DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.26300#0091
6o
iEGYPTIACA.
PART I.
this is a falfe comment upon a miftaken text. The
Arabic hiftorian fays nothing like it; he limply re-
lates the faCt, that in half a year the books were entirely
confumed: but how many baths were employed in their
deftruCtion, he neither fays nor infinuates. The incre-
dible multitude of the volumes therefore vanifhes at
once. If during the whole time which elapfed, whilft
thefe precious monuments of antiquity were gradually
confuming, no fentiment of remorfe or compunction
arofe in the breafts of the conquerors, no wifh to refcue
the ftill remaining treafures of this ineftimable Library
from further ravage and deftruCtion, well might Abul-
pharajus exclaim, “ Hear and wonder !” Hear and won-
der at the brutal ignorance, and unrelenting fury of the
barbarians !
Secondly, even if I fhould grant to Mr. Gibbon, that
we have only the evidence of Abulpharajus for the gene-
ral fact, I fee no ground for rational fcepticifm with re-
gard to its reality. I will concede even more; I will
allow that Abulpharajus himself does not mention the
circumfiance in his Syriac Univerfal Hijlory, though he
generally defcribes the period when it happened.
The nature of thefe two Univerfal Hiftories, the one
written in Arabic, the other in Syriac, may be aptly il-
luftrated by two modern publications.
iEGYPTIACA.
PART I.
this is a falfe comment upon a miftaken text. The
Arabic hiftorian fays nothing like it; he limply re-
lates the faCt, that in half a year the books were entirely
confumed: but how many baths were employed in their
deftruCtion, he neither fays nor infinuates. The incre-
dible multitude of the volumes therefore vanifhes at
once. If during the whole time which elapfed, whilft
thefe precious monuments of antiquity were gradually
confuming, no fentiment of remorfe or compunction
arofe in the breafts of the conquerors, no wifh to refcue
the ftill remaining treafures of this ineftimable Library
from further ravage and deftruCtion, well might Abul-
pharajus exclaim, “ Hear and wonder !” Hear and won-
der at the brutal ignorance, and unrelenting fury of the
barbarians !
Secondly, even if I fhould grant to Mr. Gibbon, that
we have only the evidence of Abulpharajus for the gene-
ral fact, I fee no ground for rational fcepticifm with re-
gard to its reality. I will concede even more; I will
allow that Abulpharajus himself does not mention the
circumfiance in his Syriac Univerfal Hijlory, though he
generally defcribes the period when it happened.
The nature of thefe two Univerfal Hiftories, the one
written in Arabic, the other in Syriac, may be aptly il-
luftrated by two modern publications.