PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNIVERSE. 143 



of the Euxine to Greek navigation and commerce. This 

 migration, together with the foundation of new states and 

 new institutions, first gave rise to the systematic establish- 

 ment of colonial cities, which marks an important epoch in 

 the history of Greece, and which became most influential on 

 intellectual cultivation based on enlarged views of the 

 natural world. The more intimate connection of Europe 

 and Asia was especially dependent on the establishment of 

 colonies ; they formed a chain from Sinope, Dioscurias, and 

 the Tauric Panticapseum, to Saguntum and Gyrene; the 

 latter founded from the rainless Thera. 



By no ancient nation were more numerous, of for the 

 most part more powerful, cohnial cities established ; but 

 it should also be remarked, that four or five centuries 

 elapsed from the foundation of the oldest JSolian colonies, 

 among which Mytilene and Smyrna were chiefly distin- 

 guished, to the foundation of Syracuse, Croton, and Gyrene. 

 The Indians and the Malays only attempted the formation 

 of feeble settlements on the East Goast of Africa, in Soco- 

 tora (Dioscorides), and in the South Asiatic Archipelago. 

 The Phoenicians had, it is true, a highly advanced colonial 

 .system, extending over a still larger space than the Grecian, 

 stretching (although with wide interruptions between the 

 stations) from the Persian Gulf to Cerne on the West Coast 

 of Africa. No mother country has ever founded a colony 

 which became at once so powerful in conquest and in com- 

 merce as Carthage. But Carthage, notwithstanding her 

 greatness, was far inferior to the Greek colonial cities in all 

 that belongs to intellectual culture, and to the most noble 

 and beautiful creations of art. 



Let us not forget that there flourished at the same time 



