"قاموس، فارسي، عربي، إنجليزي، مع أطروحة عن لغات أمم المشرق وآدابها وعاداتها" [و‎‎٢‎٤] (١٨٢٦/٥٢)

DISSERTATION.
XXXI
" they may be again resolved by an easy and fair
“ evolution. I subjoin to these a short interpre-
“ tation, and, at the same time, produce different
“ examples of names and titles, which are thus
“ compounded. From lienee the reader will see
“ plainly my method of analysis, and the basis of
“ my etymological enquiries.” 56
Thus has this learned gentleman created a people
to fill up every chasm of high antiquity, and to
account for all the phenomena of early population,
history, and superstition. As the Sacred \\ ritings,
however, afford no lights to trace the wanderings
of this extraordinary family ; and as all his glean
ings from profane tradition might with equal force,
in the same ingenious hands, prove Confucius to
be William the Conqueror, his proofs, d priori,
seem to amount to nothing ; the great weight of
his evidence resting chiefly on the ground of ety
mological deduction. Such being the station he
has chosen to controvert the systems of all preced
ing writers, and to fix the principles of all suc
ceeding history, it could have been wished, that
the most unquestioned strength had marked his
fundamental axioms ; that the definitions of his
elementary particles had been precisely fixed; that
the languages, whence he has drawn the meanings
he has annexed, had been distinctly specified ;
and that not a doubt should have been left upon
the readers mind with regard to the great basis
upon which this fabric stands. But on this leading
point, assertion seems too often to have usurped
the province of proof: of above forty radicals, a
half at least do not appear to approach the senses
he has given them; whilst misled by his ear and
his eye, he has fancied analogies which the lan
guages will not bear, and drawn conclusions to
which the premises seem completely foreign. 57
One great endeavour of (Jar learned author is to
trace to his Cuthites the origin of solar and igneous
worship ; and, in order to fix this theorem, he
brings forward a number of particles, which, he
says, in ancient times signified the Sun or Fire.
As he seldom mentions, however, in what parti
cular idiom they were received in those senses,
doubts naturally arise. To the sun, as a mere as
tronomical body, or to the fire, as a simple element,
few of them appear to bear the most remote rela
tion ; and, in any other sense, descriptive of them
as objects of adoration, they might, with equal
propriety, be adduced to authenticate the worship
of the Egyptian onion, the Druid’s oak, or the great
Arabian stone devil in the valley of Mina, for
how far they may have been figuratively applied,
will prove only the traces of general superstition,
without pointing either to the nature, origin, or
votaries of any particular mode of worship; be
cause great, glorious, and such epithets, which
some of those words imply, may have been indis
criminately bestowed upon every stock or stone
which the folly of man has, at any time, thought
proper to treat with respect. 38
The first of those particles which I shall take
notice of, is il or al. In Hebrew, Arabic, and Per
sian, this word has many different meanings; and,
amongst others, signifies a god: but without the
least authority to suppose that it ever had any par
ticular affinity to the sun. In a variety of instances,
however, it is merely the Arabic article the; as al
ain, the fountain; al aur, the fire; Jin al sham,
the fountain of Syria (not, the fountain of the sun);
al sayyid, the prince, &c. (and not the Saite prince).
“ The deity E/,” Mr. Bryant says, “ was particu-
“ larly invoked by the Eastern nations, when they
« made an attack in battle: at such time they used
“ to cry out El-el and Alai. This Mohammed
“ could not bring his proselytes to leave off, and
“ therefore changed it to Allah.” But this appears
to have no foundation, and the learned gentleman
produces no proof. I have not been able to dis
cover that the Arabians ever entertained the least
partiality for El, as a divinity: nor is the name
even to be found amongst the numerous idols
worshipped by the different tribes; a circumstance
extremely improbable, had it ever been remark
able as an object of their invocation. Allah, on
the contrary, is a word of much antiquity, and was
certainly in use among the Arabians long before
the era of Muhammad. I shall mention one un-