ether with whatever else the Egyptians knew, should become under
the influence of necessity, and in a favourable situation for arts and
commerce, as much celebrated for commercial riches, as their mother
country had long been for agriculture and the cultivation of the
sciences.

---
{25} That the Phoenicians were from Egypt is not doubted, and their
becoming a totally different people from being on a different soil and
in a different situation, is a strong proof of the influence of physical
circumstances on the characters of nations.
-=-

[end of page #22]

Tyre accordingly is the first example of a city becoming rich and
powerful by arts and commerce, and though few details are known,
yet those are of a very decided character.

The pride of the Tyrians appears to have been the cause of their fall,
and that pride was occasioned by the possession of wealth, far beyond
that of any other people then in the world. While they were great they
aimed at monopoly, and were partly the cause of the rapid decay of
Jerusalem. After the death of Solomon, they founded a colony, well
situated for the extention of their own trade, which consisted chiefly in
bringing the rich produce of Arabia, and India, into the western world.
Carthage was placed on the south coast of the Mediterranean to the
west of Egypt, so as never to have any direct intercourse with India
itself, while it lay extremely well for distributing the merchandize,
brought by the Tyrians, from thence in the interior of Africa, Spain,
Sicily, Italy, and the parts that lay distant from the mother city. {26}

From the extent of its territory and situation, Tyre could only be
wealthy; it never could be powerful, as the great Assyrian monarchy,
which lay immediately to the eastward, prevented the possibility of its
extention; and, as to power at sea, there was =sic= at that time no
contests on that element; the most then that could be expected was,
that it should have sufficient strength to protect itself, which, being on
a small island, very near the shore, was not difficult. If Alexander the
Great had not joined it to the land by an earthen mound, or mole, Tyre
could never have been taken till some other power got the superiority
by sea; which could not have been till after the Romans had conquered
Carthage.

Babylon, which was the centre of the Assyrian empire, and commu-

---
{26} The best account of the commodities in which the commerce of
the Tyrians consisted