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spirit, which grew to maturity in the succeeding ages, and to which the arts and sciences springing up along with it, added still more strength and vigour.
But after all, is it very certain, as the objection supposes, that the climate of Europe hath not undergone a change since the times we speak of? Those who have read the ancients with attention, think differently, and conclude, that the degrees of cold are at this time much less severe than they were formerly. This is not a place to enlarge on a subject which might appear foreign to the work[1]. Let it suffice to observe, that the rivers in Gaul, namely, the Loire and the Rhone were regularly frozen over every year, so that frequently whole armies with their carriages and baggage could march over them[2]. Even the Tyber froze at Rome, and Juvenal says positively, that it was requisite to break the ice in winter, in order to come at the water of that river[3].
- ↑ L’Histoire des Celtes, tom. i. c. 12. may be consulted in this matter.
- ↑ Vid. Diod. Sic. lib. v. Dion also mentions the coldness of Gaul, lib. lxxix. and Statius in Sylv. lib. x. carm. I.
- ↑ Hybernum fractâ glacie descendet in amnem,
Juv. Sat. 6.Ter matutino Tyberi mergetur.The abbé du Bos, from whom this quotation is borrowed, adds, that the Tyber at Rome now freezes no more than the Nile at Grand Cairo,
