117 



PRINCIPAL EPOCHS IN THE HTSTOHY OP THE PHYSICAL 

 CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNIVERSE. 



I. 



The Mediterranean taken as the point of departure for the repre- 

 sentation of the relations which led to the gradual extension of 

 the idea of the Cosmos. Connection with the earliest Greek 

 cultivation. Attempts at distant navigation towards the north- 

 east (the Argonauts) ; towards the south (Ophir) ; and towards 

 the west (Colseus of Samos). 



PLATO describes the narrow limits of the Mediterranean in 

 a manner quite appropriate to enlarged cosmographical 

 views. He says, in the Phaedo, ( 15 ) " we who dwell from the 

 Phasis to the Pillars of Hercules, inhabit only a small portion 

 of the earth, in which we have settled round the (interior) 

 sea, like ants or frogs around a marsh/' It is from this 

 narrow basin, on the margin of which Egyptian, Phoenician, 

 and Hellenic nations flourished and attained a brilliant 

 civilisation, that the colonisation of great territories in Asia 

 and Africa has proceeded ; and that those nautical enter- 

 prises have gone forth, which have lifted the veil from tho 

 whole western hemisphere of the globe. 



The present form of the Mediterranean shews traces of a 

 former subdivision into three smaller closed basins. ( 151 ) 

 The JSgean portion is bounded to the south by a curved line, 

 which, commencing at the coast of Can a in Asia Minor, is 

 formed by the islands of Rhodes, Crete, and Cerigo, joining 



