1 BABYLONIAN LITERATURE. 



peared ; although there is no original text 

 remaining of writings composed by the dif- 

 ferent schools of Chaldsea; still, the litera- 

 ture of neighbouring nations, which met 

 with a better fate, has preserved to us con- 

 siderable remains of the culture it replaced. 

 Without mentioning those Greek authors 

 who have written 'Ao-<ruptocxa and BajSuAomxcc 

 from original sources ; or Armenian writers, 

 especially Moses Chororensis, who frequently 

 mentions Chaldsean writings; or the Syrian 

 Christians, whom we continually find, during 

 the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, waging 

 never ending controversies against the Chal- 

 dseans ; or the Talmud, and kindred writings, 

 which contain large portions of astronomical, 

 and possibly of medical principles borrowed 

 from Babylon; or the Cabbala, of which 

 both the principles and the most ancient 

 forms, although under many transformations, 

 can be traced to Chaldoea ; or Gnosticism, 

 which, in one of its branches, shews the 

 degree of influence that Babylonian doc- 

 trines possessed in the midst of that vast 



