The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1851-04-19


MI. 0Iiddon'a Lectures on Egypt.
In the course Of Mr.. GLDDoN's lectures on
Egypt, in this city, he has arrived at conclusions
concerning the chronology of its antiquities, en-
tirely at variance with that Of the Mosaic his
tory. In this, he agrees with LErsIUs, BuNsEs,
and most of the Egyptian archacologists, and
their united opinions have given a good deal of
confidence to the antiscriptural theory Of the
creation.
We have not been able to pay the strict at
tention to these lectures which their interest and
Importance demand-much less to examine the
numerous authorities that deserve to be con-
suited on such momentous question. But so
far as we have become acquainted with these
speculations, and the evidence on which they rest
we confess we have seen nothing to shake our
belief in the testimony of Moses and the in
spired writers-but much to confirm it.
According to the Book of Genesis the deluge
must have occurred about two thousand years
before the coming of Christ. And hence, all the
yestiges of ancient civilization must be of later
date. But according to the conclusions of LEr-
Aus, which are adopted by Mr.. GLIDDoS, the
history of civilized monumental Egypt goes
back 3,893 years beyond the christian era-goes
almost to the very period Indicate dby Moses for
the creation.
The pretensioE to remote antiquity has always
been as common among nations as families
When our intercourse began with China and
India, II was announced that each Of them claimed
an origin, many thousand years beyond our the
DRY of the duration Of time. And we were
threatened not only with historical and monu-
mental evidence from those countries, but astro-
nomical observations made and recorded twenty
thousand years ago, the truth Of which could be
demonstrated now by extending our calculations
that far back. But further researches have de-
stroyed these pretensions, and no authentic
Chinese or Indian evidence remains to place them
beyond the confines of Mosaic chronology.
1t is remarkable also that the assumptions of
extreme Egyptian antiquity are becoming more
moderate as investigation proceeds. In lS45
BocKH Of Berlin, assigned to Menes, the first king
of what is alleged to be the historical period of
Egyption history, the year 6702 before Christ
BUNsES Of Hamburg, in his work of the same
year. fixed it at 3644, and in l849, Lepsus in his
Egyption chronology decided 1893 B. C.
The course of reasoning adopted by the latest
school of Egyptian arch9oigists, so far as we
are acquainted with it, is to begin with the ear
liest king Of Egypt, of whom we have authentic
historical knowledge, from Herodotus, about
five hundred years before Christ, and then find
ing in the various Pyramids of Egypt inscrip-
tons concerning multitude of kings prior to
him, they conclude that each of them represents
distinct antecedent generation. This view they
support by fragment which has survived, of the
books Of Manetho, an Egyptian PRIEST and hie-
torian, who claims that thirty dynasties of kings
ruled in Egypt from the commencement of the
historical (after the fabulous period) down to
the end of the second Persian invasion, B. C. $40
This account is supposed to be corroborated by
Herodotus, who was told on visiting that
country by one of the Egyptian priests, that
there were three hundred and thirty kings of
Egypt before Morris
Now 1t will be seen that this story of three
hundred and thirty kings in some seventeen dy-
nasties, and comprehendng period of some
eighteen hundred years, assumes that they
reigned, consecutively, over the same kingdom.
Such was the assertion of the Egyptian priest at
Memphis to Herodotus Bnt it is contrary to
probability, because it is contrary to the course
Of all other nations. We suppose that if those
kings ever existed at ALL they were kings of a
number of cities or petty kingdoms in Egypt,
and reigned, many of them, cote importance usy
with each other.
In the account of Abraham, by Moses, it is
stated there was war among the kings of the
cities Of the plains, five kings against four
Greece was governed by multitude of kings,
who went in league to the attack of Troy,
which was defended by multitude of the kings
of the neighboring cities there and Greece lonp
continued divided into petty states and king
doms. So Italy was originally divided into a
multitude Of cities and states So in more mod
ern times was England ruled by Heptarchy-I
France by number of independent princes
Spain also, and Germany, and Italy, during the
middle ages. This, then, being the almost inva-
riable condition Of states or races at the begin
niog of their civilization, why are we to presume
that it was otherwise in Egypt, which consisted
of valley several hundred miles long Nay,
Manetho himself, inadvertently almost betrays
this to have been the fact. OF the twenty-six
dynasties he enumerates between Menes and the
conquest of Egypt by Cambysses, he tells us
he first two are Thinites the third and fourth
Memphites the fifth from Elcphantne; the
sixth, seventh, and eighth are again Memphtes
the ninth and tenth Herakleopites; the eleventh,
twelfth, and thirteenth, Thebans; the fourteenth
Choites; the fifteenth and sixteenth Hyskos or
kings the seventeenth Diospoltes
the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth, dos