ten 
OF THE PHONETIC ALPHABET. 77 
tions, and almost shut out by the desert plains and mountains of 
Arabia, and the dangerous navigation of the Red Sea, from inter- 
course with the nations of the east, the commerce of Egypt has at 
all times been directed principally into the Mediterranean. But 
the maritime spirit of the people has immemorably bowed under the 
debasing yoke of an artful priesthood, whose policy?° has discourag- 
ed foreign communication ; and the transport of her superabundant 
produce has been abandoned to the enterprizing people who have 
occupied the more northern”? ports of the Mediterranean, or to the 
Arabian tribes which, traversing the bladeless deserts, have sup- 
plied? the eastern provinces of Palestine and of Arabia, and the 
shores of the Red Sea, prior to all written record. 
To the agricultural energy of her people, to the exuberant fecun- 
dity of her valleys, to a grovelling and arbitrary priesteraft, and the 
despotism of a regal hierophant, may be attributed at once the ar- 
chitectural splendour and the mental degradation of the Egyptians ; 
and at no period of history have they distinguished themselves by 
that spirit of foreign enterprize which has led mankind to award 
them the glory of having invented the Phonetic Alphabet. Nor 
can we conjecture any reason that could prompt their priesthood? ? 
20 A benevolent mind turns in abborrence from the contemplation of that 
general misery resulting from a false and a base policy, which impedes the 
perfection of human reason, and which only in degree distinguishes the 
priests of ancient Egypt from those of coeval states. 
21 From Tyre to Marseilles and Cadiz. 
22 The reader of Holy Writ may call to mind the journeyings ot Abra- 
ham, of the brothers of Joseph, and of their father Israel. Partial famines 
in Palestine have immemorially been relieved by the exuberant stores of 
Egypt. The same species of commerce is to this day followed over the arid 
sands of E] Tye to the port of Kaira; and the mountains of Sinai furnish to 
the inhabitants of Egypt a considerable value in dried fruits and other pro- 
duce which requires a lower degree of temperature for their perfection than 
is afforded on the shores of the Nile. 
28 In confirmation of this opinion, that a phonetic alphabet was discovered 
amongst the laity, it may be suggested that, had it been invented amongst 
the priesthood, it would have been appropriated to the use of the sacred 
orders, and carefully withheld from the people. The Brahmins of this day 
possess and hold secret a phonetic letter, for the diffusion of which the peo- 
ple of India will probably be indebted to the energy of modern Tyre, which 
holds the coasts and commerce of Hindostan. The learning (does language 
possess a sound descriptive of the contempt in which such learning ought to 
be held?) of the Egyptian priests, was rigidly monopolized by those per- 
verters of truth. ‘That of the Phoenicians was preserved in the ark of the 
Temple of Jao, from which Sanchoniatho composed the stupid mysteries 
with which his Cosmegony abounds. ‘The hallowed secrecy of the Eleusinian 
