30 INTRODUCTION. 



utility, have been handed down in an uninterrupted chain to the 

 modern nations of Europe. The Egyptians communicated their 

 arts to the Greeks ; the Greeks taught the Romans many improve- 

 ments both in the arts of peace and war ; and to the Romans the 

 present inhabitants of Europe are indebted for their civilization and 

 refinement. The kingdoms of Babylon and Nineveh remained se- 

 parate for several centuries ; but we scarcely know even the names 

 of the kings who governed them, except that of Ninus, the suc- 

 cessor of Assur, who, fired with the spirit of conquest, extended 

 the bounds of his kingdom, added Babylon to his dominions, and 

 laid the foundation of that monarchy, which, raised to its meridian 

 splendour by his enterprising successor Semiramis, and distinguish- 

 ed by the name of the Assyrian empire, ruled Asia for many ages, 



Javan, son of Japhet, and grandson of Noah, was the stock from 

 whom all the people known by the name of Greeks are descended. 

 Javan established himself in the islands on the western coast of 

 Asia Minor, from whence it was impossible that some wanderers 

 should not pass over into Europe. The kingdom of Sicyon, near 

 Corinth, founded by the Pelasgi, is generally supposed to have com- 

 menced in the year before Christ 2090. To these first inhabitants 

 succeeded a colony from Egypt, who, about 2000 years before the 

 Christian sera, penetrated into Greece, and, under the name of 

 Titans, endeavoured to establish monarchy in that country, and to 

 Introduce into it the laws and civil polity of the Egyptians. But 

 the empire of the Titans was soon dissolved ; and the Greeks, who 

 seem to have been at this time as rude and barbarous as any people 

 in the world, again fell back into their lawless and savage manner 

 of life. Several colonies, however, soon after passed over from Asia 

 into Greece, and, by remaining in that country, produced a more 

 t> p considerable alteration in the manner of its inhabitants. The 



' ' most ancient of these were the colonies of Inachus and 

 Ogyges ; of whom the former settled in Argos, and the lat- 

 ter in Attica. We know very little of Ogyges or his successors. 

 Those of Inachus endeavoured to unite the dispersed and wander- 

 ing Greeks ; and their endeavours for this purpose were not alto- 

 gether unsuccessful. 



But the history of the Israelites is the only one with which we 

 are much acquainted during those ages. The train of extraordi- 

 nary events which occasioned the settling of Jacob and his family 

 in that part of Egypt of which Tanis was the capital are universally 

 ■r. p known. That patriarch died, according to the Hebrew chro- 



' ' nology, only 1689 years before Christ, and in the year of the 

 ' world 2515. This is a remarkable sera with respect to the 

 nations of heathen antiquity, and concludes that period of time 

 which the Greeks considered as altogether unknown, and which 

 they have greatly disfigured by their fabulous narrations. Let us 

 examine, then, what we can learn from the sacred writings, with 

 respect to the arts, manners, and laws, of ancient nations. 



It is a common error among writers on this subject, to consider 

 all the nations of antiquity as being then alike in these respects. 

 They find some nations extremely rude and barbarous, and hence 

 they conclude that all were in the same situation. They discover 

 others acquainted with many arts, and hence they infer the wisdom 

 of the first ages. There appears, however, to have been as much 

 difference between the inhabitants of the ancient world, with regard 



