Nor is it only in a state of health that this inftinct difplays itself:how numerous its refources in difease, are unknown even to phyficians! The difguft of food, does it not arife from over-repletion, or when the ftomach cannot digeft it? If a burning fever throb in the veins, do we not naturally feek for acidulated and refreshing liquids; or for ftrengthening food and ftimulating remedies, when afthenia reigns in the animal fyftem? Hunger, thirft, and the greater part of the paffions, which are purely animal, are they not infallible figns of the preferving inftinct of beings? With-. out pushing thefe ideas fo far as the immortal Georges-Erneft Stahl, we are yet compelled to admit the obfervations which he has examined and developed with fo much genius, though with fomewhat of obfcurity.

If we go ftill farther, and confider that ungovernable, that ardent, refiftless, and over-bearing paffion which feizes upon every heart-what produces it? what points out to us the want of another fex of our own fpecies with whom to unite ourselves in bonds at once ftrong, facred, and agree able? Is not that also instinct, i. e. that incomprehenfible refult of the organization directed by fenfibility? operations which take place equally among the human race and the brute creation.

If reafon alone fupplies the place of inftinct in the human fpecies, it muft then be the only guide of the infant while yet in the cradle; it muft equally direct the wild fallies of youth, and the frigid caution of age. We fhould act, we fhould love, we should do every thing by reafon; that is, we should very of ten not act at all, or we fhould be afraid to expofe ourselves, unless experience had taught us, and we knew decidedly how we ought to act. How should we teach an infant, devoid of instinct, to fuck at the

breaft, being equally devoid yet of reafon? Must he begin by searching, trying, fumbling blindly, in order to afcertain that which is good, to know that which is bad? that is, he muft fwallow the poifon to discover that which is nutrici ous; he muft hazard dying a thoufand times before he can know how to live once. Reafon is fure only from experience; or rather, it is founded upon the results of experience; whilft inftinct, though inexperienced, is never blind refpecting thofe things which are fubjected to it, as are all thofe that are neceffary to exiftence. It feizes imme. diately the good, and rejects inftantly the bad. It resembles tafte in the fine arts; it is a fure criterium, which forms reafon, which is even, in fome degree, the fundamental base of it, both in man and brute; for we have feen that it is impoffible to deny to these last a fort of rule of conduct analogous to ours (proportionally), but much lefs perfect.

What, then, is inftinet, properly fpeaking? It is a fentiment which proceeds directly from felf-love; which, enlightened by the warmth of fenfibility, acts by the help of the organs; which feeks after pleafure, and flies pain; which does whatever is proper to preferve life, and whatever is connected with the reproduction of every fenfible and organifed being. It has wants, and it must therefore fupply them; becaufe the love of life is the first of all the moral energies, and because, according to nature, life is fynonymous with pleafure, and death with pain. All these things being only fimple fentiments, are merely phyfical; but their laws are not, neverthelefs (as we have feen), the fame as thofe of unorganifed bodies. We cannot, indeed, regard inftinct as proceeding from moral knowledge; this laft is merely acceffory, and is acquired by experience; and organifed beings could exceed this

if their wants, in the various periods of their existence, were not different from thofe of their infancy. It is not, therefore, neceffary to mention here that kind of delicacy of judgement in animals which properly belongs to reflexion and thought, objects which have been admirably illuftrated by Locke, Condillac, Charles Bonnet, Kant,&c.

The admiffion of inftinct, therefore, rejects all innate ideas, a theory which has been completely refuted by Locke. It is coeval with organization; modified by that, it confequently depends upon particular conformation: it may be changed by deftroying the organs, because we change the animal at the fame time that we take from him wants, give him other fentiments, other pleafures, &c. The eunuch retains nothing of love, but the paffions of envy and jealoufy; the instinct of beings varies alfo in proportion as the omnipotent hand of Time changes us, and deprives us gradually of our exterior life. There would be other alterations in our inftinct, if we could acquire a greater number of fenfes.

