Achilles, describes the earth surrounded by water, yet Herodotus,
notwithstanding his learning and research, candidly states his ignorance
in the following words:--"Neither am I better acquainted with the
islands called Capiterides, from whence _we are said_ to have our tin."
The knowledge of these shores existed in periods so remote, that it
faded. We dwindled away into a visionary land--we lived almost in fable.
The Phoenician left us, and the link of our history was severed. Hyde de
Religione Vet. Persarum, c. iv. p. 121, supposes Solomon to have traded
with the Peruvians; and the analogies between the Pyramids in Mexico and
Egypt confirm the opinion, and sanction the belief that the ancients had
a more extended knowledge of, and a greater traffic over, the earth than
history records. In the most early ages, worship was paid to stone
idols; and the Pagan introduction of statues into temples was of a
recenter date. The ancient Etruscans, as well as the ancient Egyptians,
revered the obeliscal stone, (the reason why to the obeliscal stone is
given by Payne Knight, in his extraordinary work;) nor was it, according
to Plutarch, till 170 years after the founding of the city that the
Romans had statues in their temples, their deities being considered
invisible. Many stone pillars exist in this country, especially in
Cornwall; and it is a fair inference that the Phoenician imported his
religious rites in return for his metallic exports--since we find
mention made of stone pillars in Genesis, xxviii. v. 20; Deuteronomy,
xxvii. v. 4.; Joshua, xxiv.; 2 Samuel, xx. v. 8.; Judges, ix. v. 6., &c.
&c. Many are the conjectures as to what purport these stones were used:
sometimes they were sepulchral, as Jacob's pillar over Rachel, Gen.
xxxv. 20. Ilus, son of Dardanus, king of Troy, was buried in the plain
before that city beneath a column, Iliad, xi. 317. Sometimes they were
erected as trophies, as the one set up by Samuel between Mizpeh and
Shen, in commemoration of the defeat of the Philistines; one was also
erected at Murray, in Scotland, as a monument of the fight between