^J II. H. TRieE'S LIBRARY. ' Class No.. 453 .-rmji-ii. JV "% :>.^, " ■^^A^ *^ XV• ST V^^^.^r^ Λ 'Λ -i DE PLUTARCH'S LIVES. THE TRANSLATION CALLED DRYDEN'S. Corrected front the Greek and Revised A. H. CLOUGH, SOMETIME FELLOW AND TUTOR OF ORIEL COLLEGE, OXFORD, AND LATE PROFESSOR OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE AT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON. VOL. I. BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 1895. Entered according to Act of Congresi?, in the year 1859, by Little, Brown, and Company, In tlie Clerk's Office of tlie District Court of the District of Massachusetts. John Wilsov and Son, Cameridge, U.S.A. GENERAL TABI>E OF CONTENTS. VOLUME 1 . ρ AG Β I'kefaci'; A.\i> LiFK of Plutarch . . . ν i^IFE OF TlIKSFUa ...... 1 Life of Romulus ....... 39 CoMPAUisox of Romulus with Theseus . 78 Life of Lycukgus ....... 83 Life of Numa Pomimlius ...... 127 CoMPARisox OF NuMA WITH Lycurgus .... 160 Life of Solon ..... . 168 Life of Poplicola ....... 203 Comparison of Poplicola with Solon ... 226 i>ife of tliemistocles ..... 231 Life of Camillus ...... 26;» Life of Pericles . . . . . .318 Life of Fabius . . . . . .372 Comparison of Far ι us with Pericles .... 405 Appendix ........ 40a V L U Μ R 11 Life of ALCiniADKs ....... i Life of Coriolant-^ .... .52 Comparison of Coinot.Axrs with Alcibiades . . lOl Life of T'imoleon ...... 107 LfFF. OF ^milius Paulus ..... 15ii (31 GENERAL TABLE OF CONTENTS. Comparison of /Emilius Paulus with Timoleox Life of Pelopidas . . . . Life of Marcellus .... Comparison of Marcellus λυιτη Pelopidas Life of Aristii>p',s ... Life of Cato the Elder . . . . Comparison of Cato the Elder with Aristides Life op Philopcemkn . Life of Flamininus Comparison of Flamininus with Ριπι-οροϊμεν Appendix . ... 198 201 238 276 280 316 353 360 384 413 417 VOLUME III Life of Pyrrhus Life of Marius .... Life of Lysander Life of Sylla .... Comparison of Sylla with Lysander Life of Cimox .... Life of Luoullus Comparison of Lucullus with Cimon . Life of Nicias .... Life of Crassus .... Comparison of Crassus with Nicias Life of Sertorius .... Life of Eumenes Comparison of Eumenes with Sertorius Appendix ..... • • • 1 . 48 . . 104 141 . . 192 . 198 . . 227 284 . . 289 831 . . 376 382 . . 416 441 445 VOLUME IV Life of Agesilaus .... Life of Pompey .... Comparison of Pompey with Agesilaus Life of Alexander (4) 1 60 152 159 GENERAL TABLE OF CONTENTS. Life of C^^sar ....... 256 Life of Puocion ....... 829 Life of .Cato the Youxgkr . . . . .870 Life of Agis ........ 445 Life of Cleomenes .....,, 467 Life of Tiberius Gracchus ...... 506 Life of Caius Gracchus ...... 581 Comparison of Tiberius ανπ Caius (Jracchus wn π Agis and Cleomenes ...... 558 Appendix ......... 559 VOLUME V . Life of Demosthenes . . ... Life of Cicero ...... Comparison of Cicero with Demosthenes Life of Demetrius ...... Life of Antony ...... Comparison of Antony with Demetrius Life of Dion ....... Life of Marcus Brutus ..... Comparison of Marcus Brutus with Dion Life of Aratus ...... Life of Artaxerxks ...... Life of Galba ...... Life of Otho ....... Appendix ....... Index of Historical and Geographical Propkr Names Index for reference as to the Pronunciation of Proper Names ....... 1 35 89 95 155 240 245 802 862 36 7 421 456 487 507 515 609 ALrUABKTICAL INDEX OF THK IJVES. ^Cmilius PaUI.U8 Agesilaus Agis . Alcibiaoks Alkxam>i:k Antony Aratus Aristidks Aktaxkkxks Brutus CiKSAR Camillus Marcus Cato Cato the Younger Cicero CiMON Cleomenes coriolanl's Crassus DEiMKTKIUS Demosthenes Dion EUMENES Fabius Flamimnls . (tALBA CaIUS GRACCHUe Tiberius (iRACCHue LucuLi.rs Lycuugis Lysaxdku Marcem.cs Mar I us NiCIAS Numa Pompilius Volume II. IV. IV II η- ν. V. II. V. V. IV. I. II. IV. V. III. IV u. Ill V, V V. m. I. II. V. IV. IV. III. 1. III. II. III. HI. 1. .i7• Page 155 1 445 1 15f 155 367 280 421 302 256 269 316 370 35 198 467 52 331 95 1 245 416 372 384 456 531 506 227 83 104 238 48 289 127 ALPnABETICAL INDEX. Otho Pelopidas Tkricles . PfllLOPfEMKN . Phocion . POMPEY poplicola Pykrhcs Romulus . Sertokius Solon Sylla TlIEMISTOCLK» Theseus TliMOLEON . V. 487 11. 201 1. 318 11. 360 . IV. 829 IV. 50 I. 203 III. 1 I. 39 III. 882 I. 168 III. 141 L 231 1. 1 . Π. 107 ALPHABETICAL INDEX OF THE COMPARISONiS. Agesilaus and Pompey Agis and Cleomknes and the (Jracchi Alcibiades and Coriolanus Aristides and Marcus Cato CiMON and Lucullus Demetrius and Antony Demosthenes and Cicero Dion and Brutus . Lycurgus and Numa Lysandkr and Sylla NiCIAS AND CrASSUS . Pelopidas and Mahcellus Pericles and Fabius Philopcemkn and Flaminixus Sertorius and Eumenes Solon and Poplicola Theseus and Romulus TlMOLEON AND ^MILIUS PaULU» (8» Volume Page IV. 152 IV. 553 II. 101 11. 353 III. 284 V. 240 V. 89 V. 362 1. 160 m. 192 111. 376 11. 276 1. 405 u. 413 III. 441 1. 226 1. 78 u. 198 PREFACE, CONTAINIiiG A LIFE OF PLUTAPtCH. The collection so well known as " Plutarch's Lives," is neither in form nor in arrangement what its author left behind him. To the proper work, the Parallel Lives, nar- rated in a series of Books, each containing the accounts of one Greek and one Roman, followed by a Comparison, some single lives have been appended, for no reason but that they are also biographies. Otlio and Galba belonged, prob- ably, to a series of Roman Emperors from Augustus to Vitellius. Artaxerxes and Aratus the statesman are detached narratives, like oth- ers whicii once, we are told, existed, — Hercules, Aristomenes, Hesiod, Pindar, Daiphantus, Crates the cynic, and Aratus the poet. In the Parallel Lives themselves there are gaps. There was a Book containing those of Epaminondas and Scipio the younger. Many of the comparisons are wanting, have either been lost, or were not completed. And the reader will notice for himself that references made here ^ PREFACE. and there in the extant Uves, show that then- original order ΛYas different from the present. In the very first page, for example, of the book, in the life of Theseus, mention occurs of the lives of Lycurgus and Numa, as already written. The plain facts of Plutarch's own life may be given in a very short compass. He Avas born, probably, in the reign of Claudius, about A.D. 45 or 50. His native place was Chseronea, in Boeotia, ivhere his family had long been settled and was of good standing and local reputation. He studied at Athens under a philosopher named Ammonius. He visited Egypt. Later in life, some time be- fore A.D. 90, he was at Rome " on public busi- ness," — a deputation perhaps, from Chaeronea. He continued there long enough to giΛ^e lectures which attracted attention. Whether he visited Italy once only, or more often, is uncertain. He was intimate with Sosius Senecio, to all appearances the same who was four times consul. The acquaintance may have sprung up at Rome, where Sosius, a much younger man than him- self,* may have first seen him as a lecturer ; or they may ha\^e previously known each other in Greece. To Greece and to Ch^ronea he returned, and appears to have spent in the little town, which he was loth " to make less by the withdrawal of * Unless the expression "my to be taken as a piece of pleas- sons your companions " ought antry. PREFACE. Xi even one inhabitant," tlie remainder of his life. He took part in the pnbhc business of the place and the neia'hborhood. He was archon in the town, and officiated many years as a priest of Apollo, apparently at Delphi. He was married, and Λvas the father of at least five children, of whom tv^o sons, at any rate, surAdved to manhood. His greatest work, his Biographies, and several of his smaller writings, belong to this later period of his life, under the reign of Trajan. Whether he survived to the time of Hadrian is doubtful. If A.D. 45 be taken by way of conjecture for the date of his birth, A.D. 120, Hadrian's fourth year, may be assumed, in like manner, as pretty nearly that of his death. All that is certain is that he lived to be old ; that in one of his fictitious dialogues he describes him- self as a young man conversing on philosophy with Ammonius in the time of Nero's A'isit to Greece, A.D. 66-07 ; and that he was certainlv alive and still writing in A.D. 106, the winter which Trajan, after building his bridge over the Danube, passed in Dacia. " We are told," he says, in his "Inquiry into the Principle of Cold," "by those who are now wintering with the Em- peror on the Danube, that the freezing of water will crush boats to pieces." To this bare outline of certainties, several names and circumstances mav be added from his xJi PREFACE. writings; on which indeed alone we can safely rely for the very outline itself. There are a few allusions and anecdotes in the Lives ; and from his miscellaneous compositions, his Essays, Lec- tures, Dialogues, Table-Talk, etc., the imagina- tion may furnish itself with a great variety of curious and interesting suggestions. The name of his great-grandfather, Nicarchus, is incidentally recorded in the life of Antony. "My great-grandfather used," he says, "to tell how in Antony's last war the whole of the citi- zens of Chaeronea were put in requisition to bring down corn to the coast of the gulf of Corinth, each man carrying a certain load, and soldiers standing by to urge them on with the lash." One such journey was made, and they had measured out their burdens for the second, when news arrived of the defeat at Actium.* Lam- prias, his grandfather, is also mentioned in the same life. Philotas, the physician, had told him an anecdote illustratino; the luxuriousness of Antony's life in Egypt. His father is more than once spoken of in the minor works, but never mentioned by his name. The name of Ammonius, his teacher and pre- ceptor at Athens, occurs repeatedly in the minor works, and is once specially mentioned in the * There appears, however, to bered seeing his great-grand- be no sure reason for saying father, and hearing him tell the that Plutarch himself remem- story. PREFACE. xiii Lives ; a descendant of Themistocles had studied with Plutarch under Ammonius. AVe find it mentioned that he three times held the ofiice, once so momentous in the world's history, of strategics at Athens.* This, like that of the Boeotarchs in Boeotia, continued under the Em- pire to be intrusted to native citizens, and judg- ing from what is said in the little treatise of Political Precepts, was one of the more important places under the Roman provincial governor. '' Once," Plutarch tells us, " our teacher, Am- monius, observing at his afternoon lecture that some of his auditors had been indulging too freely at breakfast, gave directions, in our pres- ence, for chastisement to be administered to his own son, because, he said, the young man has de- clined to take his breakfast unless he has sour ivine with it, fixing his eyes at the same time on the offending members of the class." The following anecdote appears to belong to some period a little later than that of his studies at Athens. '* I remember, when I myself was still a young man, I was sent in company with another on a deputation to the proconsul ; my colleague, * This may throw some doubt Plutarch was certainly skilled on the statement (with which, in all the wisdom of the Grseco- however, it is perhaps not abso- Egyptians (see his treatise ad- lutely incompatible) made by dressed to the learned lady Clea, the Byzantine historian Eunapi- on Isis and Osiris) ; but he may, us, that "Ammonius, the teacher for anything we know, have of the divine Plutarch, was an staid long and studied much at Egyptian." Alexandria. ^j^ PREFACE. it SO happened, was unable to proceed, and I saw tlie proconsul and performed the commission alone. Upon my return, when I Avas about to lay down my office, and to give an account of its discharge, my father got up in the assembly and bade me privately to take care not to say / went, but we went, nor / said, but we said, and in the Avhole narration to give my companion his share." Of his stay in Italy, his visit to or residence in liome, we know little beyond the statement which he gives us in the life of Demosthenes, that public business and visitors who came to see him on subjects of philosophy took up so much of his time that he learned, at that time, but little of the Latin language. He must have travelled about, for he saw the bust or statue of Marius at Eavenna, as he informs us in the beOTnnino: of Marius's life. He undertook, he tells us in his essay on Brotherly Afiection, the office, whilst he was in Rome, of arbitrating between two brothers, one of whom was con- sidered to be a lover of philosophy. ''But he had," he says, "in reality, no legitimate title to the name either of brother or of philosopher. When I told him I should expect from him the behavior of a philosopher towards one who ivas first of all an ordinary person making no such profession, and in the second place, a brother, as for the first point, replied he, it may he ivell PREFACE. Xy enough; hut I clonH attach any great importance to the fact of two people having come from the same pair of hocUes ; " an impious piece of free- tliinking wliicli met, of course, with Plutarch's indignant rebuke and reprobation. A more remarkable anecdote is related in his discourse on Inquisitiveness. Among other pre- cepts for avoiding or curing the fault, ''We should habituate ourselves," he says, " when letters are brought to us, not to open them in- stantly and in a hurry, not to bite the strings in two, as many people will, if they do not succeed at once Avitli their fingers ; when a messenger comes, not to run to meet him ; not to jump up, when a friend says he has something new to tell us, — rather, if he has some good or useful advice to give us. Once Λvhen I \vas lecturing at Rome, Eusticus, whom Domitian afterwards, out of jealousy of his reputation, put to death, was one of my hearers ; and Λγΐήΐε I was going on, a soldier came in and brought him a letter from the Emperor. And when every one was silent, and I stopped in order to let him read the letter, he declined to do so, and put it aside until I had finished and the audience withdrew, — an example of serious and dignified behavior which excited much admiration." L. Junius Arulenus Rusticus, the friend of Pliny and Tacitus, glorified among the Stoic martvrs whose names are written in the life of ^yl PREFACE. AgricoLa, Avas in youth the ardent disciple of Thrasea Paetus ; and when Psetus was destined by Nero for death, and the Senate was prepared to pass the decree for his condemnation, Rusticus, in the fervor of his feeKngs, was eager to inter- pose the veto still attaching in form to the office — which he happened then to hold — of tribune, and was scarcely w^ithheld by his master from a demonstration which w^ould but have added him, before his time, to the catalogue of Λdctims. After performing, in the civil wars ensuing on the death of Nero, the duties of prgetor, he pub- lished in Domitian's time a life of Thrasea, as did Senecio one of Helvidius, and Tacitus, probably, himself, that of Ag-ricola : the bold lanmiag-e of which insured his death. Among the teachers Avho afterwards gave instruction to the youth- ful Marcus Aurelius, we read the name of an Arulenus Rusticus, probably his grandson, united with that of Sextus of Chgeronea, Plutarch's nephew, '' who taught me," says the virtuous Emperor, " by his own example, the just and wise habits he recommended," and to whose door, in late life, he was still seen to go, still desirous, as he said, to be a learner. It does not, of course, follow from the terms in which the story is related, that the incident occurred in Domitian's time, and that it was to Domitian's letter that Plutarch'^ discourse was preferred. But that Plutarch was at Rome in or PREFACE. Xvii after Domitian's reign, seems to be fairly inferred from the language in which he speaks of the absurd magnificence of Domitian's palaces and other imperial buildings. His two brothers, Timon and Lamprias, are frequently mentioned in his Essays and Dia- logues. They, also, appear to have been pupils of Ammonius. In the treatise on Affection be- tween Brothers, after various examples of the strength of this feeling, occurs the following passage : " And for myself," he says, " that among the many favors for which 1 have to thank the kindness of fortune, my brother Ti- mon's affection to me is one, past and present, that may be put in the balance against all the rest, is what every one that has so much as met with us must be aware of, and our friends, of course, know \vell." His wife was Timoxena, the daughter of Alex- ion. The circumstances of his domestic life receive their best illustration from his letter addressed to this wife on the loss of their one daughter, born to them, it would appear, late in life, long after her brothers. " Plutarch to his wife, greeting. The messengers you sent to an- nounce our child's death apparently missed the road to Athens. I was told about my daughter on reaching Tanagra. Everthing relating to the funeral I suppose to have been already performed ; my desire is that all these arrangements may have xviii PREFACE. been so made as will now and in the future be most consoling to yourself. If there is anything which you have wished to do and have omitted, awaiting my opinion, and think would be a relief to you, it shall be attended to, apart from all ex- cess and superstition, which no one would like less than yourself Only, my wife, let me hope that you will maintain both me and yourself witlihi the reasonable limits of grief What our loss really amounts to, I know and estimate for myself But should I find your distress exces- sive, my trouble on your account will be greater than on that of our loss. I am not a ' stock or stone,' as you, my partner in the care of our numerous children, every one of whom we have ourselves brought up at home, can testify. And this child, a daughter, born to your wishes after four sons, and affording me the opportunity of recording your name, I am well aware Λvas a special object of affection." The sweet temper and the pretty ways of the child, he proceeds to say, made the privation pe- culiarly painful. " Yet why," he says, " should we forget the reasonings Ave have often addressed to others, and regard our present pain as obliter- ating and effacing our former joys?" Those who had been present had spoken to him in terms of admiration of the calmness and simplicity of her behavior. The funeral had been devoid of any useless and idle sumptuosity, and her own house PREFACE. xix of all display of extravagant lamentation. This was indeed no wonder to liini, who knew how much her plain and unluxurious living had sur- prised his philosophical friends and visitors, and who well remembered her composure under tlie previous loss of the eldest of her children, and a2:ahi, " Λνΐιοη our beautiful Charon left us." "I recollect," he says, ''that some acquaintance from abroad were coming up Avitli me from the sea when the tidino-s of the child's decease Λvere brought, and they followed with our other friends to the house ; but the perfect order and tran- quillity they found there made them believe, as I afterwards was informed they had related, that nothing had happened, and that the previous intellio^ence had been a mistake." The Consolation (so the letter is named) closes with expressions of belief in the immortality of each human soul ; in which the parents are sustained and fortified by the tradition of their ancestors, and the revelations to which they had both been admitted, conveyed in the mystic Dionysian ceremonies. There is a phrase in the letter which might be taken to imply that at the time of this domestic misfortune, Plutarch and Timoxena were already grandparents. The marriage of their son Auto- bulus is the occasion of one of the dinner-parties recorded in the Symposiac Questions ; and in one of the dialogues, there is a distinct allusion to XX PIIEFACE. Antobulus's son. Plutarch inscribes the little treatise in explanation of the Timseus to his two sons, Antobulus and Plutarch. They must cer- tainly have been grown up men, to have anything to do Λνίίΐι so difficult a subject. In his Inquiry as to the Way in which the Young should read the Poets, "It is not easy," he says, addressing Marcus Sedatus, *' to restrain altogether from such reading young people of the age of my Soclarus and your Oleander." But whether So- clarus was a son, or a grandson, or some more distant relative, or, which is possible, a pupil, does not appear. Eurydice, to whom and to Polli- anus, her newly espoused husband, he addresses his Marriage Precepts, seems to be spoken of as a recent inmate of his house ; but it cannot be inferred that she was a daughter, nor does it seem likely that the little Timoxena's place was ever filled up.* The office of Archon, which Plutarch held in his native municipality, was probably only an annual one ; but very likely he served it more than once. He seems to have busied himself about all the little matters of the town, and to haΛ'e made it a point to undertake the humblest duties. After relating the story of Epaminondas * Tliat he had more than two sons having staid too long at the sons who grew np, at any rate, theatre, and being, in conse- to youth, appears from a passage que nee, too late at supper, where he speaks of his younger PREFACE. xxi giving dignity to the office of Chief ScaΛ"enger, ''And I, too, for that matter," he says, ''am often a jest to my neighbors,, when they see me, as they frequently do, in pnbUc, occupied on yerj simiL-ir duties ; but the story told about Antisthenes comes to my assistance. When some one expressed surprise at his carryhig home some pickled fish from market in his own hands. It is, he answered, for 7nyself. Conversely, when I am reproached with standing by and watching while tiles are measured out, and stone and mor- tar brought up, This service, I say, is not for myself ; it is for my country." In the little essay on the question. Whether an Old J\lan should continue in Public Life, written in the form of an exhortation to Eu- phanes, an ancient and distinguished member of the Areopagus at Athens, and of the Amphic- tyonic council, not to relinquish his duties, " Let there be no severance," he says, "in our long companionship, and let neither the one nor the other of us forsake the life that was our choice." And alluding to his own functions as priest of Apollo at Delphi, " You know," he adds in another place, " that I have served the Pythian God for many ijythiads^ past, yet you Avould not now tell me, you have taken part enough in the sacrifices, processions, and dances, and it is high * Periods for four 3'ears elaps- the Pythian games, like the Olym- ing between the celebrations of piads for the Olympic games. ^^jj PREFACE. lime, Plutarch, Jiow you are an old man, to lay aside your garland, and retire as superannuated from the oracle.''^ Even in these, the comparatively few, more positive and matter-of-fact passages of allusion and anecdote, there is enough to bring up some- thing of a picture of a happy domestic life, half academic, half municipal, passed among affection- ate relatives and well-known friends, inclining most to literary and moral studies, yet not cut off from the duties and avocations of the citizen. We cannot, of course, to go yet further, accept the scenery of the fictitious Dialogues as his- torical ; yet there is much of it which may be taken as, so to say, pictorially just ; and there is, probably, a good deal here and there that is literally true to the fact. The Symposiac, or After-Dinner Questions, collected in nine books, and dedicated to Sosius Senecio, Avere discussed, we are told, many of them, in the company of Sosius himself, both at Rome and in Greece, as, for example, Avhen he was with them at the marriage festivities of Autobulus. Lamprias and Timon, the author's brothers, are frequent speak- ers, each with a distinctly traced character, in these conversations ; the father and the elder Lamprias, the grandfather, both take an oc- casional, and the latter a lively part ; there is one whole book in v/hicli Ammonius predominates; PREFACE. Xxiii the scene is ηοΛν at Delphi, and now at Athens, sometimes perhaps, but rarely, at Rome, some- times at the celebrations of the Games. Plutarch, in his priestly capacity, gives an entertainment in honor of a poetic victor at the Pythia, there is an Isthmian dinner at Corinth, and an Olympian party at Elis. As an adopted Athenian citizen of the Leontid tribe, he attends the celebration of the success of his friend, the philosophic poet Serapion. The dramatis personce of the various little pieces form a company, Avlien put together, of more than eighty names, — philosophers, rhet- oricians, and grammarians, several physicians, Euthydemus his colleague in the priesthood, Alexion his father-in-law, and four or five other connections by marriage, Favorinus the philos- opher of Aries in Provence, afterwards faA^ored by Hadrian, to whom he dedicates one of his treatises, and who in return Avrote an essay called Plutarchus, on the Academic Philosophy. Sera- pion entertains them in a garden on the banks of the Cephisus. They dine with a friendly phy- sician on the heights of Hyampolis, and meet in a party at the baths of ^depsus. The questions are of the niost miscellaneous description, grave sometimes, and moral, grammatical, and antiqua- rian, and often festive and humorous. In ichat sense does Plato say that God uses geometry ? Why do ice hear better by night than by day ? Why are dreams least true in autumn ? Which XX^y PREFACE. existed first, the hen or the egg ? Which of Venus's hands did Oiomed wound? Lamprias, the grand- father, finds fault with his sou, Pkitarch's father, for inviting too many guests to the parties giΛ'en '' wlien we came liome from Alexandria." Am- monius, in office as general at Athens, gives a dinner to the young men who had distinguished themselves at a trial of skill in grammar, rhetoric, geometry, and poetry ; and anecdotes are told on the occasion of verses aptly or inaptly quoted. Of the other minor works, some look a good deal like lectures delivered at Rome, and after- Avards published with little dedications prefixed. We have a disquisition on the Advantages Λve can derive from our Enemies, addressed to Cor- nelius Pulcher, a discourse On Fate, to Piso, and On Brotherly Affiiction, to Nigrinus and Quintus. Many, however, are dialogues and conversations, with a good deal of the same varied scenery and exuberant detail which embellish the Table- Talk. In a conversation which he had been present at, '^ long ago, wdien Nero was staying in Greece," between Ammonius and some other friends, the meaning of the strange inscription at Delphi, the two letters ET, is debated. A visitor is con- ducted by some of Plutarch's friends over the sacred buildings at Delphi, and in the intervals between the somewhat tedious speeches of the professional guides, who showed the sights, a PREFACE. XXy discussion takes place on tlie Nature of the Oracles. " It liappeued a little before the Pyth- ian games in the time of Callistratus, there met us at Delphi two travellers, from the extremities of the world, Demetrius the grammarian, on his way home to Tarsus from Britain, and Cleom- brotus the Lacedeemonian, just returned from a journey he had made for his pleasure and instruction in Upper Egypt, and far out into the Erythraean Sea." The question somehow or other occurs ; and the dialogue. Of the Cessation of Oracles, ensues, one passage of which is the famous story of the voice that proclaimed tlie death of the great Pan. Autobulus is talking with Soclarus, the companion of his son, about an encomium whicli they had heard on hunting ; the best praise they can give it is, that it diverts into a less objectionable course the passion which finds one vent in seeino; the contests of p-ladiators. Up come presently a large party of young men, lovers of hunting and fishing ; and the question of the Superior Sagacity of Land or of Water Animals is formally pleaded by two selected orators. Stories are told of elephants ; and Aris- totimus, the advocate of tlie land animals, relates a sight (of the dog imitating in a play the effects of poison) which lie himself, he says, saw in Home, and Avhich was so perfectly acted as to cause emotion in the spectators, the Emperor included, — the aged Vespasian himself being XXVI rPvEFACE. present, in tlie theatre of Marcellus. It reads very much as if Plutarch, and not Aristotimus, had been the eye-witness.