13 



dialeft or daughter of the Hebrew, yet, that dialect was now itfelf cor- 

 rupted, and varioufly fpoken) one, after the manner of Galilee, another, 

 after that of Antioch, a third of Jerufalem, and fo on, has fometimes 

 given a turn to the original words that the text would not allow. In 

 faft, fince it is obferved, that nothing is more fleeting or inconftant than 

 the found of a. living language, efpecially after it hath acquired a mix- 

 ture with other nations, that commerce, invafion, or migration itfelf, 

 may have produced ; by what ftandard fliali we determine the exaft and 

 faithful pronunciation of a dead one, efpecially that of its vowels, its 

 airy and elemental part ? Thefe obfervations will be found the more ne- 

 ceffary, when we come to the examples Le Clerc has given us of the He- 

 brew poetry, of whofe rhime, though for the reafons afligned it may not 

 always be poflible to trace or fix it, I am as firmly perfuaded, as I am of 

 the rhimes of Dryden. 



Captain Cook, or, rather, the more difcriminating Dr. Hawksworth fof 

 him, has made an obfcrvation on the Otaheitean poetry, that comes direftly 

 to our purpofe ; and though I had defigned it for another place, I cannot 

 better introduce it than in this ; efpecially, as it proves the point, which 

 thefe papers have principally in view ; viz. that favage poetry, which is 

 but another word for the language of nature, hath its rhime, as well as 

 the courtly and artificial numbers of poliflied fociety ; and that modern 

 Europe juft as much borrowed its rhime from the iflands of the Pacific 

 Ocean, as from the fliores of the Baltic. " They call every two 

 " verfes, or couplet in a fong, pehay ; they are generally, though not aU 

 " ways, in rhime ; and when pronounced by the natives, we could dfcover 

 " that they were metre. Mr. Banks took great pains, to writ* down fome 

 " of them which were made upon our arrival, as nearly as he could ex- 

 " prefs their founds by combinations of our letters; but when we read 

 " them, }iot having their accent, we could fcarcely make them either metre 

 " or rhime. The reader will eafily perceive they were of very diiferent 

 " ftrufture. 



Tede 



