Diodorus Siculus says, this tower was decayed in his time; but, in his description of Babylon, he thus speaks of it—describing it as the act of Semiramis, who flourished two thousand nine hundred and forty-four years before Christ:—“In the middle of the city, she built a temple to Jupiter-Belus; of which, since writers differ amongst themselves, and the work is now wholly decayed through length of time, there is nothing that can with certainty be related concerning it; yet it is apparent it was of an exceeding great height; and that, by the advantage of it, the Chaldean astrologers exactly observed the rising and setting of the stars. The whole was built of brick, cemented with bitumen, with great art and cost. Upon the top she placed three statues of beaten gold, of Jupiter, Juno, and Rhea: that of Jupiter stood upright, in the posture as if he was walking; it was forty feet in height, and weighed one thousand Babylonish talents. The statue of Rhea was of the same weight, sitting on a golden throne, having two lions standing on either side, one at her knees, and near to them were two exceeding great serpents of silver, weighing thirty talents each. Here, too, the image of Juno stood upright, and weighed eight hundred talents, grasping a serpent by the head in her right hand, and holding a sceptre adorned with precious stones in her left. For all these deities there was placed a table made of beaten gold, forty feet long and fifteen broad, weighing five hundred talents, upon which stood two cups, weighing thirty talents, and near to them as many censers, weighing three hundred talents: there were likewise placed three drinking bowls of gold—the one to Jupiter weighed two hundred talents, and the others six hundred each.”
We have been thus circumstantial in our description of Babylon, for obvious reasons. First—that it was the first local situation where, since the deluge, men had associated for civil purposes; and secondly—because it was the original station where the astronomical science was cultivated. From Chaldea, Astronomy travelled to Egypt, where she was studied for many ages; she also went to Phœnicia, where she was regarded with equal attention. But the peculiar occasion which the Phœnician people had to improve their acquaintance with this science, will appear, upon reflecting that these people occupied a narrow and barren tract of land between the Mediterranean and Arabian seas; therefore, they found it essentially necessary to improve their situation by those means which Divine Providence had apparently marked out for them to resort unto; we accordingly find them applying to mercantile industry; as a commercial people, in this character, they were the ready medium of communication between every part of the then known world. In consequence, they had factories or mercantile stations up the Mediterranean; but particularly on its European side, on the shores of the Atlantic, and even in the British sea: we recognise their occupying Marseilles, and others, on the coast of France; Cadiz, on that of Spain; the Lizard Point, and other places, in Cornwall, where they traded for tin in the British Isles. In brief, their commercial spirit carried them to every part of the globe: by the by, admitting that rational belief be allowed to Plato and Solon, we shall find that they had, in the first ages, explored the Atlantic Ocean, and even discovered America. A great variety of authorities may be adduced to prove the assertion—that the Phœnicians made three descents on the American coast; and others, who say that the inhabitants discovered there by the Spaniards, gave the same names to the plants as had been assigned them in Asia; that their religious rites were similar, and general customs and manners the same,—we refer to Joseph Da Costa’s “History of the Indies,” published in 1694.
This author was an eye-witness, and wrote from actual observation. The Phœnicians, in the exercise of their mercantile functions, had the most obvious necessity to cultivate the sideral science. We find that they accordingly did so, and made various improvements and very important discoveries by their exercise. From the northern hemisphere being more known to them than it was to the Chaldeans, they discovered that splendid and beautiful asterism, Cynosuræ, or the polar-star,—an asterism of the most singular service, before the properties of the magnet were discovered, and which star was sometimes called, from them, Phœnice.
From Phœnicia and Egypt the celestial science of astronomy was brought into Greece, with which people the Phœnicians were intimate; for they, by trade, having occasion to converse with the Greeks, and also from uniting in one national resemblance, the three opposite characteristics of soldiers, sailors, and men of science, the communications between the two people were very frequent. At every period, from the first establishment of the Grecian states, that highly eminent and intellectual people collected from all others every particular they could obtain in all matters having relation to sciences and arts; those they cultivated with a success worthy of the motive which first induced them to make these collections.—Loving Knowledge for herself, they succeeded beyond all others in obtaining her favours.
The first Greek who appears on record to have cultivated the celestial science with success, was Thales, born at Miletus, in Asia Minor, six hundred and forty one years before Christ; he explained the causes of eclipses, and predicted one. He also taught that the earth was round, and divided into five zones; he discovered the solstices and equinoxes, and likewise divided the year into three hundred and sixty-five days. He had travelled into Egypt in search of knowledge, where he ascertained the height of one of the pyramids, from its shade. He looked upon water as the principle of all things. From him the sect called the Ionic had their origin.
Anaximander, his pupil, followed him, and supported the opinions of his great master; he was born before Christ six hundred and ten years; he invented maps and dials, and is said to have constructed a sphere. His ideas of the planets were, however, erroneous.
Anaximenes was a scholar of Anaximander, and born five hundred and fifty-four years before Christ. He taught that air was the origin of all things, and many erroneous notions; among others, that the earth was a plane, and the heavens a solid concave sphere, with the stars affixed to it like nails.
Anaxagoras of Clazomene, the pupil of, and successor to, Anaximenes, born before Christ five hundred and sixty years. The doctrines he supported are a strange association of important truths, mixed with the most gross absurdities. He taught that the world was made by a being of infinite power; that mind was the origin of motion; that the upper regions, which he called ether, were filled with fire, that the rapid revolution of this ether had raised large masses of stone from the earth, which, being inflamed, formed the stars, which were kept in their places, and prevented from falling by the velocity of their motion.
His ideas of the solar orb were extremely erroneous; alleging, according to different authors, various uncertain positions respecting the materials of which that planet is composed: one says, he said it was a vast mass of fire; another states his opinion, that it was red-hot iron; and a third, that it was of stone. He taught that the comets are an assemblage of planets; that winds are produced in consequence of highly rarified air; that thunder and lightning are a collision of clouds; earthquakes, by subterraneous air forcing its passage upwards; that the moon is inhabited, &c.
This philosopher removed his school from Miletus to Athens, which was thenceforth the grand seat of all learning. He had taught there for thirty years, when he was prosecuted for his philosophical opinions, particularly for his just ideas relative to the Deity, and condemned to death. When sentence was pronounced, he said:—“It is long since Nature condemned me to that.” However, according to the laws of Athens, he was permitted an appeal to the people, in which his scholar, the immortal Pericles, saved his life by his eloquence. His sentence of death was changed into banishment. Whilst in prison he determined exactly the proportion of the circumference of the circle to its diameter, denominated “squaring the circle.” He died at Lampsacus. Archelaus, his scholar, was the preceptor of the divine Socrates.