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Art has ceased to reproduce
nature and is become a conventional symbol.
=Painting.=--The Egyptians used very solid colors; after 5,000 years
they are still fresh and bright. But they were ignorant of coloring
designs; they knew neither tints, shadows, nor perspective. Painting,
like sculpture, was subject to religious rules and was therefore
monotonous. If fifty persons were to be represented, the artist made
them all alike.
=Literature.=--The literature of the Egyptians is found in the
tombs--not only books of medicine, of magic and of piety, but also
poems, letters, accounts of travels, and even romances.
=Destiny of the Egyptian Civilization.=--The Egyptians conserved their
customs, religion, and arts even after the fall of their empire.
Subjects of the Persians, then the Greeks, and at last of the Romans,
they kept their old usages, their hieroglyphics, their mummies and
sacred animals. At last between the third and second centuries A.D.,
Egyptian civilization was slowly extinguished.

FOOTNOTES:
[6] Following the curves of the stream.--ED.
[7] In some localities, _e.g.


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