A pilgrimage to the temples and tombs of Egypt, Nubia, and ...

REFLECTIONS. 313
ing mouths of mummy-pits. But, ^yas Thebes
only composed of temples and of burial-grounds ?
Where were the walls of the city? where its
"hundred gates?" And how were its citizens
lodged ? Probably as the people of Egypt now
are, in mud hovels, the materials of which were
furnished to them by the all-beneficent Nile ; and
the wonders of Egyptian architecture were re-
served only for the sanctuaries of their gods and
the palaces of their kings, which were frequently
united under one roof— as the early rulers of the
land were priests as well as princes. This would
bear out the old story of despotism and oppres-
sion, of the comforts of the many sacrificed to
the luxuries of the few, of a people impoverished
in order that their rulers might live in golden
palaces, did the remains of many such palaces
exist ; but the structures that have survived the
sudden strife of War, and the slower and surer
destroying powers of Time, are all of a sacred
character. Diodorus Si cuius, who visited Egypt
while the memory of her greatness was still
fresh in the minds of her people, and that in de-
fiance of foreign supremacy, her laws, institutions,
manners, and customs, continued to preserve
their nationality, has said of the ancient Egyp-
tians :
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