summit above, while lions couch on the walls, or haunt the caverns below. Here, too, we look for the place where were the vast terraces, with their hanging or floating gardens, as the ancients called them, and which in a country by no means abounding in wood, the Assyrian monarch constructed from affection to his Median spouse. Here the widely-scattered heaps and mounds of brick, inscribed with the cuneal characters of Babylon, attest the existence and vast circumference of the mighty capital, of whose dimensions no European city, but the Asiatic cities only, can furnish an adequate idea. This Babylonish tower has been in every age a figure of the heavenaspiring edifice of lordly arrogance, which sooner or later is sure to be struck down and scattered afar by the arm of the divine Nemesis; and in Holy Writ itself, the Babylon giddied by the intoxicating cup of ambition, drunk with the blood of nations, is a mighty historical emblem, applicable to every age from the earliest to the latest times, of the mad, people-destroying career of a pagan pride. Here did the evil commence, although the first Assyrian empire had no very extensive influence on the nations westward, and although the real epoch of universal conquest dates from the Persian Cyrus. Yet the ancient Babylon contrived to maintain her power, for, as has so often been exemplified in history, she, by the moral contagion of her voluptuous manners, conquered her conquerors, who abandoned the gods of their ancestors, to embrace the sensual nature-worship of the Babylonians. In the new monarchy founded by Cyrus, the Persians (now the ruling nation) were closely united, and politically, at least, incorporated with the once more powerful Medes. Yet their race and language were originally very different, and even at a later period we can still observe some traces of mutual jealousy in a change of dynasty, or the forcible dethronement of the prince. The institute of the Magi, which Cyrus established in his new Persian empire, served, outwardly at least, to cement this union; for the Magi were of the Median race, and their sacred zend-books were not composed in the Persian language, but in two distinct dialects of Media, if one, indeed, were not rather Bactrian. The Magi were not so much an hereditary sacerdotal caste, as an order or association divided into various and successive ranks and grades, such as existed in the mysteries-the grade of apprenticeship-that of mastership-that of perfect mastership. Fo

reigners could not easily gain admission into this sacerdotal order; and it was only at the express solicitation of the King of Persia, at whose court he resided, that this extraordinary favour was accorded to Themistocles. Whether the old Persian doctrine and system of light* did not undergo material alterations in the hands of its Median restorer, Zoroaster; or whether this doctrine were preserved in all its purity by the order of the Magi, may well be questioned. It is certain, at least, that that primitive veneration of nature is found completely disfigured and corrupted in the small existing remnant of the sect of Guebers, or fire-worshippers.

On the order of the Magi devolved the important trust of the monarch's education-a trust which must necessarily have given them great weight and influence in the state. They were in high credit at the Persiangates-for that was the Oriental name given to the capital of the empire, and the abode of the prince; and they took the most active part in all the factions that encompassed the throne, or that were formed in the vicinity of the court. In Greece, and even in Egypt, the sacerdotal fraternities and associations of initiated, formed by the mysteries, had in general but an indirect, though not unimportant, influence on affairs of state; but in the Persian monarchy, they acquired a complete political ascendency. The next main pillar of the Persian monarchy was its nobility, or the principal race of the Pasargads, who immediately surrounded the throne, enjoyed the highest prerogatives, and formed indeed the flower of the Persian army. The strict moral and military education which this nobility received, and of which Xenophon has drawn such a beautiful ideal sketch, constituted the chief strength of the state. And certainly the neglect of this old. Persian system of education was one of the primary causes of the decline of the empire-a decline which the progressive relaxation and corruption of public morals accelerated with a fearful rapidity. After the first mighty impulse, and that severe moral character which Cyrus had imparted to Persia, had disappeared, the same fate befel this empire, as has befallen all the great Oriental monarchies. The same evils, which the domination of provincial satraps-a government of the seraglio invariably bring along with it-the factions, the conspiracies, the changes of dynasty, and the other disorders incident to * In the German “ Lichtsage," or Tradition of Light.—Trans.

