot; while in other parts the iron, as well as ftones near it, was blackened by fmoke; and a thick ruft that had been formed on the furface of the metal was, by the lateral force, beaten off and removed to fome diftance from it.'

Thefe appearances in particular are employed by Mr. Wilson in confirmation of fome of his opinions; and efpecially to fhew that this noble fabric, though provided with a conductor, poffibly efcaped deftruction because the rod was not pointed. We fhall only obferve in general, that the force of his reafonings on them appears, in fome degree, to be leffened by a fact mentioned in the note at page 14; where we are told that the conducting iron did not touch the lead.'-A part therefore, at least, of the abovementioned effects produced by the lightning, on a bar of iron near four inches broad, and about half an inch thick,' and in particular thofe caufed by the lateral explafion, appear to us to have been owing, in a great measure, to the interruption which the electric fluid met with in its courfe, in confequence of the difcontinuity of the conductor :a defect, which, we should hope, has by this time been remedied.

We fhall only further add, that the abovementioned incident fuggefts to us the propriety of fixing the conducting apparatus in fuch a manner, that no part of it may be in contact with any combuftible fubftance: as otherwise the rod, which has effectually protected a building from the explosive power of the light

Cc 2

ning,

ning, may nevertheless effect the deftruction of it by fire; by means of the great heat which it may have acquired in the conducting of an extraordinary quantity of the electric matter, or in confequence of the infufficient fize of the conductor, or the difcontinuity of its parts.

B-y.

ART. XII. The Io TRIADS; or, the Tenth Mufe; wherein the Origin, Nature, and Connexion of the facred Symbols, Sounds, Words, Ideas, and Things, are difcovered and inveftigated, according to the Platonic Numbers. And the Principles of all Human Knowledge, as well as the First Language, are retrieved in the English, &c. &c. By Rowland Jones, Efq. 8vo. 2 s. 6d. Robinson.

1773

Tis a humiliating reflection to a body of profeffed and wellestablished Critics, who have exercifed their trade for near 25 years paft, with fome kind of credit in the world, to find themfelves under fuch a mortifying predicament, as to be obliged fairly to acknowledge that they have been carrying it on without any acquaintance with the firft or primitive language, or even a knowledge of the very fignificant import of the four andtwenty members of the Chrift-cross-row, the very horn-book of their mother tongue. The prefent effay has been indeed a hard cruft for us Critics, and of fo refractory a texture, that so far from digefting it, our whole toothless corps have been ineffectually mumbling over it for near a year paft, without having been able to make the leaft fenfible impreffion on it.

In other works when we occafionally find ourselves at a fault, we can have recourfe to the kindly affiftance of a lexicon, or fome New and Complete Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, to lead us into the right fcent: but, in the prefent cafe, every help of this fort was denied us; except, indeed, where we were at first led to expect it, in the Alphabetical Vocabulary which we foon efpied in the body of the prefent work. Immediately and eagerly laying hold of this key of knowledge, to learn the meaning of the firit word in the title-page, the import of which we honeftly confefs we did not understand, we read as follows:

to TRIADS, The fluxion of a point, or burning bush in ftrait lines every way, expanding an infinite circle in a triad, or three divifions of the point, line, and circle, whose divifions and combinations as exhibited in the quaternion of elements, or Jove, the four lettered name, comprehend all things, with their names or fymbols, &c. &c.'

Not finding fatisfaction in this and fome other articles which we confulted, and suspecting that the discovery of the primitive language might poffibly, and aptly enough, be promulgated in fuch form, as to require a different mode of reading from that to which we are accustomed in modern times, we tried various

