552 COSMOS. 



became extinguished with the national spirit, and thus vanished 

 the two main supports of free institutions publicity and indi- 

 viduality. The eternal city had become the centre of too 

 extended a sphere, and the spirit was wanting which ought 

 to have permanently animated so complicated a state. Chris- 

 tianity became the religion of the state when the empire was 

 already profoundly shaken, and the beneficent effects of the 

 mildness of the new doctrine were frustrated by the dogmatic 

 dissensions awakened by party spirit. That dreary contest 

 of knowledge and of faith had already then begun, which 

 continued through so many centuries, and proved, under 

 various forms, so detrimental to intellectual investigation. 



If the Roman empire, from its extent and the form of con- 

 stitution necessitated by its relations of size, was wholly 

 unable to animate and invigorate the intellectual activity of 

 mankind, as had been done by the small Hellenic republics in 

 their partially developed independence, it enjoyed, on the 

 other hand, peculiar advantages to which we must here allude. 

 A rich treasure of ideas was accumulated as a consequence of 

 experience and numerous observations. The objective world 

 became considerably enlarged, and was thus prepared for that 

 meditative consideration of natural phenomena which has 

 characterised recent times. National intercourse was ani- 

 mated by the Roman dominion, and the Latin tongue spread 

 over the whole west, and over a portion of Northern Africa. 

 In the east Hellenism still predominated long after the 

 destruction of the Bactrian empire under Mithridates the L, and 

 thirteen years before the irruption of the SacaB or Scythians. 



With respect to geographical extent, the Latin tongue 

 gained upon the Greek, even before the seat of empire had 

 been removed to Byzantium. The reciprocal transfusion of 

 these two highly organised forms of speech which were so rich 

 in literary memorials, became a means for the more complete 

 amalgamation and union of different races, whilst it was likewise 

 conducive to an increase of civilisation, and to a greater sus- 

 ceptibility for intellectual cultivation, tending, as Pliny says, 

 " to humanise men and to give them one common country."* 



* This beneficial influence of civilisation, exemplified by the extension 

 of a language in exciting feelings of general good will, is finely characterised 

 in Pliny's praise of Italy: " omnium terrarum alumna eadem et parens, 

 numine Deum electa, quse sparsa congregaret imperia, ritusque molliret, 



