[end of page #19] CHAP. III. _Of the Nations that rose to Wealth and Power previously to the Conquests in Asia and Africa, and the Causes which ruined them_. Previous to the conquests made by Alexander the Great, the history of ancient nations is confused, incomplete, and inaccurate. During the contests of his successors, the intricacy and confusion are still continued, but materials are more plentiful, more accurate, and more authentic. During the first period, excepting what is contained in sacred history, a few detached facts, collected by writers long after, are our only guides in judging of the situation of ancient states, some of which consisted of great empires, and others of single cities possessed of a very small territory. Add to this, that great and striking events occupied almost exclusively the attention of historians. The means by which those events were produced were considered as of lesser importance. So far, however, as the present inquiry can be elucidated, although materials are few, yet, by adhering to a distinct plan, and keeping the object always before us, we may arrive at a conclusion. The countries that appear to have been first inhabited were Syria and Egypt, {23} both of them situated on the borders of the Mediterranean Sea; and as early as any authentic records extend, those were great and powerful countries in which agriculture and population had made great progress, and into which commerce had already brought many of the luxuries of the East. The Phoenicians, a people differing in name from those who were subjected to the Assyrian monarchs, occupied that part of Syria, now called the Levant, directly on the borders of the Mediterranean Sea; they were the first who rose to wealth and power by arts and com- --- {23} Reasons have been given in the preface for not taking any view of the situation of India, though, by its produce, it appears, at least of equal antiquity. -=- [end of page #20] merce. Tyre and Sidon were the abodes of commerce long before the arrival of the Jews in the land of Canaan, situated in the adjacent country, with whom, in the days of David and Solomon, the Phoenicians were on terms of friendship and alliance, {24} assisting the latter to carry on commerce, and enrich his people. (See Appendix B.) =sic--there is none.= The whole coast of the Mediterranean lay open to them for navigation, as did also the Grecian islands, and as their own soil was barren, they purchased the necessaries of life, giving in exchange the rich stuffs they had manufactured, and the produce of the East of which they almost exclusively possessed the commerce. The Egyptians were possessed of the most fertile soil in the world, bounded by the Mediterranean Sea on the north, and on the east and west by barren deserts. Their country was of a triangular form, and watered by the Nile, which, passing through it in its greatest extent, runs nearly down the middle.