* Autobuhis occurs again in the Dialogue on Love. At the request of his friend Flavianus, he repeats a long conversation, attended with curious incidents, in which his father had taken part on Mount Helicon, " once long ago, before we were born, when he brought our mother, after the dispute and variance which had arisen between their parents, that she might offer a sacrifice to Love at the feast held at Thespige." The variance alluded to must clearly have been a fact. And in general, though these playful fictions or semi-fictions, which form the machinery of the dialogues, are not indeed to be accepted in a literal way, they possess an authen- ticity Λvhich we cannot \'enture to attribute to the professedly historical statements about their author given in later writers. Suidas, the lexi- * Something also of a per- cliscovered and put to death, sonal remembrance of Ves- Two sons were born to them pasian's lanrelentingly severe in their hiding-place, "one of temper may be thought to whom," says Plutarch, " was appear in the story, related in here with us in Delphi only a the Dialogue on Love, of the little while ago," and he is dis- Gaulish rebel Sabinus, and his posed, he adds, to attribute the wife Eponina, mentioned by subsequent extinction of the Tacitus in his Histories, who race of Vespasian to divine dis- after living in an underground pleasure at this cruel and un- concealment several years, were feeling act. TKEFACE. XXVll cographer, repeiits a mere romance Λvhen he tells us that Trajan gave him the dignity of consul, and issued orders that none of the maoustrates in Illyria should do any thing without consult- ing him. Syncellus, the Byzantine historian, under the record of one of the first vears of Hadrian's reign, is equally or even more extrav- agant, relating that Plutarch, the philosopher of Chaeronea, was in his old age ap})i)inted by the Emperor to the office of governor of Greece. Though the period of Trajan and the Antonines was the golden age of philosophers, whose brief persecution under Domitian seems to have won them for a while a sort of spiritual supremacy, similar to that which, after Diocletian, was wrested from them by the ministers of the ηβΛν religion, still these assertions are on the face of them entirely incredible. There is a letter, indeed, given among Plu- tarch's printed works, in which a collection of Savino-s of Kinoes and Commanders is dedi- cated to Trajan ; and though much doubt is entertained, it is not at all improbable that it is Plutarch's own writino;. There is nothiuir remarkable in its contents, and it is most notice- able for the contrast in tone which it presents to another letter, undoubtedly spurious, first published in Latin by John of Salisbury, which is a very preceptorial lecture to Trajan, his pupil, by Plutarch, his supposed former teacher. xxviii PREFACE. A list of Plutarch's works, including many of Λvllich nothing remains, is also given by Suiclas, as made by Lamprias, Plutarch's son; and a little prefatory letter to a friend, whom he had known in Asia, and who had written to ask for the information, is prefixed to the catalogue. The catalogue itself may be correct enough, but the name of Lamprias occurs nowhere in all Plutarch's extant works as that of one of his sons; and it cannot but be suspected that this family name was adopted, and this letter to the nameless friend in Asia composed, by some gram- marian long after, who desired to give interest to an ordinary list of the author's extant writings. In reading Plutarch, the following points should be remembered. He is a moralist rather than a historian. His interest is less for politics and the changes of empires, and much more for personal character and individual actions and motives to action, — duty performed and reward- ed ; arrogance chastised ; hasty anger corrected ; humanity, fair dealing, and generosity triumphing in the visible, or relying on the invisible Avorld. His mind in his biographic memoirs is contin- uall}' running on the Aristotelian Ethics and the high Platonic theories, which formed the religion of the educated population of his time. The time itself is a second point ; that of Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian ; the commence- PREFACE. XXIX meut of the best and happiest age of the great Roman imperial period. The social system, spreading over all the coasts of the Mediter- ranean Sea, of which Greece and Italy were the centres, and to which the East and the furthest known West Λvere brought into relation, had then reached its highest mark of advance and consummation. The laws of Rome and the philosophy of Greece Avere powerful from the TioTis to the British islands. It Avas the last great era of Greek and Roman literature. Epic- tetus was teaching in Greek the virtues which iNlarcus Aurelius was to illustrate as Emperor. Dio Chrysostom and Arrian were recalling the memory of the most famous Attic rhetoricians and historians; and while Plutarch wrote in Chaeronea, Tacitus, Pliny the Younger, Martial, and Juvenal were writing at Rome. It may be said too, perhaps not untruly, that the Latin, the metropolitan writers, less faithfully represent the general spirit and character of the time than Avhat came from the pen of a simple Boeotian provincial, writing in a more universal language, and unwarped by the strong local reminiscences of the old home of the Senate and the Repub- lic. Tacitus and Juvenal have more, perhaps, of the "antique Roman" than of tlie citizen of the great JMediterrancan Empire. Tlie evils of the imperial government, as felt in the capital city, are depicted in the Roman prose and verse ^XX PREFACE. more vividly and more veliemently than suits a general representation of the state of the im- perial world, even under the rule of Domitian himself. It is, at any rate, the serener aspect and the better era that the life and writings of Plutarch reflect. His language is that of a man happy in himself and in what is around him. His natural cheerfulness is undiminished, his easy and joyous simplicity is unimpaired, his satisfactions are not saddened or imbittered by any overpowering recollections of years passed under the immediate present terrors of imperial wickedness. Though he also could remember Nero, and had been a man when Domitian was an emperor, the utmost we can say is, that he shows, perhaps, the in- structed happiness of one Λνΐιο had lived into good times out of evil, and that the very vigor of his content proves that its roots were fixed amongst circumstances not too indulgent or favorable. ]\Iuch has been said of Plutarch's inaccuracy; and it cannot be denied that he is careless about numbers, and occasionally contradicts his own statements. A greater fault, perhaps, is his pas- sion for anecdote ; he cannot forbear from repeat- ing stories, the improbability of which he is the first to recognize ; which, nevertheless, by mere repetition, leave unjust impressions. He is unfair in this Avay to Demosthenes and to Pericles, PREFACE. XXxi aof-ainst the latter of whom, hoAvever, he doubt- less mherited the prejudices which Plato handed down to the philosophers. It is true, also, that his unhistorical treatment of the subjects of his biography makes him often unsatisfactory and imperfect in the portraits he draws. Much, of course, in the public lives of statesmen can find its only explanation in their political position ; and of this Plutarch often knows and thinks little. So far as the researches of modern historians have succeeded in really recovering; a knowledo^e of relations of this sort, so far, undoubtedly, these biographies stand in need of their correction. Yet in the uncertainty which must attend all modern restorations, it is agreeable, and surely also profitable, to recur to portraits drawn ere new thoughts and A^ews had occupied the civilized world, without reference to such disputable grounds of judgment, simply upon the broad principles of the ancient moral code of rip-ht and wrong;. Making some little deductions in cases such as those that have been mentioned, allowing for a little over-love of story, and for some consider- able quasi-religious hostility to the democratic leaders who excited the scorn of Plato, if we bear in mind, also, that in narratives like that of Theseus, he himself confesses his inability to dis- engage fact from fiible, it may be said that in Plutarch's Lives the readers of all ages will find xxxii PREFACE instructive and faithful biographies of the great men of Greece and Rome. Or, at any rate, if in Plutarch's time it was too late to think of really faithful biographies, we have here the faithful record of the historical ti'adition of his ao-e. This is Avhat, in the second century of our era, Greeks and Romans loved to believe about their warriors and statesmen of the past. As a picture, at least, of the best Greek and Roman moral views and moral judgments, as a presentation of the results of Greek and Roman moral thought, de- livered not under the pressure of calamity, but as they existed in ordinary times, and actuated plain-living people in country places in their daily life, Plutarch's writings are of indisputable value ; and it may be said, also, that Plutarch's character, as depicted in them, possesses a natural charm of pleasantness and amiability which it is not easy to match among all extant classical authors. The present translation is a revision of that published at the end of the seventeenth century, with a life of Plutarch written by Dryden, Avliose name, it was presumed, would throw some re- flected lustre on the humbler Avorkmen who performed, better or worse, the more serious labor. There is, of course, a great inequality in their work. But the translation by Langhorne, for which, in the middle of the last century, the PREFACE. XXxiii older volumes were discarded, is so inferior in liveliness, and is in fact so dull and heavy a book, that in default of an entirely new transla- tion, some advantage, it is hoped, may be gained by the revival here attempted. It would not have been needed, had Mr. Long not limited the series Avhich he published, with very useful notes, in Mr. Knight's Shilling Library, to the lives con- nected with the Civil Wars of Home. Dryden's Life of Plutarch is, like many of Dry den's writings, hasty yet well written, inac- curate but agreeable to read ; that by Dacier, printed in the last volume of his French trans- lation, is in many respects very good. The materials for both were collected, and the refer- ences accumulated, by Rualdus, in his laborious Life appended to the old Paris folios of 1624. But eΛ^erv thing: that is of an ν value is given in the articles in Fabricius's Bibliotheca Gn^ca, and Λvith the most recent additions, in Pauly's Ger- man Cyclopaedia, Much that is useful is found, as might be expected, in Clinton's Fasti Romani, from which the following table is taken : — Date. Occurrences. Authors. Λ.Ι). 41 . . Accession of Claudius. 54 . . Accession of Nero. 66 . . Nero comes into Greece ; alluded to in ' Plutarch's Dialogue on the EI at Delphi. Seneca. 67 . . Nero celebrates the Isthmian Games ; Lucan. alluded to in Plutarch's life of Fla- Persius. mininus. χ χ XIV PREFACE. 1>ΛΤΕ. Α. υ. 68. 69. 70. 74. 79. 81 90 96 98 100 103 104 106 113 114 117 138 161 181 Death of Pliny the Elder. Occurrences. Authors. . Galba is Emperor. Civil wars. . Vitellius, Otho, Vespasian. . Taking of Jerusalem. . The Philosophers are expelled from Rome. . Death of Sabinus, the Gaul. Death of Vespasian, and accession of Titus. Eruption of A^esuvius ; alluded to by Plutarch, as a recent occurrence, in his Enquiry why the Pythian Oracles are no longer delivered in verse. . Accession of Domitian. Quintilian. I Statins. . The Philosophers are again expelled Γ gjii^^g italicus from Rome, after the death of Rusticus. Martial. . Accession of Nerva. \ . Accession of Trajan. . Pliny's Panegyric. . Epictetus is teaching at Nicopolis, Ar- rian attending him. . Pliny in Bith3^nia. . Trajan winters on the Danube ; alluded to by Plutarch, On the Principle of Cold. . Erection of Trajan's Column. . Trajan's Parthian Victories. Plutarch had written his life of Antony before these. . Accession of Hadrian. In Hadrian's third year, Plutarch, ac- cording to Eusebius, was still alive, j Ptolemy. Ajypian. Pausanias. Galen. Lucian. Athenceus. Dion Cassius. Note. — The authors ivhose mimes are printed in Italics are Greek writers. Dio Chrysostom. Tacitus, born about A.D. 60. Plutarch. Epictetus. Avr'ian. Pliny the Younger, born A.D. 61. Juvenal, born a.d. 59. Favorinus. Suetonius, born about A.D. 70. Accession of Antoninus. Accession of Marcus Aurelius. Accession of Commodus. PREFACE. XXXV The fault which runs through all the earlier biographies, from that of Rualdus cloAvnAvard, is the assumption, Avholly untenable, that Plutarch passed many years, as many perhaps as forty, at Eome. Tlie entire character of his life is of course altered by such an impression. It is, therefore, not worth Avhile reprinting here the life originally prefixed by Dryden to the transla- tions which, with more or less of alteration, follow in the present volumes. One or two character- istic extracts may be sufiicient. The first may throw some light on a subject whicli to modern readers is a little obscure. Drvden is wrono; in one or two less important points, but his general view of the dcemonic belief which pervades Plu- tarch's writings is tolerably to the purpose. " We can only trace the rest of his opinions from his philosophy, which we have said in the general to be Platonic, though it cannot also be denied that there was a tincture in it of the Electic * sect, which was begun by Potamon under the empire of Augustus, and Avhich se- lected from all the other sects what seemed most probable in their opinions, not adhering singu- larly to any of them, nor rejecting every thing. I Avill only touch his belief of spirits. In his two Treatises of Oracles, the one concerning the Reason of their Cessation, the other inquiring why they Avere not given in verse as in former * He means the Eclectic, as it is more usually called. XXXvi PREFACE. times, he seems to assert the Pythagorean doc- trine of transmigration of souls. AVe have for- merly shown that he owned the unity of a Godhead, whom, according to his attributes, he calls by several names, — as Jupiter from his almighty power, Apollo from his wisdom, and so of the rest ; but under him he places those beings whom he styles Genii or Dcemons, of a middle nature, between divine and human, for he thinks it absurd that there should be no mean between the two extremes of an immortal and a mortal being, — that there cannot be in nature so vast a flaw, without some intermedial kind of life, partaking of them both. As, therefore, we find the intercourse between the soul and body to be made by the animal spirits, so between divinity and humanity there is this species of daemons. Who * having first been men, and followed the strict rules of virtue, have purged off the grossness and feculency of their earthly being, are exalted into these genii ; and are from thence either raised higher into an ethereal life, if they still continue Λάrtuous, or tumbled down again into mortal bodies, and sinking into flesh after they have lost that purity which constituted their glorious being. And this sort of Genii are those who, as our author imagines, presided over oracles ; spirits which have so much of their * He means, I believe, Those should be omitted in line 29, who ; apparently the word and before sinking into flesh. PREFACE. XXXvii teiTestrial principles remaining in tliem as to be subject to passions and inclinations, — usually beneficent, sometimes malevolent to mankind, according as they refine themselves, or gather dross and are declining into mortal bodies. The cessation, or rather the decrease of oracles — for some of them were still remaining in Plutarch's time — he attributes either to the death of those daemons, as appears by the story of the Egyptian Thamus, who was commanded to declare that the great god Pan was dead, or to their forsak- ing of those places where they formerly gave out their oracles, from whence they were driΛ^en by strono^er Genii into banishment for a certain rev- olution of ages. Of this last nature were the war of the giants against the gods, the dispos- session of Saturn by Jupiter, the banishment of Apollo from heaven, the fall of Vulcan, and many others ; all which, according to our au- thor, were the battles of these Genii or Diem on s among themselves. But supposing, as Plutarch evidently does, that these spirits administered, under the Supreme Being, the affiiirs of men, taking care of the virtuous, punishing the bad, and sometimes communicating with the best, — as particularly, the Genius of Socrates always warned him of approaching dangers, and taught him to avoid them, — I cannot but wonder that every one who has hitherto written Plutarch's life, and particularly Rualdus, the most knowing xxxviii PREFACE. of them all, slionld so confidently affirm that these oracles were given by bad spirits, accord- ing to Plutarch. As Christians, indeed, we may think them so ; but that Plutarch so thought is a most apparent falsehood. 'T is enough to con- A'ince a reasonable man, that our author in his old age (and that then he doted not, we may see by the treatise he has written, that old men ought to have the management of public affairs), I say that then he initiated himself in the sacred rites of Delphos, and died, for ought we know, AjDoUo's priest. Now it is not to be imagined that he thought the God he served a Gacodce- mon, or as we call him, a devil. Nothing could be further from the ojoinion and practice of this holy philosopher than so gross an impiety. The story of the Pythias, or priestess of Apollo, which he relates immediately before the ending of that treatise, concerning the Cessation of Oracles, con- firms my assertion rather than shakes it; for 'tis there delivered, ' That going \vith great reluc- tation into the sacred place to be inspired, she came out foaming at the mouth, her eyes gog- gling, her breast heaving, her voice undistinguish- able and shrill, as if she had an earthquake within her laboring for vent ; and in short, that thus tormented with the god whom she was not able to support, she died distracted in a few days after. For he had said before that the divineress ought to have no perturbations of mind or im- PREFACE. XXxix pure passions at the time when she was to con- sult the oracle ; and if she had, she was no more fit to be inspired than an instrument untuned to render an harmonious sound.' And he gives us to suspect, by what he says at the close of this relation, ' That this Pythias had not lived chastely for some time before it ; so that her death appears more like a punishment inflicted for loose living, by some holy Power, than the mere malignancy of a spirit delighted naturally in mischief.' There is another observation which indeed comes nearer to their purpose, which I will digress so far as to relate, because it some- what appertains to our own country. ' There are many islands,' says he, 'which lie scattering about Britain, after the manner of our Sporades; they are unpeopled, and some of them are called the Islands of the Heroes, or the Genii.' One Demetrius was sent by the Emperor (who by comjDutation of the time must either be Caligula or Claudius *) to discover those parts, and arriv- ing at one of the islands next adjoining to the before mentioned, which was inhabited by some few Britons (but those held sacred and invio- lable by all their countrymen), immediately after his arrival, the air grew black and troubled, — strange apparitions were seen, the winds raised a tempest, and fiery spouts or whirlwinds ap- peared dancing toward the earth. When these * Undoubtedly much later. xl PPEFACE. prodigies were ceased, the islanders informed him that some one of the aerial beings, superior to our nature, then ceased to live. For as a taper, while yet burning, affords a pleasant, harmless light, but is noisome and offensive when extin- guished, so those heroes shine benignly on us and do us good, but at their death turn all things topsy-turvy, raise up tempests, and infect the air with pestilential vapors. By those holy and in- violable men, there is no question but he means our Druids, who were nearest to the Pvtliap:o- reans of any sect; and this opinion of the Genii might probably be one of theirs. Yet it pro\^es not that all dgemons were thus malicious, only those who were to be condemned hereafter into human bodies, for their misdemeanors in their aerial being. But 't is time to lea\'e a subject so very fanciful and so little reasonable as this. I am apt to imagine the natural vapors, arising in the cave where the temple afterwards was built, might work upon the spirits of those who entered the holy place, — as they did on the shepherd Coretas, who first found it out by accident, — and incline them to enthusiasm and prophetic mad- ness ; that as the strength of those vapors dimin- ished (which were generally in caverns, as that of Mopsus, of Trophonius, and this of Delphos), so the inspiration decreased by the same meas- ures ; that they happened to be stronger when they killed the Pythias, who being conscious of PREFACE. Xli this, ΛΛ^α8 SO unwilling to enter ; that the oracles ceased to be given in \^erse when poets ceased to be the priests, and that the Genius of Socrates (whom he confessed never to have seen, but only to have heard inwardly, and unperceived by others), was no more than the strength of his imagination ; or to speak in the language of a Christian Platonist, his guardian angel." The concluding passage of the life may serve as a conclusion to this prefatory essay. It is as follows: ''And now, with the usual vanity of Dutch prefacers, I could load our author with the praises and commemorations of Avriters ; for both ancient and modern have made honorable mention of him. But to cumber pages with this kind of stuff were to raise a distrust in common readers that Plutarch wants them. Rualdus, in- deed, has collected ample testimonies of them ; but I will only recite the names of some, and refer you to him for the particular quotations. He reckons Gellius, Eusebius, Himerius the Soph- ister, Eunapius, Cyrillus of Alexandria, Theo- doret, Agathias, Photius and Xiphilin, patriarchs of Constantinople, Johannes Sarisbericnsis, the famous Petrarch, Petrus Victorius, and Justus Lipsius. " But Theodorus Gaza, a man learned in the Latin tongue and a great restorer of the Greek, who lived abo\^e two hundred years ago, deserves to have his suffrage set down in words at length ; xlii PREFACE. for the rest liave only commended Plutarcli more than any single author, but he has extolled him above all together. '' 'T is said that, having this extravagant ques- tion put to him by a friend : that if learning must suffer a general shipwreck, and he had only his choice left him of preserving one author, who should be the man he ivould preserve ? he an- swered, Plutarch ; and probably might give this reason : that in saving him, he should secure the best collection of them all. '* The epigram of Agathias deserves also to be remembered. This author flourished about the year five hundred, in the reign of the Emperor Justinian. The verses are extant in the Antho- logia, and with the translation of them 1 Λνϋΐ conclude the praises of our author ; having first admonished you, that they are supposed to be written on a statue erected by the Romans to his memory. ''Chaeronean Plutarch, to tliy deathless praise Does martial Rome this grateful statue raise, Because both Greece and she thy fame have shared, (Their heroes written and their lives compared). But thou thyself couldst never write thy own; Their lives have parallels, but thine has none." PLUTARCH'S LIVES. THESEUS. As geographers, Sosiiis,* crowd into the edges of their maps parts of the λυογΜ wliich they do not know about, adding notes in the margin to the effect, that beyond this lies nothing but sandy deserts full of wild beasts, unap- proachable bogs, Scythian ice, or a frozen sea, so, in this work of mine, in which I have compared the lives of the greatest men with one another, after passing through those periods wdiich probable reasoning can reach to and real history find a footing in, I might very w^ell say of those that are farther off, Beyond this there is nothing but prodigies and fictions, the only inhabitants are the poets and inventors of fiibles ; there is no credit, or certainty any farther. Yet, after publishing an account of Lycur- gus the lawgiver and Numa the kiug, I thought I might, not without reason, ascend as high as to Romulus, being brought by my history so near to his time. Considering therefore with myself Λνΐιοπι shall I set so great a man to face ? Or whom oppose ? who 's equal to the place ? (as iEschylus expresses it), I found none so fit as him that peopled the beautiful and fiii^-famed city of Athens, to be * Sosius Senecio, Plutarch's friend at Rome, whom he addresses. VOL. I. 1 2 THESEUS. set in opposition with the father of the invincible and renowned city of Rome. Let us hope that Fable may, in what shall follow, so submit to the purifying processes of Reason as to take the character of exact history. In any case, however, Λvhere it shall be found contumaciously slighting credibility, and refusing to be reduced to any thing like probable fact, we shall beg that we may meet with candid readers, and such as will receive with indul- gence the stories of antiquity. Theseus seemed to me to resemble Romulus in many particulars. Both of them, born out of wedlock and of uncertain parentage, had the repute of being sprung from the gods. Both warriors ; that by all the world 's allowed. Both of them united with strength of body an equal vigor of mind ; and of the two most famous cities of the world, the one built Rome, and the other made Athens be in- habited. Both stand charged with the rape of women ; neither of them could avoid domestic misfortunes nor jealousy at home ; but towards the close of their lives are both of them said to have incurred great odium with their countrymen, if, that is, Λve may take the stories least hke poetry as our guide to the truth. The lineage of Theseus, by his father's side, ascends as high as to Erechtheus and the first inhabitants of Attica. By his mother's side he w^as descended of Pelops. For Pelops was the most powerful of all the kings of Pelo- ponnesus, not so much by the greatness of his riches as the multitude of his children, having married many daughters to chief men, and put many sons in places of command in the towns round about him. One of whom, named Pittheus, grandfather to Theseus, was governor of the small city of the Troezenians, and had the repute of a man of the greatest knowledge and wisdom of his THESEUS. 3 time ; Avhicli tlien, it seems, consisted cliieflj in srrave maxims, such as the poet Hesiod got his great fame by, in his book of Works and Days. And, indeed, amono- these is one that they ascribe to Pittheus, — Unto a friend suffice A stipulated price ; * which, also, Aristotle mentions. And Euripides, by call- ing Hippolytus " scholar of the holy Pittheus," shows the opinion that the world had of him. -^geus, being desirous of children, and consulting the oracle of Delphi, received the celebrated answer which forbade him the company of any woman before his return to Athens. But the oracle being so obscure as not to satisfy him that he was clearly forbid this, he went to Troezen, and communicated to Pittheus the voice of the god, which was in this manner, — Loose not the wine-skin foot, thou chief of men, Until to Athens thou art come again. Pittheus, therefore, taking advantage from the obscurity of the oracle, prevailed upon him, it is uncertain whether by persuasion or deceit, to lie with his daughter ^thra. -^geus afterwards, knowing her whom he had lain with to be Pittheus's daughter, and suspecting her to be with child by him, left a sword and a pair of shoes, hiding them under a great stone that had a hollow in it exactly fitting them ; and went away making her only * In the "Works and Days this claim, in justice, more than the proverb, as it now stand?, certainly sum tliat had been first agreed means, "Stipulate your price before- upon. Before Hesiod, liowever, hand with your friend." " Even," and perhaps originally in Hesiod, adds the following line, "in a bar- it may have simply been an injnnc- gain witii your brother, laugh, and tion to pay a friend fairly and call in a witness." Aristotle under- fully the price that at first was stood it to say, tbat no one can appointed. 4 THESEUS. privy to it, and comTiiancling her, if she brought forth a son who, when he came to man's estate, should be able to lift up the stone and take away what he had left there, she should send him away to him with those things with all secrecy, and with injunctions to him as much as possi- ble to conceal his journey from every one; for he greatly feared the Pallantidoe, who were continually mutinying against him, and despised him for his want of children, they themselves being fifty brothers, all sons of Pallas.* When ^thra was delivered of a son, some say that he was immediately named Theseus, from the tokens which his father had j)ut-\• under the stone ; others that he received his name afterwards at Athens, when ^geus acknoivkd(/cd'\- him for his son. He was brought up under his grandfather Pittheus, and had a tutor and attendant set over him named Connidas, to whom the Athenians, even to this time, the day before the feast that is dedi- cated to Theseus, sacrifice a ram, giving this honor to his memory upori much juster grounds than to Silanio and Parrhasius, for making pictures and statues of Theseus. There being then a custom for the Grecian youth, upon their first coining to man's estate, to go to Delphi and offer first-fruits of their hair to the god, Theseus also went thither, and a place there to this day is yet named Thesea, as it is said, from him. He clipped only the fore part of his head, as Homer says the Abantes did. J And this sort of tonsure was from him named Theseis. The Abantes first used it, not in imitation of the Arabians, as some imagine, nor of the Mysians, but because they were a warlike people, and used to close fighting, and above all other nations accustomed to engage hand to hand; as Archilochus testifies in these verses: — * Brother to ^geus. take to oneself, to adopt or ac- t Thesis, putting ; Thesthai, to knowledge, as a son. J The Eubceans of the Iliad. THESEUS. 5 Slings shall not Avhirl, nor many arrows fly, When on the plain the battle joins ; but SAVords, Man against man, the deadly conflict try, As is the practice of Euboea's lords Skilled with the spear. Therefore that they might not give their enemies a liold by their hair, they cut it in this manner. They write also that this was the reason why Alexander gave command to his captains that all the beards of the Mace- donians should be shaved, as being the readiest hold for an enemy. ^thra for some time concealed the true parentage of Theseus, and a report was given out by Pittheus that he was begotten by Neptune ; for the Troezenians pay Nep- tune the highest veneration. He is their tutelar god, to him they offer all their first-fruits, and in his honor stamp their money with a trident. Theseus displaying not only great strength of body, but equal bravery, and a quickness alike and force of un- derstanding, his mother ^thra, conducting him to the stone, and informing; him who Λvas his true father, com- manded him to take from thence the tokens that ^geus had left, and to sail to Athens. He without any dithculty set himself to the stone and lifted it up ; but refused to take his journey by sea, though it was much the safer way, and though his mother and grandfather begged him to do so. For it was at that time very dangerous to go by land on the road to Athens, no part of it being free from robbers and murderers. That age produced a sort of men, in force of hand, and swiftness of foot, and strength of body, excelling the ordinary rate, and wholly incapable of fatigue ; making use, however, of these gifts of nature to no good or profitable purpose for mankind, but rejoi- cing and priding themselves in insolence, and taking the benefit of their superior strength in the exercise of inhu- 6 THESEUS. manity and cruelty, and in seizing, forcing, and commit- ting all manner of outrages upon every thing that fell into their hands; all respect for others, all justice, they thought, all equity and humanity, though naturally lauded by common people, either out of want of courage to commit injuries or fear to receive them, yet no way concerned those who were strong enough to win for themselves. Some of these, Hercules destroyed and cut off in his pas- sage through these countries, but some, escaping his notice while he was passing by, fled and hid themselves, or else were spared by him in contempt of their abject submis- sion ; and after that Hercules fell into misfortune, and, having slain Iphitus, retired to Lydia, and for a long time was there slave to Omphale, a punishment which he had imposed upon himself for the murder, then, indeed, Lydia enjoyed high peace and security, but in Greece and the countries about it the like villanies again re- vived and broke out, there being none to repress or chas- tise them. It was therefore a very hazardous journey to travel by land from Athens to Peloponnesus ; and Pit- theus, giving him an exact account of each of these rob- bers and villains, their strength, and the cruelty they used to all strangers, tried to persuade Theseus to go by sea. But he, it seems, had long since been secretly fired by the glory of Hercules, held him in the highest estima- tion, and was never more satisfied than in listening to any that gave an account of him ; especially those that had seen him, or had been present at any action or saying oi his. So that he was altogether in the same state of feel- ing as, in after ages, Themistocles was, when he said that he could not sleep for the trophy of Miltiades ; enter- taining such admiration for the virtue of Hercules, that in the night his dreams were all of that hero's actions, and in the day a continual emulation stirred him up to perform THESEUS. 