Excerpt from Elements of General History, Ancient and Modern As the progress of the human mind forms a capital object 10 the study of history, the state of the arts and sciences, the religion, law's; govern ment, and manners of nations, are material parts, even in an elementary work of this nature. The history of literature 13 a most important arti cle' 1n this study. The author has therefore endeavoured to give to each of those tapics its due share of attention and in that view they are sepa rately treated, 1n distinct sections, at particular periods of time. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.