fible to deny that they fprung from the fame fource, when they are fairly laid down, and impartially confidered.

WHEN the Gomerians, on the one hand, came into Britain, and the Magogians, on the other, arrived in Ireland, they brought with them their numerals, as well as their language, where they remain, without any fenfible alteration, at this time: and as numbers were useful to all mankind, those of that family, who continued to spread themfelves all over Europe, retained them alfo, as will appear by the following table, and that, indeed, with lefs deviation than many parts of the several languages from one another; and this naturally brings on the inquiry, why there is not the like harmony, and the fame names, among the American Indians, and among people of other remote countries, fince it is most certain, that the former went from Tartary by the ways mentioned above.

To this it may be answered: that all the arts and sciences that were known to Noah and his fons, were propagated by them to their immediate defcendants, where they firft fettled, and we have fhewn before where Noah's grandsons were feated; we can only mention, for our purpose, thofe of Japhet in Greece, the ifles of Elisha; of whom, fome of these two grand people, so often mentioned, were early settled in their present fituation, and very foon fhone forth in learning, both in Britain and Ireland; for thefe were well known to flourish all over Europe, whilft the Greeks were improving, in their turns, in Greece, and the Latins in Italy, on the one hand; and, on the other, the Magogians and Gomerians all over Gèrmany, France, &c. The arts were tranfmitted, from

place to place, in due time, in the more polished nations, by commerce or conqueft; but were forgotten in the more remote countries, to which many colonies were driven by force, and where the neceffities they were under, from the barrenness of their dwelling places, and the difficulties they met in procuring the principal neceffaries of life, obliterated all knowledge of every thing but what conduced to their immediate prefervation. Thus, whilst fome tribes of the Scythians were forming polite kingdoms, improving agriculture, and encouraging commerce; others were degenerating into favages, and of neceffity compelled to lose every ray of knowledge, and, consequently, the very names of the numbers, which their forefathers ufed.

THESE were the people who paffed over to America, and, as they migrated fouthward into more friendly and fertile regions, to which numbers were naturally invited, they then began to form kingdoms and governments, furprizingly great, witness the Apalachians, Mexicans, and others; but fome remain ftill favages to this day, where they are more remote from the central countries, whofe inhabitants were always more polite.

BUT how polite, or favage foever the Americans were, they all entered into fuch new scenes and modes of life, and had fo many new, and very different, productions of fertile nature to fill their eyes, that they were obliged to find new names for things, and fo gradually lost their own, and formed new, languages: it is hence no wonder they should have given different names for their numbers, in every tribe throughout the American continent. This, however, could not be the cafe in Europe, among the go

vernments

vernments that were well established in fucceflion, in every nation. They went on in improving science, and never found it necessary to change the names of their numbers, which were originally established in the house of Japhet. There was no ceffation of the knowledge of their arts, except in the very remote Northern climes, where they were, in a few ages, deprived of every means of pursuing, or even of retaining, what their forefathers were well acquainted with, and what their cotemporaries were daily improving in the more happy Southern regions of Europe.

THAT the names of the numbers, as they are now used in Ireland and Wales, were originally in the family of Japhet, will appear, by confidering that they came with the language into these islands. The most ancient records of both places fhew it; for, in these, the numeral appellations are the same with those of this day; and these are the most ancient records in the world, many of them having been retained among Japhet's defcendants before Mofes was born; which, ftrictly agree with what that great prophet has delivered, in every thing that relates to the line from Adam to Noah, to the deluge and the divifion of the kingdoms of the earth to his three fons; and, in a word, to many other furprizing circumstances and genealogies, which could have no other foundation than truth itself, as handed down from father to fon; and yet we know that Mofes, who was born and educated in Egypt, in the 777th year of the flood, among the offspring of another line intirely, the iffue of Ham, could have no knowledge of what was done in the line of Japhet, among the bards and hiftorians, relating to these matters, nor of fome

Sf 2

CHAP. X. fome others he has himself delivered in his Pentateuch, only by divine assistance; notwithstanding what traditions may have remained among his people in Egypt, and the other defcendants of Shem, who were making their progrefs castward; for, by the time that Mofes was born, Britain and Ireland had established governments, their bards and historians were in poffeffion of their records, and they were reduced into order, as I have mentioned before; nor was it probable, that the bards and hiftorians of Britain, or Ireland, could have had the least knowledge of the books of the Old Testament, till the introduction of Christianity into these islands, whereby they became acquainted with both those of the Old and New together; which was 1571 years after Mofes was born. The antiquity, therefore, of the names of the numerals, in the family of Japhet, feems, to me, out of all doubt; however, the following table will throw fufficient light upon the matter, in the progrefs of which, I shall make some observations, by way of illuftration, upon feveral of the names, as I go on.

Obfervations