s
was here intended; and that there consequently remains a strong
probability, that the sacred Decalogue, which God himself delivered to
Moses on Sinai, A. M. 2513, B. C. 1491, was "the first writing _in
alphabetical characters_ ever exhibited to the world." See _Clarke's
Succession of Sacred Literature_, Vol. i, p. 24. Dr. Scott, in his General
Preface to the Bible, seems likewise to favour the same opinion. "Indeed,"
says he, "there is some probability in the opinion, that the art of writing
was first communicated by revelation, to Moses, in order to perpetuate,
with certainty, those facts, truths, and laws, which he was employed to
deliver to Israel. Learned men find no traces of _literary_, or
alphabetical, writing, in the history of the nations, till long after the
days of Moses; unless the book of Job may be regarded as an exception. The
art of expressing almost an infinite variety of sounds, by the interchanges
of a few letters, or marks, seems more like a discovery to man from heaven,
than a human invention; and its beneficial effects, and almost absolute
necessity, for the preservation and communication of true religion, favour
the conjecture."--_Scott's Preface_, p. xiv.

21. The time at which Cadmus, the Phoenician, introduced this art into
Greece, cannot be precisely ascertained. There is no reason to believe it
was antecedent to the time of Moses; some chronologists make it between two
and three centuries later. Nor is it very probable, that Cadmus invented
the sixteen letters of which he is said to have made use. His whole story
is so wild a fable, that nothing certain can be inferred from it. Searching
in vain for his stolen sister--his sister Europa, carried off by
Jupiter--he found a wife in the daughter of Venus! Sowing the teeth of a
dragon, which had devoured his companions, he saw them spring up to his aid
a squadron of armed soldiers! In short, after a series of wonderful
achievements and bitter misfortunes, loaded with grief and infirm with age,
he prayed the gods to release him from the burden of such a life; and, in
pity from above, both he and his beloved Hermione were changed into
serpents! History, however, has made him generous amends, by ascribing to
him the invention of letters, and accounting him the worthy benefactor to
whom the world owes all the benefits derived from literature. I would not
willingly rob him of this honour. But I must confess, there is no feature
of the story, which I c