518 COSMOS. 



tory of mankind as far as it indicates a closer connection oi 

 Southern Europe, with the south-west of Asia, the Nile, and 

 Lybia. Independently of the almost immeasurable extension 

 opened to the sphere of development by the advance of the 

 Macedonians, their campaigns acquired a character of profound 

 moral greatness by the incessant efforts of the conqueror to 

 amalgamate all races, and to establish, under the noble influence 

 of Hellenism, a unity throughout the world.* The foundation 

 of many new cities at points, the selection of which indicates 

 higher aims, the arrangement and classification of an independ- 

 ently responsible form of government for these cities, and the 

 tender forbearance evinced by Alexander for national customs 

 and national forms of worship, all testify that the plan of one 

 great and organic whole had been laid. That which was perhaps 

 originally foreign to a scheme of this kind developed itself 

 subsequently from the nature of the relations, as is always the 

 case under the influence of comprehensive events. If we re- 

 member that only fifty-two Olympiads intervened, from the 

 battle of the Granicus to the destructive irruption into Bactrir 

 of the Sacae and Tochi, we shall be astonished at the perma- 

 nence and the magical influence exercised by the introduction 

 from the west of Hellenic cultivation. This cultivation, 

 blended with the knowledge of the Arabians, the modern Per- 

 sians and Indians, extended its influence in so great a degree 

 even to the time of the middle ages, that it is often difficult to 

 determine the elements which are due to Greek literature, 

 and those which have originated, independently of all admix- 

 ture, from the inventive spirit of the Asiatic races. 



The principle of unity, or rather the feeling of the bene- 

 ficent political influence incorporated in this principle, was 

 deeply implanted in the breast of the great conqueror, as 

 is testified by all the arrangements of his polity; and its 

 application to Greece itself was a subject that had already 

 early been inculcated upon him by his great teacher. In the 

 Politico of Aristotle we read as follows :f ' The Asiatic 



* Droysen, Oesch. Alexanders des Grossen, s. 544; the same in hig 

 Oesch. derBildung des hellenistischen Staatensy 'stems, s. 23-34, 588-592, 

 748-755. 



t Aristot., Polit., vii. 7. p. 1327, Bekker; (compare also iii. 16., 

 and the remarkable passage of Eratosthenes in Strabo, lib. i. pp. 66 and 

 97, Cisaub.) 



