THE TRUE POSITION OF THE HEBREWS 65 



they were long the suzerain power over the Persians. 

 Then Cyrus, the great Persian leader, led a revolt 

 against the Medes, and, conquering Babylon in turn, 

 inaugurated the brief and brilliant world-power of 

 the Persians. Nearly the whole of the old theatre 

 of civilization, including Egypt, fell under their rule. 

 It even extended over Greece, and, as we shall see, 

 led to important developments there. So great 

 became the power of the Persian kings that in 

 480 b.c. Xerxes was able to send an army of half 

 a million men right across Asia Minor as far as 

 Athens. It was the greatest achievement of ancient 

 imperialism, and, as in the case of Assyria, it was a 

 sign that Persia was rapidly exhausting itself. "Within 

 another century Persia was in decay ; in yet another 

 century it fell to the Greeks. 



We need not enlarge on the splendours of the royal 

 cities, Persepolis and Susa. All the wealth of Babylon, 

 Nineveh, and a dozen other great cities was gathered 

 into Persia, and for a century or two it shone, perhaps, 

 more gorgeously than any civilization had yet done. 

 Magnificent remains of the palaces of Darius and 

 Xerxes still survive in the now desolate region. There 

 were two later revivals of Persia, but they do not 

 concern us here. 



It is more important for our purpose to inquire 

 what Persia contributed to the stream of mental and 

 moral culture which was slowly broadening through 

 the ages. This contribution was important. A work 

 of the German thinker Nietzsche has made widely 

 known the name of the ancient Persian prophet 

 Zarathustra, or, as 1 he used to be called, Zoroaster. 

 It need hardly be said that his gospel was the exact 

 opposite of that which Nietzsche humorously puts 



