Another Error they committed in this Doctrine, is, the Identity, or Sameness, if I may so say, of the World’s succeeding one another. They are made, indeed, of the same Lump of Matter, but they supposed them to return also in the same Form. And, which is worse, that there would be the same Face of human Affairs; the same Persons and the same Actions over again; so as the second World would be but a bare Repetition of the former, without any Variety or Diversity. Such a Revolution is commonly call’d the _Platonick Year_: A Period when all Things return to the same Posture they had been some Thousand of Years before; as a Play acted over again, upon the same Stage, and to the same Auditory: This is a groundless and injudicious Supposition. For, whether we consider the Nature of Things, the Earth, after a Dissolution by Fire, or by Water, could not return into the same Form and Fashion it had before; Or whether we consider Providence, it would no way suit with the Divine Wisdom and Justice, to bring upon the Stage again, those very Scenes, and that very Course of human Affairs, which it had so lately condemn’d and destroy’d. We may be assur’d therefore, that, upon the Dissolution of a World, a new Order of Things, both as to Nature and Providence, always appears. And what that new Order will be, in both respects, after the _Conflagration_, I hope we shall, in the following Book, give a satisfactory Account. These are the Opinions, true or false, of the Ancients; and chiefly of the _Stoicks_, concerning the Mystery of the Conflagration. It will not be improper to enquire, in the last Place, how the _Stoicks_ came by this Doctrine: Whether it was their Discovery and Invention, or from whom they learned it. That it was not their own Invention, we have given sufficient ground to believe, by shewing the Antiquity of it beyond the Times of the _Stoicks_. Besides, what a Man invents himself, he can give the Reasons and Causes of it, as Things upon which he founded his Invention: But the _Stoicks_ do not this, but, according to the ancient traditional Way, deliver the Conclusion without Proof or Premises. We named _Heraclitus_ and _Empedocles_, amongst the _Greeks_, to have taught this Doctrine before the _Stoicks_; And, according to _Plutarch_ (_de Defec. Orac._) _Hesiod_ and _Orpheus_, Authors of the highest Antiquity, sung of this last Fire in their Philosophick Poetry. But I suspect the _Stoicks_ had this Doctrine from the _Phœnicians_; for if we inquire into the Original of that Sect, we shall find that their Founder _Zeno_, was a Barbarian, or Semi-barbarian, deriv’d from the _Phœnicians_, as _Laertius_ and _Cicero_ give an Account of him. And the _Phœnicians_ had a great Share in the Oriental Knowledge, as we see by _Sanchoniathion’s_ Remains in _Eusebius_. And by their mystical Books which _Suidas_ mentions, from whence _Pherecydes_, _Pythagoras_’s Master, had his Learning. We may therefore, reasonably presume, that it