It refults from what has been faid above, that fenfibility conftitutes instinct in an organifed, living body; that this fenfibility is the principle of life in them, fome effects of which we are acquainted with, but are totally ignorant of the primitive and original caufe; that man is provided as well as animals with a kind of forefight which enfures his fafety, and teaches him the most effectual method of fecuring it; that, independently of inftinct, animals have likewife moral knowledge, which is acquired, and is indifpenfably requifite for them through their life; but that man is infinitely fuperior in organization, and confequently, in the aggregate, of knowledge and reafon. Yours,

THRASYMACHUS.

Herm. Samuel Reimarus, in his "Allgemeine Betrachtungen uber die triebe der

THE Delta, properly speaking, is, as is well known, that part of Lower Egypt which is comprised between the two principal branches of the Nile; namely, the western, which defcends to Rofetta, and the eaftern, which flows into the fea at Lefbos, below Damietta. To the eaft of this last branch, and confequently beyond the Delta, is a lake of great extent, which proceeds in a parallel direction towards the fea, and is feparated from it only by a ftrip of low earth, fteril, and at different places narrow. In antient times it took its name from the city of Tennys; but it is now called the Lake of Menzaleh.

No modern traveller has been able to procure any correct information relative to this lake, on account of the favage and ferocious habits of the people who inhabits its borders, or who fail upon its waters; but the operations of the French army in Egypt rendered it neceffary to reconnoitre it à la militaire, and General Andréoffy was entrusted with the execution of this project.

D'Anville, notwithstanding the extent of his researches, and the accuracy of his obfervations, could not avoid committing fome errors in his map of Egypt. He gave to the lake of which we are now fpeaking the form of an elliptical

thière, hauptsächlich ihre Kunftriebe," (Hamburg, 1760, 8vo.) admits inftinct in man; but this German theologian wrongly denies to animals the intellectual knowledge which Condillac, and many others, have juftly attributed to them. See alfo "Mélanges de Littérature," vol. III.

thofe of Matharyeh, amounting nearly to eleven hundred, affume the exclufive right of fishing with five or fix hundred boats, of which they are the proprietors. They exclude entirely the other riverains, who are estimated at nearly thirty thoufand: their chief, the Sheik Hhaçan Toubar, draws from this fithery an immenfe profit, as the lake is extremely abundant. A great part of the fish is exported in a falted ftate.

The peninfula of Menzaleh poffeffes fome very fine rice fields, as well as that of Damietta; there are alfo two marais falans.

The water of the lake is brackish, except towards the mouth of the canal, which renders it fit to drink for a confiderable distance, according to the Nile's greater or lefs volume of water.

This lake contains many islands, all of which are fteril and uninhabited, with the exception of thofe of Matharyeh. Two of thefe

iflands deferve a particular defcription, because they prefent to us the ruins of two cities once confiderable: Tennys, which formerly gave its name to the lake, and Thounah.

General Andréoffy makes an obfervation on the origin of the lake of Menzaleh, which is perfectly in unifon with the different facts that we have brought forward. This lake, which at first fight appears to poffefs fome circumstances similar to thofe which are obfervable on the banks of the ci-devant Languedoc, does not, however, owe its origin to the fame caufe. It is not a diminution of the fea; as a proof of this, it is fufficient to examine the nature of its bottom, where the mud of the Nile is always to be found; but to this grand and primary evidence the author adds various other proofs. We have feen that the prefent mouths of this lake clearly demonftrate, by their pofition and direction, that they have

been the continuation and conclufion of different canals or branches by which the Nile empties its waters. By founding carefully along that direction, where, it is proba ble, was once the antient Tanitic branch, General Andréoffy difcovered beneath the waters of the lake, along its whole course, a canal palbably deeper than the reft.

At a very little diftance likewife from this line are to be found the ruins of Tennys and of Thounah. Thefe two cities certainly were not built in the lake; they existed previous to its formation: probably they were placed on the banks of the Tanitic branch; if they were elevated above the waters of the lake, it is becaufe, like all the cities of Egypt which are within the bounds of the periodical overflow of the Nile, they were placed on artificial piles, and the earth was increafed by the addition of rubbifh.

