PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNIVERSE. 48T 



nean, I would now also call attention to the number of cen- 

 turies that intervened between the epoch of human civilisation, 

 in the valley of the Nile, and its subsequent transmission to 

 Greece; for without such simultaneous reference to space and: 

 time, it would be impossible, from the nature of our mental 

 faculties, to form to ourselves any clear and satisfactory picture 

 of history. 



Civilisation, which was early awakened and arbitrarily 

 modelled in the valley of the Nile, owing to the mental 

 requirements of the people, the peculiar physical character of 

 the country, and its hierarchical and political institutions,' 

 excited there, as in every other portion of the earth, an im- 

 pulse towards increased intercourse with other nations, and 

 a tendency to undertake distant expeditions, and establish 

 colonies. But the records preserved to us by history and 

 monumental representations, testify only to transitory con- 

 quests on land, and to few extensive voyages of the Egyp-t 

 tians themselves. This anciently and highly civilised race 1 

 appears to have exercised a less permanent influence on 

 foreigners than many other smaller nations less stationary in 

 their habits. The national cultivation of the Egyptians, which, 

 from the long course of its development was more favourable 

 to masses than to individuals, appears isolated in space, and 

 has on that account probably remained devoid of any beneficial 

 result for the extension of cosmical views. Ramses-Miamoun, 

 (who lived from 1388 to 1322 B.C., and therefore 600 years 

 before the first Olympiad of Corcebus) undertook distant expe- 

 ditions, having, according to the testimony of Herodotus, 

 penetrated into Ethiopia (whwe Lepsius believed that he 

 found his most southern architectural works at Mount Barkal), 

 through Palestinian Syria, and crossing from Asia Minor to 

 Europe, through the lands of the Scythians and Thracians to 

 Colchis and the river Phasis, where those of his soldiers who 

 were weary of their wanderings, remained as settlers. Ramses 

 was also the first, according to the priests, " who by means of 

 his long ships subjected to his dominion the people who 

 inhabited the coasts of the Erythrean Sea. After this achieve- 

 ment, he continued his course until he came to a sea, which 

 was not navigable owing to its shallowness."* Diodorus 



* Herod., ii. 102 and 103; Diod. Sic., i. 55 and 56. Of the memorial' 

 pillars (o-T-T/Xai) which Ramases Miamoun set up as tokens of victory in 



