[Illustration: FIGURE OF A GOOD ANGEL—PERHAPS SRAOSHA.]
Persia, having been for a century subject to the Medes, became independent under Cyrus, who also conquered Lydia and Babylonia, liberated the Jews, and founded a great empire reaching from Macedonia to India. He died in war with the Scythians, and the African expedition was left to Cambyses, his son. This king conquered Egypt, but his attempts against Ethiopia and the temple of Amun resulted only in disaster. His contempt for Egyptian idolatry was, according to the priests, punished with madness. A revolt in the name of Smerdis, whom he had murdered, placed a Magian upon the throne, and effected a reaction against the Persian reformation. The Magian was dethroned by Darius Hystaspes, who became the great organizer of the empire of Cyrus. Twenty satrapies took the place of the conquered kingdoms. A system of royal roads, couriers, and spies kept the whole dominion within the reach and beneath the eye of the king, who was surrounded by a multitude of officials and protected by a numerous army, the Persian Immortals having precedence in rank.
=25.= The Persians held the reformed religion taught by Zo´roas´ter, a great law-giver and prophet, who appeared in the Medo-Bactrian kingdom long before[28] the birth of Cyrus. In every part of the East, the belief in One God, and the pure and simple worship which the human family had learned in its original home, had become overlaid by false mythologies and superstitious rites. The teachings of Zoroaster divided the Aryan family into its two Asiatic branches, which have ever since remained distinct. The Hindus retained their sensuous Nature-worship, of which In´dra (storm and thunder), Mith´ra (sunlight), Va´yu (wind), Agni (fire), Arama´ti (earth), and Soma (the intoxicating principle in liquids), were the chief objects. Zoroaster was led, either by reason or divine revelation, to a purer faith. He taught the supremacy of a Living Creator, a person, and not merely a power, whom he called Ahu´rô-Mazdâo, or Or´mazd. The name has been differently rendered, the Divine Much-Giving, the Creator of Life, or the Living Creator of All. Ormazd was believed to bestow not merely earthly good, but the most precious spiritual gifts—truth, devotion, the “good mind,” and everlasting joy.