FRAGMENT. 2$^ 



at it's higheft degree of civilization. To the 

 epocha of the fiege of Troy, it is that n>any learned 

 men have affigned the brilliant reign of Sefojîris. 

 Befidts, this opinion, being adopted by Fenelon m 

 his Telemachns, was a fufficient authority for my 

 Work. I likevvife feleifled my traveller from 

 Egypt, by the advice of John-James^ in as much 

 as, in Antiquity, a great many political and reli- 

 gious eftablifliments were communicated by reflux 

 from Egypt, to Greece, to Italy, and even di- 

 re6lly to the Gauls, as the Hiftory of many of our 

 ancient ufages fufcciently evinces. This, too, is 

 a confequeace of political re aiflions. Whenever 

 a State has attained it's hig^heft deorree of eleva- 

 tion, it is come to it's firfl: (lage of decay ; becaufe 

 all human things begin to fade as foon as they 

 have reached the point of perfedion. Then it is 

 that the Arts, the Sciences, Manners, Languages, 

 begin to undergo a reflux from civilized to bar- 

 barous States, as is demonftrated by the age of 

 Alexander among th'e Greeks, of Augvftm among 

 the Romans, and oï Louis XIV. among ourfelves. 



I had, accordingly, oppofitions of characler in 

 the Gauls, the Arcadians, and the Egyptians. 

 But Arcadia alone prefented me with a great num- 

 ber of contrafts to the other parts of Greece, which 

 were but then emerging out of barbarifm j be- 

 tween the peaceful manners of it's induftrious in- 

 habitants, 



