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tlons, and appropriated to each of them a peculiar mode of 

 worfliip and of facrifice, and who invented or gave rife to the 

 particular forms \inder which they have ever fince been repre- 

 fented. And indeed Herodotus appears to have purpofely ex- 

 plained himfelf, refpedling thofe opinions which he wifhes to 

 be coniidered as his own, at the conclufion of the paflage 

 now under confideraiion, where, without controverting the rela- 

 tions of the priefls, (whofe facred authority in matters of remote 

 antiquity where religion is concerned, he feems by his filence 

 implicitly to admit,) he feparates and diftinguifhes his own 

 fentiments from their traditions : — " The firfl things (fays he) 

 " the priefhs of Dodona told me, but the latter, refpedting 

 " Hefiod and Homer, I myfclf aflert." That is, the priefls of 

 Dodona are they who gave me the account of this very early 

 ftate of religion, and informed me that the names firfl given 

 to the Gods were received by the Pelafgi from Egypt, and by 

 the Greeks from them ; but refpedling what I have faid of 

 the very imperfeft and fcanty knowledge of the ancients in 

 theology, and with regard to my afTertion that Hefiod and 

 Homer gave firnames to the Gods, and were the authors and 

 founders of our prefent improved fyflem, that I declare, as my^ 

 own opinion, which I think myfelf capable of forming, and 

 authorized to give, as the time of thofe bards, in comparifon 

 with the remote ages, is not very far diflant from my own. 



It would feem alfo, from the words of Herodotus, that the 

 hiflorian afcribed fomewhat more, and of much greater impor- 

 tance, to Hefiod and Homer than the inventions exprefsly de- 

 tailed 



