ibrary--a remnant which war and time and
bigotry had spared. Amrou, therefore, sent to the khalif to ascertain
his pleasure. "If," replied the khalif, "the books agree with the Koran,
the Word of God, they are useless, and need not be preserved; if
they disagree with it, they are pernicious. Let them be destroyed."
Accordingly, they were distributed among the baths of Alexandria, and it
is said that six months were barely sufficient to consume them.

Although the fact has been denied, there can be little doubt that Omar
gave this order. The khalif was an illiterate man; his environment
was an environment of fanaticism and ignorance. Omar's act was an
illustration of Ali's remark.

THE ALEXANDRIAN LIBRARY BURNT. But it must not be supposed that the
books which John the Labor-lover coveted were those which constituted
the great library of the Ptolemies, and that of Eumenes, King of
Pergamus. Nearly a thousand years had elapsed since Philadelphus began
his collection. Julius Caesar had burnt more than half; the Patriarchs
of Alexandria had not only permitted but superintended the dispersion
of almost all the rest. Orosius expressly states that he saw the empty
cases or shelves of the library twenty years after Theophilus, the uncle
of St. Cyril, had procured from the Emperor Theodosius a rescript for
its destruction. Even had this once noble collection never endured such
acts of violence, the mere wear and tear, and perhaps, I may add, the
pilfering of a thousand years, would have diminished it sadly.
Though John, as the surname he received indicates, might rejoice in a
superfluity of occupation, we may be certain that the care of a library
of half a million books would transcend even his well-tried powers; and
the cost of preserving and supporting it, that had demanded the ample
resources of the Ptolemies and the Caesars, was beyond the means of a
grammarian. Nor is the time required for its combustion or destruction
any indication of the extent of the collection. Of all articles of
fuel, parchment is, perhaps, the most wretched. Paper and papyrus do
excellently well as kindling-materials, but we may be sure that the
bath-men of Alexandria did not resort to parchment so long as they could
find any thing else, and of parchment a very large portion of these
books was composed.

There can, then, be no more doubt that Omar did order the destruction of
this library, under an impression of its uselessness or its irreligious