From an attentive confideration of all thefe facts, we may fafely conclude, with our author, that the lake of Menzaleh has been produced by the deftruction of the equilibrio between the waters of the fea, and of the Tanitic, Mendefian, and Pelufian branches.

But where did this arife? Gen. Andréoffy attributes this event to various caufes; one of the principal was probably the increase of the branch of Damietta, which, excavated at first by human hands, has progreffively enlarged itself from the most eastern branches of the Nile; which, finding themselves weakened, could no longer oppose the influx of the fea, particularly at that feafon when it is driven towards the coaft of Egypt by the north-eaft winds. Thefe waters having broken their way into the interior, found no difficulty in hollowing out a depth of one or two mètres, which was fufficient in a foil naturally fo low and loofe for producing the lake of Menzaleh.

In order to drain this lake, it will be neceffary to edge with ditches the bed of the interfecting branches of the Nile; contract, by degrees, that of the branch of Damietta; and introduce into the fpace comprifed between these different branches the water of the Nile impregnated with flime, thus forming an annual depofit which would progreffively increafe the foil. Such are the means by which, according to our author, this great enterprize might be effected.

General Andréoffy, in his first Memoir, has defcribed a country which the Nile has laid under water; that which forms the object of the fecond Memoir, appears, on the contrary, to have been vacated by this river.

There is to be found, in the defert of Lybia, to the west of Lower Egypt, two parallel vallies contiguous to each other, and which proceed from the south-east to the north-weft; the one is known by the appellation of the Lakes of Natron, and the other, which is beyond the first, on the fide of Egypt, is denominated, by geographers, Bahr-Bela-Mê, i. c. the waterlefs river. Thefe two vallies, which are feparated only by a narrow bank, seem to have ferved as a bafis for the waters of the Nile, at leaft partially, before the antient kings of Egypt were able entirely to direct this river into the valley which it now occupies. The form of thefe vallies, the name of the Waterless River, the vertebræ of fifh which our travellers have found there, as well as whole petrified trees, may be confidered as very ftrong prefumptions. The general opinion is, that in proceeding up thefe vallies we arrive at Fayoum (formerly the Nome Arfinoite, where was the lake Maris), and that in going down them we reach the fea at the bottom of the Arabian gulf (Plinthinetes Sinus), some distance to the west of Alexandria, beyond

the province of Maryouth (Mareotis). Unfortunately, the exifting circumftances would not allow the French favans who visited the lakes of Natron, to follow the course of the vallies, from their commencement at the fea, to the spot where they divide from the valley of the Nile. But this research, which is fo important with regard to the antient geopraphy of Egypt, cannot fail of being completed by thofe who may vifit Fayoum, and we fhall then know, with certainty, whatever can be known as to this lake Maris, on which fo many by pothefes may be formed.

General Andréoffy points out, both from the general aspect of the country and from the accounts of antient hiftorians, two epochs, at which the waters of the Nile have been directed towards the east ; the firft was, when they banked up, that branch which ran either entirely or in part across the deserts of Lybia, by the two vallies of which we have just been speaking, The fecond was, when they deftroyed the bed which it had formed in the western part of its pre. fent bafin, along the hills of Lybia, where may yet be seen the veftiges of a very great current.

After this geological digreffion, we fhall follow the ingenious travellers in their vifit to the lakes of Natron and the Coptic convents. The valley which contains them is about fix myriametres towards the banks of the Nile; they are separated by a vaft ominence, which is nearly level, though agitated by undulations fimilar to the fea; the wind difcovered in fome places the calcareous rock of which it is compofed, by removing the fine fand, and throwing it into the valley of Egypt, where it forms hills, and deftroys a great portion of the arable land. The inhabitants of Egypt look forward with terror to the final encroachments of these fands, which threaten to cover their whole