II. But admitting that the maxim did border upon impiety, I am by no means interested in defending or justifying it, as I was in no wise concerned in preferring it, and therefore it is very unjust in you to impute it to me. My object in the discourse you mention, was that of combating the system, which derives all the fictions of gentilism in general, from sacred history; although as is evident from my words in the 43d article of that Discourse, I admit that some of them might possibly have sprung from that source, how then can you when these were my words, fix a charge upon me of affirming, that no fiction whatever of paganism, took its rise from sacred history? III. I also combat, although it is only by the way, or _en passant_, the system of Senior Branchini, who asserts, that all the fables were the offspring of profane history; or, to speak more properly, he endeavours to inculcate, that the first are mysterious or enigmatical representations of the last, which attempt, necessarily betrays him into some violent and absurd allusions; and perhaps into such as are more glaring, than those I have pointed out, by which, he derives all the fables from holy writ. For example; he pretends that all the Iliad is a true history, but converted into allegory, agreeable to the practice of the East. That Jupiter was the successor of the great conqueror Sesostris, whose dominion extended over a vast tract of country in the time of the Trojan war; that the inferior deities, represented either eminent men, or particular nations; and that a part of those deities, were tributary princes to the said Sesostris, or some one of his successors, whose dependence upon him, did not deprive them of the option, of taking part either with the Trojans or the Greeks, just as their passions or interests dictated to them. That the goddess Juno was Syria, called _Blanca_, and was characterized by the white arms of Juno, so much extolled by Homer. Minerva was the wise Egypt, Mars the union or combination of Armenia, Colquida, Thrace and Thessaly; and in this manner, he reasons upon the other fables. Into such strange paradoxes as these, are men drawn by their passion for systems of great extent. IV. But although I don’t assent to the system of Senior Branchini, the whole of which it is impossible to adjust, without falling into great absurdities, I agree, after the example of many men eminent for their literature, that a large portion of the fables, is a compound of parcels of profane history, disguised and deformed; but still the alteration they have undergone, has not so thoroughly disfigured them, but that we may discern in the copies, sufficient marks of their origin and derivation; and I propose pointing out to you in this letter, the instances of this sort that occur to me.