We may here be permitted to hazard an observation in reference to the monuments of antiquity which are now remaining either in this country (Egypt), in Greece, Rome, or other parts of the world. On considering the magnificent cities and structures erected in former ages, either Thebes, Baalbec, Palmyra, the Pyramids, the Coliseum, &c., we are naturally struck with awe and amazement at the magnitude of the undertaking, and are inclined to imagine, that the civilisation or power of a government or people must have been considerable, to attempt and bring to maturity such gigantic and laborious works. This conclusion, however, seems not warranted. There is no doubt

that, in ancient days, as well as in the present, great individual talent was, and is to be, found. Individual talent or information must not, however, be confounded with the general talent or information spread through the community. We cannot therefore but think that these great works originated from a despotic power exercised over an ignorant and uncivilised population, over a mass of people, either confined in slavery, or controlled under the iron grasp of despotism. Take for example the Pyramids: the labour employed, or rather wasted, on these monuments, would have provided the comfort and enjoyment of millions, if expended either on their private dwellings, or in any manner for individual shelter. A population forced to work on such useless masses, could not in any manner be

civilised, according to our comprehension of that word. The same remark will apply to nearly all the monuments of antiquity. As nations advance in civilisation, and as the wealth of communities increases, useless monuments lessen in proportion. How few great works of a useless character have been undertaken of late years in Great Britain! The energies and power of our empire might, if so directed, raise works incomparably superior to any production of former ages: such, however, is not the case. The reason is evident. In a civilised and free country the energies and wealth, or command of labour, is employed by individuals for their own convenience, comfort, or luxury; in former days, where the command of the labour of the nation, or the means for payment of that labour, depended on one man, there the population was forced to apply their means and energies to gratify his wishes, not to their individual advantage. Even in the middle ages this appears to have been the case.

As civilisation advanced, and in modern days, great structures formed by the labour of an entire people are less common: the labourers must now be paid. In those days the stupendous edifices we see were the labour of slaves, or of a conquered people. The result is that no national undertaking is attempted except for the benefit of the community. and the mass of wealth and labour is expended on individual comfort.

We cannot, therefore, but arrive at the conclusion, that these magnificent works of antiquity denote deficiency of civilisation and of public opinion, certainly not an improved state of society.

We have made this remark here, not to be misunderstood in the following chapters; but it will apply equally to Greece, Rome, and other nations of antiquity, where the fine structures we admire evince the genius of the designer and skill of the architect, but their execution denotes the slavery of a people, and their degraded state.

Among the Greeks, and even with the Romans, very great contempt was entertained for Egyptian superstition and information. Both the historians and poets of the ancients exercised their wit and satire on the absurdities which they deemed themselves too well informed to imitate. "The Egyptian superstition, of all the most contemptible and abject, was frequently prohibited: the temples of Serapis and Isis demolished, and their worshippers banished from Rome and Italy."* Even Herodotus admits the excessive ignorance of the Egyptians, and the Roman poet ridicules their idolatry:

"Who knows not there is nothing vile or odd
Which brain-sick Egypt turns not to a god?
Some of the fools the crocodile adore;
The Ibis, cramm'd with snakes, as many more.

• Dion Cassius, lib. lxxx. p. 232.

A long-tail'd ape the suppliants most admire,
Where a half Memnon tunes his magic lyre.
Whole towns in one place river fish revere;
To sea fish some as piously adhere.
Nay, vegetables here take rank divine;
On various sorts they deem profane to dine.
Oh, holy nations! where the gardens bear

A crop of deities through the live-long year."*

On the ceilings of some temples and edifices in the vicinity of Thebes, the signs of the Zodiac, very similar to their present figures, have been found engraved. Music also appears to have been known to the Egyptians, as well as the arts mentioned before. It has been seen that they were acquainted with the system of land-surveying, or measurement, and a census of the population was occasionally taken. Beyond this, everything is hidden in the clouds of antiquity. There does not appear to have been a middle class, or any other than an extensive ignorant and idolatrous mass; but if trade or commerce had existed to any extent, a middle class would have been formed. "We are in the dark concerning the Babylonian, Assyrian, Chaldean, Bactrian, and Egyptian monarchies. We know little more of them than Scripture occasionally relates concerning their barbarous cruelty, bestial pride, and extravagant folly."†

A writer of this day, in his profound researches

Juvenal, Sat. xv.

† Algernon Sidney, "Discourses concerning Government."

arts.

into the antiquities of Egypt, says, " In describ ing the arts by which tyranny aimed of old at keeping the people in subjection, Aristotle enumerates, among the most efficacious, that of utterly impoverishing them, by erecting prodigiously expensive structures, such as the Pyramids of Egypt, and the magnificent dedications of Cypselus. The Theban kings appear to have been deeply versed in these To their slaves, the motive assigned — if they condescended to assign any-was, of course, piety towards the gods; and with persons of a character analogous to that of their slaves, they have obtained, in succeeding ages, credit for so holy an intention. But, with their political motives, a large proportion of mere vanity was probably mingled, advancing recklessly to its own gratification, through the sweat, and toil, and privations of the poor. And to these united incentives we owe the architectural grandeur of such edifices as the temple of Karnak. This temple had been one of the instruments by which the political degradation of the Egyptians had been effected. Priestly craft, combined with the absolute power of kings, sank them, in many respects, below the level of the brute; and legislation, if the regulations by which despots hedge round their power deserve the name, divided them, if there be any faith in history, into castes, by which the majority were condemned to pursue, from father to son, without hope or chance of a favourable change, the most sordid and servile drudgerv