.

simple case sufficiently illustrates the principle; of which, however, the application is occasionally somewhat intricate.

But it must not be imagined that M. Clavier is merely a servile attendant on his great leader; for, in two important respects at least, he may claim the praise of originality. Freret, discussing the general subject of ancient chronology, did not, in regard to the particular case of Greece, develope his system with perfect fulness of detail, and principally confined himself to that portion of the Grecian history, which falls below the Trojan war. M. Clavier, on the contrary, has thoroughly explored every nook and cranny of the Helladian legends from Inachus to Pisistratus. Pervading this broad interval by the help of the synchronisms which he from time to time discovers, as we cross a stream by means of stepping-stones, he has called forth and systematised a hundred family-histories which lay buried under the rubbish of centuries of barbarism; and scarcely the name of one swift-footed or goldenhaired hero has been discovered in the tattered relics of the classical chronologers, who is not here regularly filiated, and traced to a local habitation. Farther, it must be remarked that Freret did not adhere with unvarying steadiness and simplicity to the great chronological principle which he had been so anxious to establish. Desirous of accommodating his genealogies to certain preconceived notions, he strained them beyond all bounds; and, not content with vindicating the vulgar chronology against the Newtonian, actually placed the Trojan war sixty years earlier than even the date which the vulgar chronology assigns to that event. The present author, on the contrary, has been uniformly faithful to his polar star of genealogy; and it has guided him to a point somewhat more below the vulgar standard than Freret ascended beyond it. By the vulgar standard we mean that of Usher, which, with some variations, but variations immaterial when the question is respecting half a century, seems to have been adopted by the majority of late chronologers.

The work of M. Clavier undoubtedly does great credit to his learning, industry, and research. By those who fully acquiesce in the fundamental positions on which the author relies, this system must be considered as a much-improved edition of that of Freret,improved, not only by enlargement, we mean as to the history of Greece, but also by emendation. The system, however, may be examined with advantage even by those who view its foundations with some degree of distrust; although in what manner such persons may derive benefit from the examination, we shall be able more conveniently to explain hereafter. In the interim, we frankly acknowledge that to this class of doubters we ourselves belong; and, with every sentiment of respect both for Freret and his present

coadjutor, and with a distinct conviction that many of the props on which the Newtonian Chronology has been made to rest are worse than suspicious, we must own ourselves not thoroughly satisfied of the superiority of the vulgar system, either in its usual form, or as modified by the author before us, to that of Newton. In proceeding to state some of the reasons of our doubts on the subject, we shall no longer particularly keep in view the distinction between the chronology of Usher and that of M. Clavier; for, though that distinction amounts to little less than the interval of a century, yet the chronology of Newton (we are, of course, speaking of his profane chronology,) is distant from both the former by con siderably more than three times the same interval. Besides this, the system of M. Clavier is liable, and in an aggravated degree, to some of the identical objections which Newton, with whatever conclusiveness, urged against the vulgar system. The latter is principally formed on the dates transmitted to us by the ancients, which dates are supposed to have been fixed in part by a computation of the royal genealogies of Greece, at the rate of three descents to a century; and it is on this very ground that Newton has erected against it some of his strongest works. Those works, however, are manifestly still stronger as against the chronological scheme of M. Clavier, than as they were originally intended; because, how far the ancient schemes were constructed on the alleged basis, or any similar basis of computation, may be, and in fact has been*, questioned; but no such question can be raised respecting the scheme of M. Clavier.

It is not our purpose to expatiate on the confusedness and uncertainty, so long ago remarked by Pausanias,† of the old Greek genealogies, or on the embarrassing mixture of fable with which they are evidently but inextricably entangled. Else, a good deal might be observed on these topics. It might be observed, for example, that, according to some of the ancient writers, Inachus, king of Argos, or his son Phoroneus, was the earliest Grecian monarch, while, by others, we are confidently presented with a formal list of six or seven successive kings, who had reigned in Sicyon previously to the existence of Inachus or Phoroneus. It might be observed, farther, that, after descending through three generations of human beings from Japetus inclusive, we are not a little astonished at recognizing, in the fourth step, our old acquaintance the volatile Mercury; and that, after a similar descent, of no fewer than fourteen stages from Inachus, we discover, with a surprise equal to that of Horace on a like occasion, Bacchus justly styled

* See Shuckford's Connection of Sacred and Profane History, pref. to vol. 2. vers. fin. + Lib. 8, c. 53,

ever young.' These are mere specimens, though certainly strong ones, of the contradictions and absurdities with which the genealogical legends of Greece abound, and that, so far at least as the contradictions are concerned, with respect to periods greatly more recent than the Trojan war. We are content, however, with dropping a hint on this part of the subject, and shall pursue our attack in a somewhat different quarter.

It is found, that, on an average, there are three successive generations of mankind to a century, or, which is the same thing, about 334 years to a generation. On this principal, the genealogical chronologies of the ancients seem to have been computed; and it is applied in the same manner by M. Clavier. But here it is particularly to be observed, that the majority of the genealogies so computed, are royal genealogies. That is, they are certain recorded successions of kings, of which, we are told, that they proceeded regularly onwards from father to son. Thus the chronology of Greece, from the period of the conquest of the Peloponnesus by the family of Hercules down to the times of more authentic history, is determined principally by the number of reigns in the regal lines of Sparta, Messene, Corinth, Arcadia, and Macedon; all of which sovereignties are said to have, during that interval, or the greater part of it, flowed without interruption in a course of lineal descent; and the law of lineal descent enjoins the allowance of three generations to a century. To the royal genealogies just enumerated, the limits of both our subject and our space induce us to confine our attention.

