Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 1.djvu/385

 SOCIAL CONDITION OP THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. 800 dividing history into two eras, in the first of which the years and centuries are counted backwards, they will very probably search the Egj'ptian annals for the first clearly defined starting-point between the dim twilight of unknown ages and the broad daylight of history. Social Coxditiox of the Axciext Egyptians. So ancient is the civilisation of Egypt that in certain respects it was known only by virtue of its decadence. The national records reveal to us the peoples of the Nile Valley constantly in a state of bondage, consequently living under a system which must have debased them, suppressing all personal impulse, replacing spontaneous growth of thought by formal rule, and substituting formulas for ideas. But the extent to which a nation can develop itself and increase its store of knowledge is determined by the amount of liberty which it enjoys. AVTiat a ruler lavishly squanders in one day, to enhance his glory, had been laboriously acquired by free men or by those who enjoyed intervals of rest from the slavery imposed upon them by internecine warfare and the vicissitudes of their oppressors. Hence before being able to acquire their material resources, and the science of which the monuments they have left us are an existing proof, the Egyptians must have passed through a period of autonomy and obtained a state of relative indepen- dence. The erection of the Great Pyramids, which so many writers have appealed to as an indication of the highly civilised state of Egypt, is in fact a striking proof that before this period the nation had made very considerable progress in the arts and sciences. But at a period of about fifty centuries anterior to the present time the people had already commenced to degenerate. As Herder remarks, can any one conceive the dire state of misery and the utter degradation into which the masses must have fallen before it became possible to employ them in erecting such tombs ? A mournful civilisation must that have been, which employed thousands of men for years in transporting a few blocks of stone ! The slavery of the Egyptians, attri- buted to Joseph by the Hebrew writers, must have been effected long before that time, to enable the kings and priests to employ them on such works. The land and its inhabitants had already become the property of the Pharaohs ; under these masters the people sank to the level of a mere herd of cattle. Like the Nile, the Egyptian civilisation conceals its source in regions hitherto unknown, and, in times antecedent to King M^nes, whom the anuais state to be the founder of the empire, the hieroglyphics show the Ilor-chesou, or " servants of Horns," also engaged in raising monuments in Eg}T)t, according to plans traced on gazelle skins. The social state of the people inhabiting the banks of the Nile at this period is unknown ; but the most ancient buildings that they have left us, notably the step pyramid of Saqqarah, and the temple of Annakhis near the great sphinx, assuredly prove that they already possessed a well-established civilisation. No other Egyptian statue is more lifelike or approaches nearer to the high artistic standard than that of Khephren, -although it is one of the most ancient. In the earlier times of Egyptian history, the paintings which cover the walls