7 the like. Besides, they were related, being born of cousina german. For ^thra was daughter of Pittheus, and Alcme- na of Lysidice ; and Lysidice and Pittheus were brother and sister, children of Hippodamia and Pelops. He thought it therefore a dishonorable thing, and not to be endured, that Hercules should go out everywhere, and purge both land and sea from wicked men, and he himself should fly from the like adventures that actually came in his way ; dis- gracing his reputed father by a mean flight by sea, and not showing his true one as good evidence of the great- ness of his birth by noble and worthy actions, as by the tokens that he brought with him, the shoes and the sword. With this mind and these thoughts, he set forward Λvith a design to do injury to nobody, but to repel and revenge himself of all those that should offer any. And first of all. in a set combat, he slew Periphetes, in the neighborhood of Epidaurus, who used a club for his arms, and from thence had the name of Corynetes, or the club-bearer; who seized upon him, and forbade him to go forward in his journey. Being pleased with the club, he took it, and made it his weapon, continuing to use it as Hercules did the lion's skin, on whose shoulders that served to prove how huge a beast he had killed ; and to the same end Theseus carried about him this club ; OΛ^er- come indeed by him, but now, in his hands, invincible. Passing on further towards the Isthmus of Pelopon- nesus, he slew Sinnis, often surnamed the Bender of Pines, after the same manner in which he himself had destroyed many others before. And this he did without having either practised or ever learnt the art of bending these trees, to show that natural strength is above all art. This Sinnis had a daughter of remarkable beauty and stature, called Perigune, who, when her father was killed, fled, and was sought after everywhere by Theseus ; and coming into a place overgrown with brushwood, shrubs, g THESEUS. and asparagus-thorn, there, in a childlike, innocent manner, prayed and begged them, as if they understood her, to give her shelter, with vows that if she escaped she would never cut them down nor burn them. But Theseus call- ing upon her, and giving her his promise that he would use her with respect, and offer her no injury, she came forth, and in due time bore him a son, named Melanip- pus ; but afterwards was married to Deioneus, the son of Eurytus, the CEchalian, Theseus himself giving her to him. loxus, the son of this Melanippus who was born to Theseus, accompanied Ornytus in the colony that he carried with him into Caria, whence it is a family usage amongst the people called loxids, both male and female, never to burn either shrubs or asparagus-thorn, but to respect and honor them. The Crommyonian sow, Λvhich they called Phoea, was a savage and formidable wild beast, by no means an enemy to be despised. Theseus killed her, going out of his way on purpose to meet and engage her, so that he might not seem to perform all his great exploits out of mere neces- sity ; being also of opinion that it was the part of a brave man to chastise villanous and wicked men when attacked by them, but to seek out and overcome the more noble wild beasts. Others relate that Phaia Avas a Avoman, a robber full of cruelty and lust, that lived in Crommyon, and had the name of Sow given her from the foulness of her life and manners, and afterwards was killed by The- seus. He slew also Sciron, upon the borders of Megara, casting him down from the rocks, being, as most report, a notorious robber of all passengers, and, as others add, ac- customed, out of insolence and wantonness, to stretch forth his feet to strangers, commanding them to wash them, and then while they did it, with a kick to send them down the rock into the sea. The writers of Megara, however, in contradiction to the received report, and, as Simonides THESEUS. Ο expresses it, " fighting with all antiquity," contend that Sciron was neither a robber nor doer of violence, but a punisher of all such, and the relative and friend of good and just men; for iEacus, they say, was ever esteemed a man of the greatest sanctity of all the Greeks-; and Cychreus, the Salaminian, was honored at Athens with divine worship ; and the virtues of Peleus and Telamon were not unknown to any one. Now Sciron was son-in- law to Cychreus, father-in-law to ^acus, and grandfather to Peleus and Telamon, who were both of them sons of Endeis, the daughter of Sciron and Chariclo ; it Λvas not probable, therefore, that the best of men should make these alliances with one who was worst, giving and recei- ving mutually what was of greatest value and most dear to them. Theseus, by their account, did not slay Sciron in his first journey to Athens, but afterwards, when he took Eleusis, a city of the Megarians, having circumvented Diodes, the governor. Such are the contradictions in this story. In Eleusis he killed Cercyon, the Arcadian, in a wrestling match. And going on a little farther, in Erineus, he slew Damastes, otherwise called Procrustes, forcing his body to the size of his own bed, as he himself was used to do with all strangers ; this he did in imitation of Hercules, who always returned upon his assailants the same sort of Λάolence that they offered to him ; sacrificed Busiris, killed AntiOus in wrestling, and Cycnus in single combat, and Termerus by breaking his skull in pieces (whence, they say, comes the proverb of "a Termerian mischief"), for it seems Termerus killed passengers that he met, by running with his head against them. And so also Theseus proceeded in the punishment of evil men, who underΛvent the same violence from him which they had inflicted upon others, justly suffering after the manner of their own injustice. 10 THESEUS. As he Avent forward on his journey, and was come as far as the river Cephisus, some of the race of the Phy- laUdae met him and saUited him, and, upon his desire to use the purifications, then in custom, they performed them with all the usual ceremonies, and, having offered propitiatory sacrifices to the gods, invited him and enter- tained him at their house, a kindness which, in all his journey hitherto, he had not met. On the eighth day of Cronius, now called Hecatom- ba8on, he arrived at Athens, where he found the public affairs full of all confusion, and divided into parties and factions, ^geus also, and his whole private family, labor- ing under the same distemper : for Medea, having fled from Corinth, and promised ^geus to make him, by her art, capable of having children, was living with him. She first was aware of Theseus, whom as yet ^geus did not know, and he being in years, full of jealousies and suspi- cions, and fearing every thing by reason of the faction that was then in the city, she easily persuaded him to kill him by poison at a banquet, to which he was to be invited as a stranger. He, coming to the entertainment, thought it not fit to discover himself at once, but, willing to give his father the occasion of first finding him out, the meat being on the table, he drew his sword as if he designed to cu L w^ith it ; ^Egeus, at once recognizing the token, threw down the cup of poison, and, questioning his son, embraced him, and, having gathered together all his citizens, owned him publicly before them, who, on their part, received him gladly for the fame of his greatness and bravery; and it is said, that when the cup fell, the poison was spilt there where now is the enclosed space in the Delphinium; for in that place stood ^geus's house, and the figure of Mercury on the east side of the temple is called the Mercury of ^i^geus's gate. THESEUS. 11 The sons of Pallas, who before Λvere quiet, upon expec- tation of recovering the kingdom after ^geus's death, who Λvas Avithout issue, as soon as Theseus appeared and was acknowledged the successor, highly resenting that -^geus first, an adopted son only of Pandion, and not at all related to the family of Erechtheus, should be holding the kingdom, and that after him, Theseus, a visitor and stranger, should be destined to succeed to it, broke out into open Λvar. And, dividing themselves into two companies, one part of them marched openly from Sphettus, with their father, against the city, the other, hiding themselves in the village of Gargettus, lay in ambush, with a design to set upon the enemy on both sides. They had Avith them a crier of the township of Agnus, named Leos, λυΙιο discovered to Theseus all the designs of the Pallantidoa He immediately fell upon those that lay in ambuscade, and cut them all off; upon tidings of which Pallas and his company fled and were dispersed. From hence they say is derived the custom among the people of the township of Pallene to have no marriages or any alliance with the people of Agnus, nor to suffer the criers to pronounce in their proclamations the words used in all other parts of the country, Acouete Leoi (Hear ye people), hating the very sound of Leo, because of the treason of Leos. Theseus, longing to be in action, and desirous also to make himself popular, left Athens to fight Λvith the bull of Marathon, which did no small mischief to the inhabi- tants of Tetrapolis. And having overcome it, he brought it alive in triumph through the city, and afterwards sacri- ficed it to the Delphinian Apollo. The story of Ilecale, also, of her receiving and entertaining Theseus in this expedition, seems to be not altogether void of truth; for the tOΛvnships round about, meeting upon a certain day, 12 THESEUS. used to offer a sacrifice, which they called Hecalesia, to Jupiter Hecaleius, and to pay honor to Hecale, whom, by a diminutive name, they called Hecalene, because she, while entertaining Theseus, who was quite a youth, ad- dressed him, as old people do, with similar endearing diminutives ; and having made a vow to Jupiter for hhn us he was going to the fight, that, if he returned in safety, she would offer sacrifices in thanks of it, and dying before he came back, she had these honors given her hy way of return for her hospitality, by the command of Theseus, as Philochorus tells us. Not long after arrived the third time from Crete the collectors of the tribute which the Athenians paid them upon the following occasion. Androgens having been treacherously murdered in the confines of Attica, not only Minos, his father, put the Athenians to extreme distress by a perpetual war, but the gods also laid waste their coun- try ; both famine and pestilence lay heavy upon them, and even their rivers were dried up. Being told by the oracle that, if they appeased and reconciled Minos, the anger of the gods would cease and they should enjoy rest from the miseries they labored under, they sent heralds, and with much supplication were at last reconciled, entering into an agreement to send to Crete every nine years a tribute of seven young men and as many virgins, as most writers agree in stating; and the most poetical story adds, that the Minotaur destroyed them, or that, wandering in the labyrinth, and finding no possible means of getting out, they miserably ended their lives there ; and that this Minotaur was (as Euripides hath it) A mingled form, where two strange shapes combined, And difterent natures, bull and man, were joined. But Philochorus says tliat the Cretans will by no means THESEUS. 13 allow the truth of this, but say that the labyrinth was only an ordinary prison, having no other bad quality but that it secured the prisoners from escaping, and that Minos, having instituted games in honor of Androgeus, gave, as a reward to the victors, these youths, who in the mean time were kept in the labyrinth ; and that the first that overcame in those games was one of the greatest power and command among them, named Taurus, a man of no merciful or gentle disposition, who treated the Athenians that were made his prize in a proud and cruel manner. Also Aristotle himself, in the account that he gives of the form of government of the Bottiseans, is man- ifestly of opinion that the youths were not slain by Minos, but spent the remainder of their days in slavery in Crete ; that the Cretans, in former times, to acquit themselves of an ancient vow Avhich they had made, were used to send an offering of the first-fruits of their men to Delphi, and that some descendants of these Athenian slaves were mingled wdth them and sent amongst them, and, unable to get their living there, removed from thence, first into Italy, and settled about Japygia ; from thence again, that they removed to Thrace, and were named Bottioeans • and that this is the reason Λvhy, in a certain sacrifice, the Bottisean girls sing a hymn beginning Lei tis go to Athem. This may show us how dangerous a thing it is to incur the hostility of a city that is mistress of eloquence and song. For Minos was always ill spoken of, and repre- sented ever as a very wicked man, in the Athenian thea- tres ; neither did Hesiod avail him by calling him " the most royal Minos," nor Homer, who styles him " Jiijyiter's familiar friend ; " the tragedians got the better, and from the vantage ground of the stage showered down obloquy upon him, as a man of cruelty and violence ; Avhereas, in fact, he appears to have been a king and a lawgiver, and 14 THESEUS. Rhaclamanthus a judge under him, administering the statutes that he ordained. Now when the time of the third tribute was come, and the i^ithers who had any young men for their sons were to proceed by lot to the choice of those that were to be sent, there arose fresh discontents and accusations against iEgeus among the people, who were full of grief and indignation that he, who Λvas the cause of all their mise- ries, was the only person exempt from the punishment ; adopting and settling his kingdom upon a bastard and foreign son, he took no thought, they said, of their de- stitution and loss, not of bastards, but lawful children. These things sensibly affected Theseus, who, thinking it but just not to disregard, but rather j)artake of, the suifer- inscs of his fellow citizens, offered himself for one without any lot. All else were struck with admiration for the nobleness and with love for the goodness of the act ; and ^geus, after pra^^ers and entreaties, finding him inflexible and not to be persuaded, proceeded to the choosing of the rest by lot. Hellanicus, however, tells us that the Athe- nians did not send the young men and virgins by lot, but that Minos himself used to come and make his own choice, and pitched upon Theseus before all others ; accord- ing to the conditions agreed upon between them, namely, that the Athenians should furnish them with a ship, and that the young men that were to sail with him should carry no weapon of war ; but that if the Minotaur was destroved, the tribute should cease. On the two former occasions of the payment of the tribute, entertaining no hopes of safety or return, they sent out the ship with a black sail, as to unavoidable destruction ; but now, Theseus encouraging his father and speaking greatly of himself, as confident that he should kill the Minotaur, he gave the pilot another sail. THESEUS. 15 wliicli was white, commanding him, as he returned, if Theseus were safe, to make use of that ; but if not, to sail with the black one, and to hang out that sign of his mis- fortune. Simonides says that the sail wdiich ^geus deliv- ered to the pilot was not white, but Scarlet, in the juicy bloom Of the living oak-tree steeped,* and that this was to be the sign of their escape. Phere- clus, son of Amarsyas, according to Simonides, Λvas pilot of the ship. But Philochorus says Theseus had sent him by Scirus, from Salamis, NausithoUs to be his steersman, and Phasax his look-out-man in the prow, the Athenians having as yet not appUed themselves to navigation ; and that Scirus did this because one of the young men, Me- nesthes, Avas his daughter's son ; and this the chapels of NausithoUs and Phieax, built by Theseus near the temple of Scirus, confirm. He adds, also, that the feast named Cybernesia f was in honor of them. The lot being cast, and Theseus having received out of the Prytaneiim those upon whom it fell, he went to the Delphinium, and made an offering for them to Apollo of his suppliant's badge, which was a bough of a consecrated olive tree, with white wool tied about it. Having thus performed his devotion, he went to sea, the sixth day of Munychion, on which day even to this time the Athenians send their virgins to the same temple to make supplication to the gods. It is farther reported that he was commanded by the oracle at Delphi to make Venus his guide, and to invoke her as the companion and conductress of his voyage, and that, as he was sacrificing a she goat to her by the seaside, it was suddenly changed into a he, and for this cause that goddess had the name of Epitragia. J * Prinus, the scarlet-oak. J Tragos, a he goat, t Pilots' feast. 16 THESEUS. Wlien he arrived at Crete, as most of the ancient his- torians as well as poets tell us, having a clue of thread given him by Ariadne, who had fallen in love with him, and being instructed by her how to use it so as to con duct him through the windings of the labyrinth, he escaped out of it and slew the Minotaur, and sailed back, taking along with him Ariadne and the young Athenian captives. Pherecydes adds that he bored holes in the bot- toms of the Cretan ships to hinder their pursuit. Demon writes that Taurus, the chief captain of Minos, was slain by Theseus at the mouth of the port, in a naval combat, as he was sailing out for Athens. But Philochorus gives us the story thus: That at the setting forth of the yearly games by king Minos, Taurus was expected to carry away the prize, as he had done before ; and was much grudged the honor. His character and manners made his power hateful, and he was accused moreover of too near famili- arity with Pasiphae, for which reason, when Theseus desired the combat, Minos readily complied. And as it was a custom in Crete that the women also should be admitted to the sight of these games, Ariadne, being pre- sent, was struck with admiration of the manly beauty of Theseus, and the vigor and address \vhich he showed in the combat, overcoming all that encountered with him. Minos, too, being extremely pleased with him, especially because he had overthrown and disgraced Taurus, volun- tarily gave up the young captives to Theseus, and remit- ted the tribute to the Athenians. Clidemus gives an account peculiar to himself, very ambitiously, and be- ginning a great way back : That it was a decree consented to by all Greece, that no vessel from any place, containing above five j)ersons, should be permitted to sail, Jason only excepted, who was made captain of the great ship Argo, to sail about and scour the sea of pirates. But Daedalus having escaped from Crete, and flying by sea to Athens, THESEUS. 17 Minos, contrary to this decree, pursued him with his ships of war, was forced by a storm upon Sicily, and there ended his Ufe. After his decease, Deucahon, his son, desiring a quarrel Λvith the Athenians, sent to them, demanding that they should deliver up Dcedalus to him, threatening, upon their refusal, to put to death all the young Athenians whom his father had received as hostages from the city. To this angry message Theseus returned a very gentle answer, excusing himself that he could not deliver up Daedalus, Λvho was nearly related to him, being his cousin-german, his mother being Merope, the daughter of Erechtheus. In the mean while he secretly prepared a navy, part of it at home near the village of the ThymoetadiB, a place of no resort, and far from any common roads, the other part by his grandfather Pit- theus's means at Troezen, that so his design might be carried on with the greatest secrecy. As soon as ever his fleet Λvas in readiness, he set sail, having with him Dae- dalus and other exiles from Crete for his guides; and none of the Cretans having any knowledge of his coming, but imagining, when they saw his fleet, that they were friends and vessels of their own, he soon made himself master of the port, and, immediately making a descent, reached Gnossus before any notice of his coming, and, in a battle before the gates of the labyrinth, put Deucalion and all his guards to the SΛvord. The government by this means falling to Ariadne, he made a league with her, and received the captives of her, and ratified a perpetual friendship between the Athenians and the Cretans, w^hom he engaged under an oath never again to commence any war with Athens. There are yet many other traditions about these things, and as many concerning Ariadne, all inconsistent with each otlier. Some relate that she hung herself, being deserted by Theseus. Others that she was carried away VOL. I. 2 IS THESEUS. by his sailors to the isle of Naxos, and married to (Enariis, priest of Bacchus ; and that Theseus left her because he fell in love with another, For jiEgle's love was burning in his breast ; a verse which Hereas, the Megarian, says, was formerly in the poet Hesiod's works, but put out by Pisistratus.. in like manner as he added in Homer's Raising of the Dead, to gratify the Athenians, the line Theseus, Pirithous, mighty sons of gods. Others say Ariadne had sons also by Theseus, (Eno- pion and Staphylus ; and among these is the poet Ion of Chios, who writes of his own native city "Which once Qinopion, son of Theseus, built. But the more famous of the legendary stories every- body (as I may say) has in his mouth. In Pseon, how- ever, the Amathusian, there is a story given, differing from the rest. For he writes that Theseus, being driven by a storm upon the isle of Cyprus, and having aboard with him Ariadne, big with child, and extremely discom- posed with the rolling of the sea, set her on shore, and left her there alone, to return himself and help the ship, when, on a sudden, a violent wind carried him again out to sea. That the women of the island received Ariadne very kindly, and did all they could to console and alle- viate her distress at being left behind. That they coun- terfeited kind letters, and delivered them to her, as sent from Theseus, and, when she fell in labor, ΛYere diligent in performing to her every needful service ; but that she died before she could be delivered, and was honorablj'' interred. That soon after Theseus returned, and was greatly afflicted for her loss, and at his departure left a sum of money among the people of the island, ordering THESEUS. 19 them to do sacrifice to Ariadne ; and caused two little images to be made and dedicated to her, one of silver and the other of brass. Moreover, that on the second day of Gorpiseus,* which is sacred to Ariadne, they have this ceremony among their sacrifices, to have a youth lie down and with his voice and gesture represent the pains of a woman in travail ; and that the Amathusians call the grove* in which they show her tomb, the grove of Venus Ariadne. Diifering yet from this account, some of the Naxians write that there were two Minoses and Uyo Ariadnes, one of whom, they say, was married to Bacchus, in the isle of Naxos, and bore the children Staphylus and his brother ; but that the other, of a later age, was carried off by The- seus, and, being afterwards deserted by him, retired to Naxos with her nurse Corcyna, w^hose grave they yet show. That this Ariadne also died there, and was Λvor- shipped by the island, but in a diiferent manner from the former ; for her day is celebrated with general joy and revelling, but all the sacrifices performed to the latter are attended with mourning and gloom. Now Theseus, in his return from Crete, put in at Delos, and, having sacrificed to the god of the island, dedicated to the temple the image of A'^enus wdiich Ariadne had given him, and danced with the young Athenians a dance that, in memory of him, they say is still preserved among the inhabitants of Delos, consisting in certain measured turnings and returnings, imitative of the Avindings and twistings of the labyrinth. And this dance, as Dictearchus writes, is called among the Delians, the Crane. This he danced round the Ceratonian Altar, f so called from its consisting of horns taken from the left side of the head. They say also that he instituted games in Delos, where • September. t Keras, a horn. 20 THESEUS. he was the first that began the custom of giving a pahii to the victors. When they were come near the coast of Attica, so great was the joy for the happy success of their voyage, that neither Theseus himself nor the pilot remembered to hang out the sail which should have been the token of their safety to ^geus, who, in despair at the sight, threw himself headlong from a rock, and perished in the sea. But The- seus, being arrived at the port of Phalerum, paid there the sacrifices which he had vowed to the gods at his setting out to sea, and sent a herald to the city to carry the news of his safe return. At his entrance, the herald found the people for the most part full of grief for the loss of their king, others, as may well be believed, as full of joy for the tidings that he brought, and eager to welcome him and croΛvn him with garlands for his good news, which he indeed accepted of, but hung them upon his herald's staff; and thus returning to the seaside before Theseus had finished his libation to the gods, he stayed apart for fear of disturbing the holy rites, but, as soon as the liba- tion Avas ended, went up and related the king's death, upon the hearing of which, with great lamentations and a confused tumult of grief, they ran with all haste to the city. And from hence, they say, it comes that at this day, in the feast of Oschophoria, the herald is not crowned, but his staff, and all who are present at the libation cry out eleleu, ion, ion, the first of which confused sounds is com- monly used by men in haste, or at a triumph, the other is proper to people in consternation or disorder of mind. Theseus, after the funeral of his father, paid his vows to Apollo the seventh day of Pyanepsion ; for on that day the youth that returned with him safe from Crete made their entry into the city. They say, also, that the custom of boiling pulse at this feast is derived from hence ; be- cause the young men that escaped put all that was lef' THESEUS. 21 of their provision together, and, boiling it in one common pot, feasted themselves with it, and ate it all up together. Hence, also, they carry in procession an olive branch bound about with wool (such as they then made use of in their supplications), which they call Eiresione, crowned with all sorts of fruits, to signify that scarcity and barren ness was ceased, singing in their procession this song : Eiresione bring figs, and Eiresione bring loaves ; Bring us honey in pints, and oil to rub on our bodies, And a strong flagon of wine, for all to go mellow to bed on. Although some hold opinion that this ceremony is re- tained in memory of the Heraclidce, Avho were thus enter- tained and brought up by the Athenians. But most are of the opinion Avhich Ave have given above. The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens re turned had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Atlienians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took aw^ay the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their place, insomuch that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question as to things that grow ; '=' one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contendino: that it was not the same. The feast called Oschophoria, or the feast of boughs, which to this day the Athenians celebrate, Avas then first instituted by Theseus. For he took not with him the full number of virgins which by lot Avere to be carried away, but selected two youths of his acquaintance, of fair and Avomanish faces, but of a manly and forward spirit, and having, by frequent baths, and avoiding the * Tlie Problem called Auxano- famous one called Pseudomenos. menos, the grower, like the more the liar. 22 THESEUS. heat and scorching of the sun, with a constant use of all the ointments and washes and dresses that serve to the adorning of the head or smoothing the skin or improving the complexion, in a manner changed them from what they were before, and having taught them farther to counterfeit the very voice and carriage and gait of virgins, so that there could not be the least difference perceived ; he, undiscovered by any, put them into the number of the Athenian maids designed for Crete. At his return, he and these two youths led up a solemn procession, in the same habit that is now worn by those who carry the vine-branches. These branches they carry in honor of Bacchus and Ariadne, for the sake of their story before related ; or rather because they happened to return in au- tumn, the time of gathering the grapes. The women whom they call Deipnopherae, or supper-carriers, are taken into these ceremonies, and assist at the sacrifice, in re- membrance and imitation of the mothers of the young men and virgins upon whom the lot fell, for thus they ran about bringing bread and meat to their children ; and because the women then told their sons and daughters many tales and stories, to comfort and encourage them under the danger they were going upon, it has still con- tinued a custom that at this feast old fables and tales should be told. For these particularities we are indebted to the history of Demon, There was then a place chosen out, and a temple erected in it to Theseus, and those fam- ilies out of whom the tribute of the youth was gathered were appointed to pay a tax to the temple for sacrifices to him. And the house of the Phytalidse had the over- seeing of these sacrifices, Theseus doing them that honor in recompense of their former hospitality. Now, after the death of his father ^geus, forming in his mind a great and wonderful design, he gathered to- THESEUS. 23 gether all the inliabitants of Attica into one town, and made them one people of one city, whereas before they lived dispersed, and Avere not easy to assemble upon any affair for the common interest. Nay, differences and even wars often occurred between them, Λγhich he by his per- suasions appeased, going from township to township, and from tribe to tribe. And those of a more private and mean condition readily embracing such good advice, to those of greater power he promised a commouAvealth without monarchy, a democracy, or people's government, in which he should only be continued as their commander in Avar and the protector of their laws, all things else being equally distributed among them ; — and by this means brought a part of them over to his proposal. The rest, fearing his power, which was already groAvn very for- midable, and knoAving his courage and resolution, chose rather to be persuaded than forced into a compliance. He then dissolved all the distinct state-houses, council halls, and magistracies, and built one common state-house * and council hall on the site of the present upper town, and gave the name of Athens to the w^hole state, ordain- ing a common feast and sacrifice, Avhich he called Pana- thenasa, or the sacrifice of all the united Athenians. He instituted also another sacrifice, called Metoecia, or Feast of Migration, which is yet celebrated on the sixteenth day of HecatombiBon. Then, as he had promised, he laid down his regal power and proceeded to order a common- wealth, entering upon this great w^ork not without advice from the o-ods. For havino^ sent to consult the oracle of Delphi concerning the fortune of his new government and city, he received this answ^er : Son of the Pitthean maid, To your town the terms and fates, • Prytaneiim 24 THESEUS. My father gives of many states. Be not anxious nor afraid ; The bladder will not fail to swim On the waves that compass him. Which oracle, they say, one of the sibyls long after did in a manner repeat to the Athenians, in this verse, The bladder may be dipt, but not be drowned. Farther yet designing to enlarge his city, he invited all strangers to come and enjoy equal privileges with the natives, and it is said that the common form, Come hUher all ye people, was the Avords that Theseus pro- claimed when he thus set up a commonwealth, in a man- ner, for all nations. Yet he did not suffer his state, by the promiscuous multitude that flowed in, to be turned into confusion and be left without any order or degree, but \vas the first that divided the Commonwealth into three distinct ranks, the noblemen, the husbandmen, and artificers.'^' To the nobility he committed the care of reli- gion, the choice of magistrates, the teaching and dispensing of the laws, and interpretation and direction in all sacred matters ; the whole city being, as it were, reduced to an exact equality, the nobles excelling the rest in honor, the husbandmen in profit, and the artificers in number. And that Theseus was the first, who, as Aristotle says, out of an inclination to popular government, parted with the regal power, Homer also seems to testify, in his cata- logue of the ships, where he gives the name of People to the Athenians only. He also coined money, and stamped it with the image of an ox, either in memory of the Marathonian bull, or of Taurus, whom he vanquished, or else to put his people in mind to follow husbandry ; and from this coin came * Eupatridae, Geomori, Demiurgi. THESEUS. 