Now it occurred to Newton, that the propriety of the allowance of three reigns to a century, which is claimed for all these concurrent successions, finds no support or countenance throughout the compass of ascertained and indisputable history. Exceptions may doubtless be discovered to the position; but, on an average, the rate of regal succession has proceeded with a far greater rapidity than would have been prescribed by the law of lineal descent. In order to place the matter beyond controversy, Newton set himself carefully to examine the catalogue of such regal successions as fall within the period of historic certainty, and to deduce from these an average for the lengths of reigns. He compared together the lists of the kings of Israel, the kings of Judah, the successors of Nabonassar in Babylon, those of Cyrus in Persia, the Macedonian monarchs from Alexander, the Ptolomies, the Seleucidæ, the kings of England, and those of France; and the result was that he determined the proportion of the average length of reigns to that of generations to be as 18 or 20 to 33 or 34. It is true that the accuracy of this proportion has been disputed; but the error charged on it is not such as would materially affect it in practice.

A 4

practice. According to a learned living chronologer, Dr. Hales, the average length of reigns is about 22 years; an amount not very discrepant from the standard assigned by Newton, though we could in our turn object to some of the data from which this corrected expression is derived.

The causes of the difference, in point of duration, between reigns and descents, must be sufficiently obvious. A monarch dies without issue, and is succeeded by his brother; in which case, though there are two reigns, there is but one generation. Or he is succeeded by his father's brother; in which case there are no fewer than three reigns to one generation. These interruptions of the lineal course, are, in a long series of reigns, very probable occurrences, and, when the question is respecting several concurrent monarchies, occurrencies morally certain. A succession of reigns, therefore, does not, on a average, coincide with the contemporary succession of descents; or, which is the same thing, a list of successive kings is very seldom a genealogy. But, besides the occasional supersession of the direct by the collateral line, kings are frequently deposed, and the substituted individual may be of equal or superior age with him whom he has supplanted. For the sake, however, of simplifying the discussion, let us leave unnoticed the possibility of such deposals; and still, the liability of the direct line to interruption, will alone sufficiently authorize us to adopt the computation of Dr. Hales, which makes the ratio of the average length of reigns to that of generations as 22 to 33, or nearly 2

to 3.

Thus fortified by historic experience, the Newtonians ask the question, Why a rule of computation which is found to hold with respect to all ascertained time, is to be rejected from the early regal successions of Greece, and, were it necessary, we might add, of Egypt, Babylon, and Italy? They demand that a reason shall be assigned for excepting, not one of these as an accidental case, but almost altogether, from a maxim of known universality, and throw the burden of proof on their opponents.

To a certain extent, a reply has been made, which seems in a good measure conclusive. The objection of Newton against the vulgar mode of computation extended to the whole of fabulous history. It was very forcibly answered, therefore, that the era of a part of that history may, with the highest probability, be supposed to have fallen within the times of patriarchal longevity recorded in Scripture; during which the progress of reigns, like that of generations, must, on the whole, have been decidedly. slower than at present. But it is obvious that the observation must be confined to very carly ages. No benefit, for example, can be claimed from it by that portion of classical history which is subsequent to the Tro

jan

jan war. According to the date assigned to that event, even by the vulgar chronology, it preceded the time of David by little more than a century; and it very distinctly appears from the sacred books that, at a period anterior to that of David by at least one or two generations, and it seems probable that at a still earlier period, the ordinary duration of human life had subsided to its present level. It still remains, then, to be explained, why the chronology of the regal lines below the Trojan war should not be reduced according to the modern standard. And it is observable, that, if these are so reduced, the elder lines also, by being necessarily brought lower down, will in proportion be excluded from profiting by the longevity of the patriarchal ages.

From the manner in which we stated this question at the outset, the grand defence, which the advocates of the vulgar chronology have set up against the objections just stated, will have been anticipated. They contend that those objections sufficiently refute themselves, as being founded on the supposition of an interruption of the direct regal line, a supposition which is, in the present case, excluded. With relation, for instance, to the kings of the race of Hercules, it is the consenting report, as Freret observes, of all antiquity, that, through the whole of the period now in question, the sovereignties of Sparta, Messene, Corinth, Arcadia, and Macedon, were regularly transmitted downwards in the course of lineal descent. What, then, more plain, than that the law of lineal descent should be employed to regulate the chronology of those sovereignties? In order to confirm his argument, this indefatigable chronologer took pains to establish the point by actual examination, that, in most cases where reigns have been shorter than the average length of a generation, they have been abbreviated by an interruption of the direct line, and perhaps by the introduction of a new family. On this reasoning some of the followers of Freret have laid great stress; and, although M. Clavier does not in express terms allude to it, yet, from his professions of a general acquiescence in the answers offered by Freret to the objections of Newton, we have no doubt that he considers it as conclusive.

The argument in question seems built on what is nearly a truism; for it may readily be conceded, that, so far as any given regal succession has proceeded in the direct line, so far, generally speaking, it has been governed by the genealogical rule of three steps to a century. But, with the utmost deference to the acknowledged and undeniable acuteness of Freret, we are constrained to observe, that his reasoning cannot be applied as he would apply it, without a considerable confusion of ideas; and that, while he has bestowed much labour in proving what never was controverted, he has begged the whole of the question really at issue. When it is affirmed, by

the