All the learned recognise such derivations as necessary;...
and... certainly otherwise one could scarcely trace any etymology
back to Hebrew."
Of course, by this method of philological juggling, anything could
be proved which the author thought necessary to his pious purpose.
Two years later, Andrew Willett published at London his
_Hexapla, or Sixfold Commentary upon Genesis_. In this he insists
that the one language of all mankind in the beginning "was the
Hebrew tongue preserved still in Heber's family." He also takes
pains to say that the Tower of Babel "was not so called of
Belus, as some have imagined, but of confusion, for so the Hebrew
word _ballal_ signifieth"; and he quotes from St. Chrysostom to
strengthen his position.
In 1627 Dr. Constantine l'Empereur was inducted into the
chair of Philosophy of the Sacred Language in the University of
Leyden. In his inaugural oration on _The Dignity and Utility of
the Hebrew Tongue_, he puts himself on record in favour of the
Divine origin and miraculous purity of that language.
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