[1] Thus Dr. Hodges; but Calmet informs us, that the Hebrews call by the name of plagues all diseases sent by way of punishment or correction from God; as the pestilence, infection, the leprosy, sudden deaths, famines, tempests: in a word, all calamities, whether public or private. Calmet’s Dict. vol. ii. fol. 412. Plaga.
Parkhurst derives the Greek term loimos, either from luo, as above, or from another Greek word signifying to faint; the same from which the English word eclipse has its origin; or it may be from the Hebrew lehem, to consume.
A friend observes, that “we no where find the word perdition in our version of the Old Testament. We have, however, the word destruction, which is of a similar import; as, for instance, in Prov. xv. 11. where the Hebrew is abdun. In Rev. xvii. 8 & 11, we find the English word perdition; but as we have no Hebrew version of the New Testament, we may advert to the ancient Syriac version. The Syriac being a sister dialect of the Hebrew, differs, radically, but little from it. The Syriac of the two places referred to above is abdna; hence the word abaddon, whole root is abd, and is the same with that of the Hebrew word above.
“As to the word plague, we often find it in the Old Testament, but perhaps never in that specific sense in which the moderns use it. The original word, rendered plague, is pretty generally ngp, or its derivations; as Exod. xii. 13., ii. Sam. xxiv. 21, &c.” On this last occasion, however, as the word pestilence had been used before, in the same chapter, we can scarce doubt its having been really some kind of disease: and we know that modern plagues will sometimes destroy as quickly as this is said to have done.
[2] A myriad is generally supposed to contain ten thousand.
[3] Gibbon’s History, vol. iv.
[4] Transact. of Society for improving Medical Knowledge.
[5] Political State for 1720.
[6] Political state, ibid.
[7] Mr. Gibbon, agreeably to the subject on which he writes, particularises the mode of vengeance; saying, “the earth frequently swallows up the assassin,” &c. It is hoped the substitution of the word vengeance, in general, will not be deemed a material alteration.