Memorabilia mundi, or, Choice memoirs of the history and description of the world by G.H.

GREECE.

GReece, She had once the prehe∣minence of Rome in glory, as the precedence in time; For to say truth, she was the wisest of any people that were not inlightened with the know∣ledge of that great Mistery; She set a pattern for Government to all her suc∣ceeding ages, and (in brief) she was the Mistress almost of all Sciences: Some there are which (in a strict ac∣count) will except none but the Mathe∣maticks, but now the poor wretches suf∣fer by the Turks, under whom to this day they are, and are scarce permit∣ted by that great tyrant, means of learn∣ing to know the name for which they suffer.

And besides the base mis-usage of the mis-believing Turk, the very Natives themselves are fallen from the noble disposition of their Predecessors into an incredible sottishness, and those which

before reckoned the rest of the Earth barbarous in comparison to their Politick Common-wealth, are now themselves sunk below the envy of the meanest Nation, and become the most misera∣ble object of pity living upon the earth; indeed, they may hardly be said to live: They are lazy beyond belief; and igno∣rant almost beyond recovery; for they have now no means to bring their Chil∣dren either to learning or manners: Not an Academy in all Greece, their car∣riage generally uncivil, their feasts rio∣tous, and their mirth debaucht; Their Wives are well favoured, and so indeed they must be, for they use them no longer as their Wives than they continue to their liking, when they once fade, they are put to the house of drudgery: Their language is the same as hereto∣fore, but rudely corrupted, they have no habit almost proper, but those which serve the Turk wear their fashion, the rest which are under the Venetian, ob∣serve them in their Apparel, for they

are Slaves to both in their whole course.

Yet they retain still a shew of the Christian Religion, which was here first settled by Timothy to whom St. Paul wrote two Epistles, and was af∣ter in the primitive times, professed by diverse learned and Reverend Divines of their own Nation, which are with us received as Authentick Fathers of the Church; St. Chrysostome, Basil, &c.

Thrace. Part of this Province was here∣tofore perswaded, that their Ancesters did not at all dye, neither should they, but passe only out of this world into ano∣ther, to their supposed God Zalmoxis, once a Scholer of Pythagoras, who when he had perswaded them into this Re∣ligion, seemed wonderfully to vanish out of their sight, and appeared not any more, but left them fully possest that he was the Deity, which must after a time entertain them: And this they expected with that great joy that as oft as one dyed, instead of mourning, they set forth Games and Feasts to congratu∣late

his freedome from the troubles of this earthly condition, and the Wife only, whom he loved best (for they had many) was thought worthy to be killed by her best friends at her Hus∣bands Grave, that she might bear him company in the other World, the rest bewailed their neglect, and the residue of their life was to them as a disgrace. When a Child was born, neighbours were called to bemoan his entrance into a multitude of calamities, and in course they reckoned up, what he was to passe before he could go to their God Zal∣moxis, for they acknowledged no other, but blasphemed and shot Arrows against the Heavens as oft as they heard it Thunder.

They will not admit, that their Government should become hereditary, neither must their King be a Father of any Children; If the King offend, he shall not escape their Laws even to death, ye•• no man may set a hand to his Execution, but by a common desertion he is allow∣ed

no necessaries to live, and therefore must needs dye.