of Eneas.

For this difference no reafon can be affigned, except on the fuppofition, that diftin&t terms were affumed for the two computations.

Scheme of arrangement for the kings of Latium and Rome.

"WHEN the Greeks and Latines were forming their Technical Chronology, great were the difputesabout the antiquity of Rome. The Greeks made it much older than the Olympiads: fome of them faid” it was built by Æneas; others by Romus, the fon or grandfon of Æneas; others by Romus, the fon or grandfon of Latinus, king of the Aborigines; others by Romus, the fon of Ulyffes, or of Afcanius, or of Italus and fome of the Latines at first fell in withthe opinion of the Greeks, faying, that it was built by ˆ Romulus the fon or grandson of Æneas. Timæus Siculus reprefented it built by Romulus, the grandfon of Æneas, above 100 years before the Olympiads; and fo did Nævius the poet, who was 20 years older than Ennius, and ferved in the first Punic war, the hiftory of which he wrote. Hitherto nothing certain was agreed upon. But about 140, or 150, years after the death of Alexander the Great, they began to fay, that Rome was built a fecond time by Romulus, in the 15th age after the deftruction of Troy. By ages they meant the reigns of the Latine kings at Alba, and reckoned the firft 14 at about 432 years.'

THIS hiftorical enumeration of dates and opinions is abridged from Dionyfius of Halicarnaffus; whose teftimony merits more credit, as a voucher of ancient traditions, than as an authentic record of facts. One infallible chronological character, the overthrow of Troy, Sir I. Newton has afcertained by a procefs of operations in reafoning, the refult of which is equivalent to demonftration. The date difcovered, A. M. 3108, derives confirmation from a multiplicity of coincident events, in the pedigrees of families, and the records of kingdoms, which not only enforce conviction, but reduce to an abfurdity, every pretenfion to contradictory evidence.

By this teft let the prefumed date of the firft Olympiad be tried. To the 18th of Jehoshaphat, A. M. 3108, add 432, the fum 3540, continues the reckoning to the 17th of Xerxes, king of Perfia, or the 4th year of the 52d Olympiad, counted from the reftoration of that epoch by Iphitus, A. M. 3232. Sir I. Newton, reprobating this arrangement as exorbitant, has recourse to an equation, which brings the laft year of the Latine kings down to the 38th Olympiad..

By 14, the number of the kings, divide 432, the duration of their reigns, and the quotient, 31, will be the common measure nearly. This illuftrious author, affigning but 20 years a-piece to each fovereign, reduces the total fum from 432 to 280. This equation is ftill exceptionable on the fcore of excess. For 3108+

• Lib. i. c. 71-75.

1

280-3388, prolong the computation to the 19th of Jofiah; or the 3d of the 39th Olympiad. A much fhorter term must be allowed for the 14 kings in Latium prior to Romulus. Our worthy Reformer of ancient chronology had two justifiable methods of adjufting history by the joint aid of generations and reigns: He excluded fuch kings as had done nothing memorable, or feemed to fall under the class of Utopian princes, imaginary characters, inferted in national calendars, on purpose to amplify the accounts of time; and abridged reigns apparently too long, or numerous, to accord with the course of nature. It fairly admits a query, whether many of the kings between Eneas and Romulus, were not Utopian?

IF from the date of the reftored Olympiad, be deducted the year of Troy's downfal, (that is 32323108124), the refult of the operation is the astronomical interval; and why fhould historical arrangements be conftructed, in contradiction to phyfical truth? In the paffage above quoted immediately from Sir I. Newton on the authority of Dionyfius the Halicarnaffian, is recorded the teftimony of several ancient writers, (prior in time to Alexander the Great), whofe belief it was, that a grandson, or great grandson, of Æneas laid the foundation of Rome; whether Romulus and Remus were the founders, or either, is an indifferent circumftance. Sir Ifaac has overlooked a remark of Dionyfius, which is, "That Cephalon, a very ancient author, referred the building of Rome to the fecond generation after the Trojan war, by a colony who escaped

Dd4

escaped from Troy with Æneas; that its founder was Remus, the leader of the colony; that he was a fon of Æneas, and that Romulus was one of four brothers by the same father. Demagoras, Agathyllus also, and many others, agree in the circumstance of time, and in the conductor of the expedition. Dionyfius adds many teftimonies of Roman writers, who unanimously affirmed that a Trojan colony fettled in Italy foon after the Trojan war; and that Rome was built after the fecond generation in the line from Eneas. An interval of 15 generations, Sir Ifaac Newton admits, was never pretended till after the rife of the Greek Empire, fix full centuries after the conflagration of Troy.

THE more ancient writers of all nations never incurred the censure of affecting an extravagant antiquity. Among the Jews, Mofes was more moderate than Josephus; and the more ancient authors in Greece and Rome, than their fucceffors. This confideration fupports the not improbable conjecture, that the interval from the period of the Trojan war to the first Olympiad, has been protracted to a duration which no evidence can justify, or even credulity admit.

SUPPOSE, what Sir I. Newton will not allow, that the Varronian era was the third of the 6th Olympiad, or the 23d from the restoration of that chronological term, Rome began to be built 147 years after the fall of Troy. For 124+23=147; and 3108+147=` A. M. 3255, coincident with the first year of Romulus,

and less by unity, than the firft year of the Varronian reckoning, A. M. 3256.

THE Newtonian computation proceeds on the poftulate, that the reigns both in Latium and Rome are to be reduced. But the latter claufe of the poftulate is inadmiffible, because no scheme of historical arrangement can vindicate the propriety, or truth, of deferring the acceffion of Romulus, or the origin of his capital, to the 38th Olympiad. That great man might, without the leaft fufpicion of violating physical probability, have retrenched the number of the Latian kings. By 14 divide 147, the refult is 10 years 6 months each. These reigns are fhorter by one half than Sir Itaac is willing, in other cafes, to admit. At the rate of 5 reigns for a century, and proportionally for the residuary number, feven intermediate princes might exhaust the fpace from the fall of Troy to the rife of Rome, equivalent to about four generations of 33 years one with

another.

THE date affigned in the Chronology of ancient Kingdoms amended, for the fubverfion of Priam's capital, is in reality that fixed point, whence commences certainty in computation by the national eras of paganism ; because the time of that catastrophe is defined, by a clufter of chronological notations, which bring into coinçidence the hiftory of the Hebrews, with that of the co-existing pagan establishments. Some of the more notable fynchronisms, in the natural order, are, by way of recapitulation, subjoined.

1. JEHOSHAPHAT,