The effay itself admitting of no extracts, we have only to add, that whatever is the Reader's opinion on the particular point in question, he will, without doubt, approve of the ingenuous, pious, and charitable difpofition of the learned and benevolent Writer. Art. 51. A practical Treatife on Afflictions. To which is added, a thort Difcourfe on visiting the Sick. By Stephen Addington. 12mo. 2 s. fewed. Market-Harborough printed: London, fold by Buckland, &c. 1779. The Author tells us, that having found the confolations and inftructions contained in this book feasonable and valuable to himself in affliction, he wished to put them into the hands of others in the fame circumstances. The work treats on afflictions in general, their defign, the duties they call for, and then proceeds to addrefs a variety of fuitable confiderations to afflicted perfons, according to their different ftations and circumftances: to which are added, inftructions and exhortations for those who are recovered from affliction. It is a plain, ferious performance, and as we are all liable to distress, many may receive benefit from these benevolent inftructions. Art. 52. The Principles of the Chriftian Religion compared with thefe of all the other Religions and Systems of Philofophy, which have appeared in the World. By J. Stephens, Efq. 8vo. 4 s. in Boards. Dodfley. 1777. This work, by accident, efcaped our notice at the time of its publication; we shall now, therefore, only observe, in brief, that the Christian world is fometimes not lefs obliged to the laity than to the clergy, for a RATIONAL defence. Mr. Stephens has clearly fhewn the fuperiority of the Chriftian fcheme, above all the other religious fyftems that have hitherto obtained any establishment, in any part of this globe. sit/ Ja HUSBANDRY, &c. Art. 53. Georgical Effays: In which the Food of Plants is particularly confidered, feveral new Compofts are recommended, and other important Articles of Husbandry explained, on the Principles of Vegetation. Vol. V. 8vo. 2 s. 6 d. fewed. Dodfley. 1777. This very useful publication has been frequently recommended to our Readers: fee Review, vols. xl. xliii. xliv. and xlvii. We should have sooner inferted this fifth volume in our Journal, had we not been prevented by the accident mentioned in the preceding Article. SCHOOL-BOOKS. Art. 54. Leffons for Children of Three Years old. Part II t. 1779. More pretty inftructive ftories for young children, agreeably interfperfed with fome of the first principles of natural knowledge *The accident here alluded to, was the lofs of a parcel of books fent, in the autumn of 1777, to a Reviewer in the country, which never came to hand. Two or three other publications have, by this means, paffed hitherto unnoticed. + See Review for July, 1778, p. 25. 4 But But why will this good Lady go contrary to Nature, and perfift it making dumb creatures fpeak -However innocently and ufefully fabulous, allegorical, and poetic language may be applied to ani mate natural defcriptions, and to enforce the leflons of wisdom when addreffed to persons of riper years; we humbly conceive that as the bodies of children fhould be nourished with the food of nature, fo their tender minds fhould be fed and replenished with fimplicity and truth. . FAST-DAY SERMON. XI. The Light in which public Calamities ought to be viewed, and the 64 Hor Very well written; and very loyal. The Preacher expreffes his abhorrence of the American rebellion in the warmest terms. rid treafon! Ingrateful diflovalty," &c. &c. What a contrast to the fermon preached on the fame occafion by Dr. Price, in the Southern part of our Island! CORRESPONDENCE. T HE letter from Wadley, figned Пp, and dated June 14, refers to former letters from the fame Correfpondent; who feems difpleafed that they have not been duly acknowledged.-We have fearched our files, and turned over our memorandums, but can find no letters from this Gentleman, of a date prior to that of his prefent favour: fo that we suppose they are loft in the wreck of books and papers, occafioned by the lamented death of an ingenious and worthy affociate, which happened a few months ago. With refpect to this Correfpondent's prefent Inquiries, &c. we fhall briefly reply to them, as follows: 1. All that we have heard concerning the learned Editor of Longinus, whofe publication was the fubject of an Article in our lat month's Review, is, that he is a clergyman, refiding fomewhere in the country. 2. Mafon's English Garden, B. III. will, probably, appear in our next. 3. The fecond volume of Mr. Carr's Lucian is under confideration. Our Correfpondent inquires concerning the profeffion of this tranflator: a circumftance of which we are as ignorant as the inquirer. An account of the first volume of Mr. C's tranflation may be found in the 49th volume of our Review, p. 161, Number for Sept. 1773. " N. B. Our Wadley Correfpondent's frank was not allowed at the poft-o office. When Gentlemen make inquiries, for their private fa tisfaction, it is ufual to tranfmit them without expence to the publisher. An account of Moral and Hiftorical Memoirs will be given in our next. APPENDIX TO THE MONTHLY REVIEW. VOLUME the SIXTIETH. FOREIGN LITERATURE. ART. I. Lettres fur l'Atlantide de Platon & fur l'Ancienne Hiftoire de l'Afie, &c.-Letters concerning the Atlantides of Plato and the Ancient History of Afia, by way of Supplement to the Letters* concerning the Origin of the Sciences, addreffed to M. de Voltaire. By M. BAILLY. Paris. 