25 the expression so frequent among the Greeks, of a thing being worth ten or a hundred oxen. After this he joined Megara to Attica, and erected that famous pillar on the Isthmus, which bears an inscription of two lines, showing the bounds of the tΛVO countries that meet there. On the east side the inscription is, — Peloponnesus there, Ionia here, and on the west side, — Peloponnesus here, Ionia there. He also instituted the games, in emulation of Hercules, being ambitious that as the Greeks, by that hero's ap- pointment, celebrated the Olympian games to the honor of Jupiter, so, by his institution, they should celebrate the Isthmian to the honor of Neptune. For those that were there before observed, dedicated to Melicerta, were performed privately in the night, and had the form rather of a religious rite than of an open spectacle or public feast. There are some who say that the Isthmian games were first instituted in memory of Sciron, Theseus thus making expiation for his death, upon account of the nearness of kindred between them, Sciron being the son of Canethus and Heniocha, the daughter of Pittheus; though others write that Sinnis, not Sciron, was their son, and that to his honor, and not to the other's, these games Λvere ordained by Theseus. At the same time he made an agreement with the Corinthians, that they should allow those that came from Athens to the celebration of the Isthmian games as much space of honor before the rest to behold the spectacle in, as the sail of the ship that brought them thither, stretched to its full extent, could cover ; so Hellanicus and Andro of Halicarnassus have established. Concerning his voyage into the Euxine Sea, Philochorua 26 THESEUS. and some others write that he made it with Hercules, offering him his service in the war against the Amazons, and had Antiope given him for the reward of his valor ; but the greater number, of whom are Pherecydes, Hel- lanicus, and Herodorus, write that he made this Yoyage many years after Hercules, with a navy under his own command, and took the Amazon prisoner, — the more pro- bable story, for we do not read that any other, of all those that accompanied him in this action, took any Amazon prisoner. Bion adds, that, to take her, he had to use deceit and fly aAvay ; for the Amazons, he says, being naturally lovers of men, were so far from avoiding Theseus when he touched upon their coasts, that they sent him presents to his ship ; but he, having invited Antiope, who brought them, to come aboard, immediately set sail and carried her away. An author named Mene- crates, that wrote the History of Nicasa in Bithynia, adds, that Theseus, having Antiope aboard his vessel, cruised for some time about those coasts, and that there were in the same ship three young men of Athens, that accom- panied him in this voyage, all brothers, whose names were Euneos, Thoas, and Soloon. The last of these fell desperately in love with Antiope ; and, escaping the notice of the rest, revealed the secret only to one of his most intimate acquaintance, and employed him to disclose his passion to Antiope, she rejected his pretences with a very positive denial, yet treated the matter with much gentleness and discretion, and made no complaint to Theseus of any thing that had happened ; but Soloon, the thing being desperate, leaped into a river near the seaside and drowned himself. As soon as Theseus was acquainted with his death, and his imhappy love that was the cause of it, he was extremely distressed, and, in the height of his grief, an oracle which he had formerly received at Delphi came into his mind ; for he had been THESEUS. 27 commanded by the priestess of Apollo Pythius, that, wher- ever in a strange land he was most sorrowful and under the greatest affliction, he should build a city there, and leave some of his followers to be governors of the place. For this cause he there founded a city, which he called, from the name of Apollo, Pythopolis, and, in honor of the unfortunate youth, he named the river that runs by it Soloon, and left the two surviving brothers intrusted with the care of the government and laws, joining with them Hermus, one of the nobility of Athens, from Avhom a place in the city is called the House of Hermus; though by an error in the accent* it has been taken for the House of Hermes, or Mercury, and the honor that was designed to the hero, transferred to the god. This was the origin and cause of the Amazonian inva- sion of Attica, which would seem to have been no slight or womanish enterprise. For it is impossible that they should have placed their camj^ in the very city, and joined battle close by the Pnyx and the hill called Museum, unless, having first conquered the country round about, they had thus with impunity advanced to the city. That they made so long a journey by land, and passed the Cimmerian Bosphorus when frozen, as Hellanicus writes, is difficult to be believed. That they encamped all but in the city is certain, and may be sufficiently confirmed by the names that the places thereabout yet retain, and the graves and monuments of those that fell in the battle. Both armies being in sight, there Λvas a long pause and doubt on each side which should give the first onset ; at last Theseus, having sacrificed to Fear, in obedience to the command of an oracle he had received, gaA^e them battle ; and this happened in the month of Boedromion, in which to this very day the Athenians celebrate the Feast Boedromia. Clidemus, desirous to be very circum- • Hermou, genitive case of Hermes, instead of Hermou, that of Ilerinua 28 THESEUS. stantial, writes that the left wing of the Amazons moved towards the place which is yet called Amazonium and the right towards the Pnyx, near Chrysa * that with this wing the Athenians, issuing from behind the Museum, engaged, and that the graves of those that were slain are to be seen in the street that leads to the gate called the Piraic, by the chapel of the hero Chalcodon ; and that here the Athenians were routed, and gave way be- fore the women, as far as to the temple of the Furies, but, fresh supplies coming in from the Palladium, Ardet- tus, and the Lyceum, they charged their right wing, and beat them back into their tents, in which action a great number of the Amazons were slain. At length, after four months, a peace was concluded between them by the mediation of Hippolyta (for so this historian calls the Amazon whom Theseus married, and not Antiope), though others write that she was slain with a dart by Molpadia, while lighting by Theseus's side, and that the pillar which stands by the temple of Olympian Earth was erected to her honor. Nor is it to be wondered at, that in events of such antiquity, history should be in disorder. For indeed we are also told that those of the Amazons that were wounded were privately sent away by Antiope to Chalcis, where many by her care recovered, but some that died were buried there in the place that is to this time called Amazonium. That this war, however, was ended by a treaty is evident, both from the name of the place ad- joining to the temple of Theseus, called, from the solemn oath there taken, Horcomosium ; •}- and also from the ancient sacrifice which used to be celebrated to the Ama- zons the day before the Feast of Theseus. The Mega- rians also show a spot in their city where some Amazons were buried, on the way from the market to a place called * Or near the golden figui-e of t Horcos, oath; om&ai, to swear Victory. THESEUS. 29 Rhus, where the biulcling in the shape of a lozenge stands. It is said, likewise, that others of them were slain near Chieronea, and buried near the little rivulet, formerly called Thermodon, but now Haemon, of which an account is given in the life of Demosthenes. It appears further that the passage of the Amazons through .Thessaly was not Avithout opposition, for there are yet shown many tombs of them near Scotussa and Cynoscephalie. This is as much as is worth telling concerning the Amazons. For the account Λvhich the author of the poem called the Theseid gives of this rising of the Amazons, how Antiope, to revenge herself upon Theseus for refusing her and marrying Phaedra, came down upon the city with her train of Amazons, whom Hercules slew, is mani- festly nothing else but fable and invention. It is true, indeed, that Theseus married Phaedra, but that was after the death of Antiope, by whom he had a son called Hip- polytus, or, as Pindar writes, Demophon. The calamities which befell Phaedra and this son, since none of the histo- rians have contradicted the tragic poets that have written of them, w^e must suppose happened as represented uni- formly by them. There are also other traditions of the marriaijes of Theseus, neither honorable in their occasions nor fortu- nate in their events, Λvhich yet were never represented in the Greek plays. For he is said to have carried off Anaxo, a Trcezenian, and, having slain Sinnis and Cercyon, to have ravished their daughters; to have married Periboea, the mother of Ajax, and then Phereboea, and then lope, the daughter of Iphicles. And further, he is accused of desert- ing Ariadne (as is before related), being in love with JEgle the daughter of Panopeus, neither justly nor honorably; and lastly, of the rape of Helen, which filled all Attica with war and blood, and was in the end the occasion of his banishment and death, as will presently be related 30 THESEUS. Herodorus is of opinion, that though there were many famous expeditions undertaken by the bravest men of his time, yet Theseus never joined in any of them, once only excepted, with the Lapithae, in their war against the Centaurs ; but others say thiit he accompanied Jason to Colchis and -Meleager to the slaying of the Calydonian hoar, and that hence it came to be a proverb, Not ivith- oiit Theseus ; that he himself, however, without aid of any one, performed many glorious exploits, and that from him began the saying. He is a second Hercules. He also joined Adrastus in recovering the bodies of those that were slain before Thebes, but not as Euripides in his tragedy says, by force of arms, but by persuasion and mutual agreement and composition, for so the greater part of the historians write ; Philochorus adds further that this was the first treaty that ever was made for the recovering the bodies of the dead, but in the history of Hercules it is sho\vn that it was he who first g?i\e leave to his enemies to carry off their slain. The burying- places of the most part are yet to be seen in the village called Eleutherse ; those of the commanders, at Eleusis, where Theseus allotted them a place, to oblige Adrastus. The story of Euripides in his Suppliants is disproved by iEschylus in his Eleusinians, where Theseus himself re- lates the facts as here told. The celebrated friendship between Theseus and Piri- thoUs is said to have been thus begun : the fame of the strength and valor of Theseus being spread through Greece, Pirithoiis was desirous to make a trial and proof of it himself, and to this end seized a herd of oxen which belonged to Theseus, and was driving them away from Marathon, and, Avhen news was brought that Theseus pursued him in arms, he did not fly, but turned back and went to meet him. But as soon as they had viewed one another, each so admired the gracefulness and beauty. THESEUS. 31 and was seized with such a respect for the courage, of the other, that they forgot all thoughts of fighting; and Pirithoiis, first stretching out his hand to Theseus, bade him be judge in this case himself, and promised to sub- mit willingly to any penalty he should impose. But Theseus not only forgave him all, but entreated him to be his friend and brother in arms ; and they ratified their friendship by oaths. After this Pirithoiis married Deida- mia, and invited Theseus to the wedding, entreating him to come and see his country, and make acquaintance with the Lapithse ; he had at the same time invited the Cen- taurs to the feast, Avho growing hot with Λνΐηβ and be- ginning to be insolent and wild, and offering violence to the women, the LapithoB took immediate reΛ^enge upon them, slaying many of them upon the place, and after- wards, having overcome them in battle, drove the whole race of them out of their country, Theseus all along taking their part and fighting on their side. But Hero- dorus gives a different relation of these things : that Theseus came not to the assistance of the Lapithie till the war was already begun ; and that it was in this jour- ney that he had the first sight of Hercules, having made it his business to find him out at Trachis, where he had chosen to rest himself after all his wanderings and his la- bors ; and that this interview Λvas honorably performed on each part, with extreme respect, good-will, and admiration of each other. Yet it is more credible, as others write, that there were, before, frequent interviews between them, and that it Λvas by the means of Theseus that Hercules was initiated at Eleusis, and purified before initiation, upon account of several rash actions of his former life. Theseus was now fifty years old, as Hellanicus states, when he carried off" Helen, who Avas yet too young to be married. Some writers, to take away this accusation of one of the greatest crimes laid to his charge, say, that he 32 THESEUS. did not steal away Helen himself, but that Idas and Lyn- ceus were the ravishers, who brought her to him, and committed her to his charge, and that, therefore, he re- fused to restore her at the demand of Castor and Pollux ; or, indeed, they say her own father, Tyndarus, had sent her to be kept by him, for fear of Enarophorus, the son of Hippocoon, who would have carried her away by force when she was yet a child. But the most probable account, and that which has most witnesses on its side, is this : Theseus and Pirithoiis went both together to Sparta, and, having seized the young lady as she was dancing in the temple of Diana Orthia, fled away with her. There were presently men in arms sent to pursue, but they followed no further than to Tegea ; and Theseus and Pirithoiis, being now out of danger, having passed through Pelopon- nesus, made an agreement between themselves, that he to whom the lot should fall should have Helen to his wife, but should be obliged to assist in procuring another for his friend. The lot fell upon Theseus, who conveyed her to Aphidnae, not being yet marriageable, and deli- vered her to one of his allies, called Aphidnus, and, having sent his mother ^thra after to take care of her, desired him to keep them so secretly, that none might know where they were ; which done, to return the same service to his friend Pirithoiis, he accompanied him in his jour- ney to Epirus, in order to steal away the king of the Molossians' daughter. The king, his own name being Aidoneus, or Pluto, called his wife Proserpina, and his daughter Cora, and a great dog which he kept Cerberus, with whom he ordered all that came as suitors to his daughter to fight, and promised her to him that should overcome the beast. But having been informed that the design of Pirithoiis and his companion was not to court his daughter, but to force her away, he caused them both THESEUS. 33 to be seized, and threw Piritlious to be torn in pieces by his dog, and put Theseus into prison, and kept him. About this time, Menestheus, the son of Peteus, grand- son of Orneus, and great-grandson to Erechtheus, the ilrst man that is recorded to have affected popularity and ingratiated himself Avith the multitude, stirred up and exasperated the most eminent men of the city, λ\^ιο had long borne a secret grudge to Theseus, conceiving that he had robbed them of their several little kingdoms and lord- ships, and, having pent them all up in one city, Avas using them as his subjects and slaves. He put also the meaner people into commotion, telling them, that, deluded with a mere dream of liberty, though indeed the}' were deprived both of that and of their proper homes and religious usages, instead of many good and gracious kings of their own, they had given themselves up to be lorded over by a new-comer and a stranger. Whilst he Avas thus busied in infecting the minds of the citizens, the war that Castor and Pollux brought against Athens came very oppor- tunely to further the sedition he had been promoting, and some say that he by his persuasions was Avholly the cause of their invading the city. At their first approach, they committed no acts of hostility, but peaceably demanded their sister Helen ; but the Athenians returning answer that they neither had her there nor knew where she was disposed of, they prepared to assault the city, when Aca- demus, having, by Avhatever means, found it out, disclosed to them that she was secretly kept at Aphidnai. For which reason he was both liighly honored during his life by Castor and Pollux, and the Laceda3monians, when of- ten in aftertimes they made incursions into Attica, and de- stroyed all the country round about, spared the Academy for the sake of Academus. But Diciearchus writes that there were two Arcadians in the army of Castor and Poi- kix, the one called Echedemus, and the other Marathus; VOL. ΐ. 3 34 THESEUS. from the first that which is now called Academia was then named Echedemia, and the village Marathon had its name from the other, who, to fulfil some oracle, volun- tarily offered himself to be made a sacrifice before battle. As soon as they were arrived at Aphidnce, they overcame their enemies in a set battle, and then assaulted and took the town. And here, they say, Alycus, the son of Sciron, was slain, of the party of the Dioscuri (Castor and Pol- lux), from Avhom a place in Megara, where he was buried, is called Alycus to this day. And Hereas writes that it was Theseus himself that killed him, in witness of which he cites these verses concerning Alycus, And Alycus, upon Aphidna's plain By Theseus in the cause of Helen slain. Though it is not at all probable that Theseus himself was there when both the city and his mother were taken. Aphidnge being won by Castor and Pollux, and the city of Athens being in consternation, Menestheus persuaded the people to open their gates, and receive them with all manner of friendship, for they were, he told them, at enmity with none but Theseus, who had first injured them, and were benefactors and saviors to all mankind beside. And their behavior gave credit to those promises; for, having made themselves absolute masters of the place, they demanded no more than to be initiated, since they were as nearly related to the city as Hercules was, who had received the same honor. This their desire they easily obtained, and were adopted by Aphidnus, as Her- cules had been by Pylius. They were honored also like gods, and were called by a new name, Anaces, either from the cessation * of the war, or from the care they took that none should suffer any injury, though there was so great an army within the walls ; for the phrase anakds ekhein is * AnSkhe THESEUS. 35 asecl of those who look to or care for any thing; kino-g for this reason, perliaps, are called anades. Others say, that from the appearance of their star in the heavens, they were thus called, for in the Attic dialect this name comes Λ'■ery near the words that signify above.^• Some say that ^thra, Theseus's mother, was here taken prisoner, and carried to Lacedsemon, and from thence went away with Helen to Troy, alleging this verse of Homer, to prove that she waited upon Helen, ^thra of Pittheus born, and large-eyed Clymene. Others reject this verse as none of Homer's, as they do likeΛvise the whole fable of Munychus, who. the story says, was the son of Demophon and Laodice, born secretlv, and brought up by -^thra at Troy. But Ister, in the thirteenth book of his Attic History, gives us an account of ^thra, different yet from all the rest : that Achilles and Patroclus overcame Paris in Thessaly, near the river Sperchius, but that Hector took and plundered the city of the Troezenians, and made ^thra prisoner there. But this seems a groundless tale. Now Hercules, passing by the Molossians, was enter- tained in his way by Aidoneus the king, who, in conver- sation, accidentally spoke of the journey of Theseus and Pirithoiis into his country, of what the}^ had designed to do, and what they were forced to suffer. Hercules Λvas much grieved for the inglorious death of the one and the miserable condition of the other. As for Pirithoiis, he thought it useless to complain ; but begged to have The- seus released for his sake, and obtained that favor from the king. Theseus, being thus set at liberty, returned to Athens, where his friends were not yet wholly suppressed, and dedicated to Hercules all the sacred places which the city had set apart for himself, changing their names from * Anekas, anecathen. 36 TIIKSEUS. Tliesea to Heraclea, four only excepted, as Philochonis writes. And wishing imtnediately to resume the first phice in the commonwealth, and manage the state as be- fore, he soon found himself involved in factions and troubles; those who long had hated him had now added to their hatred contempt ; and the minds of the people were so generally corrupted, that, instead of obeying commands with silence, they expected to be flattered into their dut}'. He had some thoughts to have reduced them by force, but was overpowered by demagogues and ilic- tions. And at last, despairing of any good success of his affairs in Athens, he sent away his children privately to Euboea, commending them to the care of Elephenor, the son of Chalcodon ; and he himself, having solemnly cursed the people of Athens in the village of Gargettus, in which there yet remains the place called Araterion, or the place of cursing;, sailed to Scvros, where he had lands left him by his father, and friendship, as he thought, with those of the island. Lycomedes was then king of Scyros. The- seus, therefore, addressed himself to him, and desired to haΛ^e his lands put into his possession, as designing to settle and to dwell there, though others say that he came to beg his assistance against the Athenians. But Lyco- medes, either jealous of the glory of so great a man, or to gratify Menestheus, having led him up to the highest cliff of the island, on pi-etence of showing him from thence the lands that he desired, threw liim headlong down from the lock, and killed him. Others say he fell down of himself by a slip of his foot, as he was walking there, according to his custom, after supper. At that time there was no notice taken, nor were any concerned for his death, but Menestheus quietly possessed the kingdom of Athens. His sons were brought up in a private condition, and accompanied Elephenor to the Trojan war, but, after the decease of Menestheus in that expedition, returned to THESEUS. 37 Athens, and recovered the government. But in succeed- ing ages, beside several other circumstances that moved the Athenians to honor Theseus as a demigod, in the battle which was fought at Marathon against the Medes, many of the soldiers believed they saw an apparition of Theseus in arms, rushing on at the head of them against tlie barbarians. And after the Median war, Phajdo being arclion of Athens, the Athenians, consulting the oracle at Delphi, Avere commanded to gather together the bones of Theseus, and, laying them in some honorable place, keep them as sacred in the city. But it was very difficult to recover these relics, or so much as to find out the place where they lay, on account of the inhospitable and savage temper of the barbarous people that inhabited the island. Nevertheless, afterwards, when Cimon took the island (as is related in his life), and had a great ambition to find out the place where Theseus was buried, he, by chance, spied an eagle upon a rising ground pecking with her beak and tearing up the earth wntli her talons, when on the sudden it came into his mind, as it were by some divine inspiration, to dig there, and search for the bones of The- seus. There were found in that place a coffin of a man of more than ordinary size, and a brazen spear-head, and a sword lying by it, all which he took aboard his galley and brought with him to Athens. Upon which the Athe- nians, greatly delighted, w^ent out to meet and receive the relics with splendid processions and with sacrifices, as if it were Theseus himself returning alive to the city. He lies interred in the middle of the city, near the present gymnasium. His tomb is a sanctuary and refuge for slaves, and all those of mean condition that fly from the perse- cution of men in power, in memory that Theseus Avhile he lived Avas an assister and protector of the distressed, and never refused the petitions of the afflicted that fled to him. The chief and most solemn sacrifice whicli they 38 THESEUS. celebrate to him is kept on the eighth day of Pjanepsion, on which he returned with the Athenian young men from Crete. Besides which, they sacrifice to him on the eighth day of every month, either because he returned from Troezen the eighth day of Hecatombaeon, as Diodorus the geographer writes, or else thinking that number to be proper to him, because he was reputed to be born of Nep- tune, because they sacrifice to Neptune on the eighth day of every month. The number eight being the first cube of an even number, and the double of the first square, seemed to be an emblem of the steadfast and im- movable power of this god, who from thence has the names of Asphalius and Gseiochus, that is, the establisher and stayer of the earth- ROMULUS. From whom, and for what reason, the city of Rome, a name so great in glory, and famous in the months of all men, was so first called, authors do not agree. Some are of opinion that the Pelasgians, wandering over the greater part of the habitable world, and subduing nu- merous nations, fixed themselves here, and, from their own great sirengih * in war, called the city Rome. Others, that at the taking of Troy, some few that escaped and met with shipping, put to sea, and, driven by winds, were carried upon the coasts of Tuscany, and came to anchor off the mouth of the river Tiber, where their women, out of heart and weary with the sea, on its being proposed by one of the highest birth and best under- standinii amonu'st them, whose name was Roma, burnt the ships. With which act the men at first were angry, but afterwards, of necessity, seating themselves near Palatium, where things in a short while succeeded far better than they could hope, in that they found the country very good, and the people courteous, they not only did the lady Roma other honors, but added also this, of calling after her name the city which she had been the occasion of their founding. From this, they say, has come down that custom at Rome for women to * Rome, strength. (39) 40 ROMULTIS. salute their kinsmen and husbands with kisses ; because these women, after thej had burnt the shijDs, made use of such endearments when entreating and pacifying their husbands. Some again say that Roma, from whom this city was so called, was daughter of Italus and Leucaria; or, by another account, of Telephus, Hercules's son, and that she was married to ^neas, or, according to others again, to Ascanius, ^neas's son. Some tell us that Romanus, the son of Ulysses and Circe, built it ; some, Romus, the son of Emathion, Diomede having sent him from Troy ; and others, Romus, king of the Latins, after driving out the Tyrrhenians, who had come from Thessaly into Lydia, and from thence into Italy. Those very authors, too, who, in accordance with the safest account, make Ro- mulus give the name to the city, yet differ concerning his birth and family. For some say, he was son to ^neas and Dexithea, daughter of Phorbas, and was, with his brother Remus, in their infancy, carried into Italy, and being on the river when the waters came down in a flood, all the vessels were cast away except only that where the young children were, which being gently landed on a level bank of the river, they were both unexpectedly saved, and from them the place was called Rome. Some say, Roma, daughter of the Trojan lady above mentioned, was married to Latinus, Telemachus's son, and became mo- ther to Romulus ; others, that Emilia, daughter of ^neas and Lavinia, had him by the god Mars ; and others give you mere fables of his origin. For to Tarchetius, they say, king of Alba, who was a most wicked and cruel man, tliere appeared in his own house a strange vision, a male figure that rose out of a hearth, and stayed there for many days. There was an oracle of Tethys in Tuscany which Tarchetius consulted, and received an answer that a virgin should give herself to the apparition, and that a liOMULUS. 41 son should be born of her, higlily renowned, eminent for valor, good fortune, and strength of body. Tarchetius told the prophecy to one of his own daughters, and com- manded her to do this thing; which she avoiding as an indignity, sent her handmaid. Tarchetius, hearing this, in great anger imprisoned them both, purposing to put them to death ; but being deterred from murder b}^ the goddess Vesta in a dream, enjoined them for their pun- ishment the working a web of cloth, in their chains as they w^ere, which wdien they finished, they should be suffered to marry ; but whatever they w^orked by day, Tarchetius commanded others to unravel in the nisiht. In the mean time, the waiting-woman was delivered of two boys, Avhom Tarchetius gave into the hands of one Tera- tius, with command to destroy them ; he, hoΛvever, carried and laid them by the river side, where a Avolf came and continued to suckle them, while birds of various sorts brought little morsels of food, which they put into their mouths ; till a cow-herd, spying them, was first strangely surprised, but, venturing to draw nearer, took the children up in his arms. Thus they Λvere saved, and, when they grew up, set upon Tarchetius and overcame him. This one Promathion says, who compiled a history of Italy. But the story which is most believed and has the greatest number of vouchers was first published, in its chief particulars, amongst the Greeks by Diodes of Peparethus, whom Fabius Pictor also follows in most points. Here again there are variations, but in gene- ral outline it runs thus : the kino-s of Alba reioned in ο ο lineal descent from .^neas, and the succession devolved at length upon two brothers, Numitor and Amulius. Amulius proposed to divide things into two equal shares, and set as equivalent to the kingdom the treasure and gold that were brought from Troy. Numitor chose the kingdom ; but Amulius, having the money, and being 42 ROMULUS. able to do more with that than Numitor, took his king- dom from him with great ease, and, fearing lest his daugh- ter might have children, made her a Vestal, bound in that condition forever to live a single and maiden life. This lady some call Ilia, others Rhea, and others Silvia ; however, not long after, she was, contrary to the esta- blished laws of the Vestals, discovered to be with child, and should have suffered the most cruel punishment, had not Antho, the king's daughter, mediated with her father for her ; nevertheless, she was confined, and debarred all company, that she might not be delivered without the king's knowledge. In time she brought forth two boys, of more than human size and beauty, whom Amulius, becoming yet more alarmed, commanded a servant to take and cast away ; this man some call Faustulus, others say Faustulus was the man who brought them up. He put the children, however, in a small trough, and went towards the river with a design to cast them in ; but, seeing the waters much swollen and coming violently down, was afraid to go nearer, and, dropping the children near the bank, went away. The river overflowing, the flood at last bore up the trough, and, gentl^^ wafting it, landed them on a smooth piece of ground, which they now call Cermanus,'='• formerly Germanus, perhaps from Germani, which signifies brothers. Near this place grew a wild fig-tree, which they called Ruminalis, either from Romulus (as it is vulgarly thought), or from ruminating, because cattle did usually in the heat of the day seek cover under it, and there chew the cud ; or, better, from the suckling of these children there, for the ancients called the dug or teat of any creature nima ; and there is a tutelar goddess of the rearing of children whom they still call Rumilia, in sacrificing to whom they use no wine, but make libations of milk. * More cori'ectly Cermalus. ROMULUS. 