326 On Scriptural and profane Accounts 
ture and civilizes his people; builds Thebes 3 
collects a large army with which he invades 
AEthiopia, founds towns there, establishes col- 
lectors of revenue, and builds dams, by which 
the course of the Nile was bounded and its 
jnundations restrained. Hence he crosses 
over to Arabia and subdues the whole country 
as far as India, founding cities without num- 
ber, returns to Europe, subdues Thrace and 
Macedonia, to which he gives the name of his 
veneral Macedo, and finishing his peregrina- 
tions in Egypt, is deified for his virtues and 
public services. Now let us suppose, that 
instead, of being able to expose the romantic 
falsehood of all this from other authors, we 
had the history of Egypt only from Diodorus, 
as we have that of Assyria from Ctesias, 
what would have been the consequence ? 
Osiris and Isis would have taken their place 
among Egyptian sovereigns, as unsuspectedly 
as Ninus and Semiramis have done among 
the Assyrian; the ancients would have in- 
vented a list of their successors, and the mo- 
derns would have maintained that though 
indeed the conquests of Osiris could not have 
been so extensive as was represented, it was 
unreasonable to deny his existence and his 
victories. All this would have been com- 
pletely false in respect to Egyptian history 7 
