44

AN HISTORICAL DISQUISITION

SECT.

1 .

A. C. 6 %.

But while the monarchs of Egypt and Syria labored with emulation and ardor to fecure totheir fubjeds all the advantages of the Indian trade,a power arofe in the Weft which proved fatal toboth. The Romans, by the vigor of their militaryinftitutions, and the wifdom of their political con-dud, having rendered them (elves mailers of allItaly and Sicily , foon overturned the rival repub-lic of Carthage, fubjeded Macedonia and Greece ,extended their dominion over Syria , and at laftturned their victorious arms againft Egypt , theonly kingdom remaining of thofe eftablilhed bythe fucceftors of Alexander the Great . After aferies of events, which belong not to the fubjectof this Difquifition, Egypt was annexed to theRoman empire, and reduced into the form of aRoman province by Auguftus. Aware of its greatimportance, he, with that provident fagacity whichdiftinguiflies his charader, not only referved it asone of the provinces lubjed immediately to Impe-rial authority, but by various precautions, wellknown to every fcholar, provided for its fecurity.This extraordinary folicitude feems to have pro-ceeded not only from cotifklering Egypt as oneof the chief granaries on which the capital depend-ed for fubfiftence, but as the feat of that lucrativecommerce which had enabled its ancient monarchsto amafs fuch enormous wealth, as excited theadmiration and envy of other 'princes, and pro-duced , when brought into the treafury of theempire, an alteration in the value of property, andthe ftate of manners, in Rome itfelf.