( 4 '° )

(belaufe the Firß New-Moon, March io. i6$o happens a little öfter Mid-night, and aster the Vernal Equinox) and then to every i ooth. Year schwing ;wbicb Addltional Day häng Omitted every 2Zoth er 240th Century (orntar thereab, uts ifanj oneßiall require such great Exaclnefs) will Ballance theAccount for ever.

The New year, and Account, may best Begin wich the Vernal Equinox ;orrather with the Day of the New-Moon happening near Midnight aboutthat Time, as March io. 1680.

The Egyptian Hieroglypbick of the Year was a Serpent Carved into a Cir-cle or Ring, with Tail in Mouth : but the Emblematical Gatter will bemuch more proper for England • and is so exactly fitted to the Moeri % Mo-tion, that One Day will not be Lost or Got in Millions of Years.c*Mtmoi>ac. This (a ) Almon-ac Measures Time principally by the Moon ; but withfL a Oreat and near Respect to the Annual Motion ot the Sun on Earth. TheCourses of üt Unite or least Measürc is a Day ; and the Gart er or Luni-solar Year will be,Moou e/ tbe at a Medium, within about a Weck, or Halt a Hundredth part, of thea squared Stick, True Solar Year } that is, lo near that the Ditterence will not bv Dißerned bywbich ibej ca'Td Ordinary Popular Observation, (and therefore must needs answer the Endsthat is.Ai-moon- of Husbandry, and other Civil jijjairs, well enough ) and come otten Near,hee j d 8 ne Durch an< ^ ^omctimes very Near; and at certain Periods they Ballance one ano-‘/fi-maen-aciu ther; and have a kind of Co-incidence or Agreement, much bester thantmfo ts thefimc. th c Sun’s Course has with the Itahan Account, so much Magnify’d by Scaligerand others.

I find the Elder World generally Computed their Time (and most of the-Eastern Countries, if not the Bulk of Mankind, do so still) by the Moon, orby the Lunar, or Luni-Solar Year ; made up of Moons , er Real Montbs, orsomewhat near the Matter such ; which Months were for the most part 12,and some Years 1 z. This appears from their Kakndars, &c. ’Tis plain(ffom 1 Sam. c. 20. v. 5, 18, 24.. compared with -v. 27, 34,) that theDays of the Jcwißi Month were the fame with those of the Moon : And theGrxcians (where Afironomy , as well as other Arts and good Learning mostFlourish’d) and particulari y the Atheniansfatcor&mg to the Institution of theirWlse Legislator Solon) did thus Reckon their Time; and so did the Romanstoo, till Julius Cafar Alter’d, I cannot fay Mended, the Year,

Among the Gratcians there Lived, in three not Lr distant Ages, three Fa-mem Afrommer i in their scveral Times, Meton , Calippus, and Hipparchus ;cach of whom still farther improved Afirommj, and Rectity’d the Accountsof Time more and more one alter another refpectively, aecording to theirLight, and the Obftrvationsof their Own and the fore-going Ages. Hippar-chus, the Last of them Flourished about 100 or 90 Years besore Julius Cä-sar Altered the Year : Yet Cafar t or his Afirsnomer Sosigines, follow’d CalippusinFraming ehe Julian Year', as I find by Examining their Account s. ForCalippus his Period 0(76 Years consisted of 27759 D a j s -> and so do 76 JulianYears. About 3 Centuries and a Half after Cafar, the Counctl of Ntce (first)and about 2 Centuries after that Dyonyßus Exiguus ( again ) introdue’d theDecenncval Cycle (call’d the Golden Number ) for the Celebrat ion of Eafier ;

following