A TL 



abode of tlic Atlantis ? how is it alfo potlible to conceive 

 aflronomy cultivated in a frozen and cloudy region, where 

 the obfervations of the heavenly bodies mull have been in- 

 convenient and impracticable : Tlicfe difficulties, fays our fan- 

 ciful author, cannot be removed without fuppoling a ciiange 

 of air and climate in thofe regions by the gradual coohng 

 of the earth, and its progrelfive motion towards univerfal 

 congelation. Such is the "fairy tale" of this learned and 

 ingenious author. Sir W.Jones, the learned prcndent of 

 the Afiatic Society, in his elaborate account of the Perfians 

 (Afiatic Refearches, vol.ii. p. 4.!..), fuggells that one may 

 confider " Iran" as the nobkft ifland, foVfo the Greeks and 

 Arabs would have called it, or at leaft as the noblell penin- 

 fula in this habitable globe ; and he adds, " if M. Bailly 

 had fixed on it as the Atlantis of Plato, he might have fup- 

 ported his opinion with far ftronger arguments than any 

 that he has adduced in favour of Nova Zcmbla. If the ac- 

 count indeed, of the Atlantes," fays this writer, "be not 

 furely an Egyptian or an Utopian fable, I fliould be more 

 irclined to place them in Iran than in any region with 

 which I am acquainted." 



Others will have America to be the Atlantis ; and hence 

 infer that the new world was not unknown to the ancients : 

 but wliat Plato fays, does by no means fupport this fuppo- 

 fition.- America fhould rather feem to be the vail continent 

 beyond the Atlantis, and the other iflands mentioned by 

 Plato. 



Kircher, in his Mundus Subterraneus ; and Beckman, in 

 his Hiftory of Illands, chap. v. advance the mofl probable 

 opinion, if the reality of this ifland be admitted. — The At- 

 lantis, according to them, was a large ifland which extended 

 from the Canaries to the Azores ; and thefe iflands are the 

 remains thereof not fwallowed up by the fea. 



Atlantis, A'cw, is the name of a ficlitious, philofophi- 

 cal commonwealth, of which a dcfcription has been given 

 by lord Bacon. 



The New Atlantis is fuppofcd to be an ifland in the 

 South-fea, to which the author was driven in a voyage 

 from Peru to Japan. The compofition is an ingenious 

 fable, formed after the manner of the Utopia of Sir 

 Thomas- Ivlore, or CampaneUa's City of the Sun. Its 

 chief defign is to exhibit a model or defeription of a col- 

 lege, inilituted for the interpretation of nature, and the 

 production of great and marvellous works, for the bene- 

 fit of men, imder the name of Solomon's houfe, or the 

 ccdlege of the fix days work. Thus much, at leatt, is 

 iinifhed ; and with great beauty and magnificence. , Tlie 

 author alfo propofes a frame of laws, or of the bell ftate 

 or mould of a commonwealth : but this part is not exe- 

 cuted. Bac. Works, tom. iii. p. 235'. 



ATLAS, in Biography and Mythology, an ancient king 

 of Mauritania, the fon of Uranus and brother of Pro- 

 metheus, who is faid to have lived about the time of Mo- 

 fes, or about 1582 years B. C. He is reprefcnted as hav- 

 ing been an excellent aflronomer, as an obfcrver of the 

 ftars, and as the inventor of the fphere. The poets have 

 exhibited him as bearing the heavens on his flioulders, 

 and thus he is feen in the famous ilatue at the Farncfe 

 palace in Rome ; and one of them reprcfeiits him as 

 groaning under the burden, on account of the multitude 

 of gods whom fuperflition had placed in this elevated 

 maniion. He was raetamorphofed into a mountain for 

 liis inhofpitality to Perfeus. His daughters, it is faid, 

 were transformed into itars, in complement to his allro- 

 romical talents and obfervations ; feven of them forming 

 the Pleiades, and the other feven the Hyadcs. 



Atlas, in Geography, a ctlcbvatcd mountain or rather 



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chain of mountains, in Africa, which is fo high, that it 

 feems to bear the heavens. Hence the fable, in which 

 Atlas, the king of this country, is faid to bear the hea- 

 vens on his flioulders. 