experiments

experiments on the text of this work. We at first. imagined that it might be the learned Author's intention to divulge the arcana of the first language by a reading from the right hand to the left, after the manner of the Hebrews and indeed fome of Our firft eflays feemed greatly to favour this hypothefis; but on further trial, we found caufe to reject it. The fame difappointment, we confefs, attended our attempts to read after the more modern, but ftill very ancient, zig-zag manner, called by the learned Bergondo, or that which is ufed in the celebrated Sigean and other Greek infcriptions of the highest antiquity. Laftly-for why should we be ashamed to own our making random and whimsical experiments, on the text of a great philological difcoverer, who deals in ftrange types, and fymbols, and other fingular devices-we attempted the perufal of thefe Sibyline leaves, by cafting our eyes in a perpendicular line from the bottom to the top, after the manner of the Chinefe; and vice verfa. On the whole, however, as the rules of grammar and common fenfe were, in general, fomewhat less frequently violated in pursuing the vulgar or modern courfe of reading, than any of the former, we found ourfelves obliged to give the preference to it; and we accordingly recommend it to be followed by thofe who mean to fit down seriously to the ftudy of this profound treatife.

As there is no point, however, fo clear, but that it may be contraverted by carping critics, we fhall give a few quotations from the work, which may at the fame time furnish the Reader with a taste of the Author's manner, and a sketch of the nature of his difcoveries. Thefe fpecimens are the more valuable, as this, which is the fixth of his productions, is here declared to be the last which the Author means to give the world, on this important fubject;' and comprehends the whole of his interefting difcoveries,' condenfed into a half-crown pamphlet. Our extracts are indeed given in a fomewhat mutilated state; but the Author's paragraphs poffefs this peculiar excellence that they do not fuffer by mutilation.-You may here cut and flash a sentence into as many pieces as you do a polype, and every piece will be as much a whole, as when the parts were all together.

Speech, the found part action. Spirit, the feeing fire part property. Spring, the lower or other parts in, as thofe of water, seasons, vegetables, &c.' p. 39.

* In the Sigean and other very ancient monuments of Grecian antiquity, the first line is read, as with us, from the left to the right; the next in a contrary direction, and fo on, to the end. We need not inform our learned Readers that the term is derived from the turns made by the plough.

Cc 3

• Devil,

• Devil, deprived of life and free volition, a fallen angel, or a ray of a light frozen into matter, and evil is the privation of will.' P. 24.

The foregoing extracts are taken from the Vocabulary abovementioned. The following are fpecimens of the grounds or elements, on which fuch explanations as the foregoing are founded:

• An, en, na, ne, exprefs. mere existences in earth and water, and their primitives, affirmations, and negatives, as in an or a in, and or a in divifion, animal, annals, annual, &c.' P. 19. N. B. This is one of the many paffages that at one time strongly inclined us to try the reading a la Bergondov.

Ic expreffes the first motion; or ic-er-at, motion flowing from the point of i to the surface of the water or creat ing; as does its derivative and inflectory ig, the like emanative motion in the generation of animals and vegetables, or ig-en-er at, and be-eg-in; and uc and ug, the return, emotions, and fpringing up of these emanations, as in genu.' P. 15, 16.

Od, ot, do, to, fignify the feveral divifions or things, fides, and mizmaze, comprehended within a circle or fyftem, together with their motions and actions, and covering inclofing, and bordering parts, as hod, hodge-podge, odd, ode, other, &c.— Os, fo, the circle or extent, feen or founded, and affirming by the fame.'

Our mother tongue Mr. Jones conceives to approach the nearest to the primitive language, as any one,' he fays, may be convinced of by the farther difcoveries now made therein; more particularly where the b, f, c and d are joined with the i and u, which are truly primitive, and unmatchable. It is no lefs,' he adds, than that most genuine remains of the Japhetan language, which efcaped the Babylonian confufion.'-It is really, after all, not a little hard on our mother tongue, that the old lady, after having escaped found, wind and limb, as we are here told, from the great crash at the downfal of the tower of Babel, fhould be thus hamstrung, crippled, and beat about the head and eyes, by a modern Efquire, who all the time, forfooth, pretends to be making violent love to her. But to proceed.

To clear up any difficulties that may yet remain on this subject, after all his labours, the Author has, he tells us, literally represented Adam ftanding in the garden of Eden,' in what he calls a map, prefixed to the work; where his legs correfpond with JL, the divifion of T or L; his thighs with the transverse line at top, with n; the joint buttocks of the human pair, with

their earth and water parts; which are again divided into death and life by db, forming a new io of man, in the way of propagation

3