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despotism, appear in exactly similar colours in the Persian annals; and even in the modern kingdom of Persia, we find many of those characteristic traits or usages of Asiatic government as they existed in the ancient empire. Even the army, for the most part, consisted of troops levied out of the conquered nations, and the greater were its numbers, the less internal union did it possess. Hence we can well conceive that a small army of Greeks, animated by patriotic valour, and commanded by generals possessed of a true tactical eye and genius, were able to oppose to the immense hosts of Persia a resistance, which, in a numerical point of view, appears almost incredible, and were even enabled to gain unexpected victories over their enemies. We can conceive too, how, in the time of Alexander the Great, three battles should have decided the fate of this great empire; for its moral life and energy were gone, and the pillars of the state were completely decayed.

The Persian empire lasted but for the short period of two hundred and twenty years, from its foundation by Cyrus, to the reign of the last Darius, whose personal character and fate leave such an affecting and tragical impression on our minds. The universal conquests of the Persians, rapid, but transient, acted on the age with all the violence of the elemental powers of nature. Sudden and rapid, like a wind-storm, they invaded and subdued all other states and kingdoms :-the expedition of Xerxes into Greece was a real inundation of nations-and as the destructive fire, after blazing on high and desolating and consuming all things around, sinks quickly again--it was so with the Persian empire. The dominion of the Persians exerted no very permanent influence on those other nations whose civilisation was anterior to their own. Egypt, in despite of the violent persecution which she sustained under Cambyses, remained still the ancient Egypt-and with yet greater fidelity did she cling to her ancient customs, under the milder sway of the Ptolemies, whose government was so much more congenial to her spirit and character. Phoenicia, Palestine, and Asia Minor, also remained essentially unchanged. In an historical point of view, the main result of the Persian conquests was this-they brought the nations of Western Asia and of Egypt into a close contact, and a very active and permanent intercourse with the states of Greece, and those situated on the shores of the Mediterranean. The Persian dominion, and the contest

of that power with Greece, had indeed a very great, though only indirect, influence on the latter country, inasmuch as it favoured the growth and development of Grecian liberty, and at a later period produced the great reaction under Alexander the Great. This Greek re-action was, in its spirit and character, somewhat similar to the previous irruption and ambitious invasion of the Persians, in Alexander at least, we can clearly discover an Oriental spirit, that not content with the narrow boundaries of his hereditary kingdom of Macedon, sought to transcend the sphere of Hellenic civilisation, Hellenic doctrines, and Hellenic modes of thinking. And I call that an Asiatic enthusiasm which, with resistless impetuosity, bore away the Macedonian to the capital of Persia, and even beyond the banks of the Indus.

END OF LECTURE VII.

LECTURE VIII.

Variety of Grecian Life and Intellect-State of Education and of the Fine Arts among the Greeks-The Origin of their Philosophy and Natural Science-Their Political Degeneracy.

It would be difficult to point out a more striking difference, a more decided opposition in the whole circle of the intellectual and moral character and habits of nations, as far at least as the sphere of known history extends, than that which exists between the seclusive and monotonous character of Asiatic intellect the generally unchangeable uniformity of Oriental manners and Oriental society, and the manifold activity-the varied life of the Greeks, in the first flourishing ages of their history. This amazing diversity in the moral and intellectual habits of the Greeks appears not only in their legislation, their forms of government, their manners, occupations, and usages of life, but in their various and widely dispersed settlements and colonies, in their descent, which was composed of so many heterogeneous elements, in the first seeds of their civilisation -as well as their distribution into hostile tribes and great and petty states, and even in their traditions, their history, and the arts and forms of art to which those gave rise-finally, in a science, engaged in incessant strife, and marching from system to system, amid the noise and tumult of opposition. In Asia, even in those countries such as India, where the poetry, the views of life, and the systems of philosophy were extremely various, and bore in this respect an external resemblance to those of Greece; where even the country in ancient times was never permanently united into one compact empire; yet the whole way of thinking, the prevalent feeling, was entirely monarchical, proceeding from, and returning again to, unchangeable unity. On the other hand, in Greece, science, like life itself, was thoroughly republican-and if we meet with particular thinkers, who leaned to this Asiatic doctrine of unity,