43 While the infants lay here, history tells us, a she-wolf nursed them, and a woodpecker constantly fed and watched them ; these creatures are esteemed holy to the god Mars, the woodpecker the Latins still especially wor- ship and honor. Which things, as much as any, gave credit to what the mother of the children said, that their father was the god Mars : though some say that it was a mistake put upon her by Amulius, who himself had come to her dressed up in armor. Others think that the first rise of this fable came from the children's nurse, through the ambiguity of her name ; for the Latins not only called \volves lupce, but also women of loose life ; and such an one was the wife of Faustulus, who nurtured these children, Acca Larentia by name. To her the Romans offer sacrifices, and in the mouth of April the priest of Mars makes libations there; it is called the Larentian Feast. They honor also another Larentia, for the following reason : the keeper of Her- cules's temple having, it seems, little else to do, pro- posed to his deity a game at dice, laying down that, if he himself won, he would have something valuable of the god ; but if he were beaten, he ΛνοηΚΙ spread him a noble table, and procure him a fair lady's com- pany. Upon these terms, throwing first for the god and then for himself, he found himself beaten. Wish- mg to pay his stakes honorably, and holding himself bound by what he had said, he both provided the deity a good supper, and, giving money to Larentia, then in her beauty, though not publicly known, gave her a feast in the temple, where he had also laid a bed, and after supper locked her in, as if the god were really to come to her. And indeed, it is said, the deity did truly visit her, and commanded her in the morning to walk to the maiket-place, and, whatever man she met first, to sa- lute him, and make him her friend. She met one named 44 ROMULUS. Tarrutius, who was a man advanced in years, fairly rich, without children, and had always lived a single life. He received Larentia, and loved her well, and at his death left her sole heir of all his large and fair possessions, most of which she, in her last will and testament, bequeathed to the people. It was reported of her, being now cele- brated and esteemed the mistress of a god, that she sud- denly disappeared near the place where the first Larentia lay buried ; the spot is at this day called Velabrum, because, the river frequently overflowing, they went over in ferry-boats somewhere hereabouts to the forum, the Latin word for ferrying being vdatura. Others derive the name from velum, a sail ; because the exhibitors of public shows used to hang the road that leads from the forum to the Circus Maximus with sails, beginning at this spot. Upon these accounts the second Larentia is honored at Rome. Meantime Faustulus, Amulius's swineherd, brought up the children without any man's knowledge ; or, as those say Λvho wish to keep closer to probabilities, with the knowledge and secret assistance of Numitor ; for it is said, they went to school at Gabii, and were well in- structed in letters, and other accomplishments befitting their birth. And they were called Romulus and Remus, (from ruma, the dug,) as we had before, because they were found sucking the wolf In their very infancy, the size and beauty of their bodies intimated their natural supe- riority ; and when they grew up, they both proved brave and manly, attempting all enterprises that seemed hazard- ous, and showing in them a courage altogether undaunted. But Romulus seemed rather to act by counsel, and to show the sagacity of a statesman, and in all his dealings with their neiohbors, whether relatinii to feedino; of flocks or to hunting, gave the idea of being born rather to rule than to obey. To their comrades and inferiors they were ROMULUS. 45 therefore dear ; but the king's servants, his bailiffs and overseers, as being in nothing better men than them- selves, they despised and slighted, nor were the least concerned at their commands and menaces. They used honest pastimes and liberal studies, not esteeming sloth and idleness honest and liberal, but rather such exercises as hunting and running, repelling robbers, taking of thieves, and delivering the wronged and oppressed from injury. For doing such things they became famous. A quarrel occurring betwixt Numitor's and Amulius's cowherds, the latter, not enduring the driving away of their cattle by the others, fell upon them and put them to flight, and rescued the greatest part of the prey. At \vhich Numitor being highly incensed, they little regard- ed it, but collected and took into their company a num- ber of needy men and runaway slaves, — acts which looked like the first stages of rebellion. It so happened, that when Romulus was attending a sacrifice, being fond of sacred rites and divination, Numitor's herdsmen, meet- ing with Remus on a journey wdth few companions, fell upon him, and, after some fighting, took him prisoner, carried him before Numitor, and there accused him. Numitor would not punish him himself, fearing his brother's anger, but went to Amulius, and desired justice, as he was Amulius's brother and was affronted by Amu- lius's servants. The men of Alba likewise rcsentino: the thing, and thinking he had been dishonorably used, Amu- lius was induced to deliver Remus up into Numitor's hands, to use him as he thought fit. He tlierefore took and carried him home, and, being struck with admiration of the youth's person, in stature and strength of body exceeding all men, and perceiving in his very counte- nance the courage and force of his mind, which stood unsubdued and unmoved by his present circumstances, and hearing further that all the enterprises and actions oi 45 ROMULUS. his life were answerable to what he saw of him, but chiefly, as it seemed, a divine influence aiding and direct- ing the first steps that were to lead to great results, out of the mere thought of his mind, and casually, as it were, he put his hand upon the fact, and, in gentle terms and with a kind aspect, to inspire him with confidence and hope, asked him who he was, and whence he was derived. He, taking heart, spoke thus : "I will hide noth- ing from you, for you seem to be of a more princely temper than Amulius, in that you give a hearing and examine before you punish, while he condemns before the cause is heard. Formerly, then, we (for we are twins) thoug;ht ourselves the sons of Faustulus and Larentia, the king-'s servants ; but since Λve have been accused and aspersed with calumnies, and brought in peril of our lives here before you, we hear great things of ourselves, the truth of which my present danger is likely to bring to the test. Our birth is said to have been secret, our fos- tering and nurture in our infancy still more strange ; by birds and beasts, to whom we were cast out, Λve were fed, by the milk of a wolf, and the morsels of a Avoodpecker, as we lay in a little trough by the side of the river. The trough is still in being, and is preserved, with brass plates round it, and an inscription in letters almost effaced, which may prove hereafter unavailing tokens to our pa- rents when we are dead and gone." Numitor, upon these words, and computing the dates by the young man's looks, slighted not the hope that flattered him, but considered how to come at his daughter privately (for she was still kept under restraint), to talk with her concerning these matters. Faustulus, hearing Remus was taken and delivered up, called on Romulus to assist in his rescue, informing him then plainly of the particulars of his birth, not but he had before given hints of it, and told as much as an atten- ROMULUS. 47 tive man might make no pmall conclusions from ; he liim- self, full of concern and fear of not coming in time, took the trough, and ran instantly to Numitor; but giving a suspicion to some of the king's sentry at his gate, and being gazed upon by them and perplexed with their questions, he let it be seen that he was hiding the trough under his cloak. By chance there was one among them who was at the exposing of the children, and was one employed in the office ; he, seeing the trough and know- ing it by its make and inscription, guessed at the business, and, without further delay, telling the king of it, brought in the man to be examined. Faustulus, hard beset, did not show himself altogether proof against terror ; nor yet was he wholly forced out of all ; confessed indeed the children were alive, but lived, he said, as shepherds, a great way from Alba; he himself Avas going to carry the trough to Ilia, who had often greatly desired to see and handle it, for a confirmation of her hopes of her children. As men generally do who are troubled in mind and act either in fear or passion, it so fell out Amulius now did ; for he sent in haste as a messenger, a man, other- wise honest, and friendly to Numitor, with commands to learn from Numitor whether any tidings were come to him of the children's being alive. He, coming and seeing how little Remus wanted of being received into the arms and embraces of Numitor, both gave him surer confidence in his hope, and advised them, Avith all expedition, to pro- ceed to action ; himself too joining and assisting them, and indeed, had they wished it, the time would not have let them demur. For Romulus was now come very near, and many of the citizens, out of fear and hatred of Amu- lius, were running out to join him ; besides, he brought great forces with him, divided into companies, each of an hundred men, every captain carrying a small bundle of grass and shrubs tied to a pole. The Latins call such 48 ROMULUS. bundles manipiiU, and from hence it is that in their armies still they call their captains manipiilares. Remus rousing the citizens within to revolt, and Romulus making attacks from without, the tyrant, not knowing either what to do, or Avhat expedient to think of for his security, in this per- plexity and confusion was taken and put to death. This narrative, for the most part given by Fabius and Diodes of Peparethus, who seem to be the earliest historians of the foundation of Rome, is suspected by some, because υί' its dramatic and fictitious appearance ; but it would not wholly be disbelieved, if men would remember what a poet fortune sometimes shows herself, and consider that the Roman power would hardly have reached so high a pitch without a divinely ordered origin, attended with great and extraordinary circumstances. Amulius now being dead and matters quietly disposed, the two brothers would neither dwell in Alba without ffovernino; there, nor take the o;overnment into their own hands during the life of their grandfather. Having therefore delivered the dominion up into his hands, and paid their mother befitting honor, they resolved to live by themselves, and build a city in the same place where the}^ Λvere in their infancy brought up. This seems the most honorable reason for their departure ; though per- haps it was necessary, having such a body of slaves and fugitives collected about them, either to come to nothing by dispersing them, or if not so, then to live with them elsewdiere. For that the inhabitants of Alba did not think fugitives worthy of being received and incorporated as citizens among them plainly appears from the matter of the women, an attempt made not wantonly but of ne- cessity, because they could not get Λvives by good-will. For they certainly paid unusual respect and honor to those whom they thus forcibly seized. Not long after the first foundation of the city, they ROMULUS. 49 opened a sanctuary of refuge for all fugitives, Λνΐήοΐι they called the temple of the god Asylceus, where they received and protected all, delivering none back, neither the servant to his master, the debtor to his creditor, nor the murderer into the hands of the magistrate, saying it was a privi- leged place, and they could so maintain it by an order ol the holy oracle ; insomuch that the city grew presently v(;ry populous, for, they say, it consisted at first of no more than a thousand houses. But of that hereafter. Their minds being fully bent upon building, there arose presently a difference about the place wdiere. Romulus chose what was called Roma Quadrata, or the Square Rome, and would have the city there. Remus laid out a piece of ground on the Aventine Mount, Avell fortified by nature, Λvhich was from him called Remonium, but now Rignarium. Concluding at last to decide the contest by a divination from a flight of birds, and placing themselves apart at some distance, Remus, thej^ say, saw six vultures, and Romulus double the number ; others say Remus did truly see his number, and that Romulus feigned his, but, when Remus came to him, that then he did, indeed, see twelve. Hence it is that the Romans, in their divinations from birds, chiefly regard the vulture, though Ilerodorus Ponticus relates that Her- cules was always very joyful when a vulture appeared to him upon any action. For it is a creature the least hurtful of any, pernicious neither to corn, fruit-tree, nor cattle ; it preys only upon carrion, and never kills or hurts any living thing; and as for birds, it touches not them, though they are dead, as being of its own species, whereas eagles, owls, and hawks mangle and kill their own fellow-ciea- tures; yet, as yEschylus says, — What bird is clean that preys on fellow bird? Besides, all other birds are, so to saj•, never out of our VOL. L 4 50 ROMULUS. eyes; they let themselves be seen of us continually; but a vulture is a very rare sight, and you can seldom meet with a man that has seen their 3'oung ; their rarity and infrequency lias raised a strange opinion in some, that they come to us from some other world ; as soothsayers ascribe a divine origination to all things not produced either of nature or of themselves. When Remus knew the cheat, he was much displeased;" and as Romulus was casting up a ditch, w^here he designed the foundation of the city-wall, he turned some pieces of the work to ridicule, and obstructed others : at last, as he was in contempt leaping over it, some say Romulus him- self struck him, others Celer, one of his companions ; he fell, however, and in the scuffle Faustulus also was slain, and Plistinus, who, being Faustulus's brother, story tells us, helped to bring up Romulus. Celer upon this fled instantly into Tuscany, and from him the Romans call all men that are swift of foot Celeres ; and because Quintus Metellus, at his father's funeral, in a few days' time gave the people a show of gladiators, admiring his expedition in getting it ready, they gave him the name of Celer. Romulus, ha\ang buried his brother Remus, together with his two foster-fathers, on the mount Remonia, set to building his city ; and sent for men out of Tuscany, λυΙιο directed him by sacred usages and written rules in all the ceremonies to be observed, as in a religious rite. First, they dug a round trench about that which is now the Comitium, or Court of Assembly, and into it solemnly threw the first-fruits of all things either good hy custoni or necessary by nature ; lastly, every man taking a small piece of earth of the country from whence he came, they all threw them in promiscuously together. This trencli they call, as they do the heavens, Mundus ; making which their centre, they described the city in a circle round it. Then the founder fitted to a plough a brazen ROMULUS. 51 ploughshare, and, yoking together a bull and a cow. drove himself a deep line or furrow round the bounds ; while the business of those that followed after was to see thatΛvhat- ever earth was thrown up should be turned all inwards towards the cit}^, and not to let any clod lie outside. With this line they described the Avail, and called it, by a contrac- tion, Pomoerium, that 'm,posi miiriim, after or beside the wall ; and where they designed to make a gate, there they took out the share, carried the plough over, and left a space ; for Avhich reason they consider the whole wall as holy, except Avhere the gates are; for had they adjudged them also sacred, they could not, Avithout offence to religion, have given free ingress and egress for the necessaries of human life, some of w^hich are in themselves unclean. As for the day they began to build the city, it is univer- sally agreed to have been the twenty-first of April, and that day the Romans annually keep holy, calling it their country's birth-day. At first, they say, they sa- crificed no living creature on this day, thinking it fit to preserve the feast of their country's birth-day pure and without stain of blood. Yet before ever the city Avas built, there was a feast of herdsmen and shepherds kept on this day, wiiich went by the name of Palilia. The Roman and Greek months have now little or no agree- ment; they say, however, the day on which Romulus began to build was quite certainly the thirtieth of the month, at which time there was an eclipse of the sun which they conceive to be that seen by Antimachus, the Teian poet, in the third year of the sixth Olympiad. In the times of Varro the philosopher, a man deeply read in Ro- man history, lived one Tarrutins, his familiar acquain- tance, a good philosopher and mathematician, and one, too, that out of curiosity had studied the way of drawing schemes and tables, and Avas thought to be a proficient in the art; to him \^arro propounded to cast Romulus's 52 ROMULUS. nativity, even to the first day and hour, making his deductions from the several events of the man's hfe which he should be informed of, exactly as in working back a geometrical problem ; for it belonged, he said, to the same science both to foretell a man's life by knowing the time of his birth, and also to find out his birth by the Ι^ηοΛν- ledo;e of his life. This task Tarrutius undertook, and first lookino; into the actions and casualties of the man, to- gether with the time of his life and manner of his death, and then comparing all these remarks together, he ^Q,\y confidently and positively pronounced that Romulus was conceived in his mother's womb the first year of the second Olympiad, the twenty-third day of the month the Egyptians call Choeac, and the third hour after sunset, at which time there was a total eclipse of the sun ; that he was born the twenty-first day of the month Thoth, about sun-rising; and that the first stone of Rome was laid by him the ninth day of the month Pharmuthi, be- tween the second and third hour. For the fortunes of cities as well as of men, they think, have their certain periods of time prefixed, which may be collected and fore- known from the position of the stars at their first foun- dation. But these and the like relations may perhaps not so much take and delight the reader with their novelty and curiosity, as offend him by their extravagance. The city now being built, Romulus enlisted all that were of age to bear arms into military companies, each company consisting of three thousand footmen and three hundred horse. These companies were called legions, because they were the choicest and most select of the people for fighting men. The rest of the multitude he called the people ; an hundred of the most eminent he chose for counsellors; these he styled patricians, and their assembly the senate, which signifies a council of elders. The patricians, some say, were so called because ROMULUS. 53 they were the fathers of lawful children ; others, because they could give a good account who their own fathers were, which not every one of the rabble that poured into the city at first could do ; others, from patronage, their word for protection of inferiors, the origin of which they attribute to Patron, one of those that came over with Evan- der, who \vas a great protector and defender of the weak and need}^ But perhaps the most probable judgment might be, that Romulus, esteeming it the duty of the chiefest and Avealthiest men, with a fatherly care and con- cern to look after the meaner, and also encouraging the commonalty not to dread or be aggrieved at the honors of their superiors, but to love and respect them, and to think and call them their fathers, might from hence give them the name of patricians. For at this very time all foreigners give senators the style of lords ; but the Ro- mans, making use of a more honorable and less invidious name, call them Patres Conscripti ; at first indeed simply Patres, but afterΛvards, more being added, Patres Con- scripti. By this more imposing title he distinguished the senate from the populace ; and in other Avays also sepa- rated the nobles and the commons, — calling them pa- trons, and these their clients, — by λυΙιΙοΙι means he created wonderful love and amity betwixt them, productive of great justice in their dealings. For they were always their clients' counsellors in law cases, their advocates in courts of justice, in fine their advisers and supporters in all affairs whatever. These again faithfully served their patrons, not only paying them all respect and deference, l)ut also, in case of poverty, helping them to portion their daughters and pay off their debts; and for a patron to witness against his client, or a client against his patron, was what no law nor magistrate could enforce. In after- times, all other duties subsisting still between them, it was thouu;ht mean and dishonorable for the betler sort 54 ROMULLS. to take money from their inferiors. And so much of these matters. In the fourth month, after the city was built, as Fabius writes, the adventure of stealing the women was at- tempted ; and some say Romulus himself, being naturally a martial man, and predisposed too, perhaps, by certain oracles, to believe the fates had ordained the future growth and greatness of Rome should depend upon the benefit of war, upon these accounts first offered violence to the Sa- bines, since he took away only thirty virgins, more to give an occasion of war than out of any want of women. But this is not very probable; it would seem rather that, observing his city to be filled by a confluence of foreign- ers, few of Λvhom had wives, and that the multitude in general, consisting of a mixture of mean and obscure men, fell under contempt, and seemed to be of no long continuance together, and hoping farther, after the women were appeased, to make this injury in some mea- sure an occasion of confederacy and mutual commerce with the Sabines, he took in hand this exploit after this manner. First, he gave it out as if he had found an altar of a certain god hid under groimd ; the god they called Consus, either the god of counsel (for they still call a con- sultation consilium, and their chief magistrates consiiles, namely, counsellors), or else the equestrian Neptune, for the altar is kept covered in the circus maximus at all other times, and only at horse-races is exposed to public view; others merely say that this god had his altar hid under ground because counsel oug^ht to be secret and con- cealed. Upon discovery of this altar, Romulus, by pro- clamation, appointed a day for a splendid sacrifice, and for public games and shows, to entertain all sorts of people ; many flocked thither, and he himself sate in front, amidst his nobles, clad in purple. Now the signal for their fall- ing on Λvas to be whenever he rose and gathered up his ROMULUS. 55 robe and threw it over his body ; his men stood all ready armed, with their eyes intent upon him, and when the sio;n was given, drawino^ their swords and falHn"• on with a great shout, they ravished away the daughters of the Sabines, they themselves flying without any let or hin- drance. They sny there were but thirty taken, and from them the Curiai or Fraternities were named; but Valerius Antias says five hundred and twenty-seven, Juba, six hun- dred and eighty-three virgins; which was indeed the greatest excuse Romulus could allege, namely, that they had taken no married Avoman, save one only, Hersilia by name, and her too unknowingly ; which showed they did not commit this rape wantonly, but with a design purely of forming alliance with their neighbors by the greatest and surest bonds. This Hersilia some say Ilostilius mar- ried, a most eminent man among the Romans; others, Romulus himself, and that she bore two children to him, a daughter, by reason of primogeniture called Prima, and one only son, whom, from the great concourse of citizens to him at that time, he called Aollius/^' but after ages AbilHus. But Zenodotus the Troezenian, in giving this account, is contradicted by many. Among those who committed this rape upon the virgins, there were, they say, as it so then happened, some of the meaner sort of men, who were carrying off a damsel, ex- celling all in beauty and comeliness of stature, whom when some of superior rank that met them attempted to take away, they cried out they were canying her to Talasius, a young man, indeed, but brave and worthy ; hearing that, they commended and applauded them loudly, and also some, turning back, accompanied them Avith gΌod-Λvill and pleasure, shouting out the name of Talasius. Hence the Romans to this very time, at their * Aollein, Gr., to collect a multitude. 56 ROMULUS. weddings, sing Talasius for their nuptial word, as the Greeks do Hymenoeus, because, thej say, Talasius was very happy in his marriage. But Sextius Sylla the Car- thaginian, a man wanting neither learning nor ingenuity, told me Romulus gave this word as a sign when to begin the onset ; everybody, therefore, Λνΐιο made prize of a maiden, cried out, Talasius ; and for that reason the cus- tom continues so now at marriages. But most are of opi- nion (of whom Juba particularly is one) that this word was used to new-married women by way of incitement to good housewifery and talasia (spinning), as we say in Greek, Greek words at that time not being as yet overpowered by Italian. But if this be the case, and if the Romans did at that time use the word talasia as we do, a man might fancy a more probable reason of the custom. For when the Sabines, after the war against the Romans, were reconciled, conditions were made concerning their women, that they should be obliged to do no other servile offices to their husbands but what concerned spinning ; it was customary, therefore, ever after, at weddings, for those that gave the bride or escorted her or otherwise were present, sportingly to say Talasius, intimating that she was henceforth to serve in spinning and no more. It continues also a custom at this very day for the bride not of herself to pass her husband's threshold, but to be lifted over, in memory that the Sabine virgins were car- ried in by violence, and did not go in of their own will. Some say, too, the custom of parting the bride's hair with the head of a spear was in token their marriages began at first by Λvar and acts of hostility, of which I have spoken more fully in my book of Questions. This rape Avas committed on the eighteenth day of the month Sextilis, now called August, on Λvhich the solemni- ties of the Consualia are kept. The Sabines were a numerous and martial people, but KOMULUS. 57 lived in small, iinfortifiefl vilhiges, as it befitted, they thought, a colony of the Lacediemonians to be bold and fearless; nevertheless, seeing themselves bound by such hostages to their good behavior, and being solicitous for their daughters, they sent ambassadors to Romvdus with fair and equitable requests, that he Λvould return their young women and recall that act of violence, and after- wards, by persuasion and lawful means, seek friendly cor- respondence between bo^h nations. Romulus would not part with the young Λvomen, yet proposed to the Sabincs to enter into an alliance Avith them ; upon which point some consulted and demurred long, but Acron, king of the Ceninenses, a man of high spirit and a good warrior, who had all along a jealousy of Romulus's bold attempts, and considering particularly from this exploit upon the women that he was growing formidable to all people, and indeed insufferable, were he not chastised, first rose up in arms, and with a powerful army advanced against him. Romulus likewise prepared to receive him ; but when they came Λvithin sight and viewed each other, they made a challenge to fight a single duel, the armies stand- ing by under arms, without participation. And Romulus, making a vow to Jupiter, if he should conquer, to carry, himself, and dedicate his adversary's armor to his honor, overcame him in combat, and, a battle ensuing, routed his army also, and then took his city ; but did those he found in it no injury, only commanded them to demolish the place and attend him to Rome, there to be admitted to all the privileges of citizens. And indeed there was nothing did more advance the greatness of Rome, than that she did always unite and incorporate those Avhom she conquered into herself. Romulus, that he might perform his vow in the most acceptable manner to Jupi- ter, and withal make the pomp of it delightful to the eye of the city, cut down a tall oak which he saw grow- 58 ROMULUS. ing in the camp, which he trimmed to the shape of a trophj'^, and fastened on it Acron's whole suit of armor disposed in proper form ; then he himself, girding his clothes about him, and crowning his head with a laurel- garland, his hair gracefully flowing, carried the trophy resting erect upon his right shoulder, and so marched on, singing songs of triumph, and his whole army following after, the citizens all receiving him with acclamations of joy and wonder. The procession of this day was the origin and model of all after triumphs. This trophy was styled an offering to Jupiter Feretrius, irom. ferire, which in Latin is to smite ; for Romulus prayed he might smite and overthrow his enemy ; and the spoils Λvere called opima, or royal spoils, says Varro, from their richness, wdiich the word opes signifies ; though one would more probably conjecture from ojms, an act; for it is only to the general of an army Λνΐιο with his own hand kills his enemies' general that this honor is granted of offering the opima spolia. And three only of the Roman captains have had it conferred on them : first, Romulus, upon killing Acron the Ceninensian ; next, Cornelius Cossus, for slaying Tolumnius the Tuscan ; and lastly, Claudius Marcellus, upon his conquering Viridomarus, king of the Gauls. The two latter, Cossus and Marcellus, made their entries in triumphant chariots, bearing their trophies themselves; but that Romulus made use of a chariot, Dionysius is wrong in asserting. History says, Tarquinius, Damaratus's son, Λvas the first that brought triumphs to this great pomp and grandeur; others, that Publicola was the first that rode in triumph. The statues of Romulus in triumph are, as may be seen in Rome, all on foot. After the overthro\v of the Ceninensians, the other Sabines still protracting the time in preparations, the people of FidenoB, Crustumerium, and Antemna, joined their forces against the Romans ; they in like maimer ROMULUS. 59 were defeated in battle, and surrendered up to Romulus their cities to be seized, their lands and territories to be divided, and themselves to be transplanted to Rome. All the lands Λvhich Romulus acquired, he distributed among the citizens, except only Avhat the parents of the stolen virgins had ; these he suffered to possess their own. The rest of the Sabines, enraged hereat, choosing Tatius their captain, marched straight against Rome. The city Avas almost inaccessible, having for its fortress that which is now the Capitol, Λvhere a strong guard was placed, and Tarpeius their captain ; not Tarpeia the virgin, as some say wdio Avould make Romulus a fool. But Tarpeia, daughter to the captain, coveting the golden bracelets she saw them w-ear, betrayed the fort into the Sabines' hands, and asked, in reAvard of her treachery, the things they wore on their left arms. Tatius conditioning thus with her, in the night she opened one of the gates, and received the Sabines in. And truly Antigonus, it w^ould seem, was not solitary in saying, he loved betrayers, but hated those who had betrayed ; nor Caesar, who told Rhymitalces the Thracian, that he loved the treason, but hated the traitor ; but it is the general feeling of all who have occasion for wicked men's service, as people have for the poison of venomous beasts; they are glad of them while they are of use, and abhor their baseness when it is over. And so then did Tatius behave towards Tarpeia, for he com- manded the Sabines, in regard to their contract, not to refuse her the least part of what they Avore on their left arms ; and he himself first took his bracelet off his arm, and threw that, together wnth his buckler, at her; and ah the rest folloAving, she, being borne down and quite buried with the multitude of gold and their shields, died under the weight and pressure of them; Tarpeius also himself, being prosecuted by Romulus, w^as found guilty of treason, as Juba says Sulpicius Galba relates. Those 60 ROMULUS. who write otherwise concerning Tarpeia, as that she was the daughter of Tatius, the Sabine captain, and, being for- cibly detained by Romulus, acted and suffered thus by her father's contrivance, speak very absurdly, of whom Antigonus is one. And Simylus, the poet, who thinks Tarpeia betrayed the Capitol, not to the Sabines, but the Gauls, having i\illen in love with their king, talks mere folly, saying thus : — Tarpeia 't was, who, dwelling close thereby, Laid open Rome unto the enemy. She, for the love of the besieging Gaul, Betrayed the city's strength, the Capitol. And a little after, speaking of her death : — The numerous nations of the Celtic foe Bore her not living to the banks of Po ; Their heavy shields upon the maid they threw, And with their splendid gifts entombed at once and slew. Tarpeia afterwards was buried there, and the hill from her was called Tarpeius, until the reign of king Tarquin, who dedicated the place to Jupiter, at which time her bones were removed, and so it lost her name, except only that part of the Capitol which they still call the Tarpeian Rock, from which they used to cast down malefactors. The Sabines being possessed of the hill, Romulus, in great fury, bade them battle, and Tatius was confident to accept it, perceiving, if they were overpowered, that they liad behind them a secure retreat. The level in the mid- dle, where they were to join battle, being surrounded with many little hills, seemed to enforce both parties to a sharp and desperate conflict, by reason of the difficulties of the place, which had but a few outlets, inconvenient either for refuge or pursuit. It happened, too, the river having overflowed not many days before, there was left ROMULUS. 