45 



the true Carthaginian pronunciation would flill be wanting, without 

 which the pofition and return of the rhime mufl for ever continue uncer- 

 tain. Neither are we very fure, that Plautus himfelf was correft ; and 

 if we may judge by the loofenefs of his tranflation, it fliould feem he 

 was not. Yet I would not be underflood to diiparage the venerable 

 Plautus, whom I do not the lefs refpeft for having preferved to us the 

 only cxifting fragment of the Phoenician mufe. 



Whate'er our predecelTors taught us, 



I have a great efteein for Plautus. '• 



• i 



But we know that the Septuagint themfelves, as Cappellus has abun- 

 dantly fhewn in his Critical Notes, have with all their accuracy and in- 

 duftry, betrayed in many places the groffefl ignorance of the text, from 

 ■which they tranflated. Mofl true it is, that, in the time of Plautus, 

 notwithftanding the recency of the firfl Punic war, the Carthaginian 

 language was utterly unfamiliar to his readers, or the poet had not been 

 his own interpreter. All thefe circumftances confidered, and many more 

 that might be added, it is not wonderful that the rhimes fliould not 

 ftare us in the face. But enough of accuracy has remained, to enable 

 the learned Le Clerc to gather up the rhimes ; and it mud be owned, 

 ^hat, with the afliflance of the Great Bochart, he has ' performed his 

 talk tolerably well ; to me, at leafi, in the mofl perfpicuous and beautiful 

 manner; afluming only, what it would be uncandid not to allow him, 

 becaufe he has proved the faft, that Plautus confolidated two and twenty 

 lines of the Punic into the eleven of his own. One thing more I would 

 add, that although we fliould punftuate the words in Plautus, after the 

 -manner of the Hebrews, or of the Syrians, there would, even then, be 



no 



materially difFers from the other in his general interpretation of the words. Le Clerc, it 

 is prefumed, with fo excellent a guide as Bochart, had an equal right to amend and 

 reftore the text, efpecially if he inferted no one word of his own, to make out the rhime. 

 Nay, I am of opinion, that the rhime itfelf is the befl: guide to the true reading of tlie 

 paflage, if what Le Clerk telh us be a faft ; viz. that in feveral places of the Septuagint, 

 where the vertion abounds in more words than the text of the original feems to warrant, 

 il you reftore the riiine, the Septuagint fliall be found to have tranflated faith&lly. 



