The Ruins | Page 3

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This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, [email protected].

THE RUINS,
OR, MEDITATION ON THE REVOLUTIONS OF EMPIRES:
AND
THE LAW OF NATURE,
by
C. F. VOLNEY,
COMTE ET PAIR DE FRANCE. COMMANDEUR DE LA LEGION
D'HONNEUR, MEMBRE DE L'ACADEMIE FRANCAISE, ET DE
PLUSIEURS AUTRES SOCIETES SAVANTES.
DEPUTY TO THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF 1789, AND
AUTHOR OF "TRAVELS IN EGYPT AND SYRIA," "NEW
RESEARCHES ON ANCIENT HISTORY," ETC.
TO WHICH IS ADDED
VOLNEY'S ANSWER TO DR. PRIESTLY, A BIOGRAPHICAL
NOTICE BY COUNT DARU, AND THE ZODIACAL SIGNS AND
CONSTELLATIONS BY THE EDITOR.
I will cherish in remembrance the love of man, I will employ myself on
the means of effecting good for him, and build my own happiness on
the promotion of his.--Volney.
NEW YORK, TWENTIETH CENTURY PUB. CO., 4 WARREN ST.
1890.

PUBLISHER'S PREFACE.
Having recently purchased a set of stereotyped plates of Volney's Ruins,
with a view of reprinting the same, I found, on examination, that they
were considerably worn by the many editions that had been printed
from them and that they greatly needed both repairs and corrections. A
careful estimate showed that the amount necessary for this purpose
would go far towards reproducing this standard work in modern type
and in an improved form. After due reflection this course was at length
decided upon, and all the more readily, as by discarding the old plates
and resetting the entire work, the publisher was enabled to greatly
enhance its value, by inserting the translator's preface as it appeared in
the original edition, and also to restore many notes and other valuable
material which had been carelessly omitted in the American reprint.
An example of an important omission of this kind may be found on the
fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth pages of this volume, which may
be appropriately referred to, in this connection. It is there stated, in
describing the ancient kingdom of Ethiopia, and the ruins of Thebes,
her opulent metropolis, that "There a people, now forgotten, discovered,
while others were yet barbarians, the elements of the arts and sciences.
A race of men, now rejected from society for their sable skin and
frizzled hair, founded on the study of the laws of nature, those civil and
religious systems which still govern the universe."
A voluminous note, in which standard authorities are cited, seems to
prove that this statement is substantially correct, and that we are in
reality indebted to the ancient Ethiopians, to the fervid imagination of
the persecuted and despised negro, for the various religious systems
now so highly revered by the different branches of both the Semitic and
Aryan races. This fact, which is so frequently referred to in Mr.
Volney's writings, may perhaps solve the question as to the origin of all
religions, and may even suggest a solution to the secret so long
concealed beneath the flat nose, thick lips, and negro features of the
Egyptian Sphinx. It may also confirm the statement of Dioderus, that
"the Ethiopians conceive themselves as the inventors of divine worship,
of festivals, of solemn assemblies, of sacrifices, and of every other
religious practice."
That an imaginative and superstitious race of black men should have
invented and founded, in the dim obscurity of past ages, a system of

religious belief that still enthralls the minds and clouds the intellects of
the leading representatives of modern theology,--that still clings to the
thoughts, and tinges with its potential influence the literature and faith
of the civilized and cultured nations of Europe and America, is indeed a
strange illustration of the mad caprice of destiny, of the insignificant
and apparently trivial causes that oft produce the most grave and
momentous results.
The translation here given closely follows that published in Paris by
Levrault, Quai Malaquais, in 1802, which was under the direction and
careful supervision of the talented author; and whatever notes Count
Volney then thought necessary to insert in his work, are here carefully
reproduced without abridgment or modification.
The portrait, maps and illustrations are from a French edition of
Volney's complete works, published by Bossange Freres at No. 12 Rue
de Seine, Paris, in 1821,--one year after the death