Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 1.djvu/169

CHAP. in. 7. INTRODUCTION. 155 to the continents their present division, instead of marking them out by lines drawn parallel to the equator, by which means the different animals, plants, and temperatures would have been distinguished, according as they approached the frigid or the torrid zones ; so that each continent would have formed a kind of zone. Afterwards, however, he overturns and gives up altogether this view, bestowing every commend- ation on the existing system, and thus making his argument altogether worthless and of no avail. | In fact, the va- rious arrangements [of a country] are not the result of pre- meditation, any more than the diversities of nations or lan- guages ; they all depend on circumstances and chance. Arts, forms of government, and modes of life, arising from certain [internal] springs, flourish under whatever climate they may be situated ; climate, however, has its influence, and therefore while some peculiarites are due to the nature of the country, others are the result of institutions and education. It is not owing to the nature of the country, but rather to their educa- tion, that the Athenians cultivate eloquence, while the Lace- daemonians do not ; nor yet the Thebans, who are nearer still. Neither are the Babylonians and Egyptians philosophers by nature, but by reason of their institutions and education. In like manner the excellence of horses, oxen, and other animals, results not alone from the places where they dwell, but also from their breeding. Posidonius confounds all these distinc- tions. 7 In praising the division of the continents as it now stands, he advances as an argument the difference between the In- dians and the Ethiopians of Libya, the former being more robust, and less dried by the heat of the climate. It is on this account that Homer, who includes them all under the title of Ethiopians, describes them as being separated into two divi- sions, " These eastward situate, those toward the west." 1 [Crates], to support his hypothesis, supposes another inhabited earth, of which Homer certainly knew nothing ; and says that the passage ought to be read thus, " towards the descending sun," viz. when having passed the meridian, it begins to de- cline. 1 Odyssey i. 23.