ON THE ORIGINS,

or on the antiquity of Hebraism,

and the affinity of languages.

The greatest gift granted to man in this life by God, the parent of nature, according to the spirit of incorruptible nature, seems to have been speech itself and the articulation of the voice. For it would have been little to have made this microcosm, and a small exemplar of the whole of nature participating in divinity, and to have given that reason attracted from the celestial nature, constant to itself, by which man might be perpetually held by a desire for higher things and seek celestial ones, and to have made him the sole possessor of all nature, if speech had not been added to propagate such a benefit, which in the place of all creatures might celebrate the First Cause by the name of all, which might hand down through the ages the magnitude of such a benefit and its artifice, from which finally that object of admiration, the works of men, the disciplines themselves, recounting such great providence, might arise: in sum, so that this celestial gift might become more common and more divine. For it is the nature of good that it wishes to be, if not common to all, at least common to as many as possible. One ought, however, to recognize it before one inquires: but without the mutual speech of men, that cannot happen. That animal, indeed, however excellent and happy, had nature made it so, would have been in the worst condition of all living things if it had happened to be mute. For no mortal anywhere would make the greatest happiness of the whole world if it were known only to himself, and no eloquence of speech were made known, especially what pertains to wealth and the status of external fortune. But there was formerly a great contention among the ancients as to which—