) ee 
OF THE PHONETIC ALPHABET. 71 
ciently distressing, is further aggravated by the mystery in which 
the authenticity of the early writers is involved. The very exist- 
ence of Orpheus, of Sanchoniatho, and of Homer, has been debated 
by the erudite with all the warmth of polemical ingenuity, and the 
premises on which our arguments should have found rest are insuf- 
ficient to sustain the gentlest breath of discussion. The Holy 
Scriptures themselves have been a rallying point round which even 
believers have exhausted the sources of ingenious and pernicious’ 
criticism ; and the conflict has been maintained to the present day 
by the perversity of some, and the imprudence of others, whose ar- 
dour in the pursuit of truth has well nigh shaken the only unmoy- 
able® basis on which, as we are told, truth itself is founded. 
tional. Attend to the following :—*‘ Sed cum poetices honos inter grzecos 
frequentari czepisset, essentque primum, quisigillatim particulam aliquam ex 
toto illo cyclo mythico decerptam carmine tractarent ornarent et delectationis 
causa variarent, tum alii imprimis lyrici, quicarmina sua suavibus episodiis 
distinguerent, ex eo tempore res Trojanze quasi materiz poetice loco esse 
czeperunt, gua ingeniosi homines in guamcunque formam diffingenda uterentur, 
unumque id propositum haberent ut cum probdabilitate aliqua delectarent.”— 
He then goes on to deplore the additional confusion that ensued with the 
dramatic poets, and especially the Grammatici of the Ptolemzan schools, que 
omnia miscuit et turbavit (Apollodorus, in his Bibliotheca, still extant, Lysi- 
machus of Alexandria, and others). 'Those who after these handled this sub- 
ject, “ omnia inter sese miscuerunt totamque adeo veterum mythorum turba- 
runt, ut in plerisque difficile sit perspicere, quid ac quantum veteris vel phi- 
losophize, vel religionis, vel historize, vel prisci sermonis, iis subesse creden- 
dum sit.” After attributing these confusions to the commentators on the 
poets, he proceeds to reproach the philosophers, the sophists, and the rheto- 
ricians, with a share of the blame. The historians who followed are accused 
of accommodating these mutilated fragments to the probable arrangements 
of history. The Greeks, after their subjugation by Rome, and their descend- 
ants of the middle ages, are severally charged with having further confounded 
the Mythic and the Trojan cycles, which at length became mixed up with 
the conceits of allegory and the visions of astrology. Such, and in such keep- 
ing, do we find the argonautic, the Trojan, the Thebaic, and other histories 
of mankind, prior to and after the introduction of phonetic letters. That 
dates have been assigned by the moderns to such a mass of fables and confu- 
sion, subserving their own high purposes, excites neither surprise or censure 
—the field remains open, and is unworthy a contest. 
7 “The prodigious difference there is between the Septuagint (or Greek 
bible), and the Vulgate (or Latin bible), occasions an embarrassment it is 
the more difficult to avoid as we cannot positively say on which side the 
error lies. ‘The Greek bible counts, for example, from the creation of the 
world to the birth of Abraham, 1500 years more than the Hebrew or Latin 
bibles.” —Zneyc. Brit. art. Chronology. 
* When the succeeding quotation is subjoined in reference to an event in 
which the whole human race is supposed to be interested, and to which hea- 
