A chronological view of the world; exhibiting the leading events of universal history, the origin and progress of the arts and sciences, the obituary of distinguished men, and the periods in which they flourished; together with an account of the appearance of comets, and a complete view of the fall of meteoric stones, in all ages, collected chiefly from the article "chronology" in the new Edinburgh encyclopædia

Front matter

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Preface

This volume is intended to accompany and illustrate Strass's Stream of Time or Chart of Universal History, as happily adapted to English literature, by Dr. Irving of Great Britain. The illustration at the bottom of the chart will sufficiently explain its use. It is a complete bird's-eye view of Universal History, and by a careful inspection of it, will convey a more complete view of the subject than can otherwise be obtained in the same time. The following concise work is chiefly taken, as the title indicates, from the article Chronology, in Sir David Brewster's New Edinburgh Encyclopedia, a work of great and deserved reputation ; and like all the articles in that work, it is very complete of its kind. It contains a much more full view of the events of Universal History than could be indicated in the body of the chart, and will greatly aid the study of history by the use of it. The facts recorded in this volume are exceedingly numerous and very much compressed, and are not designed so much for continuous reading, as for reference and review. For continuous reading there are numerous universal histories of all dimensions, which can everywhere be obtained, but after such reading, this more concise and comprehensive work will be exceedingly useful for a review of the whole subject, and even of itself will furnish an extensive view of Universal History, and will greatly add to the value of the chart. With regard to the additions to the work of Sir David Brewster, the object has been, by enlarging many of the articles, to present the subject somewhat more in detail, and to relieve the dryness of a mere chronological table ; to add important particulars not contained in the work from which it is taken, particularly in regard to American history ; and to continue the whole to the present time. The extent of this concise work did not allow of doing this but in a limited form ; to have done it fully, would have been to write a voluminous

4. PREFACE.

history, which would have been inconsistent with the design, and has been purposely avoided.

Professor F. Strass of Klosterbergen, Magdeburg, published his Chart or Stream of History, together with an introductory pamphlet, for the purpose of affording instruction to the corps of cadets at Berlin. Of this chart, what Dr. Priestley says in his Lectures on History, respecting an older chart originally compiled in France, and afterwards published in England and in the United States, may be affirmed with greater emphasis: "This is properly a picture of all history, and is made by such natural methods of expression, that it renders visible to the eye, without reading, the whole figure and dimensions of all history, general and particular ; and so perfectly shows the origin, progress, extent, and duration, of all kingdoms and states that ever existed, at one view, with every circumstance of time and place, uniting chronology and geography, that it not only, in the most agreeable manner, refreshes the memory, without the fatigue of reading ; but a novice in history may learn more from it by a mere attentive inspection of a few hours, than he can acquire by the reading of many weeks or months." The chart of Strass is a much more complete work than that of which Dr. Priestley, an eminently competent judge, made the above remarks. Nothing needs to be added, but that when the names of distinguished persons are inserted in the book, the time in which they flourished is denoted, and when the letters ob., (obiit,) followed by a date are added, it denotes the time when they died.