61 behind in the plain, where now the forum stands, a deep blind mud and slime, which, though it did not appear much to the eye, and was not easily avoided, at bottom was deceitful and dangerous ; upon which the Sabines be- ing unwarily about to enter, met with a piece of good for- tune ; for Curtius, a gallant man, eager of honor, and of aspiring thoughts, being mounted on horseback, was gal- loping on before the rest, and mired his horse here, and, endeavoring for awhile by whip and spur and voice to disentangle him, but finding it impossible, quitted him and saved himself; the place from him to this very time is called the Curtian Lake. The Sabines, having avoided this danger, began the fight very smartly, the fortune of the day being very dubious, though many were slain ; amongst whom was Hostilius, who, they say, \vas husband to Hersilia, and grandfather to that Hostilius who reigned after Numa. There were many other brief conflicts, we may suppose, but the most memorable was the last, in which Romulus having received a wound on his head by a stone, and being almost felled to the ground by it, and disabled, the Romans gave way, and, being driven out of the level ground, fled towards the Palatium. Romulus, by this time recovering from his Avound a little, turned about to renew the battle, and, facing the fliers, with a loud voice encouraged them to stand and fight. But being overborne with numbers, and nobody daring to face about, stretching out his hands to heaven, he prayed to Jupiter to stop the army, and not to neglect but maintain the Roman cause, now in extreme danger. The prayer was no sooner made, than shame and respect for their king checked many; the fears of the fugitives changed suddenly into confi- dence. The place they first stood at was where now is the temple of Jupiter Stator (which may be translated the Stayer); there they rallied again into ranks, and re- pulsed the Sabines to the place called now Regia, and to 62 ROMULUS. the temple of Vesta ; where both parties, preparing to be- gin a second battle, were prevented by a spectacle, strange to behold, and defying description. For the daughters of the Sabines, who had been carried off, came running, in great confusion, some on tliis side, some on that, with miserable cries and lamentations, like creatures possessed, in the midst of the army, and among the dead bodies, to come at their husbands and their fathers, some with their young babes in their arms, others their hair loose about their ears, but all calHng, now upon the Sabines, now upon the Romans, in the most tender and endearing words. Hereupon both melted into compassion, and fell back, to make room for them betwixt the armies. The sight of the women carried sorrow and commiseration upon both sides into the hearts of all, but still more their words, which began with expostulation and upbraiding, and ended with entreaty and supplication. "Wherein," say they, "have we injured or offended you, as to deserve such sufferings, past and present ? We were ravished away unjustly and violently by those whose now w^e are ; that being done, Λve were so long neglected by our fathers, our brothers, and countrymen, that time, having now by the strictest bonds united us to those we once mortally hated, has made it impossible for us not to tremble at the danger and weep at the death of the very men who once used violence to us. You did not come to vindicate our honor, while we were virgins, against our assailants ; but do come now to force away wives from their husbands and mothers from their chil- dren, a succor more grievous to its wretched objects than the former betrayal and neglect of them. Which shall we call the worst, their love-making or your compassion ? If you were making war upon any other occasion, for our sakes you ought to withhold your hands from those to whom we have made you fathers-in-law and grandsirea. ROMULUS. 63 If it be for our own cause, then take us, and witli us your sons-in-law and grandchildren. Restore to us our parents and kindred, but do not rob us of our children and hus- bands. Make us not, we entreat you, twice capti\^es." Ilersilia having spoken many such words as these, and the others earnestly praying, a truce was made, and the chief officers came to a parley ; the women, in the mean time, brought and presented their husbands and children to their fathers and brothers ; gave those that wanted, meat and drink, and carried the wounded home to be cured, and showed also how much they governed within doors, and how indulgent their husbands were to them, in de- meaning• themselves towards them with all kindness and respect imaginable. Upon this, conditions were agreed upon, that what women pleased might stay where they were, exempt, as aforesaid, from all drudgery and labor but spinning ; that the Romans and Sabines should in- habit the city together ; that the city should be called Rome, from Romulus; but the Romans, Quirites, from the country of Tatius ; and that they both should govern and command in common. The place of the ratification is still called Comitium, from coirc, to meet. The city being thus doubled in number, an hundred of the Sabines were elected senators, and the legions were increased to six thousand foot and six hundred horse ; then they divided the people into three tribes ; the first, from Romulus, named Rauinenses ; the second, from Tatius, Tatienses ; the th'.rtl, Luceres, from the liicvs, or grove, where the A.sylum stood, whither many fled for sanctuary, and were received into the city. And that they were just three, the very name of tribe and tribune seems to show; each tiibe contained ten curite, or bro- therhoods, which, some say, took their names from the Sabine women ; but that seems to be false, because many had their names from various places. Though it is 64 ROMULUS. true, they then constituted many things in honor to the women ; as to give them the way wherever they met them ; to speak no ill word in their presence ; not to ap- pear naked before them, or else be liable to prosecution before the judges of homicide ; that their children should wear an ornament about their necks called the hulla (because it was like a bubble), and the prcetexta, a gown edged with purple. The princes did not immediately join in council to- gether, but at first each met with his own hundred ; afterwards all assembled together. Tatius dwelt where now the temple of Moneta stands, and Romulus, close by the steps, as they call them, of the Fair Shore, near the descent from the Mount Palatine to the Circus Maximus. There, they say, grew the holy cornel tree, of which they report, that Romulus once, to try his strength, threw a dart from the Aventine Mount, the staff of which was made of cornel, which struck so deep into the ground, that no one of many that tried could pluck it up ; and the soil, being fertile, gave nourishment to the wood, which sent forth branches, and produced a cornel-stock of considerable bigness. This did posterity preserve and worship as one of the most sacred things ; and, therefore, walled it about ; and if to any one it appeared not green nor flourishing, but inclining to pine and whither, he immediately made outcry to all he met, and they, like people hearing of a house on fire, with one accord would cry for water, and run from all parts with buckets full to the place. But when Caius Caesar, they say, was repairing the steps about it, some of the laborers digging too close, the roots were destroyed, and the tree withered. The Sabines adopted the Roman months, of which whatever is remarkable is mentioned in the Life of Numa. Romulus, on the other hand, adopted their long shiekls, iind changed his own armor and that of all the ROMULUS. 65 Romans, who before wore round targets of the Argive pat- tern. Feasts and sacrifices they partook of in common, not abolishing any which either nation observed before, and instituting several new ones ; of which one was the Matronalia, instituted in honor of the women, for their extinction of the war; likewise the Carmentalia. This Carmenta some think a deity presiding over human birth ; for which reason she is much honored by mothers. Others say she was the wife of Evander, the Arcadian, being a prophetess, and wont to deliver her oracles in verse, and from carmen, a verse, was called Carmenta ; her proper name being Nicostrata. Others more probably derive Carmenta from carens menie, or insane, in allusion to her prophetic frenzies. Of the Feast of Palilia we have spoken before. The Lupercalia, by the time of its cele- bration, may seem to be a feast of purification, for it' is solemnized on the dies nefasti, or non-court days, of the month February, Avhich name signifies purification, and the very day of the feast was anciently called Februata ; but its name is equivalent to the Greek LycaBa; and it seems thus to be of great antiquity, and brought in by the Arcadians who came with Evander. Yet this is but dubious, for it may come as Avell from the Λvolf that nursed Romulus ; and we see the Luperci, the priests, begin their course from the place Λvhere they say Romulus was ex- posed. But the ceremonies performed in it render the origin of the thing more difficult to be guessed at ; for there are goats killed, then, two young noblemen's sons beinji: brought, some are to stain their foreheads Avith the bloody knife, others presently to wipe it off with wool dipped in milk ; then the young boys must laugh after their foreheads are wiped ; that done, having cut the goats' skins into thongs, they run about naked, only with something about their middle, lashing all they meet ; and the young wives do not avoid their strokes, fancying thoy VOL. I. 5 G6 ROMULUS. will help conception and child-birth. Another thing pe- culiar to this feast is for the Liiperci to sacrifice a dog. But as, a certain poet who wrote fabulous explanations of Roman customs in elegiac verses, says, that Romulus and Remus, after the conquest of Amulius, ran joyfully to the place where the wolf gave them suck ; and that in imita- tion of that, this feast was held, and two young noblemen ran — Striking at all, as when from Alba town, With sword in hand, the twins came hurrying down ; and that the bloody knife applied to their foreheads was a sign of the danger and bloodshed of that day ; the cleansing of them in milk, a remembrance of their food and nourishment. Caius Acilius WTites, that, before the city was built, the cattle of Romulus and Remus one day going astray, they, praying to the god Faunus, ran out to seek them naked, wishing not to be troubled with sweat, and that this is why the Luperci run naked. If the sacrifice be by way of purification, a dog might very well be sacrificed ; for the Greeks, in their lustrations, carry out young dogs, and frequently use this ceremony of perisci/lacismiis, as they call it. Or if again it is a sacri- fice of gratitude to the wolf that nourished and preserved Romulus, there is good reason in killing a dog, as being an enemy to wolves. Unless indeed, after all, the creature is punished for hindering the Luperci in their running. They say, too, Romulus was the first that consecra- ted holy fire, and instituted holy virgins to keep it, called vestals ; others ascribe it to Numa Pompilius ; agreeing, however, that Romulus was otherwise eminently religious, and skilled in divination, and for that reason carried the litiius^ a crooked rod with Avhich soothsayers describe the quarters of the heavens, when they sit to observe the flights of birds. This of his, being kept in ROMULUS. G7 the Palatiuia, was lost when the city was taken by the Gauls ; and afterwards, that barbarous people being dri- ven out, was found in the ruins, under a great heap of ashes, untouched by the fire, all things about it being consumed and burnt. He instituted also certain laws, one of which is somewhat severe, which suffers not a wife to leave her husband, but grants a husband power to turn off his wife, either upon poisoning hei• children, or counterfeiting his keys, or for adidtery ; but if the husband upon any other occasion put her aΛvay, he ordered one moiety of his estate to be given to the wife, the other to fall to the goddess Ceres ; and whoever cast off his wife, to make an atonement by sacrifice to the gods of the dead. This, too, is observable as a singular thing; in Ro- mulus, that he appointed no punishment for real parricide, but called all murder so, thinking the one an accursed thing, but the other a thing impossible ; and, for a long time, his judgment seemed to have been right ; for in al- most six hundred years together, nobody committed the like in Rome ; and Lucius Hostius, after the wars of Han- nibal, is recorded to have been the first parricide. Let thus much suffice concerning these matters. In the fifth year of the reign of Tatius, some of his friends and kinsmen, meeting ambassadors coming from Laurentum to Rome, attempted on the road to take away their money by force, and, upon their resistance, killed them. So great a villany having been committed, Romu- lus thought the malefactors ought at once to be punished, but Tatius shuilled off and deferred the execution of it ; and this one thing was the beginning of open quarrel betwixt them ; in all other respects they were very care- ful of their conduct, and administered affairs toirether with great unanimity. The relations of the slain, being debarred of lawful satisfaction by reason of Tatius, fell upon him as lie was sacrificing with Romulus at LaviniuuL 68 ROMULUS. and slew him ; but escorted Romulus home, commending and extolling him for a just prince. Romulub took the body of Tatius, and buried it very splendidly in the Aven- tine Mount, near the place called Armilustrium, but altoo-ether neg;lected reveno-in": his murder. Some au- thors Avrite, the city of Laurentum, fearing the conse- quence, delivered up the murderers of Tatius; but Ro- mulus dismissed them, saying, one murder was requited with another. This gave occasion of talk and jealousy, as if he were well pleased at the removal of his copartner in the government. Nothing of these things, however, raised any sort of feud or disturbance among the Sabines ; but some out of love to him, others out of fear of his power, some again reverencing him as a god, they all continued living peacefully in admiration and awe of him ; many foreign nations, too, showed respect to Romulus ; the Ancient Latins sent, and entered into league and con- federacy with him. Fidense he took, a neighboring city to Rome, by a party of horse, as some say, whom he sent before with commands to cut down the hinges of the gates, himself afterwards unexpectedly coming up. Oth- ers say, they having first made the invasion, plundering and ravaging the country and suburbs, Romulus lay in ambush for them, and, having killed many of their men, took the city ; but, nevertheless, did not raze or demolish it, but made it a Roman colony, and sent thither, on the Ides of April, two thousand five hundred inhabitants. Soon after a plague broke out, causing sudden death without any previous sickness; it infected also the corn with unfruitfulness, and cattle with barrenness ; there rained blood, too, in the city ; so that, to their actual suf- ferings, fear of the wrath of the gods was added. But when the same mischiefs fell upon Laurentum, then every- body judged it was divine vengeance that fell upon both cities, for the neglect of executing justice upon the mur- ROMULUS. 69 dor of Tatius and the ambassadors. But the murderers on both sides being delivered up and punished, the pesti- lence visibly abated ; and Romulus purified the cities with lustrations, which, they say, even now are performed at the wood called Ferentina. But before the plague ceased, the Camertines invaded the Romans and overran the country, thinking them, by reason of the distemper, unable to resist ; but Romulus at once made head against them, and gained the victory, with the slaughter of six thousand men ; then took their city, and brought half of those he found there to Rome ; sending from Rome to Camerium double the number he left there. This Λvas done the first of August. So many citizens had he to spare, in sixteen years' time from his first founding Rome. Among other spoils, he took a brazen four-horse chariot from Camerium, which he placed in the temple of Vulcan, setting on it his own statue, Λvith a figure of Victory crowning him. The Roman cause thus daily gathering strength, their weaker neighbors shrunk away, and were thankful to be left untouched ; but the stronger, out of fear or envy, thought they ought not to give way to Romulus, but to curb and put a stop to his growing greatness. The first were the A^eientes, a people of Tuscany, who had large possessions, and dwelt in a spacious city; they took occa- sion to commence a war, by claiming Fidenas as belonging to them ; a thing not only very unreasonable, but very ridiculous, that they, who did not assist them in the great- est extremities, but permitted them to be slain, should challenge their lands and houses when in the hands of others. But being scornfully retorted upon by Romulus in his answers, they divided themselves into two bodies ; with one they attacked the garrison of FideniE, the other marched against Romulus ; that which went against Fide- nne got the victory, and slew two thousand Romans ; the 70 ROMULUS. other was worsted bj Romulus, with the loss of eight thou- sand men. A fresh battle was fought near Fidense, and here all men acknowledge the day's success to have been chiefly the work of Romidus himself, λυΙίο showed the high- est skill as well as courage, and seemed to manifest a strength and swiftness more than human. But what some write, that, of fourteen thousand that fell that day, above half were slain by Romulus's own hand, verges too near to fable, and is, indeed, simply incredible ; since even the Messenians are thought to go too far in saying that Ari- stomenes three times offered sacrifice for the death of a hundred enemies, Lacedcemonians, slain by himself The army being thus routed, Romulus, suffering those that were left to make their escape, led his forces against the city ; they, having suffered such great losses, did not venture to oppose, but, humbly suing to him, made a league and friendship for an hundred years; surrender- ing also a large district of land called Septempagium, that is, the seven parts, as also their salt-works upon the river, and fifty noblemen for hostages. He made his triumph for this on the Ides of October, leading, among the rest of his many captives, the general of the Veientes, an elderly man, but who had not, it seemed, acted with the prudence of age ; Avhence even now, in sacrifices for victories, they lead an old man through the market-place to the Capitol, apparelled in purple, with a hiHa, or child's toy, tied to it, and the crier cries, Sardians to he sold ; for the Tuscans are said to be a colony of the Sardians, and the Veientes are a city of Tuscany. This was the last battle Romulus ever fought; after- wards he, as most, nay all men, very few excepted, do, who are raised by great and miraculous good-haps of fortune to power and greatness, so, I say, did he ; relying upon his own great actions, and growing of an haughtier mind, he forsook his popular behavior for kingly arro- ROMULUS. 71 gance, odious to the people ; to whom in particular the Btate which he assumed was hateful. For he dressed in scarlet, with the purple-bordered robe over it; he gave audience on a couch of state, having always about him some young men called Celeres, from their swiftness in doing commissions ; there went before him others with staves, to make room, with leather thongs tied on their bodies, to bind on the moment whomever he commanded. The Latins formerly used Ugare in the same sense as now alligare, to bind, whence the name lidors, for these officers, and baciila, or staves, for their rods, because staves w^ere then used. It is probable, however, they were first called lUores, afterwards, by putting in a c, Udores, or, in Greek, lihirgi, or people's officers, for le'itos is still Greek for the commons, and laos for the people in general. But when, after the death of his grandfather Numitor in Alba, the throne devolving upon Romulus, he, to court the people, put the government into their own hands, and appointed an annual magistrate over the Albans, this taught the great men of Rome to seek after a free and anti-monarchical state, wherein all might in turn be subjects and rulers. For neither w^ere the patricians any longer admitted to state affairs, only had the name and title left them, convening in council rather for fashion's sake than advice, where they heard in silence the king's commands, and so departed, exceeding the commonalty only in hearing first what Λvas done. These and the like were matters of small moment ; but w4ien he of his own accord parted among his soldiers what lands were ac- quired by war^ and restored the Veientes their hostages, the senate neither consenting nor approving of it, then, indeed, he seemed to put a great afiVont upon them ; so that, on his sudden and strange disappearance a short while after, the senate fell under suspicion and calumny. He disappeared on the Nones of July, as they now call 72 ROMULUS. the month which was then Quintihs, leaving nothing of certainty to be rehitecl of his death; only the time, as just mentioned, for on that day many ceremonies are still performed in representation of what happened. Neither is this micertainty to be thought strange, seeing tlie manner of the death of Scipio Africanus, who died at his own home after supper, has been found capable neither of proof or disproof; for some say he died a natural death, being of a sickly habit ; others, that he poisoned himself; others again, that his enemies, breaking in upon him in the night, stifled him. Yet ScijDio's dead body lay open to be seen of all, and any one, from his own observation, might form his suspicions and conjectures; whereas Eo- mulus, when he vanished, left neither the least part of his body, nor any remnant of his clothes to be seen. So that some fancied, the senators, having fallen upon him in the temple of Vulcan, cut his body into pieces, and took each a part away in his bosom ; others think his disap- pearance was neither in the temple of Vulcan, nor with the senators only by, but that, it came to pass that, as he was haranguing the people without the city, near a place called the Goat's Marsh, on a sudden strange and unac- countable disorders and alterations took place in the air ; the face of the sun was darkened, and the day turned into night, and that, too, no quiet, peaceable night, but with terrible thunderings, and boisterous winds from all quarters; during which the common people dispersed and fled, but the senators kept close together. The tem- pest being over and the light breaking out, \vhen the people gathered again, they missed and inquired for their king ; the senators suffered them not to search, or busy themselves about the matter, but commanded them to honor and worship Romulus as one taken up to the gods, and about to be to them, in the place of a good prince, now a propitious god. The multitude, hearing this, went RO^ruLUS. 73 away believing and rejoicing in hopes of good things from him ; but there were some, who, canvassing the matter in a hostile temper, accused and aspersed the pa- tricians, as men that persuaded the people to believe ridiculous tales, when they themselves were the murder- ers of the king. Things being in this disorder, one, they say, of the pa- tricians, of noble family and approved good character, and a faithful and familiar friend of Romulus himself, having come with him from Alba, Julius Proculus by name, presented himself in the forum ; and, taking a most sacred oath, protested before them all, that, as he was travelling on the road, he had seen Romulus coming to meet him, looking taller and comelier than ever, dressed in shining and flaming armor ; and he, being affrighted at the apparition, said, " Why, king, or for what purpose have you abandoned us to unjust and wicked surmises, and the whole city to bereavement and endless sorrow?" and that he made answer, "It pleased the gods, Proculus, that Ave, who came from them, should remain so long a time amongst men as we did ; and, having built a city to be the greatest in the world for empire and glory, should again return to heaven. But farewell ; and tell the Romans, that, by the exercise of temperance and fortitude, they shall attain the height of human power ; we will be to you the propitious god Qui- rinus." This seemed credible to the Romans, upon the honesty and oath of the relater, and indeed, too, there mingled with it a certain divine passion, some preternatu- ral influence similar to possession by a divinity ; nobody contradicted it, but, laying aside all jealousies and detrac- tions, they prayed to Quirinus and saluted him as a god. This is like some of the Greek fables of Aristeas the Proconnesian, and Cleomedes the Astypalaean ; for they say Aristeas died in a fuller's work-shop, and his friends, 74 ROMULUS. coming to look for him, found his body vanished ; and that some presently after, coming from abroad, said they met him travelling towards Croton. And that Cleomedes, being an extraordinarily strong and gigantic man, but also wild and mad, committed many desperate freaks ; and at last, in a school-house, striking a pillar that sus- tained the roof with his fist, broke it in the middle, so that the house fell and destroyed the children in it ; and being pursued, he fled into a great chest, and, shutting to the lid, held it so fast, that many men, with their united strength, could not force it open ; afterwards, breaking the chest to pieces, they found no man in it alive or dead ; in astonishment at which, they sent to consult the oracle at Delphi ; to whom the prophetess made this answer, Of all the heroes, Cleomede is last. They say, too, the body of Alcmena, as they were carry- ing her to her grave, vanished, and a stone was found lying on the bier. And many such improbabilities do your fabulous writers relate, deifying creatures naturally mortal ; for though altogether to disown a divine nature in human virtue were impious and base, so again to mix heaven with earth is ridiculous. Let us believe with Pindar, that All human bodies yield to Death's decree, The soul survives to all eternity. For that alone is derived from the gods, thence comes, and thither returns ; not with the body, but when most disengaged and separated from it, and when most entirely pure and clean and free from the flesh ; for the most per- fect soul, says Heraclitus, is a dry light, which flies out of the body as lightning breaks from a cloud ; but that whioli i"^ clogged and surfeited with body is like gross and ROMULUS. 75 humid incense, 8ΐθΛν to kindle and ascend. We must not, therefore, contrary to nature, send the bodies, too, of good men to heaven ; but we must really believe that, accord- ins: to their divine nature and law, their virtue and their souls are translated out of men into heroes, out of heroes into demi-gods, out of demi-gods, after passing, as in the rite of initiation, through a final cleansing and sanctifica- tion, and so freeing themselves from all that pertains to mortality and sense, are thus, not by human decree, but really and according to right reason, elevated into gods, admitted thus to the greatest and most blessed perfec- tion. Romulus's surname Quirinus, some say, is equivalent to Mars ; others, that he was so called because the citizens were called Quirites ; others, because the ancients called a dart or spear Quiris ; thus, the statue of Juno resting on a spear is called Quiritis, and the dart in the Eegia is addressed as Mars, and those that were distinguished in war were usually presented with a dart; that, therefore, Romulus, being a martial god, or a god of darts, was called Quirinus. A temple is certainly built to his honor on the mount called from him Quirinalis. The day he vanished on is called the Flight of the Peo- ple, and the Nones of the Goats,* because they go then out of the city, and sacrifice at the Goat's Marsh, and, as they go, they shout out some of the Roman names, as Marcus, Lucius, Caius, imitating the way in which they then fled and called upon one another in that fright and hurry. Some, however, say, this was not in imitation of a flight, but of a quick and hasty onset, referring it to the following occasion : after the Gauls who had taken Rome were driven out by Camillus, and the city was scarcely as yet recovering her strength, many of the Latins, * Populifugia, Nonse Caprotinae. 76 ROMULUS. under the command of Livius Postnmius, took this time to march against her. Postnmius, halting not far from Rome, sent a herald, signifying that the Latins were desirous to renew their former alliance and affinity (that was now almost decayed) by contracting new marriages between both nations ; if, therefore, they would send forth a good number of their virgins and widows, they should have peace and friendship, such as the Sabines had formerly had on the like conditions. The Romans, hearing this, dreaded a war, yet thought a surrender of their women little better than mere captivity. Being in this doubt, a servant-maid called Philotis (or, as some say, Tutola), advised them to do neither, but, by a stratagem, avoid both fighting and the giving wp of such pledges. The stratagem was this, that they should send herself, with other well-looking servant-maids, to the enemy, in the dress of free-born virgins, and she should in the night light up a fire-signal, at which the Romans should come armed and surprise them asleep. The Latins were thus deceived, and accordingly Philotis set up a torch in a wild fig-tree, screening it behind with curtains and cover- lets from the sight of the enemy, while visible to the Romans. They, when they saw it, eagerly ran out of the gates, calling in their haste to each other as they went out, and so, falling in unexpectedly upon the enemy, they defeated them, and upon that made a feast of triumph, called the Nones of the Goats, because of the wild fig-tree, called by the Romans Caprificus, or the goat-fig. They feast the women without the city in arbors made of fig- tree boughs, and the maid-servants gather together and run about playing; afterwards they fight in sport, and throw stones one at another, in memory that they then aided and assisted the Roman men in fight. This only a few authors admit for true ; for the calling upon one an- other's names by day and the going out to the Goat's ROMULUS. 77 Marsh to do sacrifice seem to agree more with tho former story, unless, indeed, we shall say that both the actions might have happened on the same day in diiTer- ent years. It was in the fifty-fourth year of his age and the thirty-eighth of his reign that Romulus, they tell rs, left the world. COMPARISON OF ROMULUS WITH THESEUS. This is what I have learnt of Romulus and Theseus, worthy of memory. It seems, first of all, that Theseus, out of his own free-will, without any compulsion, when he might have reigned in security at Trcezen in the enjoyment of no inglorious empire, of his own motion affected great actions, whereas the other, to escape pre- sent servitude and a punishment that threatened him, (according to Plato's phrase) grew valiant purely out of fear, and, dreading the extremest inflictions, attempted great enterprises out of mere necessity. Again, his greatest action was only the killing of one king of Alba ; while, as mere by-adventures and preludes, the other can name Sciron, Sinnis, Procrustes, and Corynetes ; by redu- cing and killing of whom, he rid Greece of terrible oppres- sors, before any of them that were relieved knew who did it ; moreover, he might without any trouble as well have gone to Athens by sea, considering he himself never was in the least injured by those robbers ; where as Romu- lus coul \ not but be in trouble whilst Amulius lived. Add to this the fact that Theseus, for no wrong done to himself, but for the sake of others, fell upon these vil- lains ; but Romulus and Remus, as long as they themselves suffered no ill by the tyrant, permitted him to oppress all others. And if it be a great thing to have been wounded in battle by the Sabines, to have killed king Acron, and to have conquered many enemies, we may oppose to these actions the battle with the Centaurs and the feats done against the Amazons. But Avhat Theseus adven- (78) THESEUS AND ROMULUS. 