second series, and he then made two fives thus, V
Λ X, or ten. This was with him a most important number, and became in process of time of the greatest importance also, as we shall hereafter find, in the concerns of mankind. It was called the perfect, or complete number, evidently from completing the number of the fingers of the hands. When man began to follow up his arithmetic to his number of twenty-eight, he proceeded with this as he had done with his calculi and number ten, and added units thus, XI, XII, &c., until he arived at twenty, and then he wrote two tens thus, XX. After this he again proceeded in the same way till he arrived at his XXVIIII. Nothing can be more simple than this, and this is what we find among the Latins, the same nation in which we found our calculi, and the Etruscans, and it is what (except with respect to the X) was used, according to General Vallancey,[1] by the ancient Irish, among whom indeed, if any where, we may expect to find the first traces of civilized man. How the X came to be varied, or its use left off by the Irish, I know not; but it was probably from a religious motive similar to that which made the Hebrews substitute a letter for their Jod, of which more hereafter.
32. General Vallancey observes, That from the X all nations began a new reckoning, because it is the number of fingers on both hands, which were the original instruments of numbering: hence יד (id) iod in Hebrew means both the hand and the number ten;[2] and in the same manner the word lamb means hand and ten with the Buddhists of Tartary, whose first arithmetic stopped at ten; and lima means hand and five with the Malays, whose first arithmetic stopped at five. We can scarcely believe that this coincidence of practice is the effect of accident.
33. Among the Hebrews the name of the perfect number, i.e. ten, was Jod or I, their name of God. Among the Arabs, it was Ya, the ancient Indian name of God (as in the course of this work I shall prove), and among the Greeks it was I or EI, the same as the Hebrew name of God. By the Etruscans, whatever might be its name, it was described by the X or T, and for the sake of an astrological meaning I have no doubt the Greeks contrived that the X should stand for 600. But relative to this I shall have much to say hereafter.
34. In the Chinese language the twenty-fourth radical, the Shih, is in the shape of the cross thus +, and means ten. It also means complete, perfect, perfectly good.[3] Thus the same system is universally found.
35. What I have said respecting the origin of numbers, and the importance which I have attached to them, must not be considered merely a theory, totally without support from history, for the historical accounts of most nations shew us that the superstitious regard to numbers was carried to almost an inconceivable length. I think the doctrines of Pythagoras may be considered as among the oldest of any which we find in the Western world, and whatever they were, thus much we know, that they were all founded on numbers. We also know that the astronomical system which is confessed to have been obtained by him in the East was the true one, in its great features—the revolving motions of the planets; then have we not reason to believe that these very numbers, which we find recurring every where in the Eastern and Western systems, were the same? We find the numbers five and six continually recurring in both systems, as the basis of the sacred 60, 360, 3600, and 432, 4320, &c. Then how can we doubt that they became sacred for the reasons which I have given? There must have been some cause for the effect, and what other can be assigned than that which I have supposed?
36. We will now return to our incipient astronomers’ twenty-eight calculi.
37. I feel little doubt that the system I have here developed was the origin of arithmetic, that it preceded the art of writing, and was its cause or precursor. It led the way to this most useful discovery. Mr. Bryant supports my opinion so far as to allow that the use of arithmetic must have been known long before letters.
38. After man had found by this combination of right lines the art of writing down the few limited ideas appertaining to these twenty-eight signs for numbering the days, he would begin to entertain the desire of extending the art of writing to other objects. For this purpose he would naturally try to use these same right lines. This experiment we have in full view in the Irish Oghams, and it is particularly exemplified in an Irish inscription called the Callan inscription, which is given in the Celtic Druids, in the second table of Alphabets. The total unfitness of this kind of writing for the conveyance of complicated chains of reasoning, or indeed of ideas generally, is there exhibited. Dr. Aikin says, “fifteen lines are required to express the first five letters of this alphabet, and this may be translated in five different ways; consequently nothing can be more uncertain than its true meaning.” Here I think we find the origin of the Ogham writing and of the Northern Runes. Thus these simple lines at angles would constitute the first letters or figures or signs used by mankind for the conveyance of ideas. This is confirmed by the result of our researches into the earliest inscriptions and letters on ancient monuments.
39. The Oghams, or secret alphabets, of the Irish, all consist of right lines, and the ancient Runes of the same; and it would be very easy to select several complete alphabets, consisting of nothing but right lines, at various angles, from
