To

"On account," says he, "of the vast concourse of persons using the English language, who resort to Canton, a vocabulary of English words has been published in Chinese characters merely expressive of sound, [or of the English pronunciation] for the use of the native merchants concerned in the trade. each character is annexed a mark, to denote that it is not intended to denote the [Chinese] idea, but merely the foreign sound attached to it. The habit of applying the sound instead of the meaning of hieroglyphics, [may have] led to the application of them likewise as sounds, to assist the memory in the pronunciation of other hieroglyphics in the same language, but not in common use; and this repeated application of them, for the same purpose, may be at length supposed to have effaced their original use."

"Thus the passage from hieroglyphic alphabetic writing may naturally be traced, without the necessity of having recourse to Divine instruction, as some learned men have conjectured, on the ground that the art of writing by an alphabet is too refined and artificial for untutored reason."

"It is indeed," concludes he, "equally natural to suppose, that no such art could have preceded the establishment of hieroglyphic, or that a mixture of other nations superinduced the invention of alphabetic language."

The drift of this hypothesis, so freely and openly avowed by its patron, to exclude the necessity of Divine instruction,— would lead us to distrust his reasons, were they even more specious but they are evidently insufficient: for, 1. It will appear, from the whole tenor of ancient history, both sacred and profane, that the art of alphabetical writing not only could, but actually did, precede the establishment of hieroglyphic; and 2. That the invention of alphabetic language was not superinduced by a mixture of other nations, nor could it be so superinduced.

1. "The book of the genealogy" of the antediluvian patriarchs from Adam to Noah, is evidently represented as a written record, Gen. v. 1. And indeed how could it possibly record their names, and their generations, residues of life, and total ages, without written words? How could oral tradition hand down, through two and twenty centuries to the deluge, unimpaired, thirty large and unconnected numbers, rising from a hundred to near a thousand years?

2. Some Jewish and Oriental traditions ascribe the invention of

writing to Seth, the son of Adam; others to Enoch, the seventh from Adam; whether well founded, or not, it proves the prevailing opinion, that letters were of antediluvian date.

3. And Western tradition affirms the same. Pliny says, Literas semper arbitror Assyrias fuisse. “I am of opinion that letters were always found among the Assyrians." The term semper, "always," is emphatic, and marks from the beginning of the world. Nat. Hist. 7, 56.

4. Cicero confirms the opinion of Pliny, and assigns an additional reason for it; namely, that the Assyrians were much addicted to astronomy, and therefore required the art of writing to record their observations *.

5. The first numeral characters in use were the letters of the primitive alphabet; their introduction, therefore, as letters, must have been prior to their designation of numbers.

On the other hand,

6. Gaspar Samedo expressly asserts, from the Chinese annals, that hieroglyphic symbols were first introduced into China only 3700 years before he wrote, in A.D. 1640; or about B.C. 2060, which was upwards of a thousand years after the deluge.

7. Tacitus attributes the invention of hieroglyphics to the Egyptians :-Primi per figuras animalium Ægyptii sensus mentis effingebant. Annal. 11, 14. And the learned Needham has endeavoured to trace a resemblance between the Egyptian and Chinese hieroglyphics. And indeed it is recorded by Herodotus and Diodorus, that the great pyramids near Memphis abounded both with hieroglyphics, and also written inscriptions, recording the number of workmen employed, their expences, &c.

8. By a fortunate discovery, a stone has been recently brought from Egypt to England, on which is a triple inscription in hieroglyphic symbols, in alphabetical Egyptian letters, and lastly, an explanation of both in Greek, which may furnish a clue to decypher the rest.

From these observations, we may fairly collect, that the hieroglyphic symbols formed the sacred character of the Egyptian priests, who thereby veiled their discoveries from the vulgar and uninitiated; and consequently, that they were in reality long

Principio Assyrii (ut ab ultimis auctoritatem referam) propter planiciem magnitudinemque regionum quas incolebant, cum cœlum ex omni parte patens atque apertum intuerentur, trajectiones motusque stellarum observarunt: quibus notatis, quid cuique significaretur, memoriæ prodiderunt. De Divinat. 1, 1.

. B b 2

posterior to the use of alphabetical writing, which was often subjoined by way of explanation, and probably not earlier than B.C. 2095, in Egypt, and B.C. 2060, in China.

The second presumptive argument, "that a mixture of other nations superinduced the invention of alphabetical language,” is equally contradicted by experience.

1. Ever since the first introduction of hieroglyphics into China, the labours of their literati have been spent in classing and contracting their symbols, and extending their system; and the curious and scientific nature of their classification into genera and species, by characteristic marks*, is much commended by Sir George Staunton. The whole number amounts to about 80,000 distinct symbols. Few of their scholars, however, know more than twenty or thirty thousand, and the generality are satisfied with about ten thousand.

In consequence also of "the insensible deviation of these characters from their primitive shapes," in the lapse of ages, some of their most ancient books, as the Shuking, are now almost obsolete, and unintelligible to their most skilful and sagacious grammarians. See Sablier's Essai sur les Langues, 1778, Paris.

