Idolatry and Philosophy of the Zabians. 217 
ed since Chiron the centaur lived, and thereby to settle the true 
time of the Trojan war. When 'Tauric worship was instituted, the 
horns of the bull were tipped by the equinoctial colure ; ‘he then 
began to open with his horns the vernal year.’ But the horns of 
the bull are now eighty degrees from the equinoctial point, and as 
it requires seventy two years to recede one degree, 80° x 72=5760 
years, which gives the time since the Tauric festival of May day 
was instituted. 
Jeroboam the idolater set up two calves in Dan and Bethel, and 
ordained a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month. Now 
originally the year was supposed to consist of twelve months, each 
month of thirty days, and the remaining five days and few minutes 
were brought in after a sufficient time had elapsed, to form another 
month. In their festival calculations the year was supposed to con- 
sist of three hundred and sixty six days. The fifteenth day of the 
eighth month falls on November the sixth. ‘There were two festi- 
vals to Bel during the year, the first on the first day of spring, the 
second on the first day of autumn. ‘The year was divided into four 
seasons, each season consisting of ninety days. If six days be sub- 
tracted from November, (these six were merely added to make the 
time come nearer the truth,) and then, if two seasons, or one hundred 
and eighty days be subtracted from the three hundred and sixty, it 
brings the time of the commencement of spring, or the first 'Tauric 
festival to the first day of May.* 
In these remote ages we have every reason to believe, that the 
true system of the Universe was understood. ‘That the Chaldeans 
were the first discoverers of the arrangement of the planetary orbs 
in the solar system, there can be no doubt. At an early period they 
made an approximative determination of the length of the year, and 
were able to predict eclipses. Now the mere idea of the path of a 
planetary body revolving round the sun, or any other star, implies 
much more extensive acquaintance with theoretical astronomy than 
might at first appear. ‘The movement of an inferior planet, such 
as Venus, is to the eye oscillatory, and from the elements deduced 
from observation of her progressive and retrograde motions, and un- 
equal velocity in different parts of her apparent movement, I do not 
see how they could convert her oscillatory vibrations into a circular 
* From the Chaldee Saros we deduce their measure of the year to be 365 days, 
5 haurs, 49 minutes, and 11 seconds, exceeding the truth only by 26”. 
Vol. XXVIII.—No. 2. 28 
