Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/132

 116 HISTORY OF GREECE. basis of their various lunar periods. It is pretended that Thali?* was the first who predicted an eclipse of the sun, not, indeed, accurately, but with large limits of error as to the time of its occurrence, and that he also possessed so profound an acquaint- ance with meteorological phenomena and probabilities, as to be able to foretell an abundant crop of olives for the coming year, and to realize a large sum of money by an olive speculation. 1 From Thales downward we trace a succession of astronomical and physical theories, more or less successful, into which I do not intend here to enter : it is sufficient at present to contrast the father of the Ionic philosophy with the times preceding him, and to mark the first.commencement of scientific prediction among the Greeks, however imperfect at the outset, as distinguished from the inspired dicta of prophets or oracles, and from those special signs of the purposes of the gods, which formed the habit- ual reliance of the Homeric man. 9 We shall see these two modes of anticipating the future, one based upon the philosophical, the other upon the religious appreciation of nature, running simultaneously on throughout Grecian history, and sharing be- tween them in unequal portions the empire of the Greek mind ; the former acquiring both greater predominance and wider appli- cation among the intellectual men, and partially restricting, but never abolishing, the spontaneous employment of the latter among the vulgar. Neither coined money, nor the art of writing, 3 nor painting, nor sculpture, nor imaginative architecture, belong to the Ho- meric and Hesiodic times. Such rudiments of arts, destined ultimately to acquire so great a development in Greece, as may have existed in these early days, served only as a sort of nucleus to the fancy of the poet, to shape out for himself the fabulous 1 Herodot. i. 74 ; Aristot. Polit. i. 4, 5. 'H reoficv 6e &ebv aivetv Tepctf aiirup 6y' ijulv Aetff, Kal j/vu-yci Tre/iayof jiiaov ttf TZvfioiav Tepveiv, etc. Compare Odysfc. xx. 100; Iliad, i. 62; Enrip. Suppl. 216-230. 3 The af/fiara Zvypti mentioned in the Iliad, v:. 168, if they prove any- thing, are rather an evidence against, than for, the sxistence of alphabetical writing at the times when the Iliad was composed
 * Odyss. iii. 173.