From Tyre Alexander proceeded to Jerusalem, to chastise the Jews for having refused to supply him with provisions during the siege. Here, as we are told, an extraordinary scene was exhibited. Jaddua, the high priest, being warned in a vision, ordered all the priests to put on their respective .ceremonial dresses; and, having arrayed himself in his pontifical robes, they all marched out in procession to meet Alexander, and de precate his vengeance. When, to the astonishment of all, the haughty conqueror bowed himself to the ground, before the high-priest, and saluted him with religious veneration ; assigning, as the reason, that this very per son had appeared to him, in a dream, in Macedonia, and encouraged him to proceed in his expedition against the Persians.—We may be permitted to doubt this ac count, without incurring the charge of scepticism. It rests solely on the authority of Josephus, who, though• in general deserving of credit, appears in this instance to have been misled by rabbinical traditions, invented to exalt the importance of the Jews. All the ancient his torians are not only silent respecting this memorable occurrence, but in a manner expressly contradict .it. They all declare, that Alexander went straight from Tyre to Gaza; and make no mention of his ever having been at Jerusalem. Besides, there are some circum stances in the story which cannot be true. Alexander is represented as accompanied in his march towards Jerusalem, by the Plurnicians and Chaldcans : With regard to the latter people, this could not be true ; for at that time he had neither conquered nor seen Chaldea. Another improbable circumstance is related by Joscphus. Parmenio is represented as asking Alex ander, how he, whom all the world adored, came to adore the Jewish high-priest ? Now, it is well known that Alexander had not at that time made any preten sions to divine honours; nor did he order himself to be adored till after the complete conquest of Persia. And farther, according to the most approved chronology, Jaddua the high-priest was dead some years before Da rius Codomanus came to the throne.
After having invested and taken Gaza, which made an obstinate resistance, Alexander marched towards Egypt : which was at that time subject to the Persians. So great was the dissimilarity between the Egyptians and Persians, in point of manners and religion, that the former never were cordial in their allegiance. The Persians, who worshipped the fire or the heavenly bo dies, took every opportunity of ridiculing the gross ido latry of the Egyptians ; and of insulting them, on a point in which men can least bear indignity, the religious in stitutions of their ancestors. The Egyptians, therefore, were glad of an opportunity of throwing off the Persian yoke ; and Alexander took possession of their country without resistance. It was at this time that he founded the city of Alexandria,* which long remained a monu ment of his political sagacity, after the empire which he had won by his arms had fallen to pieces. Here he formed the design of visiting the temple of Jupiter Ammon, nobody knows well for what. This temple was situated in a fertile oasis, in the midst of the Libyan desert, and was almost inaccessible. Cambyses had lost the greater part of his army in an attempt to penetrate to it. This, however, did not deter Alexander, who accomplished the journey, after surmounting incredible difficulties ; and, as the reward of his labours, was gratified with the title of the Son of Jupiter. It is men tioned, however, by Plutarch, in his Life of Alexander, that some were of opinion that the king received this honourable title, rather from a blunder of the priest, than from the response of the oracle. For when he
wished to address Alexander in Greek, with the title of Traic)`1ov, my son, from his ignorance of the language he pronounced the word, 7:al Are's, which signifies Son of Jupiter. However this might be, Alexander was ex ceedingly well pleased with his designation ; and in a letter to his mother on that occasion, hinted that he had made some important discoveries. Olympias, however, had too much sense to listen to such absurdities ; and ironically entreated of her son not to embroil her with Juno.
Alexander returned with all possible speed from this romantic expedition, and arrived at Tyre, which had been appointed as the general rendezvous of the forces. Darius, about this time, made very advantageous pro posals to Alexander, offering to surrender to him the whole country between the Euphrates and the Helles pont; but nothing short of the empire of all Asia could satisfy the ambition of Alexander. The proposals there fore were rejected ; and Alexander crossed the Eu phrates in search of his enemies. The two armies met near Arbela; Darius's consisting, it is said, of 600,000 foot, and 40,0ou horse ; whilst Alexander's consisted only of 40,000 foot, and 7000 or 8000 cavalry. A terrible engagement ensued, in which the Persian army was entirely routed, with the loss, it is said, of 300,000 men. See ARBELA.
This battle decided the fate of Asia, and introduced a new era into the history of the world. Alexander en tered Babylon without opposition ;—and Darius, being shortly after this murdered by his rebellious subjects, left the conqueror without an enemy in Persia. After having subdued many of the barbarous nations, which had professed a nominal allegiance to the Persian go vernment, Alexander turned his thoughts towards India, and actually penetrated as far as the Hyphasis, the mo dern Beyah. He was preparing to cross this river, fin' no other purpose than to seek new adventures, when his soldiers, seeing no end to his enterprises, began to murmur, and clamorously to demand that they might be permitted to return to their own country. Finding it impossible to allay this spirit, and not being able to as sign any good reason for advancing farther, he was obliged to yield to the importunities of his soldiers, and reluctantly consented to return. llis mind therefore being called off from conquest, he began to turn his attention to the more rational project of exploring the country through part of which he had already passed. A curious circumstance served to confirm him in this resolution, He had observed many crocodiles in the rivers which fell into the Indus : as these creatures were not known to exist but in Egypt, he concluded that he had discovered the sources of the Nile ; and in this persuasion he prepared a fleet to sail down that river to Egypt. After various adventures, he at last reached the ocean, having spent nine months in this navigation. Here he gave directions to conduct his fleet through the Persian gulf, and to proceed up the river Tigris to meet him and his army in Mesopotamia ; re solving to return to Babylon with his forces by land. This he effected with much difficulty, after having lost about the fourth part of his army. Here terminated the career of this mighty conqueror. For whilst he was engaged at Babylon in forming schemes of future con quests, he was suddenly seized with a fever, in con sequence, as some say, of poison being administered to him ; but more probably from the effects of exces sive drinking, to which he had become very much ad dicted.