The ancients, however, afcribed to this mountain a 

 magnitude and an elevation to which it lias no claim ; as it 

 can no where ftand in competition with the Alps or the 

 Apennines. They feem to have confidcied it as one 

 high mountain, not as a ridge. Thus Phny (I. v. c. i.l, 

 dcfcribes it as a detached mountain, rifmg from the fands to 

 a great height on the fhoVes of the ocean to w hich it gave 

 its name; and yet, in the fame chapter, he reprefents it'as a 

 range paffcd by Suetonius Paiilinus on his progrefs to the 

 Niger. Strabo (1. xvii.) mentions its being called Dyris, 

 (fteAoiRis) by the ancients, and as being beyond the 

 pillars of Hercules, on turning to the left or fouth. Dr. 

 Shaw (Trav. p. 5.) rcprcftnts it as a remarkable chain of 

 eminences, which fometimes borders upon the Sahara, and 

 fometimes lies within the Tell. He adds, " that if we 

 conceive, in an cafy afcent, a number of hills, ufually of 

 the perpendicular height of 4, 5, or 600 yards, with a 

 fucceflion of feveral groves, and ranges of fruit and foreft- 

 trees, growing one behind another, upon them ; and if to 

 this profpetl we fometimes add a rocky precipice of fuperior 

 eminence, and more difficult accefs, and place upon the 

 fide, or fummit of it, a mud-walled Dafhkrah of the Ka- 

 bylcs, we lliall then have a juft and hvcly pifture of mount 

 Atlas, without giving the Icall credit to the noAunial 

 flames, the melodious founds, or lafcivious revels of fuch 

 imaginary beings, as Pliny, Sohnus, and others, have in a 

 peculiar manner attributed to it." According to fome 

 modern accounts, this ridge divides the kingdom of 

 Algiers from Zaab and Bikdulgerid, or its direction it 

 fouth-wefl and noith-cafl ; and therefore it may be confider- 

 ed as extending from cape Geer in a north-eall dircdion, 

 and giving fource to many rivers flowing north and fouth, 

 till it terminates in the kingdom of Tunis. This main 

 ridge in fome places may prefent a double chain, and in 

 others diverge its branches. Its flruAure towards the 

 wellern extremity is granite and primitive. M. Lem- 

 priere, in his journey to Morocco, feems to have clearly 

 afcertained the range of Atlas. The town of Santa Cruz 

 Hands near its furthcll extremity; while Tarudant, to 

 which he paifcs through an open plain, lies on the fouth 

 of the Atlas. Hence it appears, that Cape Geer is its 

 termination, or the great Atlas of Ptolemy, while the 

 fmaller Atlas is a branch extending towards SafS or Cape 

 Cantin; and another branch, now called the Leffer Atlas, 

 reaches to Tangier. According to Chenier (Prefent Stale 

 of Morocco, vol. i. p. 13.), Mount Atlas is the eaflem 

 boundary of all the weflern provinces of Morocco. He 

 reprefents it as formed by an endlefs chain of lofty eminen- 

 ces, divided into different countries, inhabited by a multi- 

 tude of tribes, whofe ferocity permits no flranger to ap. 

 proach. He profeffes to be unable to defcribe thefe moun- 

 tains accurately ; but adds, that nothirg would be more 

 interefting to the curioiity of t!ie philofopher, or conduce 

 more to the improvement of our knowledge in Natural 

 Hiftory, than a journey over mount Atlas. The chmate, 

 though extremely cold in vi-inter, is very healthy and plea- 

 fant , the vallies are > ell cultivated, abound 11 fruits, and 

 are diyertifitd with fortfls and plentiful fpr ij . . the lircams 

 of which, unitii.g at a little diflance, form great rivers, and 

 lofc themltlvcs in the ocean. According to the reports of 

 the Moors, there are man\ quarries of marble, granite, and 

 other valuable i'.one, in tl.cle mountains ; and it is proba- 

 ble, there arc alio mines, but the inhabitants have no idea 



of 



