EGYPT, AND SYRIA. 321 
only of no value, but often of dangerous refult. But it is 
fuited to the indolence of the human mind, and flattering to 
perfonal vanity, which delights to perform much by a fmgle 
energy. Hence, an hypothecs fupported by fome infulated 
fadt, perhaps only by fpecious error, is often advanced with 
warmth, and the moft important confiderations militating 
againft it, are forgotten, or warped to ferve the purpofe of 
the inventor. Thus the increafe of the Nile was once confi- 
dently attributed to the Etefian winds ; and the malady which 
has fo often almoft depopulated Kahira, is ftill by fome imagined 
to proceed from the putrid depofition of its waters. 
We have at length difpofed ourfelves to the habit of tracing 
the caufe of difeafe, by combining a number of minute, and 
often varying, fymptoms. A practice which, if correct in its 
detail, can never but be accurate in its dedudions. Relative 
to the Plague, however, whofe very name diftrads the timid, 
and appals even the courageous, our reafonings and our deduc- 
tions are quite of a different defcription. Refpeding its caufe, 
all is conjedure. No experienced or well-informed praditioner 
has watched the bed of the fick ; none has accurately examined 
the different appearances which the difeafe affumes in different 
perfons, nor even in its different flages, in the fame perfon. 
Scarcely any, it is believed, has been tranquil enough to hear 
patiently from the mouth of the fufferer an account of his fenfa- 
tions, which, recounted by a third perfon, never fail to vary. 
Where this malady appears, the phyfician and the priefl, 
the pride of fcience and the fecurity of faith, confident and 
T T boaflful 
