[86] "The two principal statues among the Elgin marbles are those of Theseus, the Athenian hero, and a recumbent figure, supposed to be the river-god Ilissus (numbered in the Synopsis 93 and 99). They are executed in a style of extraordinary breadth and grandeur. Theseus is represented half reclined on a rock, covered with the skin of a lion, and appears to be resting after some mighty labour. The figure of the Ilissus is less robust: all his contours flow in lines of undulating elegance. But in both these statues, that which chiefly strikes us, in spite of the dilapidations which they have suffered, is the vitality which seems to pervade them. In these, not only the office and appearance of the muscles, whether in action or at rest, but the bearings of the skeleton, are expressed with an accuracy which could only have resulted from the most profound science, added to an acute and perpetual observation of nature. The statue of the Ilissus is especially remarkable for its graceful flexibility; and we would observe, without going too technically into the subject, how different is the indentation, formed by the lower line of the ribs in this figure, so admirably expressing its position, from that geometrical arch by which this part of the body is designated in the ordinary antique statues, and which is so rarely accommodated to the action represented. The principle, pointed out in this instance, may be traced throughout the Elgin marbles, in which true art is never superseded by conventional style. We believe that in the opinion of the majority of connoisseurs, the statue of Theseus is considered superior to that of the Ilissus. Canova, however, preferred the latter; and Raffaelle, who imported designs from Greece, has adapted this figure to that of the fallen Commander, in his picture of Heliodorus. It is well known that the Ilissus was a small stream which ran along the south side of the plain of Athens. The statue in which it is here personified occupied the left angle of the west pediment of the Parthenon, and that of Theseus was placed opposite to it on the east pediment next to the horses of Hyperion."
[87] Herodotus; Thucydides; Pliny, the younger; Plutarch; Pausanias; Wheler; Rollin; Chandler; Stuart; Barthelemy; Sandwich; Montague; Brewster; Rees; Byron; Dodwell; Clarke; Hobhouse; Eustace; Quin; Williams; De la Martine.
[88] Gen. c. x. v. 10.
[89] Gen. xi. v. 4.—"The schemes that men of coarse imaginations have raised from a single expression in the Bible, and sometimes from a supposition of a fact no where to be found, are astonishing. If you believe the Hebrew doctors, the language of men, which, till the building of Babel, had been one, was divided into seventy languages. But of the miraculous division of the languages there is not one word in the Bible."—"Dissertation on the Origin of languages," by Dr. Gregory Sharpe, 2nd Ed. p. 24.
[90] The greatest cities of Europe give but a faint idea of the grandeur which all historians unanimously ascribe to the famous city of Babylon.—Dutens.
[91] "It is conceivable," says an elegant writer on civil architecture, "that walls of the height of the London monument might have, during the long existence of a great empire, been raised to protect so great a city as Nineveh; but it requires a much greater stretch of thought to conceive them, as in the case of Babylon, to be raised to a height equal to that of the cross which terminates the dome or cupola of St. Paul's cathedral in London. Yet, when we recollect that Nebuchadnezzar was intoxicated with conquest, in possession of unbounded power and riches, and ambitious of erecting a metropolis for all Asia, upon a scale which should surpass every city the world had seen, we shall hesitate in condemning as improbable even the descriptions of Herodotus."
[92] It must be confessed, indeed, that in the comparison of ancient and modern measures, nothing certain has been concluded. According to vulgar computation, a cubit is a foot and a half; and thus the ancients also reckoned it; but then we are not certainly agreed about the length of their foot.—Montfaucon.
The doubt expressed by Montfaucon appears unnecessary; these measures being taken from the proportions of the human body, are more permanent than any other. The foot of a moderately-sized man, and the cubit—(that is, the space from the end of the fingers to the elbow), have always been twelve and eighteen inches respectively.—Beloe.
[93] Thus, saith the Lord, to his anointed, to Cyrus, I will go before thee; I will break in pieces the gates of brass.—Isaiah.
[94] The original Erythræan, or Red Sea, was that part of the Indian ocean, which forms the peninsula of Arabia; the Persian and Arabian gulfs being branches of it.—Beloe.