The Egyptians had an inventive genius, but directed it only to useful
projects. Their Mercuries filled Egypt with wonderful inventions, and left
it scarcely ignorant of any thing which could contribute to accomplish the
mind, or procure ease and happiness. The discoverers of any useful
invention received, both living and dead, rewards worthy of their
profitable labours. It is this which consecrated the books of their two
Mercuries, and stamped them with a divine authority. The first libraries
were in Egypt; and the titles they bore inspired an eager desire to enter
them, and dive into the secrets they contained. They were called the
_remedy for the diseases of the soul_,(370) and that very justly, because
the soul was there cured of ignorance, the most dangerous, and the parent
of all other maladies.
As their country was level, and the sky always serene and unclouded, the
Egyptians were among the first who observed the courses of the planets.
These observations led them to regulate the year(371) from the course of
the sun; for as Diodorus observes, their year, from the most remote
antiquity, was composed of three hundred sixty-five days and six hours. To
adjust the property of their lands, which were every year covered by the
overflowing of the Nile, they were obliged to have recourse to surveys;
and this first taught them geometry. They were great observers of nature,
which, in a climate so serene, and under so intense a sun, was vigorous
and fruitful.
By this study and application they invented or improved the science of
physic. The sick were not abandoned to the arbitrary will and caprice of
the physician. He was obliged to follow fixed rules, which were the
observations of old and experienced practitioners, and written in the
sacred books. While these rules were observed, the physician was not
answerable for the success; otherwise, a miscarriage cost him his life.
This law checked, indeed, the temerity of empirics; but then it might
prevent new discoveries, and keep the art from attaining to its just
perfection. Every physician, if Herodotus may be credited,(372) confined
his practice to the cure of one disease only; one was for the eyes,
another for the teeth, and so on.
What we have said of the pyramids, the labyrinth, and that infinite number
of obelisks, temples, and palaces, whose precious remains still strike the
beholder with admiration, and in which the magnificence of the princes who
raised them, the skill of the workmen, the riches of the ornaments
diffused over every part of them, and the just proportion and beautiful
symmetry of the parts, in which their greatest beauty consisted, seemed to
vie with each other; works, in many of which the liveliness of the colours
remains to this day, in spite of the rude hand of time, which commonly
deadens or destroys them: all this, I say, shows the perfection to which
architecture, painting, sculpture, and all other arts, had arrived in
Egypt.
The Egyptians entertained but a mean opinion of those gymnastic exercises,
which did not contribute to invigorate the body, or improve health;(373)
as well as of music, which they considered as a diversion not only useless
but dangerous, and only fit to enervate the mind.(374)