rOL. XVII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 547 



the time of Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel. These learned men were called 

 Chaldeans and Magi ; and the chief of them were physiologers and astronomers. 

 To these Pythagoras resorted to learn the motions of the heavens, and the 

 original of the world, says Justin. These were then under the Persians, but 

 the remainders of the Chaldeans and Babylonians. However, nothing is left 

 of their opinions but what Diodorus has hinted, that they believed the matter 

 of the world eternal ; but its form, order, and ornament to be constituted by 

 divine providence. And further, that they believed the earth to be of the 

 form of a schiff or tray : he speaks of their antiquity, and of making astrono- 

 mical observations many ages before Alexander. 



In the 5th chapter he speaks of the Persian Magi, who cultivated physiology 

 as well as theology. These had a Theogonia like the Greeks ; and from these 

 Pythagoras learnt the origin of the world, and the motions of the heavens. 

 These taught likewise the periods and renovation of the world. The prince of 

 these Magi was Zoroaster, of which he judges there were two. The Persians 

 held the elements, stars, and the heavens to be gods ; and worshipped most the 

 sun among the stars, and the fire among the elements : and under the nature 

 of Jupiter they comprehended the whole circuit of heaven. They, as well as 

 the Greeks, Romans, and Hebrews, continually nourished the fire. And the 

 Egyptians, as well as other nations, much honoured it. The Persians supposed 

 this fire to have fallen from heaven ; and the Stoicks called it Jupiter, into 

 which all things resolved. Thus their theology was physiology, and all their 

 other rites may be in the same manner resolved. 



In the 6th chapter he inquires after what is to be met with among the Ara- 

 bians and Phoenicians. The first is Job, whom he makes an Arabian, before 

 the time of Moses, who had the knowledge of letters, and of the heavens, 

 and many other parts of the creation, besides that of the worship of the true 

 God. This knowledge lasted to the time of Solomon, as appears by the queen 

 of Sheba : nay, till the birth of Christ, as appears by the Magi that came to 

 worship him. The Zabii he makes to be some of the ancient Arabs, among 

 whom Abraham was bred. These boast of having the religion of Noah. To 

 these. Porphyry says, Pythagoras went : and Pliny affirms the same of Demo- 

 critus. The Phoenicians he finds very ancient, and early knowing in letters, 

 arithmetic, astronomy, physiology, navigation, foreign trade and planting. 

 Thales and Zeno were Phoenicians, and to them went divers of the Greek 

 philosophers. Strabo says, that Moschus found the hypothesis of atoms before 

 the Trojan war. 



In the 7th chapter he inquires what footsteps of ancient physical learning is 



4 A 2 ' 



