Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/148

 Man upon his first seeing of them would naturally ask, what they were, by whom, and for what Intent erected. To which we may add, that these very Buildings are more exactly described in Mr Greaves's Pyramidographia, than in any ancient Author now extant.

The Difficulty of determining the Age when Sesostris lived, is another Instance of the Carelesness of the Egyptian Historians. Either he was the same with Sheshak, who invaded Judæa in Rehoboam's Time, as Sir John Marsham (f) asserts after Josephus, or not: If he was, his Time is known indeed, but then the Authority of Manetho, and of those Pillars from which Manetho pretended to transcribe the Tables of the several Dynasties of the Egyptian Kings, is at an End; besides, it contradicts all the Greek Writers that mention Sesostris, who place him in their fabulous Age, and generally affirm, that he lived before the Expedition of the Argonauts, which preceded the War of Troy. If he was not that Sheshak, then the Time when the only famous Conqueror of the Egyptian Nation lived is uncertain, and all that they know of him is, that once upon a time there was a mighty King in Egypt, who conquered Ethiopia, Arabia, Assyria and up to Col-