Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/23

 peared, which were carefully to be removed. The greatest was, That some Sciences and Arts, of a very compounded Nature, seem really to have been more perfect anciently than they are at present; which did, as it were, directly overthrow my Position. Therefore I was obliged, first, to enquire whether the Thing were true in Fact, or not: Next, If true, whether it proceeded from a particular Force of Genius, or from the Concurrence of some accidental Circumstances; and also, whether, in Case such Circumstances did concurr, in other Things, where those Accidents could have no Place, the Moderns did not out-do the Ancients so much, as, allowing the World to be no older than the Mosaical Account, it was reasonably to be expected that they should. For then, if all these Questions could be satisfactorily resolved, the Objection