ing or finding fault with great men in the commonwealth of letters, to whofe names and memories I fhall always pay a fincere refpect and deference. I only in this differtation humbly propose and design to do justice to the facred books, and to prevent the prejudices that young scholars may receive by the authority of fome great men, against the style of our Lord's Apostles and Evangelifts; by confuting fome vulgar errors, and wiping off fome dirt that has been thrown upon these precious volumes. Therefore the nature of my work obliges me to make it appear, without difrespect or reflection, that little regard is to be had to many celebrated critics on this head, who, without confidering the matter deeply, and reading the Claffics and divine writers with the view of carefully comparing them together, have na gifterially dictated to the world, that the Greek of the new Testament is either quite a new language or a barbarous dialect prodigiously different from the common. Many young scholars, taking the charge of folecifms, blemishes and barbarisms in thefe facred authors for granted, have, to their great lofs and disadvantage, conceived an early disgust, and have either neglected to read those inestimable treasures of wisdom and genuine eloquence, or have read them with a careless indifference and want of taste.

To

To pursue my design. I begin with the laborious gentleman we nam'd first.

'Idavidov in the Septuagint and the new Teftament writers is a vigorous repetition after the Hebrew dialect; but 'tis at the fame time pure Greek.

Lucian has it, and 'tis quoted by Pfochenius: but his adverfary fets afide Lucian's authority; and lays he mixes many poetical phrafes in his Style, and infinuates this may be one. Or elfe he rather fuppofes, that that fcoffing buffoon ufes it here by way of contempt and ridicule of the facred phrafe. Tho' I think there is no ground for thefe fuppofitions, let 'em pafs. We prove the expreffion claffical by authority fuperior, and fuch as muft entirely filence all cavils. Ἔφασαν λέγοντες, and ἔφη λέγων ήm Herodotus, ἔθει δρόμῳ in Thucidides, and σῶν ἂν ἀπελθὸν ᾤχετο in Plato', are the fame repetitions exprefsid in the fame manner.

But ἐς ἀλκὴν ἄλκιμα and μεγάθει μεγάλες are repetitions more harth and licentious than I any have obferved in the divine writers. IgQnrnS is instanced by Gataker, as ridicul'd by Lucian, as

q Acts vii. 34. Exod. iii. 7. Gat de ftyl. N. T. 98. Her. Gr. 9. 509. 1. pen. 3. 219. l. 44.

f. 297. 1. 11.

Plat. Phæd. p. 164. 1. 30, 31. in Divin. Dial. Cant. ▾ Her. Gale 3. p. 205. Her Gr. 1. 19. l. 11.

3

if it was not a claffical word; and he fays not a word to vindicate it": but Herodotus often uses it, and fure the authority of such a noble writer is enough to support it.

'And for ε un is objected against, and thought not to be pure and claffical, but Herodotus puts it beyond all exception'. The chile dren or fons of Ifrael for Ifraelites, and fons of men for men will not be allow'd by this writer to be an idiotifm of the Greek language, nor justify'd by Homer's fons of the Greeks, because, fays my author, Homer is a poet, and the poetical language will not eftablish any idiom. And he farther fays that no Greek author ufes fons of men for men.

But Herodotus, whom most of the critics allow to be a tolerable good Greek author, fpeaks commonly in this manner, the fons or children of the Lydians, Æthiopians, Ionians stand barely for Lydians, Æthiopians, and Ionians”.

a

The learned man feems to reject ñò ävwdev êws náτw in St. Mark as a form very rarely, if ever, us'd by the approv'd Claffics: but expreflions ex

Gat. P. 80.

* Ἔπειτα ἐπειρώτευν τις προφήτας τὸ ἄιτιον τῇ παρόντο nang Her. Gr. 9.543. 1. pen. So does Plato, Alcibiad. 2. y Gat. de ftyl. N. T. 204. St. Mar. ix. 8. Herod. Gr. 7. 420. 1. 38.

z Her. Gr. 1. 10. 1. 33. 3. 167. 1. 46. 5. 303. 1. 11. • St. Mar. xv. 38.

actly

actly parallel are very commonly us'd by the best authors of Greece, μέχρι πόῤῥω τῆς ἡμέρας εις ὁπότ ̓ ἕσαι · ἐπὶ μᾶλλον ἐις τότε, till that time.

Tho' it cou'd not be allow'd that Pfochenius had prov'd from Euripides, that ixos for a Family or Lineage was claffical Greek, yet the authority of Herodotus and Demofthenes must carry it. Δεύτε ρος ὅτος τῆς οικίης τάυτης, he was the Second of this family. Φυλάσσω, to obferve laws, rites and cuftoms is deny'd to be us'd by the antient Greeks, but against the resistless authority of the two foremention'd noble authors.

2

Herodotus having spoken of several, both religious and civil, rites and customs prevailing among the Per fans, concludes, ταυτα μέν νυν ὅτω φυλάσσETar these things are thus obferv'd and practifed. Demofthenes tells the Athenians, that they ought to confider and weigh well what laws they enact, but, when they have made laws, to keep and obferve them.

Xograw is faid to be us'd only of the feeding of brutes, and never of men, in the Claffics. Lambert Bos brings feveral inftances to the con

b Xen. Hel. 7. p. 469. Æfchin. adv. Ctef. p. 63. 1. 2. Oxon. Her. Gr. 1. 40. 1. 16. Plat. Alcib. 2. p. 151. Ed. Hen. Steph.

1.5.

Her. Gr. 1. p. 56. 1. 6.

Demofthenes adv. Mid. p. 390.

trary.

trary. Plato uses it of human creatures: Bóonovται χορταζόμενοι καὶ ὀχεύοντες. Tho' it muf be acknowledged, that the men there described acted below the dignity of their nature, and the dictates of their reason, and were totally degenerated, and deeply funk into a state of brutality and fottifhnefs. 'Tis in my thoughts a perverfe and unreafonable adherence to an hypothefis once laid down, to object against a word or phrafe in the new Teftament being pure and claffical, because it is more us'd in the Hebrew or Syriac than the Greek. When a word or conftruction is found in any good and authentic writer of old Greece, nothing but obftinacy can hinder any man from allowing it to be pure and proper. Gataker has fix'd upon an instance very foreign to the purpose he defign'd it for: Χαρὰν μεγάλην σφόδρα ἐχάρη cay, where he fays there is a double Hebraifm; he rejoic'd a joy, and then exceeding great: and whatever can be faid to the contrary, he determines 'em to be Hebraifms or Syriafms rather than Grecifms.

}

Con

They were originally in the Hebrew; but 'tis certain they are equally proper in Greek. ftruction parallel to χαρὰν ἐχάρησαν may, I believe,

e Plat. Refp. 9. p. 266. 1. 25. Ed. Maffey. f St. Mat. ii. 10. Gat. de ftylo, p. 258.