then falls into a state of decay. The disease of the potatoe plant, for example, is the same as the consumption of the animate kingdom, of which salt is evidently the chief cause.

Thus it appears that salt is in its nature exceedingly inimical to life, whether vegetable or animal; and it is evident that it operates most injuriously on young people, whose constitutions being subjected to its exciting and debilitating influence, are consequently wont to be invaded by destructive disease, and to be carried off by death before arriving at mature age. Those whose constitutions are distinguished by a delicate fibre, and a high degree of sensibility, are the least capable of warding off the effects of salt, and consequently they are most commonly the victims of consumptive diseases. But they of coarser fibre of body, and more sturdy and stronger frame, do not suffer so severely from the effects of salt; and in all cases the constitution makes some provision for its own protection from its influence, or, in other words, becomes by habit to a certain degree inured to it, as is the case even with the most deleterious of all known substances when gradually introduced into the system. These, then, are the terrible effects which occur under the use of salt. Where shall we find an account of the diseases which are produced by the substances put forth by nature for man's food?

Now it must naturally be supposed that abstinence from salt will wonderfully facilitate and expedite the cure of diseases; a result which, with a properly regulated diet, I have constantly observed by experience. Indeed it is certain that many dis

eases, under a judicious abstinence from salt, would subside without the adoption of any other measures than thus cutting off their source and origin. It is not contended that persons ever accustomed to the use of salt should indiscriminately and suddenly discontinue the practice of eating it; but that in the presence of favourable circumstances, and under certain conditions of the body, the health may be wonderfully benefited by its partial or total avoidance, and that an entire abstinence from salt is absolutely necessary in the cure of a great number of diseases.

CHAPTER VIII.

OF CERTAIN CUSTOMS AMONGST THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS, AND OF THE INCULCATIONS OF THEIR WISE MEN RESPECTING THE NATURE OF SALT, AS

MOST HURTFUL TO MAN'S CONSTITUTION.

THE ancient Egyptian priests and wise men were universally regarded as the greatest and most learned philosophers in existence. It was from them that the celebrated sages of Greece derived their wisdom: various authors mention the circumstance of their going into Egypt to instruct themselves in the philosophy of the priests. Plutarch states that, on account of the profound wisdom of the Egyptian priests, the kings of that country were always chosen from their order, or else from that of knights and warriors, and that when a knight was chosen, he was, after election, admitted into the college of the priests, who instructed him in the secrets of their philosophy.

In ancient times, as is seen both by sacred and profane history, all nations had their wise men; as the Persian magi, the Chaldean philosophers, and others, who were after the manner of the Egyptian priests. Those societies were chiefly, but not entirely, composed of priests: they were held in the greatest reverence, and ruled not only the people but the kings and princes of those times. Their philosophy was set forth by allegorical and figurative representations. We see too, by sacred history, that

symbol and allegory were in general use at those times; this has thrown extreme difficulties in the way of translation: our knowledge of antiquity, from this and other circumstances, has been confined within very narrow limits.

We now read much about what has been called the superstition of the ancient Egyptians; but some of the principal examples set forth, seem in reality to be instances of great wisdom; as the reverence shown by them towards the ibis, the crocodile, and the cat, of which they had representations in their temples, and which has been particularly pointed out as being superstitious. Let us now investigate the circumstances of the origin of this, to us, singular custom.

Egypt has been a most fertile country, covered with the most luxuriant vegetation, and teeming with anime life. Herodotus relates, that Egypt was formerly so populous that its towns amounted to twenty thousand; and that its inhabitants were, after the Libyans, the healthiest people in the world.

of Moses,

pedition

opians.

The swarms of fierce and noxious serpents by Stratagem which Egypt was formerly infested were so great as in his mito render certain regions of the country impassable. litary exJosephus relates, that Moses, as general of the against Egyptians against the Ethiopians, surprised the the Ethienemy, who was devastating Egypt; by traversing certain tracts of the country which were difficult to be passed, in consequence of the vast numbers of serpents, some of which were of unusual fierceness, and rising up and flying in the air, attacked men unawares, and did them much injury. This, he says,

Herod.

B. II., c. 76.

was accomplished by taking with them great num-
bers of the ibis, in baskets like arks of sedge, which,
being let out in the infested places, cleared a passage
for the army, by devouring the serpents. It is
evident that Egypt would have been infested by
them to a degree altogether intolerable to man, had
they not been kept down by the ibis. It
It appears
to have been from this kind of serpent that the
Israelites, in the wilderness, suffered, as related in
the twenty-first chapter of Numbers. Herodotus
describes this flying serpent, which is also mentioned
as a flying animal, in the sixth verse of the thirtieth
chapter of Isaiah, as having wings like those of
a bat.

In the fertile times of Egypt, the progress of life rushed forward with such stupendous precipitation, that the waters of the Nile would have been overwhelmed, polluted, and rendered unfit for use, by myriads of living creatures, had not the excessive rapidity of their increase been limited, principally, by a sufficient number of crocodiles; which destroyed them in countless numbers.

Ancient historians also relate that the cities of Egypt would have been rendered absolutely uninhabitable by the wonderfully rapid increase of mice, had not provision, by means of the cat, been made to obviate such a calamity. Diodorus Siculus speaks particularly of the unaccountable myriads of mice by which Thebes was infested. Mice, when existing under unnatural circumstances, in such vast crowds, fall into a very diseased condition, and cause a most intolerable and unwholesome stench. They are very liable to a cancerous disease of the mouth,