This monarch seems to have
been actuated by a desire to be honoured as the patron of science, nearly
as strong as the desire to be known to posterity as the conquerer of the
world: the facilities he afforded to Aristotle in drawing up his natural
history, by sending him all the uncommon animals with which his travels and
his conquests supplied him, is a striking proof of this. With respect to
his endeavours to extend geographical knowledge,--this was so intimately
connected with his plans of conquest, that it may appear to be ascribing to
him a more honourable motive than influenced him, if we consider the
improvement that geography received through his means as wholly unconnected
with his character as a conquerer: that it was so, in some measure, however
is certain; for along with him he took several geographers, who were
directed and enabled to make observations both on the coasts and the
interior of the countries through which they passed; and from their
observations and discoveries, a new and improved geography of Asia was
framed. Besides, the books that till his time were shut up in the archives
of Babylon and Tyre were transferred to Alexandria; and thus the
astronomical and hydrographical observations of the Phoenicians and
Chaldeans, becoming accessible to the Greek philosophers, supplied them
with the means of founding their geographical knowledge on the sure basis
of mathematical science, of which it had hitherto been destitute.
Pages:
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112