334 



TOPOGRAPHY. 



We, at least, are inclined to be of this opinion, and do not 

 hesitate to add, that the spirit of system can never lead to the 

 true understanding of the primitive derivation of antique 

 fables. To endeavour to deduce the whole of them from the 

 same class of circumstances, is'a nugatory and useless under- 

 taking. The greater part of the extravagances of father Har- 

 douin emanated from this principle ; and if the celebrated 

 Bianchini discovers a weak part in his Universal History, it is 

 because he endeavoured to adhere tenaciously to a system, 

 which could not, by itself alone, explain all the different 

 vicissitudes of antiquity in the historical and traditional part*. 

 Each of the fables may repose partially on a fa6t, or on a pre- 

 conceived opinion ; and it is indifferent whether it originated 

 in Palestine, Egypt, or Greece. 



In the sides and small level spaces of the mountains situated 

 at the entrance of the province of Tarija, where the Indians 

 inhumed the dead bodies, petrifications of bones, the most 

 prodigious that Nature can furnish, are to be found. In one 

 of the MSS. which have been transmitted to us, an individual 

 residing in that province communicates the following fa6t : 

 *' In digging." he observes, " at the base of a hill, in the 

 descent to Tascora, I met with a hard substance, which ap- 

 peared to be of stone, of a colour between grey and yellow. I 



* This Jesuit refused all belief to the profane history of antiquity, which 

 he derived entirely from the sacred writings. Bianchini, a celebrated historian, 

 astronomer, and mathematician, proposed to fill up the void spaces which 

 are to be found in the profane history of the ages anterior to the war of Troy, 

 by an absolute exclusion of the helps afforded by the sacred text. Is it possible, 

 that, in matters of fad, the truth should be found by two paths diametrically opposite 

 to each other ? 



had 