8vo. 1779. THO HOSE of our Readers who have a taste for difcuffions of this kind may recollect, that Voltaire confidered the Brahmins as the primitive fages and inventors of the fciences, whereas M. BAILLY confiders them only as the depofitaries of learning and philofophy, which they derived from the Northern parts of our globe. A fourth letter from the deceased Poet to our learned Author, containing new doubts and objections to the fyftem of the latter, is placed at the head of the prefent publication. The filence of Meffrs. Holwell and Dow, with respect to the hypothefis of M. BAILLY, the total want of any documents or veftiges of inftruction communicated to the Indians by any foreign nation, are the two principal objections contained in Voltaire's last letter; and, indeed, thefe objections seem to leave nothing to fupport our Author's opinion, but mere poffibility, which is but a poor foundation for any hypothefis. M. BAILLY is not difcouraged at the view of these objections; and his anfwers to them are compofed with ftill more fpirit and warmth than the preceding letters. But do they prove the Author's hypothefis? That's a crabbed question. We think not: though we think at the fame time, that the agreeable and extenfive erudition of the Author will, together with his inge * See an account of thefe Letters in the Appendix to the 56th volume of our Review, 1777. APP. Rev. Vol. 1x. K k nious ver CD fo pro kn nious conjectures, almost make amends for the want of fatis factory evidence with respect to the main point. In the furthe letter, which, being confidered as a continuation, is called the eleventh, M. B. obferves, that the Hanferit, a language which ftill exists, but is, now, little understood in India, is a proof of the derivation of that language from fome other na tion, who tranfplanted it thither with their science and philo fophy.-He, moreover, quotes Plato, as telling the Greeks, that they were only a feeble remnant of an ancient race of men, the Atlantes, who formerly invaded Europe and Afia, the con queft of which produced multiplied fcenes of defolation, and placed an immenfe defert between the vanquished nations and thofe that had fubdued them. In the two following letters we have the whole relation which Plato gives of the Atlantis, aid of the Atlantides, before they had facrificed their primitive fimplicity and virtue to that luxury which increafed their wants, and inspired that thirft of depredation and conqueft that rendered them the fcourge of mankind, and drew down upon themselves the judgments of Heaven in the fubmerfion of their island. Nor is Plato the only witnefs alleged by our Author to afcertain the th former existence of this people and this ifland; Homer, Sanchoniathon, and Diodorus Siculus, exhibit fragments of the genealo gies, exploits, manners and character of the Atlantides, and our Author is very dexterous in fewing together thefe broken to fcraps; he has a knack at making handfome patch-work, la beyond what we have obferved in almost any menders of the old and tattered garments of mythology and history. By his ingepi nious combinations of the reports of thefe Authors, it would fa appear that the Atlantides were an ancient and powerful people, that they inhabited a fruitful and maritime country, that the hiftory of this country is the hiftory of the Egyptian and Grecian mythology, and that it is with an account of this people that the Egyptians begin their own hiftory. lu ot N of fu of th ef This now being the primitive people from whom all fcience C and philofophy were derived; the next point to be fettled is, where were they fituated? Plato fays, in an ifland (long fince fwallowed by the deep) near the continent, and oppofite to the pillars of Hercules. But where was that? was it Cadiz ?-was it a land of which the Canaries are the fhattered remains? was it what we now call America? It was none of all thefe, as our Author proves in his fourteenth letter, nor yet any place in the ocean, which has been called Atlantic for above two thoufand years, nor in the Red Sea which Herodotus called the Atlantic, and in the neighbourhood of which a learned man difcovered the -pillars of Hercules, in the temple of that hero-god at Tyre. lo The learned arguments, embellished with all the graces of wit and eloquence, that M. BAILLY has employed to prove, do th that 21 the ha ter ΟΙ co by tio let Co W ha th th CO the Platonic Atlantis was fituated in none of thefe places, are very entertaining. The only question is, whether he is not chargeable with a high degree of literary prodigality in spending fo much precious labour on a geographical description, which probably had no object but in the imagination of the Athenian fage; for his Atlantis may be no more than a moral romance borrowed from the Egyptians, whofe allegorical genius is well known, or perhaps a poetical reprefentation of fome aftronomical fact. But let us not judge definitively on this head before we have feen the farther arguments alleged by M. BAILLY to determine the fituation of this famous ifland. Thefe are the result of the hiftories, traditions, fables, monuments, religious inftitutions, feftivals, languages, etymologies, that he has examined, compared, and combined, in order to establish his favourite hypothefis. The ftatue of Hercules is always accompanied with two columns or pillars, one of which was confecrated to fire, and the other to the clouds and winds. They were, alfo, fays our Authar, fometimes called limits and boundaries as well as pillars. Now from thefe pillars of Hercules found in his temple at Tyre, which M. BAILLY ingeniously confiders as a monument of gratitude (a matk of the joy that is natural when one comes to the end of a long journey), he boldly concludes that the Atlantides had failed from the North to Tyre, in queft of a fruitful country and a warm fun, and had thus erected the votive pillars to the fire they had found in a funny climate, and to the favourable winds that had conducted them thither. The magic of ftyle, the extenfive erudition, and the fecundity of imagination, which diftinguifh our Author, are employed in the fifteenth letter to render this conjecture palatable. . He fees the Atlantides coming down from their mountains in the North with the Scythians, or under the denomination of that people, paffing the Caucafus, and falling on the kingdom of Pontus and it is to them he attributes the worship of the fun and moon, that was established in Phrygia, Tyre, and other eastern countries. This worship is alleged as a proof of his hypothefis; for it must have been, according to him, imported from the North, where the beams of the fun, that burn and deftroy in the hot and eaftern climates, are ineftimably precious to quicken and revive the chilly inhabitants of thofe cold and barren regions. Accordingly, fays he, the Greeks fpeak of the Hyperborean Apollo, i. e. of a foreign god, whom they had adopted into their lift of deities; and the feftivals of Adonis and Oferis (i, e. of the fun loft and found again), could never have been invented but in thofe countries, which are for a long time deprived of the light and heat of that great luminary. This notion is, however, more ingenious than folid: it is well known, that the alter Kk 2c natives |
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