rush in its infancy the
endeavour of truth and sincerity, of broad-mindedness and tolerance.
When placed before the question to be or not to be, to be logical or
illogical, it has chosen the latter, and striven after the impossible:
the reconciliation of what cannot be reconciled without alterations,
rejections, and selections. The happy marriage of Hellenism and Hebraism
in Egypt had a tragic end. The union was dissolved, not, however,
without having produced its issue: the Alexandrian culture, which was
carried to Rome by Philo Judaeus, and thus influenced later European
thought and humanity at large.

[Illustration: 015.jpg PAGE IMAGE--Alexandria]

CHAPTER I--EGYPT CONQUERED BY THE GREEKS

_Alexander the Great.--Cleomenes.--B.C. 332-323_

The way for the Grecian conquest of Egypt had been preparing for many
years. Ever since the memorable march of Xenophon, who led, in the face
of unknown difficulties, ten thousand Greeks across Asia Minor, the
Greek statesman had suspected that the Hellenic soldier was capable of
undreamed possibilities.

When the young Alexander, succeeding his father Philip on the throne
of Macedonia, got himself appointed general by the chief of the Greek
states, and marched against Darius Codomanus, King of Persia, at the
head of the allied armies, it was not difficult to foresee the result.
The Greeks had learned the weakness of the Persians by having been so
often hired to fight for them. For a century past, every Persian army
had had a body of ten or twenty thousand Greeks in the van, and
without this guard the Persians were like a flock of sheep without the
shepherd's dog. Those countries which had trusted to Greek mercenaries
to defend them could hardly help falling when the Greek states united
for their conquest.

Alexander defeated the Persians under Darius in a great and memorable
battle near the town of Issus at the foot of the Taurus, at the pass
which divides Syria from Asia Minor, and then, instead of marching upon
Persia, he turned aside to the easier conquest of Egypt. On his way
there he spent seven months in the siege of the wealthy city of Tyre,
and he there punished with death every man capable of carrying arms, and
made slaves of the rest. He was then stopped for some time before the
little town of Gaza, where Batis, the brave governor, had the courage to
close the gates against the Greek army. His angry fretfulness at being
checked by so small a force was onl