110 COSMOS. 



quiring a knowledge of the natural character of the Earth's 

 surface (as, for instance, the configuration of continents, the 

 direction of mountain chains, and the relative height of ele- 

 vated plateaux), and in the case of extended tracts of land, of 

 presenting us with materials for expounding the general laws 

 of nature. It is unnecessary, in this historical sketch, to give 

 a connected tissue of events, and it will be sufficient, in the 

 history of the recognition of nature as a whole, to refer mere- 

 ly to those events which, at early periods, have exercised a 

 decided influence on the mental efforts of mankind, and on a 

 more extended view of the universe. Considered in this light, 

 the navigation of Colseus of Samos beyond the Pillars of Her- 

 cules ; the expedition of Alexander to Western India ; the 

 dominion exercised by the Romans over the then discovered 

 portions of the world ; the extension of Arabian cultivation, 

 and the discovery of the New Continent, must all be regarded 

 as events of the greatest importance for the nations settled 

 round the basin of the Mediterranean. My object is not so 

 much to dwell on the relation of events that may have occur- 

 red, as to refer to the action exercised on the development of 

 the idea of the Cosmos by events, whether it be a voyage of 

 discovery, the establishment of the predominance of some 

 highly-developed language rich in literary productions, or the 

 sudden extension of the knowledge of the Indo- African mon- 

 soons. 



As I have already incidentally mentioned the influence of 

 language in my enumeration of heterogeneous inducements, I 

 will draw attention generally to its immeasurable importance 

 in two wholly different directions. Languages, when extens- 

 ively diffused, act individually as means of communication 

 between widely-separated nations, and collectively when sev- 

 eral are compared together, and their internal structure and 

 degrees of affinity are investigated, as means of promoting a 

 more profound study of the history of mankind. The Greek 

 language, which is so intimately connected with the national 

 life of the Hellenic races, has exercised a magic power over 

 all the foreign nations with which these races came in eon- 

 tact.* The Greek language appears in the interior of Asia, 

 through the influence of the Bactrian empire, as a conveyer 

 of knowledge, which, a thousand years afterward, was brought 



* Niebuhr, Rom. Geschichle, th. i., s. 60 ; Droysen, Gesch. der Blldimg 

 des Hellenistischen Staaiensystems, 1843, s. 31-34, .5G7-.573 ; Fi'ietl. 

 Cramer, De Studiis quce veleres ad alia) um Gentium contulerint Linguas. 

 1844, p. 2-13. 



