Before Chrlft 550. 41 



the profpedt of obtaining honours above their prefent condition. The 

 value of trade began now to be known in Athens, as appears by one of 

 Solon's laws, whereby a fon, whofe father had ne;i,leded to teach him 

 any ufeful branch of induftry, was exempted from the obligation of 

 maintaining him when fuperannuated. Solon alfo introduced the 

 Egyptian law, which obliged all perfons to give an account every year, 

 how they acquired their livelihood, and he eftablifhed regulations againft 

 prodigality and idlenefs *. 



Pythagoras, a native of the flourifhing ifland of Samos, pafTedthe ear- 

 ly part of his life in traveling for improvement. From the Chaldaeans 

 he learned aftronomy, from the Phoenicians arithmetic, and from the 

 Egyptians geometry. He taught the rotundity of the earth, and the 

 exiftence of the antipodes : and from fome hints, to be colled:ed from 

 Philolaus and fome others of his difciples, there is reafon to believe, 

 that he had obtained fome confufed idea of the real motion of the pla- 

 nets in our folar fyflem, as it was demonftrated in later ages by Coper- 

 nicus. But thefe notions of Pythagoras, or of his teachers, were only 

 the conjedures of ingenious men upon a fubjed: which engaged much 

 of their attention : they were far fhort of fcience founded upon experi- 

 ment and demonft ration. Deftitute of thefe only fupports of fcience, 

 and apparently contradided by the teftimony of the eyes, the true fyf- 

 tem of the univerfe, if it was indeed known, and faintly hinied to the 

 Greeks, by the Pythagorean philofophers, lay hid for many dark cen- 

 turies, during which, if any heaven-born genius happened to obtain a 

 glimpfe of the truth, the popes, who took upon themfelves to be the in- 

 fallible diredors of fcience as well as of religion, generally took care to 

 crufh in the bud every attempt to enlighten the human mind. 



Anaximander, a Milefian and a difciple of Thales, firfl ihowed the 

 Greeks the ufe of the dial, and taught the dechnation of the ecliptic. 

 He exhibited in maps the form of the fea and the land ; and he even 

 conftruded a globe. Though thefe were great advances in the fcience 

 of geography, yet flill the progrefs of it among the Greeks was won- 

 derfully flow. 



Nearly contemporary with thefe was Anacharfis, the celebrated Scy- 

 thian philofopher. Some authors afcribe to him the invention of the 

 potter's wheel, and of a fecond fluke for the anchor, hitherto made with 

 only one f . But the potter's wheel is mentioned long before this time 

 by Homer, and it is utterly incredible, that nautical improvements 

 fhould be invented by a man, who, from his fayings, recorded by Dio- 



• How different was the anticommercial fyftem the two-fluked anchor, [bU.ntem) and to Ana- 



of Sparta, whicli coiifined every man to the pro- charfis the harpagona, which is a hooked inflru- 



feffion of his father, and configned agricukure, ment nf iome kind, but whether it may mean the 



trade, and the ufeful arts, to the hands of flaves. grappling, vrhich boats have for an anchor, is un- 



f Pliny [£. vii, c. J 6] afcribcs to Eupalamus certain. 



Vol. I. F 



