The ADDITIONS to the feventh and eighth, and all the reft, were written by the Author of the ENQUIRY into the Life and Writings of HOMER. They take, it is true, a quite different Road; yet all tend to one and the fame End of promoting Learning and Virtue, and doing Fuffice to the firft Inftructors of MEN.

Part

PART of a

LETTER

TO

SIR EVERARD FAWKENEr.

****

"BUT

Tis it poffible the Hurry of a Court, and the Duty of

of two fuch Places, fhould leave you a Moment's Leifure to bestow upon Literature---? If they do, may this come to your Hands at the lucky Hour, when, difengaged and easy, you can afford to liften to the old Story I am just going to tell you. 'That FABLE was the first • Form in which Religion, Law, and Philofophy (united originally) ap peared in the World; that the ancient Fables, as we now read and un

1

t

derftand them, convey no fuch Knowledge: that confequently they are not • understood: that therefore learned • Men have had Recourfe to feveral ingenious but clashing Schemes to explain them; while fome will have all 'the GODS of Antiquity to be deified Heroes; fome, to be Jewish Patriarchs; • others, to be the firft Egyptian Kings; others, to be emblematical Figures, like Sign-Pofts, in the fame Country; ' and a late well-meaning Writer has even difcovered them to be Types of our modern Divinity."

To decypher then thefe obfcure Remains, and trace this loft Stream of ancient Wisdom to its real Source, is the Aim of the following LETTERS. Some of them having been writ to a young Gentleman of great Parts, but in a wrong Pursuit of Happiness, has Spread an Air of Pleafantry thro' the Whole; which I am apt to think will

be

be no Difadvantage. The unnatural Separation of Learning from Life, has done infinite Harm to both. 'Twere indeed pity a Treatife fhould be lefs inftructive that it smile; or lefs entertaining that it lay open ancient Wisdom, canvass folemn Rites, and explore the Recesses of the myfterious EAST. Several familiar humorous Terms have escaped in the Revifal of the first fix Letters, which tho' very pardonable in private Correspondence, will yet require fome Grains of Allowance from the Public: Nor ought we to lofe Sight of the original Defign of thefe Letters, which is, To explain the religious Opinions of the ANCIENTS, and their confequent Practice:' If that be accomplished, no matter whether thefe Opinions were true, or fuch as a purer Religion, and improved Science have fince fhewn us to be without Foundation. The Fable, for Inftance, of the Death of ADONIS, proceeds upon a

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Miftake;

Miftake; that of the Birth of SATURN upon Truth: And fo Men of your Candour will judge of the reft.

FROM fuch, the Difficulty of this Attempt will procure an eafy Pardon of Errors Scarcely to be avoided in So various and abftrufe a Research: And both the Difficulty and Dignity of fuch a Subject as the first RELIGION and PHILOSOPHY of the Lords and Lawgivers of the World, will be my beft Apology for making this Work a Proof of my Difcernment in Men, while I publifh the particular Affection, and unfeigned Attachment taken to Sir EVERARD FAWKENER, by

IT'S AUTHOR.