344 Baron Cuvier's Lectures on the Natural Sciences. 



In Greece^ the external forms of religion only were received, 

 without, however, any understanding of the meaning concealed 

 under these emblems, so that the priests there were not in general 

 more learned than the vulgar. They did not form a caste, for, 

 although in the beginning, there had been a tendency to perpe- 

 tuate the priesdy dignity in the same families, this scheme was 

 acted on within very narrow limits, and could therefore exercise 

 but a feeble influence upon the constitution. 



The sciences, therefore, at their revival in Greece, were com- 

 pletely separated from i-eligion, and consequently free in their 

 progress ; while, in the countries in which a divine origin was 

 attributed to them, they necessarily remained stationary, as no 

 one, without being guilty of sacrilege, could change in any re- 

 spect a doctrine which had emanated from the Divinity itself. 



Epochs of the History of the Sciences in Greece. — The his- 

 tory of the sciences in ancient Greece presents four distinct 

 epochs. The first commences with the establishment of the 

 Pelasgi in that country, and terminates with the arrival of the 

 Egyptian colonies, about the fourteenth or fifteenth century be- 

 fore our era. The second comprehends all the time that elapsed 

 between the arrival of these Egyptians and the settlement of the 

 Greek colonies upon the coast of Asia Minor, about the year 

 1100 before Christ. The third extends from the establishment 

 of these colonies to the time when the communications with 

 Egypt were revived, about the year 600 before Christ. The 

 fourth epoch commences with the journey of Thales to Egypt, 

 and comprises the most brilliant age of Greece. 



Were we to refer to some writers of the Alexandrian school, 

 we might suppose ourselves possessed of a very exact history of 

 ancient Greece. We have genealogies of the kings who reigned 

 in that country, with quite as many details as those of the sove- 

 reign houses of Europe ; but these genealogies, in which there 

 always figure at the head some mythological personages, such 

 as Jupiter or Neptune, are evidently not authentic. Thus, the 

 history of the Greeks, before the time when Cadmus brought 

 them the art of writing, is entirely conjectural. All that we 

 know is, that, previous to the arrival of that chief, the Pelasgi 



