PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNIVERSE. 119 



PRINCIPAL MOMENTA THAT HAVE INFLUENCED THE HIS- 

 TORY OF THE PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNI- 

 VERSE. 



THE MEDITERRANEAN CONSIDERED AS THE STARTING-POINT FOR 

 THE REPRESENTATION OF THE RELATIONS WHICH HAVE LAID THE 

 FOUNDATION OF THE GRADUAL EXTENSION OF THE IDEA OF THE 

 COSMOS. SUCCESSION OF THIS RELATION TO THE EARLIEST CUL- 

 TIVATION AMONG HELLENIC NATIONS. ATTEMPTS AT DISTANT 

 MARITIME NAVIGATION TOWARD THE NORTHEAST (BY THE ARGO- 

 NAUTS) ; TOWARD THE SOUTH (TO OPHIR) ; TOWARD THE WEST 

 (BY COL^EUS OF SAMOS). 



PLATO, in his Phcedo, describes the narrow limits of the 

 Mediterranean in a manner that accords with the spirit of en- 

 larged cosmical views.* " We, who inhabit the region extend- 

 ing from Phasis to the Pillars of Hercules, occupy only a small 

 portion of the earth," he writes, "where we have settled our- 

 selves round the inner sea like ants or frogs round a swamp." 

 This narrow basin, on the borders of. which Egyptian, Pho3- 

 nician, and Hellenic nations flourished and attained to a high 

 degree of civilization, is the point from which the most im- 

 portant historical events have proceeded, no less than the col- 

 onization of vast territories in Africa and Asia, and those 

 maritime expeditions which have led to the discovery of the 

 whole western hemisphere of the globe. 



The Mediterranean shows in its present configuration the 

 traces of an earlier subdivision into three contiguous smaller 

 closed basins. t 



The ^Egean is bounded to the south by the curved line 

 formed by the Carian coast of Asia Minor, and the islands of 

 Rhodes, Crete, and Cerigo, and terminating at the Pelopon- 



* Plato, Phesdo, p. 109, B. (Compare Herod., ii., 21.) Cleomedes 

 supposed that the surface of the earth was depressed in the middle, in 

 order to receive the Mediterranean (Voss, Crit. Blatter, bd. ii., 1828, 

 8. 144 uud 150). 



t I first developed this idea in my Rel. Hist, du Voyage aitx Region. 

 Equinoxiales, t. iii., p. 236, and in the Examen Crit. de V Hist, de la 

 Geogr. au lleme Siecle, t. i., p. 36-38. See, also, Otfried Mailer, in 

 the Giittingische gelehrte Anzeigen, 1838, bd. i., B. 376. The most west- 

 ern basin, which I name generally the Tyrrhenian, iueludes, according 

 to Strabo, the Iberian, Liguriau, and Sardinian Seas. The Syrtic basin, 

 east of Sicily, includes the Ausonian or Siculian, the Libyan, and the 

 Ionian Seas. The southern and southwestern part of the JSgean Sea 

 \vas called Cretic, Saronic, and Myrtoic. The remarkable passage in 

 Aristot., De Mundo, cap. iii. (p. 393, Bekk.), refers only to the bay-like 

 configuration of the coasts of the Mediterranean, and its effect on the 

 ocean flowing into it. 