And yet so wedded are the Chinese literati to their own awk

The following extract from an ancient Chinese writer, Li yang ping, given by Sir William Jones, in the Asiatic Researches, Vol. II. p. 195, is curious, and throws light on the nature and construction of Chinese hieroglyphics: :

"The ancient characters used in China were the outlines of visible objects, terrestrial and celestial; but as things merely intellectual could not be expressed by these figures, the grammarians contrived to represent the various operations of the mind by metaphors, drawn from the productions of nature. Thus the idea of roughness and of rotundity, of motion and rest, were conveyed to the eye by signs representing a mountain, the sky, a river, and the earth; the figures of the sun and moon, and the stars, differently combined, stood for smoothness and splendour, for any thing artfully wrought, or woven with delicate workmanship. Extension, growth, increase, and many other qualities, were painted in characters taken from the clouds, from the firmament, and from the vegetable part of the creation; the different ways of moving, agility and slowness, were expressed by various insects, birds, fish, and quadrupeds. In this manner, passions and sentiments were expressed by the pencil, and ideas, not subject to any sense, were exhibited to the sight; until, by degrees, new combinations were invented, new expressions added, the characters deviated insensibly from their primitive shape, and the Chinese language became not only clear and forcible, but rich and elegant in the highest degree."

How it was possible for a language to be "clear," precise, or distinct, where literal and figurative meanings of the symbols, applied with great variety and latitude, were so apt to be confounded and mistaken for each other, is difficult to conceive. See a Chinese Ode in the original, Asiat. Research, Vol. II. p. 273, and its literal translation and paraphrase, p. 199.

ward and embarrassing symbols, which can only be decyphered, not read; exhibiting a string of disjointed metaphors, without connecting verbs or particles, piled on each other like a wall of loose stones, without mortar or cement, that they still obstinately reject the inestimable advantages of alphabetical writing, which they might easily have learned from the European missionaries resident among them for some centuries past. The mercantile expedient for conveying English words by means of Chinese sounds expressed in their hieroglyphics, upon which Sir George Staunton builds so much, is foreign to the purpose, for it is neither pure hieroglyphic, nor alphabetical writing, but a mongrel species between both, and never can lead to the invention of the latter, from which it is so radically and essentially different. And it is strange, how this writer could be so blinded, by his sceptical prejudices against the Mosaic history, as to imagine that it could ever lead thereto; especially among such a people as the Chinese, the jealous policy of whose government prevents their intermixture with Europeans in general; and the pride of whose Mandarins, through an affectation of concealing their knowledge, probably occasioned at first their neglect of alphabetical writing, which they might have once known, but gradually lost, and their preference of the more mysterious and recondite mode of hieroglyphical.

The learned Brotier profoundly observes, " Writing diverged from Assyria to all those nations, who either through rusticity did not neglect, or through vanity did not despise, this excellent invention. Two nations, the Egyptians and Chinese, between whom Assyria lay, and who were both exceedingly alike in vices and virtues, seem to have laboured under this sort of pride. But their pride turned to the punishment of both: the stupendous monuments of the Egyptians are become unknown and obsolete; the Chinese, always children, grow old together in decyphering their characters." Brotier's Tacitus, Vol. II. p. 341, Note.

EGYPT.

This country seems to have attained an earlier and a higher degree of civilization and refinement than any other in the world. Even in Abraham's days, we find it the seat of a royal government, and a princely court, abounding with provisions, while the neighbouring countries, and even the fertile regions of

Palestine, were exposed to frequent famines. Gen. xii. 10. In his grandson Jacob's time, there was a settled caravan trade carried on through Palestine, from Arabia and the east, for spicery, balm, and myrrh, and probably also for slaves. Gen. xxxvii. 25. Its superior fertility, indeed, was occasioned by the annual inundation of the Nile, and the irrigation of their lands. Deut. xi. 10.

The length of Egypt was very disproportionate to its breadth: its extent, from the mouths of the Nile to Syene, the border of Nubia, under the tropic of Cancer, was about 500 miles; but it was little wider than the valley through which the Nile ran in Upper Egypt, until it reached the Lower Egypt, at some distance above the head or vertex of the Delta, where the valley expanded itself. The Upper Egypt, or Thebaid, seems to be called PATHROs in Scripture, as distinguished from the Lower, properly called CAPHTOR, or Egypt. Compare Isa. xi. 11. with Ezek. xxix. 14; and Jer. xliv. 1. with Ezek. xxx. 14—16. Deut. ii. 23; Jer. xlvii. 4.

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THE LAND OF GOSHEN.

This was the most fertile pasture-ground in the whole of Lower Egypt: thence called Goshen, from Gush, in Arabic, signifying a heart," or whatsoever is choice or precious. There was also a Goshen in the territory of the tribe of Judah, so called for the same reason. Josh. x. 41. Hence Joseph recommended it to his family as "the best of the land," Gen. xlvii. 11. and “the fat of the land," Gen. xlv. 18.

The land of Goshen lay along the most easterly branch of the Nile, and on the east side of it; for it is evident, that at the time of the Exode, the Israelites did not cross the Nile. In ancient times, the fertile land was considerably more extensive, both in length and breadth, than at present, in consequence of the general failure of the eastern branches of the Nile; the main body of the river verging more and more to the west continually, and deepening the channels on that side. Rennel's Herod. p. 537.

ZOAN, OR TANIS.

This appears to have been an ancient city. To raise the antiquity of Kiriath-Arba, or Hebron, the chief residence of Abraham and his family, it is said to have been built seven years before Zoan." Numb. xiii. 22. It was one of the royal cities, for

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