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Pleiades in t. 23 0 . 53': and by confequence the Lucida Pleia^ Greeks.dum had, linee the Argonautic expedition, moved from the equi-nox 4 0 . 26'. 52": andthis motion, after the rate of 72 years toa degree, anfwers to 320 years. Count thefe years back fromthe time in which Thales was a young man fit to apply himfelfto aftronomical ftudies, that is from about the 41H: olympiad ( 2 ),and the reckoning will place the Argonautic expedition about 44years after the death of Solomon, as above: and in the days ofThales, the folftices and equinoxes, by this reckoning, will havebcen in the middle of the eleventh degrees of the ligns. ButThales, in publifhing his book about the tropies and equinoxes,might lean a little to the opinion of former alfronomers, fo asto place them in the twelfth degrees of the ligns.

XXXVII. Meton and Eudemon, a inorder to pubi illi the lu-* p ^ a T-nar cycle of nineteen years, obferved the fummer folffcice in the >• 4 - <=. 26.year of Nabonaffar 316, the year before the Peloponnelian warbegan ; and Columella b telis us, that they placed it in the eighth * Co1un j el *degree of Cancer, which is at leall feven degrees backwarder Piin.i. 18.

c, 25 ^ 59.

fiod placed the morning-fetting of the Pleiades on the very day of the equinox, as that Thalesplaced it 25 days later. And if it be true, that Lucida Pleiadum did really fet at fun-rife onthe day of the autumna! equinox, in the age of Hefiod ; this will much inore refute Sir Ifa icNewton’s date of the Argonautic expedition, than the affiimption, that the morning-fetting ofthe fame ftar was 25 days later, in the age of Thales, confirms it. For that Hefiod was-fornetime later than the Argonautic expedition, is agreed : we have his ovvn teftimony, that helived after the war of Troy. The Argonautic expedition happened, according to Sir Ifaac New-ton, in that age when the iongitude of Lucida Pleiadum was in the 20th degree of the fign ofAries. But when this ftar fet at fun-rife, on the day of the autumnal equinox, its Iongitudemuft have been rather behind the verna! equinox: as any allronomer, who will take the troubleto make the neceflary calculations, may ealily perceive. So that between the age of Hefiod, asthus defined by the morning-fetting of Lucida Pleiadum , and that time which Sir Ifaac Newtonaifigns to the Argonautic expedition, the ftars muft have advanced more than 20 degrees in lon-gitude : and a change of 20 degrees, at the rate of 1 degree in 72 years, requires 1440 years.

Thertfoi e Sir Ifaac Newton’s date of the Argonautic expedition cannot be lefs than 1500 yearstoo late.

To this fpecious objcftion our author would probably have replied ; thatPIiny reports thefea-fon of the morning-ietting of this ftar, in the age of Ileliod, from a book of aftronomy, ofwhich he fays only, that it was extant under the name of Hefiod : and that this book could notbe Iiefiod’s. For Hefiod fpcaks of AnShmis as riling at lun-fet fixty days after the winter lol-ftice. And it is impoflible that any ftar of the Pleiades could fet at fun-rife, on the day of theautumnal equinox, in the fame age when Ardhirus rofe at fun-rile 60 days after the winter fol-ftice : or that thefe t,wo circumftances of the fpliere fliould be removed from each other by a lefsinterval of time, than the fpace of 1440 years. This book of aftronomy, therefore, that was ex-tant in Pliny’s time under the name of Hefiod, our author might have reafonably contended wascertainly a luppofitious work. And probably the psrformance of forne petty retalier of fciencein the decline of the Grecian iearning. The extravargant antiquity it would give to the Greekaftronomy, entirely deflroys its credit.

. ( 2 ) Diog. Laert. lib, 1. fegm 37, 38.

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