PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATIOIi OF THE UNIVERSE. 129 



tercourse subsisting between the lonians and the Phoenicians.^ 

 According to the views which, since ChampoUicii's great dis- 

 covery, have been generally adopted regarding the earlier con- 

 dition of the development of alphabetical writing, the PhoBni- 

 cian as well as the Semitic characters are to be regarded as a' 

 phonetic alphabet, that has originated from pictorial writing, 

 ^nd as one in which the ideal signification of the symbols is 

 wholly disregarded, and the characters are considered as mere 

 signs of sounds. Such a phonetic alphabet was, from its very 

 nature and fundamental character, syllabic^ and perfectly able 

 to satisfy all requirements of a graphical representation of 

 the phonetic system of a language. " As the Semitic written 

 charpcters," says Lepsius, in his treatise on alphabets, "pass- 

 ed inV Europe to Indo-Germanic nations, who showed through- 

 out a much stronger tendency to define strictly between vowels 

 and consonants, and were by that means led to ascribe a high- 

 er significance to the vowels in their languages, important and 

 lasting modifications were effected in these syllabic alphabets. "1 

 The endeavor to do away with syllabic characters was very 

 strikingly manifested among the Greeks. The transmission 

 of Phoenician signs not only facilitated commercial intercourse 

 among the races inhabiting almost all the coasts of the jNIed- 

 iterranean, and even the northwest coast of Africa, by form- 

 ing a bond of union that (embraced many civilized nations, 

 but these alphabetical characters, when generalized by their 

 graphical flexibility, were destined to be attended by even 

 higher results. They became the means of conveying, as an 

 imperishable treasure, to tho latest posterity, those noble fruits 

 developed by the Hellenic races in the differenc departments 

 of the intellect, the feelings, and the inquiring and creative 

 faculties of the imagination. 



The share taken by the Phoenicians in increasing the ele 

 ments of cosmical contemplation was not, however, limited 

 to the excitement of indirect inducements, for they widened 

 the domain of knowledge in several directions by independent 

 inventions of their own. A state of industrial prosperity, based 

 on an extensive maritime commerce, and on the enterprise 

 manifested at Sidon in the manufacture of white and colored 



* See the passages collected in Otfried Muller's Minyer, s. 115, and 

 in his Dorier, abth. i., s. 129; Franz, Elementa Epigraphices Grcecce, 

 1840, p. 13, 3-2, and 34. 



t Lepsius, in his memoir, Ueier die. Anordnung und Verua-ndtschafi 

 des Seniitischen, Indischen, Alt-PersischeH. Alt-^gj/piiscken ttnd ^^thii> 

 pischen Alvhabels, 1836. s. 23, 28. nnd 57; Gesenius, ^:.ipiv-a' Pku 

 nu:i(i: Muiiuinenfa, 1837 p. 17. 



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