glory, say of so sterile and so barbarous a wild? The few mournful sepulchres, those mute but powerful pleaders of former population, would not speak more forcibly to his imagination, than they do to other unprejudiced minds, when they are found in other parts of the world. The tumuli, and the other repositories of the dead, which have been discovered in the plain and extensive deserts of the north, and in many of which, the bodies have been found wrapped in plates, and in cloths of gold, with bracelets, necklaces, vases, crowns, rings, sabres, &c. ornamented with emeralds, rubies, and variety of precious stones, address themselves as significantly to the understanding, as the tomb of the Scipios, or the mausoleum of Adrian.

An unphilosophical notion has also gone abroad, relative to the enervating quality of warm climates. The Greeks and the Romans speak much of Asiatic effeminacy, and give indolence as the distinguishing, character of the inhabitants of those countries. Montesquieu, adopting the same opinion, and assuming the fact as a principle, has laid it down as an axiom, that the inhabitants of hot countries must necessarily be indolent, inert of body, and, from analogy, inert of mind and character, But were

the Assyrians, whose ambition, and wars during five hundred years, threw Asia into confusion; the Medes, who shook off their yoke, and dispossessed them; the Percians, who, under Cyrus, within the space of thirty years, extended their conquests from the Indus to the Mediterranean; not to say any thing of modern days; were these incrt and indolent people? May we not oppose to this system, also, the Phoenicians, who, for so many centuries, were in possession of the commerce of the whole ancient world; the Palmyranians, of whose industry we possess such stupendous monuments; the Parthians, those unconquerable rivals of Rome; and even the Jews, who, limited to a little state, never ceased to struggle for a thousand years, against the most powerful empires? If the men of these nations want activity, what is activity? If they were active, where then is the influence of climate? Does Carthage in Africa, and Hannibal, bear one and the same meaning, as indolence and inactivity? The truth is, our sensations are relative to our habits; and we assume a temperament analogous to the mental climate in which we live, and not to the atmospherical.

In the regions of the north, the ruins of extensive cities have been traced.

Pyramids, and

other

other pompous monuments have been discovered, Nor are we, because the sky is inclement, seriously to believe, that white bears and rein deer have been the sole inhabitants of the higher la titudes of Europe. To the north we modern nations of the globe are infinitely indebted. It is to that polar light, notwithstanding the difference of climate, of religion, and of particular accidents, we are to look up, in a great measure, for the illustration of our institutions, of our police, of our customs, of our manners, and of our laws The most flourishing and celebrated European states owe, originally, to the northern nations, whatever liberty they now enjoy, either in their constitutions, or in the nature of their governments. The empire of honour, which characterizes mankind at present, we have derived from the north. The great prerogative of the north, in a word, and what ought to recommend its inhabitants beyond every people upon earth, is, that they have given birth or patronage to the liberty of Europe, that is, to almost all the liberty that is among men. The north of Europe has been called the forge of mankind. I should rather call it the forge of those instruments, which have broken the fetters of mankind, that were manufactured in the south. It was there those valiant nations were bred, who

who left their native climate to destroy tyrants and slaves, and to teach men, that nature having made them equal, no reason could be assigned for their becoming dependent, but their mutual happiness.*

In fact, history has not recorded the annals of a people, who have occasioned greater, more sudden, or more numerous revolutions, than the nations of the north; even though we survey them, from the moment of their issuing, step by step, from the homes of their Scythian ancestors. When we consider the rapid conquests of these people, are we to give credit to the derogatory accounts given of them by their enemies; or to ascribe their success to force, and to brutal force alone? The science and genius of Zingis Cawn and Timour, children of the same soil, who in later days destroyed mighty empires, founded on arms and military discipline, are surely not to be doubted; and that they were not deficient in the arts of peace, is evident in their institutes. Can any reasonable man be persuaded then, that the lasting and flourishing governments which the northern nations established in various parts of Europe, could have been framed by the undiscriminating

• Montesquieu.

efforts

efforts of ignorant savages? Or that such mighty atchievements could have been planned and executed without some extraordinary vigour of mind, some uniformity in their principles of conduct, and at least no common talents of political sagacity?

From what we have recorded in the page of undisputed history, we should learn to judge of what may have preceded the æras with which we are acquainted. The revolution which the Saracens, for instance, occasioned in Spain, is memorable. The Goths had come out of the north, and after many vicissitudes of fortune, had established a mighty kingdom, when another nation from the south approached to destroy it : just as when two storms arise in the air, the one disperses the other, The Goths had at length established good laws and polity in Spain, and the church flourished under the protection of their kings, when, on a sudden, the Saracens introduced a foreign religion, language, and manners. But, how is the imagination astonished at Timour, in his camp before Smyrna, meditating, and almost accomplishing, the invasion of the Chinese empire? From the Irtish and the Volga to the Persian Gulf, and from the Ganges to Damascus and the Archipelago, Asia was in

the