79 tiired, iii offering himself voluntarily with young boys and AdrginSj as part of the tribute unto Crete, either to be a prey to a monster or a victim upon the tomb of Andro- gens, or, according to the mildest form of the story, to live vilely and dishonorably in slavery to insulting and cruel men ; it is not to be expressed Avhat an act of cou- rage, magnanimity, or justice to the public, or of love for honor and bravery, that was. So that methinks the phi- losophers did not ill define love to be the provision of the gods for the care and preservation of the young ; for the love of Ariadne, above all, seems to have been the proper work and design of some god in order to preserve The- seus ; and, indeed, v^e ought not to blame her for loving him, but rather wonder all men and women were not alike affected towards him; and if she alone were so, truly I dare pronounce her worthy of the love of a god, who was herself so great a lover of virtue and goodness, and the bravest man. Both Theseus and Romulus were by nature meant for governors; yet neither lived up to the true character of a king, but fell off, and ran, the one into popularity, the other into tyranny, falling both into the same fault out of different passions. For a ruler's first end is to main- tain his office, which is done no less by avoiding Λvhat is unfit than by observing what is suitable. Whoever is either too remiss or too strict is no more a king or a governor, but either a demagogue or a despot, and so be- comes either odious or contemptible to his subjects. Though certainly the one seems to be the fiiult of easiness and good-nature, the other of pride and severity. If men's calamities, again, are not to be Λvholly imputed to fortune, but refer themselves to differences of charac- ter, who will acquit either Theseus of rash and unreason- able anger against his son, or Eomulus against his brother ? Looking at motives, we more easily excuse the anger 80 THESEUS Α^Ό ROMULUS. which a stronger cause, like a severer blow, provoked. Romulus, having disagreed with his brother advisedly and deliberately on public matters, one would think could not on a sudden have been put into so great a passion ; but love and jealousy and the complaints of his wife, which few men can avoid being moved by, seduced The- seus to commit that outrage upon his son. And what is more, Romulus, in his anger, committed an action of unfortunate consequence ; but that of Theseus ended only in words, some evil speaking, and an old man's curse ; the rest of the youth's disasters seem to have pro- ceeded from fortune ; so that, so far, a man would give his vote on Theseus's part. But Romulus has, first of all, one great plea, that his performances proceeded from very small beginnings; for both the brothers being thought servants and the sons of swineherds, before becoming freemen themselves, gave liberty to almost all the Latins, obtaining at once all the most honorable titles, as destroyers of their country's enemies, preservers of their friends and kindred, princes of the people, founders of cities, not removers, like The- seus, who raised and compiled only one house out of many, demolishing many cities bearing the names of ancient kings and heroes. Romulus, indeed, did the same after- wards, forcing his enemies to deface and ruin their own dwellings, and to sojourn with their conquerors; but at first, not by removal, or increase of an existing city, but by foundation of a new one, he obtained himself lands, a country, a kingdom, wives, children, and relations. And, in so doing, he killed or destroyed nobody, but benefited those that wanted houses and homes and were willing to be of a society and become citizens. Robbers and male- factors he slew not ; but he subdued nations, he overthrew cities, he triumphed over kings and commanders. As to Remus, it is doubtful by whose hand he fell ; it is gene- THESEUS AND ROMULUS. 81 rally imputed to others. Ili.s mother he clearly retrieved from death, and placed his grandfather, who was hrought under base and dishonorable vassalage, on the ancient throne of ^neas, to whom he did voluntarily many good offices, but never did him harm even inadvertently. IJut Theseus, in his forgetfulness and neglect of the command concerning tlie flag, can scarcely, methinks, by any ex- cuses, or before the most indulgent judges, avoid the im- putation of parricide. And, indeed, one of the Attic wri- ters, perceiving it to be very hard to make an excuse for this, feigns that ^gens, at the approach of the ship, running hastily to the Acropolis to see what news, slipped and fell down, as if he had no servants, or none λυοπΜ attend him on his way to the shore. And, indeed, the faults committed in the rapes of women adinit of no plausible excuse in Theseus. First, because of the often repetition of the crime ; for he stole Ariadne, Antiope, Anaxo the Troezenian, at last Helen, when he was an old man, and she not marriageable ; she a child, and he at an age past even lawful wedlock. Then, on account of the cause ; for the Troezenian, Lace- daemonian, and Amazonian virgins, beside that they were not betrothed to him, were not W()rthier to raise children by than the Athenian women, derived from Erechtheus and Cecrops ; but it is to be suspected these things were done out of wantonness and lust. Romulus, when he had taken near eight hundred women, chose not all. but only flersilia, as they say, for himself; the rest he divided among the chief of the city ; and afterwards, by the re- spect and tenderness and justice shown towards them, he made it clear that this violence and injury was a com- mendable and politic exploit to establisli a society ; by which he intermixed and united both nations, and made it the fountain of after friendship and public stability. And to the reverence and love and constancy he esta V(»L. i. 6 82 THESEUS AND ROMULUS. blished in matrimony, time can witness ; for in two liim- clrecl and thirty years, neither any husband deserted his wife, nor any wife her husband ; but, as the curious among the Greeks can name the first case of parricide or matri- cide, so the Romans all well know that Spurius Carviliiis was the first who put away his wife, accusing her of bar- renness. The UOmediate results were similar; for upon those marriages the two princes shared in the dominion, and both nations fell under the same government. But from the marriages of Theseus proceeded nothing of friendship or correspondence for the advantage of com- merce, but enmities and wars and the slaughter of citi- zens, and, at last, the loss of the city Aphidnge, when only out of the compassion of the enemy, whom they entreated and caressed like gods, they escaped suffering what Troy did by Paris. Theseus's mother, however, was not only in danger, but suffered actually what Hecuba did, desert- ed and neglected by her son, unless her captivity be not a fiction, as I could wish both that and other things were. The circumstances of the divine intervention, said to have preceded or accompanied their births, are also in contrast; for Romulus was preserved by the special favor of the gods ; but the oracle given to ^geus, commanding him to abstain, seems to demonstrate that the birth of The- seus was not agreeable to the will of the gods. LYCURGUS. There is so much imcertainty in the accounts which historians have left us of Lycurgus, the lawgiver of Sparta, that scarcely any thing is asserted by one of them which is not called into question or contradicted by the rest. Their sentiments are quite different as to the family he came of, the voyages he undertook, the place and man- ner of his death, but most of all when they speak of the laws he made and the commonwealth which he founded. They cannot, by any means, be brought to an agreement as to the very age in which he lived ; for «some of them say that he flourished in the time of Iphitus, and that they tWo jointly contrived the ordinance for the cessation of arms during the solemnity of the Olympic games. Of this opinion was Aristotle ; and for confirmation of it, he alleges an inscription upon one of the copper quoits used in those sports, upon which the name of Lycurgus contin- ued uneffaced to his time. But Eratosthenes and Apollo- dorus and other chronologers, computing the time by the successions of the Spartan kings, pretend to demonstrate that he was much more ancient than the institution of the Olympic games. Timaeus conjectures that there were two of this name, and in diverse times, but that the one of them being much more famous than the other, men gave to him the glory of the exploits of both ; the elder of the (83) 84 LYCURGUS. two, according to him, was not long after Homer ; and some are so particular as to say that he had seen him. But that he was of great antiquity may be gathered from a passage in Xenophon, where he makes him contempo- rary with the Heraclidoe. By descent, indeed, the very last kings of Sparta w^ere Heraclidse too ; but he seems in that place to speak of the first and more hnmediate suc- cessors of Hercules. But notwithstanding this confusion and obscurity, we shall endeavor to compose the history of his life, adhering to those statements which are least contradicted, and depending upon those authors who are most worthy of credit. The poet Simonides will have it that Lycurgus was the son of Prytanis, and not of Eunomus ; but in this opinion he is singular, for all the rest deduce the genealogy of them both as folloAVS : — Aristodemus. I Patrocles. I Soiis. I Eurypon. I Eunomus. Polydectes by his first wife. Lycurgus by Dionassa bis second. Dieuchidas says he was the sixth from Patrocles and the eleventh from Hercules. Be this as it Avill, Soils certain- ly was the most renowned of all his ancestors, under whose conduct the Spartans made slaves of the Helots, and added to their dominions, by conquest, a good part of Arcadia. There goes a story of this king Soils, that, being besieged by the Clitorians in a dry and stony place so that he could come at no water, he was at last con- strained to agree with them upon these terms, that he would restore to them all his conquests, provided that himself and all his men should drink of the nearest LYCURGUS. 8δ spring. After the usual oaths and ratifications, he called his soldiers together, and offered to him that would for- bear drinking, his kingdom for a reward ; and when not a man of them was able to forbear, in short, when they had all drunk their fill, at last comes king Soils himself to the spring, and, having sprinkled his face only, without swal- lowing one drop, marches ofi" in the face of his enemies, refusing to yield up his conquests, because himself and all his men had not, according to the articles, drunk of their water. Althouo-h he was iustlv had in admiration on this account, yet his family Avas not surnamed from him, but from his son Eurypon (of whom they were called Eury•• pontids) ; the reason of which was that Eurypon relaxed the rigor of the monarchy, seeking favor and popularity with the many. They, after this first step, grew bolder ; and the succeeding kings partly incurred hatred with their people by trying to use force, or, for popularity's sake and through Λveakness, gave way ; and anarchy and con- fusion long prevailed in Sparta, causing, moreover, the death of the father of Lycurgus. For as he was endeav- oring to quell a riot, he was stabbed Avith a butcher's knife, and left the title of king to his eldest son Poly- dectes. He, too, dying soon after, the right of succession (as every one thought) rested in Lycurgus; and reign he did, until it Avas found that the queen, his sister-in-law, was with child ; upon which he immediately declared that the kingdom belonged to her issue, provided it were male, and that he himself exercised the regal jurisdiction only as his guardian ; the Spartan name for which office IS jjrodicus. Soon after, an overture was made to him by the queen, that she would herself in some way destroy the infant, upon condition that he would marry her when he came to the crown. Abhorriuij: the woman's wicked• 86 LYCURGUS. ness, he nevertheless did not reject her proposal, but, making show of closing with her, despatched the messen- ger with thanks and expressions of joy, but dissuaded her earnestly from procuring herself to miscarry, which would impair her health, if not endanger her life ; he himself, he said, would see to it, that the child, as soon as born, should be taken out of the way. By such arti fices having drawn on the woman to the time of her lying-in, as soon as he heard that she was in labor, he sent persons to be by and observe all that passed, with orders that if it were a girl they should deliver it to the women, but if a boy, should bring it to him whereso- ever he were, and whatsoever doing. It so fell out that when he was at supper with the principal magistrates the queen was brought to bed of a boy, who was soon after presented to him as he was at the table ; he, taking him into his arms, said to those about him, " Men of Sparta, here is a king born unto us ; " this said, he laid him down in the king's place, and named him Charilaus, that is, the joy of the people ; because that all were transported with joy and with wonder at his noble and just spirit. His reign had lasted only eight months, but he was hon- ored on other accounts by the citizens, and there were more who obeyed him because of his eminent virtues, than because he was regent to the king and had the royal power in his hands. Some, however, envied and sought to impede his growing influence while he was still young; chiefly the kindred and friends of the queen- mother, who pretended to have been dealt with injuri- ously. Her brother Leonidas, in a warm debate which fell out betwixt him and Lycurgus, went so far as to tell him to his face that he was well assured that ere long he should see him king ; suggesting suspicions and preparing the way for an accusation of him, as though he had made away with his nephew, if the child should chance LYCURGUS. ST to fail, though by a natural death. Words of the like import were designedly cast abroad by the queen-mother and her adherents. Troubled at this, and not knowing what it might come to, he thought it his wisest course to avoid their envy by a voluntary exile, and to travel from place to place until his nephew came to marriageable years, and, by having a son, had secured the succession ; setting sail, therefore, with this resolution, he first arrived at Crete, where, hav- ing considered their several forms of government, and got an acquaintance with the principal men amongst them, some of their laws he very much approved of, and resolved to make use of them in his own country ; a good part he rejected as useless. Amongst the persons there the most renowned for their learning and their wisdom in state matters was one Thales, whom Lycurgus, by importunities and assurances of friendship, persuaded to go over to Lacedaemon ; where, though by his outward appearance and his own profession he seemed to be no other than a lyric poet, in reality he performed the part of one of the ablest lawgivers in the world. The very songs which he composed were exhortations to obedience and concord, and the very measure and cadence of the verse, conveying impressions of order and tranquillity, had so great an influence on the minds of the listeners, that they were insensibly softened and civilized, insomuch that they renounced their private feuds and animosities, and were reunited in a common admiration of virtue. So that it may truly be said that Thales prepared the way for the discipline introduced by Lycurgus. From Crete he sailed to Asia, with design, as is said, to examine the difference betwixt the manners and rules of life of the Cretans, which were very sober and tempe- rate, and those of the lonians, a people of sumptuous and delicate habits, and so to form a judgment; just as phj•- 88 LYCURGUS. sicians do by compearing healthy and diseased bodies. Here he had the first sight of Homer's works, in the hands, we may suppose, of the posterity of Creophylus ; and, haΛdng observed that the few loose expressions and actions of ill example which are to be found in his poems w^ere much outweighed by serious lessons of state and rules of morality, he set himself eagerly to transcribe and digest them into order, as thinking they would be of good use in his own country. They had, indeed, already obtained some slight repute amongst the Greeks, and scatr tered portions, as chance conveyed them, were in the hands of individuals ; but Lycurgus first made them really known. The Egyptians say that he took a voyage into Egypt, and that, being mucli taken with their way of separating the soldiery from the rest of the nation, he transferred it from them to Sparta, a removal from contact with those employed in low and mechanical occupations giving high refinement and beauty to the state. Some Greek writers also record this. But as for his voyages into Spain, Africa, and the Indies, and his conferences there with the Gym- nosophists, the whole relation, as far as 1 can find, rests on the single credit of the Spartan Aristocrates, the son of Hipparchus. Lycurgus was much missed at Sparta, and often sent for, " for kings indeed we have," they said, " who Avear the marks and assume the titles of royalty, bi^t as for the q^ualities of their minds, they have notliing by which they are to be distinguished from their subjects ; " adding, that in him alone Λvas the true foundation of sovereignty to be seen, a nature made to rule, and a genius to gain obe- dience. Nor were the kings themselves averse to see him back, for they looked upon his presence as a bul• uai'k against the insolencies of the people. Things being in this posture at his return, he applied hiuiself, without loss of time, to a thorough reformation LYCURGUS. 80 and resolved to change the whole face of the common- wealth ; for what could a few particular laws and a par- tial alteration avail ? He must act as wise physicians do, in the case of one who labors under a complication of diseases, by force of medicines reduce and exhaust him, change his whole temperament, and then set him upon a totally new regimen of diet. Having thus projected things, away he goes to Delphi to consult Apollo there ; which having done, and offered his sacrifice, he returned with that renowned oracle, in which he is called beloved of God, and rather God than man ; that his prayers were heard, that his laws should be the best, and the common- Avealth which observed them the most famous in the world. Encouraged by these things, he set himself to bring over to his side the leading men of Sparta, exhort- ing them to give him a helping hand in his great under- taking ; he broke it first to his particular friends, and then by degrees gained others, and animated them all to put his design in execution. When things were ripe for action, he gave order to thirty of the principal men of Sparta to be ready armed at the market-place hy break of day, to the end that he might strike a terror into the opposite party. Hermippus hath set down the names of twenty of the most eminent of them ; but the name of him whom Lycurgus most confided in, and who was of most use to him, both in making his laws and putting them in execution, w^as Arthmiadas. Thino;s o-rowintj- to a tumult, king Charilaus, apprehending that it was a con- spiracy against his person, took sanctuary in the temple of Minerva of the Brazen House ; but, being soon after undeceived, and having taken an oath of them that they had no designs against him, he quitted his refuge, and himself also entered into the confederacy with tliem ; of so gentle and fiexible a disposition he was, to which Ar- chelaus, his brother-king, alluded, Λvllen, Jiearing him ex 90 LYCURGUS. tolled for his goodness, he said, " Who can say he is a,ny thino• but good ? he is so even to the bad." Amongst the many changes and alterations which Ly- CLirgus made, the first and of greatest importance was the establishment of the senate, which, having a power equal to the kings' in matters of great consequence, and, as Plato expresses it, allaying and qualifying the fiery genius of the royal office, gave steadiness and safety to the com- monwealth. For the state, wdiich before had no firm basis to stand upon, but leaned one while towards an ab- solute monarchy, when the kings had the upper hand, and another while towards a pure democracy, when the people had the better, found in this establishment of the senate a central weight, like ballast in a ship, which always kept things in a just equilibrium; the twenty- eight always adhering to the kings so far as to resist de- mocracy, and, on the other hand, supporting the people against the establishment of absolute monarchy. As for the determinate number of twenty-eight, Aristotle states, that it so fell out because two of the original associates, for want of courage, fell off from the enterprise ; but Sphasrus assures us that there were but twenty-eight of the confederates at first ; perhaps there is some mystery in the number, which consists of seven multiplied by four, and is the first of perfect numbers after six, being, as that is, equal to all its parts.* For my part, I believe Lycur- gus fixed upon the number of twenty-eight, that, the two kings being reckoned amongst them, they might be thirty in all. So eagerly set was he upon this establishment, that he took the trouble to obtain an oracle about it from Delphi, the Rhetra, Λvhich runs thus : " After that you have built a temple to Jupiter Hellanius, and to Minerva Hellania, and after that you have ph^led the people into ph?/lcs, and obe'd them into obes, you shall establish a coun- * 1 4, 2, 7, 4, 1, make by addition 28 ; as 3, 2, 1, make 6. LYCURGUS. 9] oil of thirty elders, the leaders included, and shall, from time to time, apellazein the people betwixt Babyea and Cnacion, there propound and put to the vote. The com- mons have the final voice and decision." By phijlcs and ohcs are meant the divisions of the people ; by the leaders, the two kings ; apellazein, referring to the Pythian Apollo, signifie? to assemble ; Babyea and Cnacion they now call Qinus ; Aristotle says Cnacion is a river, and Babyea a bridge. Betwixt this Babyea and Cnacion, their assem- blies Λvere held, for they had no council-house or building to meet in. Lycurgus was of opinion that ornaments were so far from advantaging them in their counsels, that they Avere rather an hinderance, by diverting their atten- tion from the business before them to statues and pic- tures, and roofs curiously fretted, the usual embellish- ments of such places amongst the other Greeks. The people then being thus assembled in the open air, it Avas not alloAved to any one of their order to give his advice, but only either to ratify or reject what should be pro- pounded to them by the king or senate. But because it fell out afterwards that the people, by adding or omitting words, distorted and perverted the sense of propositions, kings Polydorus and Theopompus inserted into the Rhe- tra, or grand covenant, the following clause : " That if the people decide crookedly, it should be lawful for the elders and leaders to dissolve ; " that is to say, refuse rati- fication, and dismiss the people as depravers and pervert- ers of their counsel. It passed among the people, by their management, as being equally authentic Avith the rest of the Rlietra, as appears by these verses of Tyr taeus, — These oracles they from Apollo heard, And broufflit from Pytlio home the perfect word : The heaven-appointed kings, who love the land. Shall foremost in the nation's council stand ; 92 LYCURGUS. The elders next to them ; tlie commons last ; Let a straight Klietra among all be passed. Although Lyciirgiis had, in this manner, used all the qualifications possible in the constitution of his common- wealth, yet those who succeeded him found the oligarchi- cal element still too strong and dominant, and, to check its high temper and its violence, put, as Plato says, a bit in its mouth, which was the power of the ephori, esta- blished an hundred and thirty years after the death of Lycurgus. Elatus and his colleagues were the first who had this dignity conferred upon them, in the reign of king Theopompus, who, when his queen upbraided him one day that he would leave the regal power to his child- ren less than he had received it from his ancestors, said, in answer, "No, greater; for it will last longer." For, indeed, their prerogative being thus reduced within rea- sonable bounds, the Spartan kings were at once freed from all further jealousies and consequent danger, and never experienced the calamities of their neighbors at Messene and Argos, who, by maintaining their preroga- tive too strictly, for want of yielding a little to the popu- lace, lost it all. Indeed, whosoever shall look at the sedition and mis- government which befell these bordering nations to whom they were as near related in blood as situation, will find in them the best reason to admire the wisdom and fore- sight of Lycurgus. For these three states, in their first rise, were equal, or, if there were any odds, they lay on the side of the Messenians and Argives, who, in the first allot- ment, Λvere thought to have been luckier tlian the Spar- tans; yet was their happiness but of sraal] continuance, partly the tyrannical temper of their kings and partly the ungovernableness of the people quickly bringing upon them such disorders, and so complete an overthroAV of all existing institutions, as clearly to show how truly divine a LYCURGUS. 93 blessing the Spartans had had in that wise lawgiver who gave their government its happy balance and temper. Bat of this I shall say more in its due place. After the creation of the thirty senators, his next task, and, indeed, the most hazardous he ever undertook, was the making a new division of their lands. For there was an extreme inequality amongst them, and their state was overloaded with a multitude of indigent and necessitous persons, while its whole wealth had centered upon a very few. To the end, therefore, that he might expel from the state arrogance and envy, luxury and crime, and those yet more inveterate diseases of want and superfluity, he obtained of them to renounce their properties, and to con- sent to a new division of the land, and that they should live all together on an equal footing; merit to be their only road to eminence, and the disgrace of evil, and credit of worthy acts, their one measure of diiference between man and man. Upon their consent to these proposals, proceeding at once to put them into execution, he divided the country of Laconia in general into thirty thousand equal shares, and the part attached to the city of Sparta into nine thousand ; these he distributed among the Spartans', as he did the others to the country citizens. Some authors say that he made but six thousand lots for the citizens of Sparta, and that king Polydorus added three thousand more. Others say that Polydorus doubled the number Lycurgus had made, which, according to them, was but four thousand five hundred. A lot was so much as to yield, one year with another, about seventy bushels of grain for the master of the family, and twelve for his wife, with a suitable proportion of oil and wine. And this he thought sufficient to keep their bodies in good health and strength ; superfluities they >vere better without. 1} is repoitLMl, that, as he returned from a journey shoitlv 94 LYCURGUS. after the division of tlie lands, in harvest time, the ground being newly reaped, seeing the stacks all standing equal and alike, he smiled, and said to those about him, " Me- thinks all Laconia looks like one family estate just divided among a number of brothers." Not contented with this, he resolved to make a division of their movables too, that there might be no odious di- stinction or inequality left amongst them ; but finding that it would be very dangerous to go about it openly, he took another course, and defeated their avarice by the following; stratag;em : he commanded that all gold and Ο Ο Ο silver coin should be called in, and that only a sort of money made of iron should be current, a great weight and quantity of which was but very little worth ; so that to lay up twenty or thirty pounds there was required a pretty large closet, and, to remove it, nothing less than a yoke of oxen. With the diffusion of this money, at once a number of vices Avere banished from Lacedoemon ; for Λvho would rob another of such a coin ? Who would unjustly detain or take by force, or accept as a bribe, a thing which it was not easy to hide, nor a credit to have, nor indeed of any use to cut in pieces ? For when it was just red hot, they quenched it in vinegar, and by that means spoilt it, and made it almost incapable of being worked. In the next place, he declared an outlawry of all need- less and superfluous arts ; but here he might almost have spared his proclamation ; for they of themselves would have gone after the gold and silver, the money which remained being not so proper payment for curious work ; for, being of iron, it was scarcely portable, neither, if they should take the pains to export it, would it pass amongst the other Greeks, who ridiculed it. So there was now no more means of purchasing foreign goods and small wares; merchants sent no shiploads into Laconian ports ; no rhe- LYCURGUS. C J toric-iiin.ster, no itinerant fortune-teller, no harlot-monger, or gold or silversmith, engraver, or jeweller, set foot in a country which had no money ; so that luxury, deprived little by little of that which fed and fomented it, wasted to nothing, and died away of itself For the rich had no advantage here over the poor, as their wealth and abun- dance had no road to come abroad by, but Avere shut up at home doing nothing. And in this way they became excellent artists in common, necessary things ; bedsteads, chairs, and tables, and such like staple utensils in a family, were admirably well made there ; their cup, particularly, was very much in fashion, and eagerly bought up by sol- diers, as Critias reports ; for its color was such as to pre- vent water, drunk upon necessity and disagreeable to look at, from being noticed ; and the shape of it was such that the mud stuck to the sides, so that only the purer part came to the drinker's mouth. For this, also, they had to thank their lawgiver, who, by relieving the artisans of the trouble of making useless things, set them to show their skill in giving beauty to those of daily and indi- spensable use. The third and most masterly stroke of this great law- giver, by which he struck a yet more eftectual blow against luxury and the desire of riches, was the ordinance he made, that they should all eat in common, of the same bread and same meat, and of kinds that were specified, and should not spend their lives at home, laid on costly couches at splendid tables, delivering themselves up into the hands of their tradesmen and cooks, to fatten them in corners, like greedy brutes, and to ruin not their minds only but their very bodies, which, enfeebled by indul- gence and excess, would stand in need of long sleep, warm bathing, freedom from work, and, in a word, of as nnich care and attendance as if they were continually sick. It was certainly an extraordinary thing to have 96 LYCURGUS. brought about siicli a result as this, but a greater yet to have taken away from wealth, as Theophrastus observes, not merely the property of being coveted, but its very nature of being wealth. For the rich, being obliged to go to the same table with the poor, could not make use of or enjoy their abundance, nor so much as please their vanity by looking at or displaying it. So that the com- mon proverb, that Plutus, the god of riches, is blind, was nowhere in all the world literally verified but in Sparta. There, indeed, he was not only blind, but like a picture, without either life or motion. Nor were they allowed to take food at home first, and then attend the public tables, for every one had an eye upon those who did not eat and drink like the rest, and reproached them with being dainty and effeminate. This last ordinance in particular exasperated the wealth- ier men. They collected in a body against Lycurgus, and from ill words came to throwing stones, so that at length he was forced to run out of the market-place, and make to sanctuary to save his life ; by good-hap he outran all excepting one Alcander, a young man otherwise not ill accomplished, but hasty and violent, who came up so close to him, that, Avhen he turned to see who was near him, he struck him upon the face with his stick, and put out one of his eyes. Lycurgus. so far from being daunted and dis- couraged by this accident, stopped short, and showed his disfigured face and eye beat out to his countrymen ; they, dismayed and ashamed at the sight, delivered Alcander into his hands to be punished, and escorted him home, with expressions of great concern for his ill usage. Lycur- gus, having thanked them for their care of his person, dismissed them all, excepting only Alcander ; and, taking him with him into his house, neither did nor said any thing severely to him, but, dismissing those whose place it was. bade Alcander to wait upon him at table. Thr LYCURGUS. 