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Greeks.—In the Greek world we see a finer type of humanity: a versatile intellect, expressed in exalted works of philosophy and literature; a refined æsthetic taste embodied in the most beautiful specimens of architecture and sculpture; and a strong love of freedom, shown in the development of democratic institutions.

Romans.—In the Roman world we see a more practical genius and a more vigorous manhood; a great capacity for military and political organization; a broad sense of civil justice, expressed in an enduring system of law; a wide cosmopolitan spirit, capable of appropriating the ideas of other peoples—in short, a civilization which expressed the highest unity and broadest culture of the ancient world.

HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY AND DISCOVERY

No intelligent knowledge of the historical nations is possible without a corresponding knowledge of their geography. The first and most important question that geography answers for us is where. Historical Geography answers both where and when? Where is Rome located? Where and when did the Babylonian Empire exist?

History not only answers the questions when and who but, in addition, gives us a consecutive account of the doings of civilized mankind in their progress toward the most valued and elevating of social and political blessings. It deals rather with the life of nations than with races of men; and its special function is to sketch the career and describe the conditions of those great nations whose ideas and institutions, or whose achievements in politics, war, literature, art and science, were remarkable in their own epoch, or, by influencing other nations, helped to make the civilized world what it is now.

WHERE THE FIRST
CIVILIZATIONS BEGAN

The first scenes in the drama of human history are laid in two remarkable river valleys—the one formed by the Euphrates and the Tigris in western Asia, and the other formed by the river Nile in northeastern Africa. The Euphrates and the Tigris poured their waters into the Persian Gulf, the Nile flowed north into the Mediterranean Sea. Both these valleys were possessed of a rich, alluvial soil, that favored the early development of industrial life among their dwellers. Along the lower courses of the Asiatic rivers were the Babylonians, and later, by conquest, the Chaldeans. In the upper reaches were the Assyrians. On the banks of the Nile were the Egyptians. Such, according to our present knowledge, is the first historic zone in which the real history of the civilized world began.