Quamvis Æthiopum populis, Arabumque beatis

Gentibus, atque Indis unus sit Jupiter Ammon.

The Arabians worshipped only two Gods, Cœlus, otherwise called Ouranus, or Jupiter Uranius, and Bacchus: and these were Jupiter Ammon and Sesac, as above: and so also the people of Meroe above Egypt [[274]] worshipped no other Gods but Jupiter and Bacchus, and had an Oracle of Jupiter, and these two Gods were Jupiter Ammon and Osiris, according to the language of Egypt.

At length Sesostris, in the fifth year of Rehoboam, came out of Egypt with a great army of Libyans, Troglodytes and Ethiopians, and spoiled the Temple, and reduced Judæa into servitude, and went on conquering, first eastward toward India, which he invaded, and then westward as far as Thrace: for God had given him the kingdoms of the countries, 2 Chron. xii. 2, 3, 8. In [[275]] this Expedition he spent nine years, setting up pillars with inscriptions in all his conquests, some of which remained in Syria 'till the days of Herodotus. He was accompanied with his son Orus, or Apollo, and with some singing women, called the Muses, one of which, called Calliope, was the mother of Orpheus an Argonaut: and the two tops of the mountain Parnassus, which were very high, were dedicated [[276]] the one to this Bacchus, and the other to his son Apollo: whence Lucan; [[277]]

Parnassus gemino petit æthera colle,

Mons Phœbo, Bromioque sacer.

In the fourteenth year of Rehoboam he returned back into Egypt; leaving Æetes in Colchis, and his nephew Prometheus at mount Caucasus, with part of his army, to defend his conquests from the Scythians. Apollonius Rhodius [[278]] and his scholiast tell us, that Sesonchosis King of all Egypt, that is Sesac, invading all Asia, and a great part of Europe, peopled many cities which he took; and that Æa, the Metropolis of Colchis, remained stable ever since his days with the posterity of those Egyptians which he placed there, and that they preserved pillars or tables in which all the journies and the bounds of sea and land were described, for the use of them that were to go any whither: these tables therefore gave a beginning to Geography.

Sesostris upon his returning home [[279]] divided Egypt by measure amongst the Egyptians; and this gave a beginning to Surveying and Geometry: and [[280]] Jamblicus derives this division of Egypt, and beginning of Geometry, from the Age of the Gods of Egypt. Sesostris also [[281]] divided Egypt into 36 Nomes or Counties, and dug a canal from the Nile to the head city of every Nome, and with the earth dug out of it, he caused the ground of the city to be raised higher, and built a Temple in every city for the worship of the Nome, and in the Temples set up Oracles, some of which remained 'till the days of Herodotus: and by this means the Egyptians of every Nome were induced to worship the great men of the Kingdom, to whom the Nome, the City, and the Temple or Sepulchre of the God, was dedicated: for every Temple had its proper God, and modes of worship, and annual festivals, at which the Council and People of the Nome met at certain times to sacrifice, and regulate the affairs of the Nome, and administer justice, and buy and sell; but Sesac and his Queen, by the names of Osiris and Isis, were worshipped in all Egypt: and because Sesac, to render the Nile more useful, dug channels from it to all the capital cities of Egypt; that river was consecrated to him, and he was called by its names, Ægyptus, Siris, Nilus. Dionysius [[282]] tells us, that the Nile was called Siris by the Ethiopians, and Nilus by the people of Siene. From the word Nahal, which signifies a torrent, that river was called Nilus; and Dionysius [[283]] tells us, that Nilus was that King who cut Egypt into canals, to make the river useful: in Scripture the river is called Schichor, or Sihor, and thence the Greeks formed the words Siris, Sirius, Ser-Apis, O-Siris; but Plutarch [[284]] tells us, that the syllable O, put before the word Siris by the Greeks, made it scarce intelligible to the Egyptians.

I have now told you the original of the Nomes of Egypt and of the Religions and Temples of the Nomes, and of the Cities built there by the Gods, and called by their names: whence Diodorus [[285]] tells us, that of all the Provinces of the World, there were in Egypt only many cities built by the ancient Gods, as by Jupiter, Sol, Hermes, Apollo, Pan, Eilithyia, and, many others: and Lucian [[286]] an Assyrian, who had travelled into Phœnicia and Egypt, tells us, that the Temples of Egypt were very old, those in Phœnicia built by Cinyras as old, and those in Assyria almost as old as the former, but not altogether so old: which shews that the Monarchy of Assyria rose up after the Monarchy of Egypt; as is represented in Scripture; and that the Temples of Egypt then standing, were those built by Sesostris, about the same time that the Temples of Phœnicia and Cyprus were built by Cinyras, Benhadad, and Hiram. This was not the first original of Idolatry, but only the erecting of much more sumptuous Temples than formerly to the founders of new Kingdoms: for Temples at first were very small;

Jupiter angusta vix totus stabat in æde.