The Grecians were so prepossessed with a notion of their own excellence and antiquity, that they supposed every antient tradition to have proceeded from themselves. Hence their mythology is founded upon the grossest mistakes: as all extraneous history, and every foreign term, is supposed by them to have been of Grecian original. Many of their learned writers had been abroad; and knew how idle the pretensions of their countrymen were. Plato in particular saw the fallacy of their claim, he confesses it more than once: yet in this article nobody was more infatuated. His Cratylus is made up of a most absurd system of etymology. [465]Herodotus expressly says, that the Gods of Greece came in great measure from Egypt. Yet Socrates is by Plato in this treatise made to derive Artemis from το αρτεμες, integritas: Poseidon from ποσι δεσμον, fetters to the feet: Hestia from ουσια, substance and essence: Demeter, from διδουσα ὡς μητηρ, distributing as a mother: Pallas from παλλειν, to vibrate, or dance: Ares, Mars, from αῤῥεν, masculum, et virile: and the word Theos, God, undoubtedly the Theuth of Egypt, from θεειν, to run[466]. Innumerable derivations of this nature are to be found in Aristotle, Plato, [467]Heraclides Ponticus, and other Greek writers. There is a maxim laid down by the scholiast upon Dionysius; which I shall have occasion often to mention. [468]Ει βαρβαρον το ονομα, ου χρη ζητειν Ἑλληνικην ετυμολογιαν αυτου. _If the term be foreign, it is idle to have recourse to Greece for a solution_. It is a plain and golden rule, posterior in time to the writers above, which, however, common sense might have led them to have anticipated, and followed: but it was not in their nature. The person who gave the advice was a Greek, and could not for his life abide by it. It is true, that Socrates is made to say something very like the above. [469]Εννοω γαρ, ὁτι πολλα ὁι Ἑλληνες ονοματα, αλλως τε και ὁι ὑπο τοις Βαρβαροις οικουντες, παρα των Βαρβαρων ειληφασι--ει τις ζητοι ταυτα κατα την Ἑλληνικην φωνην, ὡς εοικοτως κειται, αλλα μη κατ' εκεινην, εξ ἡς το ονομα τυγχανει ον, οισθα ὁτι αποροι αν. _I am very sensible that the Grecians in general, and especially those who are subjects to foreigners, have received into their language many exotic terms: if any person should be led to seek for their analogy or meaning in the Greek tongue, and not in the language from whence they proceeded, he would be grievously puzzled_. Who would think, when Plato attributed to Socrates this knowledge, that he would make him continually act in contradiction to it? Or that other [470]writers, when this plain truth was acknowledged, should deviate so shamefully? that we should in after times be told, that Tarsus, the antient city in Cilicia, was denominated from ταρτος, a foot: that the river Nile signified νε ιλυς: and that Gader in Spain was Γης δειρα.