196 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



work of civilization. The Greeks had in the highest degree the 

 genius for invention in letters and the arts. The other great peo- 

 ples of their time reached a certain point and stopped there, after- 

 ward only repeating the types which they had created during 

 their earlier period ; or else were content to "borrow and adapt ; 

 and, finishing their useful work before they lost their independ- 

 ence, continued to exist long after they had ceased to live and 

 bring forth. 



But Greece has always been progressive, or at least moving. 

 Even when subjugated by the Romans, and when its series of 

 original creations seemed to have been exhausted, it still culti- 

 vated science and history ; attempted criticism ; extended and 

 sounded more deeply the ancient systems of philosophy ; and took 

 a part in the elaboration of the dogmas of Christianity. 



In art, while its master sculptors and painters were extinct, its 

 architects still produced great works without copying Ictinus and 

 Mnesicles. The basilicas of Ravenna and the noble structure of 

 St. Sophia are comparable in merit with the highest classical 

 forms. 



No organic development in the history of the human mind has 

 been better known, or has been richer and at the same time more 

 simple, than that of the Grecian genius. Notwithstanding the 

 extent to which the Hellenic population was scattered, and the 

 distances which separated the various groups, the evolution, 

 taken as a whole, was governed by the same laws and exhibited 

 the same phases in like order and under like conditions, in all the 

 lands in which the Greek language was spoken. The different 

 stocks were like trees of the same species, destined to produce the 

 same fruits, the color and taste of which were liable, it is true, 

 to be modified by local influences, but the variations were kept 

 within narrow bounds. So these peoples were kept from greatly 

 diverging by their constant communication with each other, 

 which was aided by the forms and relations of their lands — prom- 

 ontories jutting out toward one another, and frequent islands ; 

 so that the sailor between distant ports was hardly ever out of 

 sight of some Grecian headland. Nowhere else does the Mediter- 

 ranean offer such a disposition ; and there was in this geographi- 

 cal feature a direct provocative of the spirit of adventure. 



The Hellenic peninsula is divided into two masses of nearly 

 equal size — central Greece and the Peloponnesus — each of which 

 is in turn divided into secondary peninsulas that have curiously 

 irregular contours; while the islands are often so near to one 

 another that one can pass between them or to the mainland with 

 a few strokes of the oars. The waters in the sinuosities of the 

 straits are always smooth ; the deep bays lying in the recesses of 

 the hilly shore ; the narrow creeks concealed in the serratures of 



