the armillary sphere to Atlas, the son of Japetus, the son of Uranus. But the Japetus of the Greeks was apparently no other than the Japhet, or Japet, of the Hebrew Scripture; and thus even the highly-prized testimony of the Greeks goes to prove, that the immediate descendants of Noah were versant in astronomy, in which it is clear that they must have been instructed by the Patriarch and his sons. Upon the whole, then, I am inclined to ascribe the divisions of the stars into constellations to the anteluvians, and to assign to them the invention of the zodiac. It does not follow from this, that all the zodiacal emblems remained the same. On the contrary, I should think that some of them were changed soon after the deluge. Cham, or Ham, and his descendants, seem no sooner to have settled on the banks of the Nile, than they applied themselves to the study of the sciences. Branches of the same family established themselves in Phoenice, Ethiopia, and Arabia, whence they passed by sea into India; in which last country they met the descendants of Shem in the line of Arphaxad, who crossed the Indus, after having taken possession of Iran. Cham appears always to have remained in Egypt. That country is denominated the land of Ham, (or rather Cham, for so D should be written in Roman characters,) in several parts of Scripture. Plutarch mentions that Egypt was anciently named Chemia; and Chemi is the appellation given, in the Coptic dialect, to the lower Egypt. Cham, according to the traditions, preserved some of the remains of antediluvian science; and there is nothing improbable in the supposition, that this patriarch instructed his descendants in the knowledge which he himself possessed. It would be rash, perhaps, to pronounce that Cham himself became a proselyte to the Tsabean superstition; but it appears that his posterity, as the learned Maimonides observes, soon fell into this error. The Tsabeans (who are often and improperly called Zabeans, as in the original the word begins with a tsade,) commenced, no doubt, by adoring the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars, as symbols of the Deity, of his attributes, and also of those spiritual beings, whom the Hebrews called Melachim, and whom we call angels. But this worship soon degenerated into polytheism and idolatry; and it may be suspected, that these were the sins of the antediluvian world, and which had likewise originated in the worship of the Hosts of Heaven. The Egyptians, however, having adopted this religion, if it de serve the name, would naturally choose such names and symbols, for the celestial bodies, as suited their purposes and their situation; and while they retained the ancient di visions of the zodiac, they probably altered some of the emblems by which it was represented. I have thought that these preliminary observations might not be improperly introduced, before I entered into a parti cular discussion concerning the zodiacs of Esneh and Dendera. Should this Memoir ever find its way to the press, it may require an apology; as, hitherto at least, it has been written under circumstances little favorable to the researches, about which its author has been employed. ADVERSARIA LITERARIA. NO. XXIX. Epitaphe de Bonaparte. Cyrnæus, toto semotus ab orbe, Prometheus, P. H. MARRON. Domine salvum pour les Grecs insurgés. Celse terrarum moderator orbis, Dira fac rumpat juga barbarorum : Alma Libertas, tua si triumphet P. H. MARRON. Ludovico XVIII, Gallia Regi, in festis baptismalibus Regii Dum solio, LUDOVICE, regnas. Regnas, subactis seditionibus, Hac luce suetas sollicitudines, Non tibi sint aliena festa. Piavit, et monstrum latebris Tartarei evomitum barathri. Cadis nefandâ nocte, cadis miser, Nulla advocatâ ex arte Machaonis Pallentibus cùm decidua a labris Gaudia, de tenebrisque lucis Accendit almos jam radios novæ : Nec vana vox, nec consilia irrita. Undique ab insidiis, catervæ. Sic publica imples vota, Princeps; Cui merita in patriam dedere, Reddere luxuriem juventæ. Decus Garumnæ nomine te suo Tollit honore caput coruscum. P. H. MARRON. H. Stephens' Reading of a Passage in Euripides. IN NO. XLIV. p. 469. were noticed two passages of Euripides, as cited by H. Stephens in his Thesaurus, in a manner singularly at variance with the received editions. A similar instance occurs in Vol. 1. col. 755. of the old edition, under the word Bλów: « Apud Euripidem metaphorice, Λέγουσα μύθους ὦ βλύων aixóun." The line alluded to is undoubtedly by Hec. 967.; but there the reading universally acknowledged is xλówv. It is most probable, that H. Stephens (in thus attributing to Euripides a word never used by him, nor indeed by the other Tragedians, nor even by Aristophanes, all of whom instead of it employ Bgów) was deceived by a typographical error of his copy. A farther inaccuracy which escaped his notice is, that ẞλów would have required ofs, not av. I The Arak Atsa Root. M. It is remarkable that the root resembling the potato, lately brought to England for cultivation, from Santa Fé de Bogota, is an African root which grows near the Southern Atlas in Lower Susé, and called in that country, among the Arabs of Woled Abbusebah, by the same name that it bears in South America, viz. Arak Atsha or Atshan,be, unquestionably true Arabic words, signifying the absorbing or thirsty root: arak the root, atshan thirsty. 13 How has this root found its way to South America and there retained its original Arabic name? Were the ancient Arabs possessed of more nautical knowledge than we have on record? did they, at some remote period, (and many centuries before the discovery of America by Columbus,) cross the Western Ocean, and transport their plants to America? or are we to suppose that there has been a continent submerged, which once afforded communication between Africa and South America, now divided by an ocean 30 degrees across from shore to shore? J. G. JACKSON. NOTICE OF A Vindication of 1 John, ch. v. 7. from the objections of M. Griesbach in which is given a new view of the external evidence, with Greek authorities for the authenticity of the verse, not hitherto adduced in its defence. By the Bishop of St. David's. We have had an opportunity, on several occasions, of expressing the high opinion, which we entertain of this pious, ingeni See the map in Shabeeny's Account of Timbuctoo, Housa, &c. p. 55. VOL. XXIV. Cl. Jl. |