444 MEMOIRS OT MR BOSTON. flrengthened with ; and I need no more, Sir, tháfi what I have, to affure of your readinefs to favour me in that matter which I have fb much at heart. I have long travailed as in pain about it, not without fears fometimes, that both itand I flrould be hiffed off the ftage, tho' I dare not fay I ever altogether loft hopes in its behalf: how then could the judgment of Schultens and Gronovius uponthe fpecimen mifs of affording me a very fingular comfort ? And if what is expeéted fromMr Loftus fhould prove to be a balance to it, I will, through grace, fall down, and kifs the high hand that fends it. I wrote at large to your Honour t'other day, before yours came to my hand, in the which dif- penfation I faw a beauty : and I fhall not enlarge here. As to what you require of me, I fhall only add, that I think it will henceforth be natural to me to rejoice and weep with Sir Richard Ellys, in all his concerns ; being,Honoured Sir, your Hon- our's molt obliged, and molt obedient humble fervant, T. BOSTON. No. 16. Letters from the Author to his correfpondent in Edin- burgh. Olober 8. 17.20. (1.),Dear Sir, Laft time I wrote to you, I was in a mind to have writ- ten you anent the matter I have now in hand ; but that I- *as hurried, and time would not allow. The profpeál of engaging in it, which is awful, whether I confider myfelf or the matter, and the proof I. have had of your Chriftian friendfhip, natively led me to impart it you, as I have done to a very few others. The fubjeót is the accentuation of the Hebrew Bible, which in the depth of fovereign wifdom has been lets cultivated by the learned than any thing elfe I know of relating to the facred volume. My acquaintance with books is very narrow; but I know no tranflations of the Bible in which the tranflators have not thought themfelves very much at liberty in pointingof the text. I am of their opinion who think the Hebrew text is molt accurately pointed ; and from my own obfervation, as well as from books, I am convinced the facred ftigrnatology bears the fignature of a divine hand. The difficulty has been, and is, to allign the proper value to the feveral flops therein tired. Now, if that divine pointing can be cleared, it is eafy to fee what in- fluence it muft have on tranflations, and commentaries too, fix- ing the grammatical fenfe of the words. There have been but
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