149 



EPOCHS IN THE HISTORY OF THE CONTEMPLATION OP THB 

 UNIVERSE. CONQUESTS OE ALEXANDER. 



II. 



Military Expeditions of the Macedonians under Alexander the Great. 

 Change in the mutual relations of different parts of the 

 World. Fusion of the West with the East, by the promotion, 

 through Greek influence, of a union between different nations 

 from the Nile to the Euphrates, the Jaxartes and the Indus. 

 The knowledge of nature possessed by the Greeks suddenly 

 enlarged, both by direct observation, and by intercourse with 

 nations addicted to industry and commerce, and possessing an 

 ancient civilization. 



THE Macedonian Expeditions under Alexander the Great, 

 the downfal of the Persian Empire, the beginning of inter- 

 course with Western India, and the influence of the 116 

 years' duration of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom, mark one ot 

 the most important epochs of General History; or of that 

 part of the progressive development of the History of the 

 Human Race, which treats of the more intimate communi- 

 cation and union of the European countries of the West 

 with South- Western Asia, the Valley of the Nile and Lybia, 

 The sphere of the development of community of life, or of the 

 common action and mutual influence of different nations, 

 was not only immensely enlarged in material space, but it 

 was also powerfully strengthened, and its moral grandeur 

 increased, by the constant tendency of the unceasing efforts 



