AND LOWER EGYPT. 107 



yoking, and it was no difficult matter to forgive 

 them. 



It is abundantly obvious of what excesses men 

 are capable, who, in the most ordinary transactions, 

 display the symptoms of fury. When their soul is 

 elevated, when it partakes of the impetuous move- 

 ments of the body, they disdain all restraint. Like 

 an overbearing torrent, which strikes terror at once 

 by iis noise, and by the ravages which it commits, 

 they abandon themselves to all the vehemence of 

 passion ; then it is they really approximate to the 

 savage animals which come to dispute with them 

 the possession of the sands which they are equally 

 eaacr and intelligent to stain with blood. Hence 

 the insurrections, the tumultuous riots by which 

 Europeans have often suffered so severely. It is 

 worthy of being remarked, that this irritable cha- 

 ra< ter, th s proneness to sedition, likewise was, 

 though with less rage, that of the ancient inhabit- 

 ants of Alexandria. 



If there he altars dedicated to the demon of re- 

 venge, in Egypt undoubtedly are the temples 

 which contain them : there she is the goddess, or 

 rather the tyrant of the human heart. Not only 

 the generality of the men, whose combination con- 

 stituted the mass of the inhabitants, never forgive, 

 but, however signal the reparation made, they 



never 



