; there
Jupiter was born and nursed; there was the celebrated shrine of Ammon,
dedicated to Theban Jove, which the Greeks reverenced more highly than
the Delphic Oracle; there was the birth-place and oracle of Minerva;
and there, Atlas supported both the heavens and the earth upon his
shoulders.

It will be said that fables prove nothing. But there is probably much
deeper meaning in these fables than we now understand; there was surely
some reason for giving them such a "local habitation." Why did the
ancients represent Minerva as born in Africa,--and why are we told that
Atlas there sustained the heavens and the earth, unless they meant to
imply that Africa was the centre, from which religious and scientific
light had been diffused?

Some ancient writers suppose that Egypt derived all the arts and
sciences from Ethiopia; while others believe precisely the reverse.
Diodorus supported the first opinion,--and asserts that the Ethiopian
vulgar spoke the same language as the learned of Egypt.

It is well known that Egypt was the great school of knowledge in the
ancient world. It was the birth-place of Astronomy; and we still mark
the constellations as they were arranged by Egyptian shepherds. The
wisest of the Grecian philosophers, among whom were Solon, Pythagoras
and Plato, went there for instruction, as our young men now go to
England and Germany. The Eleusinian mysteries were introduced from
Egypt; and the important secret which they taught, is supposed to have
been the existence of one, invisible God. A large portion of Grecian
mythology was thence derived; but in passing from one country to the
other, the form of these poetical fables was often preserved, while
the original meaning was lost.

Herodotus, the earliest of the Greek historians, informs us that the
Egyptians were negroes. This fact has been much doubted, and often
contradicted. But Herodotus certainly had the best means of knowing
the truth on this subject; for he travelled in Egypt, and obtained his
knowledge of the country by personal observation. He declares that the
Colchians must be a colony of Egyptians, because, "like them, they have
a black skin and frizzled hair."

The statues of the Sphinx have the usual characteristics of the negro
race. This opinion is confirmed by Blumenbach, the celebrated German
naturalist, and by Volney, who carefully examined the architecture of
Egypt.

Concerning the sublimity of the architecture in this ancient n