[Footnote 9:  Avenpace—­This Author is oftentimes quoted by the Name of Ebn’olfayeg; he was accounted a Philosopher. of great Ingenuity and Judgment.  Maimonides, in his Epistle to R. Samuel Aben Tybbon, gives him a great Character.  Abu’l Hasen Ali, who collected all his Works, and reduced them into One Volume, prefers him before all the Mahometan Philosophers whatsoever.  He was famous for his Poetry as well as Philosophy; he died young, being prison’d at Fez, in the Year of the Hegira 533. i.e. of Christ, 1138, or 39, others in the Year 525, which answers to 1131. Most of his Works are imperfect.  See Dr. Pocock’s Elenchus Scriptorum prefix’d to the Arabick Edition of this Book.]

[Footnote 10:  Tho’ this instance will serve to explain the meaning of the Author, yet ’tis very improper, because ’tis utterly impossible to give a Man that is born Blind, the least notion or idea of Light or Colours.]

[Footnote 11:  The Hanifitick Sect, and the Mahometan Religion,—­That is, not only the Hanifitick Sect, but even the Mahometan Religion too, of which that Sect is a Branch, does forbid the over curious enquiring into these abstruse Matters.  This Sect was very early among the Mahometans, for it had its Name from Abu Hanifah Al Nooman, who was born,in the 80 year of Hegira, or according to others in the 70. I must confer, that it seems something odd, that he should mention that Sect first, and then the Mahometan Religion which includes it, and if it had not been for the word Asshariyato, which, if I mistake not, is never us’d to express any particular Sect, but signifies a Religion, or Law of God, I should have understood those Words of the Sect of Mahomet Ebn Edris Asshaphiensis. See Dr. Pocock ’s Specimen p. 295. Or else the Hanifitick Sect and the Mahometan Religion may signifie the same thing, because Abraham, (whose Religion the Mahometans pretend to follow) is called in the Alcoran Hanif. Dr. Sike.]

[Footnote 12:  Alpharabius,—­Without Exception, the greatest of all the Mahometan Philosophers, reckon’d by some very near equal to Aristotle himself.  Maimonides, in the Epistle which I just now mention’d, commends him highly; and tho’ he allows Avicenna a great share of Learning, and Acumen; yet be prefers Alpharabius before him.  Nay, Avicenna himself confesses, that when he had read over Aristotle’s Metaphysicks forty times, and gotten them by heart; that he never understood them till he happened upon Alpharabius_’s Exposition of them.  He wrote Books of Rhetorick, Musick, Logick, and all parts of Philosophy; and his Writings have been much esteemed; not only by_ Mahometans but Jews and Christians too.  He was a Person of singular