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Has it not been related of the little Jew babe sucking at its mother's breast in Jerusalem, that this innocent, long after the Captivity, would start convulsively, relinquishing its feast, and indulging in the purest. Hebrew lamentation of the most tenacious of races, at the passing sound of a Babylonian or a Ninevite voice?
As yet but a small proportion of this literature has been published, and a thorough understanding of it is impossible until systematic publications shall have been issued. Meanwhile it is safe to assert that, as in the case of incantations and prayers, the omens were generally combined into series by the Babylonian and Assyrian scribes. Omens From Planets and Stars.
'I don't think much of your "nice Egypt", Robert whispered to Jane; 'it's simply not a patch on Babylon. 'Ah, you wait till you see the palace, Jane whispered back. The palace was indeed much more magnificent than anything they had yet seen that day, though it would have made but a poor show beside that of the Babylonian King.
There is no evidence to prove whether the original edifice had, or had not, a third story; since the chamber seen by the Arabs was no doubt a late Babylonian work. The third story of the accompanying sketch must therefore be regarded as conjectural. It is not necessary for our present purpose to detain the reader with a minute description of the ancient temple at Abu-Shahrein.
At the same time he is a god almost universally acknowledged in the invocations of the Babylonian and Assyrian kings, in which he has a most conspicuous place. In Assyria he seems to be inferior only to Asshur; in Chaldaea to Ra and Ana. Of Beltis, the wife of Bel-Nimrod, a full account will be given presently.
The suppression of the Babylonian revolt established his authority throughout the whole interior of his empire. If that vast, and populous, and wealthy city was found unable to resist his power, no other smaller province or capital could hope to succeed in the attempt.
This work, which was an inevitable one, was primarily of an intellectual order. We are justified, then, in looking for traces of this activity in the remains that have been recovered of ancient Babylonian literature.
But on the whole, the Hebrew laws place a higher estimate on life and less on property. They reflect also a simpler type of civilization than the Babylonian. When three or four obviously later additions have been removed, the Judgments are found to consist of five decalogues, each divided into two pentads which deal with different phases of the same general subject.
They divided the equator into three hundred and sixty degrees and they divided the day into twenty-four hours and the hour into sixty minutes and no modern man has ever been able to improve upon this old Babylonian invention. They possessed no watches but they measured time by the shadow of the sun-dial. The Chaldeans also were the first people to recognize the necessity of a regular day of rest.
Following the Babylonian model, Ptolemy erected a great museum and began collecting a library. Before his death it was said that he had collected no fewer than two hundred thousand manuscripts. He had gathered also a company of great teachers and founded a school of science which, as has just been said, made Alexandria the culture-centre of the world.
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