THE KORAN.
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fined what the sublime was, Moses[1] had ex-
- ↑ It is curious to remark the slow progress of knowledge and civilization. Seven centuries after the deluge, two persons resident in Egypt, Moses and Cecrops, contributed to this happy event. Moses with miraculous inspiration, and a nation of colonists, passed into Canaan, where first a Republic, afterwards a Kingdom, was established on the subversion of petty monarchies: he laid down the principles of true theology and morality, and drew a line of circumvallation round his people, separating them from the rest of the world, which line, more than 4000 years have proved unable to destroy. At the same time, Cecrops left Egypt and arrived at Greece: he became the founder of a dynasty of kings, which lasted pear five centuries. The marbles of Lord Arundel begin with Cecrops. Moses introduced his alphabet into Syria and Phœnicia; Cecrops had no letters: about 100 years after him, Cadmus the Phoenician came into Greece and founded Thebes. He produced seventeen letters of the Chaldean alphabet, but turned them a contrary way, and read alternately from right to left. It was about 250 years after Cadmus, that the siege of Troy, the capital of Phrygia, commenced, and Homer flourished something more than four centuries after the taking of that city by the Greeks; so that from Cadmus to Homer is nearly a period of seven centuries: which is probable, for an equal time is consumed in other nations before a simple alphabet could grow to the perfection of Homer's matter and language. Applying these remarks to religion, though its universality is unquestionable, yet we may well conceive it a gradual and progressive work.
