240 A N T I E N T M E T A P H Y S I C S. Book 11. 



the Greek philofophers ; that it was as perfect as any govern- 

 ment on this earth can be; and that the people, who lived under 

 it, muft have been very happy, and indeed I believe the happieft of 

 men : Nor do I think they could have been otherwife, as they were 

 governed not only by religion, but by philofophy, without which, 

 as Plato tells us, no people can be happy ; nor can there, fays he, be 

 any end of human mifery, unlefs kings become philofophers, or phi- 

 lofophers kings. 



If any doubt ftiould remain of the government of Eygpt being fo 

 perfect a government, the duration of it would be fufficient proof: 

 For in government, as well as in every thing elfe, what is moft per- 

 fedl in the form will laft the longeft. Of the duration of the go- 

 vernment of Egypt I have already fpoken*. It is proved by a 

 chronological monument, fuch as is not to be found, nor ever was 

 to be found, in any other country in the world ; I mean the flatues 

 of the High Priefts of Jupiter in Thebes : And, befides thefe, the 

 numbers of the years of the reigns of their Kings were fet down, as 

 Herodotus informs us, in the books of their Priefts, whofe account 

 of thefe Kings was fo exact, that they fet down their ftature, as Di- 

 odorus Siculus informs us. During all this prodigious number of 

 years which their government lafted, from Menes their firft human 

 King, (for I reckon not the reigns of their Gods, though I believe 

 them to have been as real Kings as the human Kings, and their 

 reigns were very much longer), down to the Perfian conqueft, there 

 was no change of the government ; nor during all that time was 

 there fo much as an attempt to change the government, or any re- 

 bellion againft their eftablifhed Kings, or affaffmation of them, nor 

 any thing that can pofTibly be called a civil war, though, after the 

 Greeks had found the way into the country, there were two dif- 

 putes about the fiiccefTion to the Crown, but each of them -vras ter- 

 minated 



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