Tyre accordingly is the first example of a city becoming rich and powerful by arts and commerce, and though few details are known, yet those are of a very decided character.
The pride of the Tyrians appears to have been the cause of their fall, and that pride was occasioned by the possession of wealth, far beyond that of any other people then in the world. While they were great they aimed at monopoly, and were partly the cause of the rapid decay of Jerusalem. After the death of Solomon, they founded a colony, well situated for the extention of their own trade, which consisted chiefly in bringing the rich produce of Arabia, and India, into the western world. Carthage was placed on the south coast of the Mediterranean to the west of Egypt, so as never to have any direct intercourse with India itself, while it lay extremely well for distributing the merchandize, brought by the Tyrians, from thence in the interior of Africa, Spain, Sicily, Italy, and the parts that lay distant from the mother city. {26}
From the extent of its territory and situation, Tyre could only be wealthy; it never could be powerful, as the great Assyrian monarchy, which lay immediately to the eastward, prevented the possibility of its extention; and, as to power at sea, there was =sic= at that time no contests on that element; the most then that could be expected was, that it should have sufficient strength to protect itself, which, being on a small island, very near the shore, was not difficult. If Alexander the Great had not joined it to the land by an earthen mound, or mole, Tyre could never have been taken till some other power got the superiority by sea; which could not have been till after the Romans had conquered Carthage.
Babylon, which was the centre of the Assyrian empire, and commu-
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{26} The best account of the commodities in which the commerce of the Tyrians consisted, as well as the best description of their wealth, and the cause of the downfall is to be found in Ezekiel, chap. xxvi. and the two following. It is perfectly distinct and conclusive with respect to the principal points of wealth, pride, and luxury founded on wealth.
The Tyre here spoken of is not the same taken by the king of Babylon, or Assyrian monarch long before Alexander's time, which only appears to have been a settlement on the main land belonging to the same people, and subject to the same prince.
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nicated with the eastern part of Asia, by the river Euphrates, and by the Persian Gulf with India, was, as Memphis, of Egypt, a capital; but the Assyrians were not protected on all sides, like the Egyptians, from foreign inroads; they consequently did not cultivate the arts of peace and the sciences so much. On the east, were the Medes and Persians; on the north, the Scythians and Partheans; but, as the territory was fertile and extensive, under one of the finest climates of the world, the monarchs became rich and luxurious, which was the cause of their subjection, and they were always subdued by people less advanced in luxury than themselves.