90 On the Comparative Population of the World, 



character. From the narrative of Quintus Curtius, there 

 appears to have been, at the time of Alexander's invasion, a 

 considerable number of small monarchies, in that large tract 

 of land between Persia and the Indus, which is, at this time, 

 so wretchedly cultivated, and so thinly peopled. Persia itself, 

 from the concurrent accounts of various writers, was un- 

 doubtedly one of the most flourishing, opulent, and best- 

 inhabited kingdoms which has ever existed. Even in the 

 infancy of that great empire, immediately after its conquest by 

 the Medes, the army of Cyrus, on its return from a peregri- 

 nation through the provinces, consisted of no less than 800,000 

 men ; but this is nothing compared to the efforts of that power- 

 ful state at a later period. According to the statements of 

 Herodotus, Plutarch, and Isocrates, the army with which Cyrus 

 invaded Greece amounted to not less than five millions of 

 souls, a number perhaps incredible, but, after making due 

 allowances for exaggeration, that armament was assuredly 

 prodigious. We are warranted in this belief, from the con- 

 junction of almost every circumstance in the state of the 

 Persian monarchy, which usually indicates an exalted pitch of 

 power and resources. The prudent and salutary maxims of 

 policy, ascribed to that government by Xenophon, show a high 

 advancement in civilization, and the prevalence of that system 

 of domestic economy, which is now understood to constitute 

 the real wealth of nations. The division of the empire into 

 one hundred and twenty-seven sub-governments ; the splendour 

 of these appointments ; the establishment of posts, and many 

 similar circumstances, are unequivocal signs of a highly ad- 

 vanced period of society. The careful cultivation of the soil 

 was the great object pressed upon the attention of the pro- 

 vincial governors ; and each of these officers was sure to be 

 esteemed and encouraged in proportion to the flourishing state 

 of agriculture in his district. AVhen to these considerations is 

 added the well-known fact, that, among the Persians and other 

 Asiatics, most of the common-people and all the slaves were 

 nourished entirely on bread or vegetables, we may conceive 

 the multitudes of people which must have been accumulated, 

 in a country where such perfection of domestic economy was 

 united to such maxims of public poUcy. 