97 young man. who was of an ingenuous temper, without murmuring did as he was commanded ; and, being thus admitted to live with Lycurgus, he had an opportunity to observe in him, besides his gentleness and calmness of temper, an extraordinary sobriety and an indefatigable industry, and so, from an enemy, became one of his most zealous admirers, and told his friends and relations that Lycurgus was not that morose and illnatured man they had formerly taken him for, but the one mild and gentle character of the world. And thus did Lycurgus, for chas- tisement of his fault, make of a wild and passionate young man one of the discreetest citizens of Sparta. In memory of this accident, Lycurgus built a temple to Minerva, surnamed Optiletis ; optilus being the Doric of these parts for opJdhalmus, the eye. Some authors, how- ever, of whom Dioscorides is one (who \vrote a treatise on the commonwealth of Sparta), say that he was wounded, indeed, but did not lose his eye with the blow ; and that he built the temple in gratitude for the cure. Be this as it will, certain it is, that, after this misadventure, the Lace- daemonians made it a rule never to carry so much as a staff into their public assemblies. But to return to their public repasts; — these had several names in Greek ; the Cretans called them andria, because the men only came to them. The LacediBmonians called them phidilia, that is, by changing I into d, the same as philUia, love feasts, because that, by eating and drinking together, they had opportunity of making friends. Or perhaps from jjhido, parsimony, because they were so many schools of sobriety ; or perhaps the first letter is an addition, and the word at first was editia, from cdode, eating. They met by companies of fifteen, more or less, and each of them stood bound to bring in monthly a bushel of meal, eight gallons of wine, five pounds of cheese, two pounds and a half of figs, and some very small VOL. I. 7 98 LYCURGUS. gum of money to buy flesh or fish with. Besides this, when any of them made sacrifice to the gods, they always sent a dole to the common hall; and, likewise, when any of them had been a hunting, he sent thither a part of the venison he had killed ; for these two occasions were the only excuses allowed for supping at home. The custom of eating together Λvas observed strictly for a great while afterwards ; insomuch that king Agis himself, after having vanquished the Athenians, sending for his commons at his return home, because he desired to eat privately with his queen, was refused them by the polemarchs; which refusal when he resented so much as to omit next day the sacrifice due for a war happily ended, they made him pay a fine. They used to send their children to these tables as to schools of temperance ; here they were instructed in state affairs by listening to experienced statesmen ; here they learnt to converse with pleasantry, to make jests without scurrility, and take them without ill humor. In this point of good breeding, the Laceda3monians excelled particularly, but if any man were uneasy under it, upon the least hint given there was no more to be said to him. It Avas customary also for the eldest man in the company to say to each of them, as they came in, " Through this " (pointing to the door), " no words go out." When any one had a desire to be admitted into any of these little societies ; he was to go through the folloΛving probation, each man in the company took a little ball of soft bread, which they were to throw into a deep basin, which a waiter carried round upon his head ; those that liked the person to be chosen dropped their ball into the basin without altering its figure, and those who disliked him pressed it bet\vixt their fingers, and made it flat; and this signified as much as a negative voice. And if there were but one of these flattened pieces in the basin, the LYCURGUS. 99 Fultor Avas rejected, so desirous were they that all the members of the company should be agreeable to each other. The basin was called caddichus, and the rejected candidate had a name thence derived. Their most famous dish was the black broth, which Avas so much valued that the elderly men fed only upon that, leaving Avliat flesh there was to the younger. They say that a certain king of Pontus, having heard much of this black broth of theirs, sent for a Lacedoemo- nian cook on purpose to make him some, but had no sooner tasted it than he found it extremely bad, which the cook observing, told him, " Sir, to make this broth relish, yon should have bathed yourself first in the river Enrotas." After drinking moderately, every man went to his home without lights, for the use of them Avas, on all occa- sions, forbid, to the end that they might accustom them- selves to march boldly in the dark. Such was the com- mon fashion of their meals. Lycurgus would never reduce his laws into writing ; nay, there is a Rhetra expressly to forbid it. For he thought that the most material points, and such as most directly tended to the public Avelfare, being imprinted on the hearts of their youth by a good discipline, would be sure to remain, and would find a stronger securit}'-, than any compulsion would be, in the principles of action formed in them by their best lawgiver, education. And as ibr things of lesser importance, as pecuniary contracts, and such like, the forms of which have to be chanired as occasion requires, he thought it the best way to prescribe no positive rule or inviolable usage in such cases, willing that their manner and form should be altered according to the circiunstances of time, and determinations of men of sound judgment. Every end and object of law and enactment it was his desio-n education should effect. 100 LYCURGUS. One. then, of the Rhetras was, that their laws should not be written ; another is particularly levelled against luxury and expensiveness, for by it it was ordained that the ceilings of their houses should only be wrought by the axe, and their gates and doors smoothed only by the saw. Epaminondas's ftimous dictum about his own table, that " Treason and a dinner like this do not keep com- pany together," may be said to have been anticipated by Lycurgus. Luxury and a house of this kind could not well be companions. For a man must have a less than ordinary share of sense that would furnish such plain and common rooms with silver-footed couches and purple coverlets and gold and silver plate. Doubtless he had good reason to think that they would proportion their beds to their houses, and their coverlets to their beds, and the rest of their goods and furniture to these. It is reported that king Leoty chides, the first of that name, was so little used to the sight of any other kind of work, that, being entertained at Corinth in a stately room, he was much surprised to see the timber and ceil- ing so finely carved and panelled, and asked his host whether the trees grew so in his country. A third ordinance or Rlietra was, that they should not make war often, or long, Avith the same enemy, lest that they should train and instruct them in war, by habitua- ting them to defend themselves. And this is what Agesi- laus was much blamed for, a long time after ; it being thought, that, by his continual incursions into Boeotia, he made the Thebans a match for the Lacedcemonians ; and therefore Antalcidas, seeing him wounded one day, said to him, that he was very well paid for taking such pains to make the Thebans good soldiers, whether they would or no. These laws were called the Rhetras, to intimate that they were divine sanctions and revelations. In order to the good education of their youth (which, LYCURGUS. 101 as I said before, lie thought the most important and noblest work of a lawgiver), he went so far back as to take into consideration their very conception and birth, by regulating their marriages. For Aristotle is wrong in saying, that, after he had tried all Λvays to reduce the women to more modesty and sobriety, he was at last forced to leave them as they were, because that, in the absence of their husbands, who spent the best part of their lives in the wars, their wives, whom they Λvere obliged to leave absolute mistresses at home, took great liberties and assumed the superiority ; and were treated with overmuch respect and called by the title of lady or queen. The truth is, he took in their case, also, all the care that w^as possible ; he ordered the maidens to exer- cise themselves Λvith Λvrestlin":, runnins:, throwino• the quoit, and casting the dart, to the end that the fruit they conceived might, in strong and healthy bodies, take firmer root and find better growth, and withal that they, with this greater vigor, might be the more able to undergo the pains of child-bearing. And to the end he might take away their over-great tenderness and fear of ex- posure to the air, and all acquired womanishness, he ordered that the young women should go naked in the l^rocessions, as well as the young men, and dance, too, in that condition, at certain solemn feasts, singing certain songs, Λvhilst the young men stood around, seeing and hearing them. On these occasions, they now and then made, by jests, a befitting reflection upon those who liad misbehaved themselves in the wars ; and again sang enco- miums upon those who had done any gallant action, and by these means inspired the younger sort Avith an emula- tion of their glory. Those that were thus commended went away proud, elated, and gratified with their honor among the maidens; and those λυΙιο were rallied were a.••: sensibly touched with it as if they had been formally 102 LYCURGUS. rGprimanded ; and so much the more, because the kings and the elders, as well as the rest of the citj, saw and heard all that passed. Nor was there any thing shameful in this nakedness of the young women ; modesty attend- ed them, and all wantonness was excluded. It taught them simj)licity and a care for good health, and gave them some taste of higher feelings, admitted as they thus were to the field of noble action and glory. Hence it was natural for them to think and speak as Gorgo, for example, the wife of Leonidas, is said to have done, when some foreign lady, as it would seem, told her that the women of Lacedaemon were the only women of the world who could rule men ; " With good reason," she said, " for we are the only women who bring forth men." These public processions of the maidens, and their appearing naked in their exercises and dancings, were incitements to marriage, operating upon the young with the rigor and certainty, as Plato says, of love, if not of mathematics. But besides all this, to promote it yet more effectually, those who continued bachelors were in a degree disfranchised by law ; for they were excluded from the sight of those public processions in which the young men and maidens danced naked, and, in Λvinter- time, the officers compelled them to march naked them- selves round the market-place, singing as they went a certain song to their own disgrace, that they justly suffered this punishment for disobeying the laws. More- over, they were denied that respect and observance which the younger men paid their elders ; and no man, for example, found fault with what was said to Dercyllidas, though so eminent a commander ; upon whose approach one day, a young man, instead of rising, retained his seat, remarking, " No child of yours will make room lor me." In their marriages, the husband carried off his bride by LYCURGUS. 103 a sort of force ; nor were their brides ever small and of tender years, but in their full bloom and ripeness. After this, she who superintended the wedding comes and clips the haii^of the bride close round her head, dresses her up in man's clothes, and leaves her upon a mattress in the dark ; afterwards comes the bridegroom, in his every-da}; clothes, sober and composed, as having supped at the common table, and, entering privately into the room where the bride lies, unties her virgin zone, and takes her to himself; and, after staying some time together, he returns composedly to his own apartment, to sleep ae usual with the other young men. And so he continues to do, spending his days, and, indeed, his nights Avitli them, visiting his bride in fear and shame, and with circumspec- tion, when he thought he should not be observed ; she, also, on her part, using her Λvit to help and find favorable opportunities for their meeting, when company Λvas out of the way. In this manner they lived a long time, inso- much that they sometimes had children by their wives before ever they saw their faces by daylight. Their inter- views, being thus difficult and rare, served not only for continual exercise of their self-control, but brought them together Avith their bodies healthy and vigorous, and their affections fresh and lively, unsated and undulled by easy access and long continuance with each other ; while their partings were always early enough to leave behind unex- tinguished in each of them some remainder fire of lono'ing and mutual delight. After guarding marriage Avith this modesty and reserve, he was equally careful to banish empty and womanish jealousy. For this object, exclu- ding all licentious disorders, he made it, nevertheless, hon- oi-able ibr men to give the use of their wives to those whom they should think fit, that so they might have children by them ; ridiculing those in whose opinion such favors are so unfit for participation as to fight and shed 104 LiCURGUS. blood and go to war about it. Lycurgus allowed a man who was advanced in years and had a young wife to recommend some virtuous and approved young man, that she might have a child by him, who might iniierit the good qualities of the father, and be a son to himself On the other side, an honest man who had love for a mar- ried Λγοη^η upon account of her modesty and the well- fav«)redness of her children, might, without formality, beg her company of her husband, that he might raise, as it were, from this plot of good ground, worthy and well- allied children for himself And, indeed. Lycurgus was of a persuasion that children were not so much the property of their parents as of the whole commonwealth, and, therefore, would not have his citizens begot by the first comers, but by the best men that could be found ; the laws of other nations seemed to him very absurd and in- consistent, where people would be so solicitous for their dogs and horses as to exert interest and pay money to procure fine breeding, and yet kept their wives shut up, to be made mothers only by themselves, who might be foolish, infirm, or diseased ; as if it were not apparent that children of a bad breed would prove their bad qualities first upon those who kept and were rearing them, and well-born children, in like manner, their good qualities. These regulations, founded on natural and social grounds, were certainly so far from that scandalous liberty which was afterwards charged upon their women, that they knew not what adultery meant. It is told, for instance, of Geradas, a very ancient Spartan, that, being asked by a stranger what punishment their law had appointed for adulterers, he answered, " There are no adulterers in our country." " But," replied the stranger, " suppose there were ? " " Then," answered he, " the offender would haΛ'e to give the plaintiff a bull with a neck so long as that he might drink from the top of Taygetus of the Eurotas river LYCURGUS. 105 below it." The man, surprised at this, said, " Why, 't is impossible to find such a bull." Geradas smilingly re- plied, " 'T is as possible as to find an adulterer in Sparta." So much I had to say of their marriages. Nor was it in the power of the father to dispose of the child as he thought fit ; he was obliged to carry it before certain triers at a place called Lesche ; these were some of the elders of the tribe to which the child belonged ; their business it was carefully to view the infant, and, if they found it stout and well made, they gave order for its rearing, and allotted to it one of the nine thousand shares of land above mentioned for its maintenance, but, if they found it puny and ill-shaped, ordered it to be taken to what was called the Apothetae, a sort of chasm under Taygetus ; as thinking it neither for the good of the child itself, nor for the public interest, that it should be brought up, if it did not, from the very outset, appear made to be healthy and vigorous. Upon the same ac- count, the women did not bathe the new-born children Λvith water, as is the custom in all other countries, but with wine, to prove the temper and complexion of their bodies ; from a notion they had that epileptic and weakly children faint and waste away upon their being thus bathed, while, on the contrary, those of a strong and vigorous habit acquire firmness and get a temper by it, like steel. There was much care and art, too, used by the nurses; they had no swaddling bands; the children grew up free and unconstrained in limb and form, and not dainty and fanciful about their food ; not afraid in the dark, or of being left alone ; without any peevishness or ill humor or crying. Upon this account. Spartan nurses were often bought up, or hired by people of other coun- tries; and it is recorded that she who suckled Alcibiades was a Spartan; who, howevei•, if fortunate in his nurse, was not so in his preceptor; his guardian, Pericles, as 106 LYCURGUS. Plato tells us, chose a servant for that office called Zopy rus, no better than any common slave. Lycurgus Λvas of another mind ; he would not have masters bought out of the market for his young Spartans, nor such as should sell their pains ; nor was it lawful, indeed, for the father himself to breed up the children after his own fancy; but as soon as they were seven years old they were to be enrolled in certain companies and classes, where they all lived under the same order and discipline, doing their exercises and taking their play to- gether. Of these, he who showed the most conduct and courage Λvas made captain ; they had their eyes always upon him, obeyed his orders, and underwent patiently whatsoever punishment he inflicted; so that the Λvhole course of their education was one continued exercise of a ready and perfect obedience. The old men, too, were spec- tators of their performances, and often raised quarrels and disputes among them, to have a good opportunity of find- ing out their different characters, and of seeing which would be valiant, Avhich a coward, when they should come to more dangerous encounters. Reading and writing they gave them, just enough to serve their turn ; their chief care was to make them good subjects, and to teach them to endure pain and conquer in battle. To this end, as they grew in years, their discipline Avas proportionably in- creased ; their heads Avere close-clipped, they were accus- tomed to go bare-foot, and for the most part to play naked. After they were twelve years old, they were no longer allowed to \vear any under-garment ; they had one coat to serve them a year ; '"''■ their bodies were hard and dry, with but little acquaintance of baths and unguents ; these human indulgences they were allowed only on some few * The chiton and the himation, sponding in use to the Iloman tunic one inside and one out, constituted and toga. the ordinary Gx'eek dress ; corre- LYCURGUS. 207 particular days in the year. They lodged together in little bands upon beds made of the rushes which grew by the banks of the river Eurotas, which they Avere to break off with their hands without a knife ; if it were winter, they mingled some thistle-down w^ith then- rushe.«, which it was thought had the property of giving warmth. By the time they were come to this age, there was not any of the more hopeful boys who had not a lover to bear him company. The old men, too, had an eye upon them, coming often to the grounds to hear and see them contend either in wit or strength with one another, and this as seriously and with as much concern as if they were their fathers, their tutors, or their magistrates ; so that there scarcely was any time or place without some one present to put them in mind of their duty, and punish them if they had neglected it. Besides all this, there was always one of the best and honestest men in the city appointed to undertake the charge and governance of them ; he again arranged them into their several bands, and set over each of them for their captain the most temperate and boldest of those they called Irens, who were usually twenty years old, two years out of the boys ; and the eldest of the boys, again, were Mell-Irens, as much as to say, Λνΐιο would shortly be men. This young man, therefore, was their captain when they fought, and their master at home, using them for the offices of his house ; sending the oldest of them to fetch wood, and the weaker and less able, to gather salads and herbs, and these they must either go without or steal ; Avhich they did by creeping into tli(i gardens, or conveying themselves cunningly and closely into the eating-houses ; if they were taken in the fact, they were whipped without mercy, for thieving so ill and awkwardly. They stole, too, all other meat they could lay their hands on, looking out and watching all ojipor- 108 LYCURGUS. tunities, when people were asleep or more careless than usual. If they were caught, they were not only punished with whipping, but hunger, too, being reduced to their ordi- nary allowance, which was but very slender, and so con- trived on purpose, that they might set about to help them- selves, and be forced to exercise their energy and address. This was the principal design of their hard fare ; there was another not inconsiderable, that they might grow taller ; for the vital spirits, not being overburdened and oppressed by too great a quantity of nourishment, which necessarily discharges itself into thickness and breadth, do, by their natural lightness, rise ; and the body, giving and yielding because it is pliant, grows in height. The same thing seems, also, to conduce to beauty of shape ; a dry and lean habit is a better subject for nature's configuration, which the gross and over-fed are too heavy to submit to properly. Just as we find that women who take physic wdiilst they are with child, bear leaner and smaller but better-shaped and prettier children; the material they come of having been more pliable and easily moulded. The reason, however, I leave others to determine. To return from whence we have digressed. So seri- ously did the Lacedaemonian children go about their stealing, that a youth, having stolen a young fox and hid it under his coat, suffered it to tear out his very bowels with its teeth and claws, and died upon the place, rather than let it be seen. What is practised to this very day in Lacedsemon is enough to gain credit to this story, for I myself have seen several of the youths endure whipping to death at the foot of the altar of Diana surnamed Or- thia. The Iren, or under-master, used to stay a little with them after supper, and one of them he bade to sing a song, to another he put a question Λvhich required an advised and deliberate answer; for example, λΥΙιο was LYCURGUS. 109 the best man in the city ? What he thought of such an action of such a man ? They used them thus early to pass a right judgment upon persons and things, and to inform themselves of the abilities or defects of their countrymen. If they had not an answer ready to the question Who was a good or who an ill-reputed citizen, they were looked upon as of a dull and careless disposition, and to have little or no sense of \'irtae and honor ; besides this, they were to give a good reason for what they said, and in as few words and as comprehensive as might be ; he that failed of this, or answered not to the purpose, had his thumb bit by his master. Sometimes the Iren did this in the presence of the old men and magistrates, that they might see Λvhether he punished them justly and in due measure or not ; and when he did amiss, they would not reprove him before the boys, but, when they were o;one, he Λvas called to an account and underwent correc- tion, if he had run far into either of the extremes of indulgence or severity. Their lovers and favorers, too, had a share in the young boy's honor or disgrace ; and there goes a story that one of them was fined by the magistrates, because the lad whom he loved cried out effeminately as he was fighting. And though this sort of love Avas so approved among them, that the most virtuous matrons would make profes- sions of it to young girls, yet rivalry did not exist, and if several men's fancies met in one person, it was rather the beginning of an intimate friendship, whilst they all jointly conspired to render the object of their ailection as accomplished as possible. They taught them, also, to speak with a natuial and graceful raillery, and to comprehend much nuUter of thought in few words. For Lycurgus, who ordered, as we saw', that a great piece of money should be but οΓ an inconsideial)le value, on the contrary would allow nu 110 LYCURGUS. discourse to be current which did not contain in few words a great deal of useful and curious sense ; children in Sparta, by a habit of long silence, came to give just and sententious answers; for, indeed, as loose and incon- tinent livers are seldom fathers of many children, so loose and incontinent talkers seldom originate many sen- sible words. King Agis, when some Athenian laughed at their short swords, and said that the jugglers on the stage swallowed them with ease, answered him, " We find them lonu; enough to reach our enemies with ; " and as their swords were short and sharp, so, it seems to me, were their sayings. They reach the point and arrest the atten- tion of the hearers better than any. Lycurgus himself seems to have been short and sententious, if we may trust the anecdotes of him ; as appears by his answer to one who by all means would set up democracy in Lace- diiemon. "Begin, friend," said he, "and set it up in your i'amily." Another asked him why he allowed of such mean and trivial sacrifices to the gods. He replied, " That we may always have something to oiler to them." Being asked Avhat sort of martial exercises or combats he ap- proved of, he answered, "All sorts, except that in which you stretch out your hands." * Similar answers, addressed to his countr-ymen by letter, are ascribed to him ; as, being consulted how they might best oppose an invasion of their enemies, he returned this answer, " By continuing poor, and not coveting each man to be greater than his fellow." Being consulted again whether it were requi- site to enclose the city with a wall, he sent them word, " The city is well fortified which hath a wall of men in- stead of brick." But whether these letters are counterfeit or not is not easy to determine. Of their dislike to talkativeness, the following apo- * The form of crying quarter among the ancients. LYCURGUS. Ill plitliegiiis are evidence. King Leonidas said to one who held liini in dis-course upon some useful matter, but not in due time and place, "Much to the purpose. Sir, else- where " King Charilaus, the nephew of Lycurgus, being asked why his uncle had made so few laws, ansΛvered, " Men of fcAv words require but few laws." When one Ijlamed Hecataius the sophist because that, being invited to the public table, he had not spoken one word all sup- per-time, Archidamidas answered in his vindication, " He who knows how to speak, knows also when." The sharp and yet not ungraceful retorts whicli I men- tioned may be instanced as foUow's. Demaratus, being asked in a troublesome manner by an importunate fellow, Who vvas the best man in Lacedcemon ? answered at last, " He, Sir, that is the least like you." Some, in company where Agis was, much extolled the Eleans for their just and honorable management of the Olympic games ; " In- deed," said Agis, " they are highly to be commended if they can do justice one day in five jears." Theopompus answered a stranger vvho talked much of his affection to the Laceda3monians, and said that his countrymen called him Philolacon (a lover of the Lacedaemonians), that it had been more for his honor if they had called him Phi- lopolites (a lover of his own countrymen). And Plistoa- nax, the son of Pausanias, vvhen an orator of Athens said the Lacedaemonians had no learning, told him, " You say true, Sir ; we alone of all the Greeks have learned none of your bad qualities." One asked Archidamidas what number tliere might be of the Spartans; he answered, " Enough, Sir, to keep out wicked men." We may see their character, too, in their very jests. For they did not throw them out at random, but the very wit of them was grounded upon something or other worth thinking about. For instance, one, being asked t and greatest 198 SOLON. enemies to the rich ; insomuch that, though the city still used the new laws, yet all looked for and desired a change of government, hoping severally that the change would be better for them, and put them above the contrary fac- tion. Affairs standing thus, Solon returned, and was reverenced by all, and honored ; but his old age ΛνοηΜ not permit him to be as active, and to speak in public, as formerly ; yet, by privately conferring with the heads of the factions, he endeavored to compose the differences, Pisistratus appearing the most tractable ; for he was ex- tremely smooth and engaging in his language, a great friend to the poor, and moderate in his resentments ; and Avhat nature had not given him, he had the skill to imi- tate ; so that he was trusted more than the others, being accounted a prudent and orderly man, one that loved equality, and would be an enemy to any that moved against the present settlement. Thus he deceived the majority of people ; but Solon quickly discovered his character, and found out his design before any one else ; yet did not hate him upon this, but endeavored to humble him, and bring him off from his ambition, and often told him and others, that if any one could banish the passion for preeminence from his mind, and cure him of his desire of absolute power, none would make a more virtuous man or a more excellent citizen. Thespis, at this time, beginning to act tragedies, and the thing, because it was new, taking very much with the multitude, though it was not yet made a matter of competition, Solon, being by nature fond of hearing and learning something neAV, and now, in his old age, living idly, and enjoying himself, indeed, with music and with wine, w^ent to see Thespis iiimself, as the ancient custom was, act; and after the pi a}• was done, he addressed him, and asked him if he was not ashamed to tell so many lies before such a num- ber of people; and Thespis replying that it was no huvr' SOLON. 199 to say or do so in play, Solon vehemently struck his staff against the ground : " Ay," said he, " if we honor and commend such play as this, we shall find it some day in our business," Now when Pisistratus, having wounded himself, was brought into the market-place in a chariot, and stirred up the people, as if he had been thus treated by his op- ponents because of his political conduct, and a great many were enraged and cried out, Solon, coming close to him, said, " This, son of Hippocrates, is a bad copy of Homer's Ulysses ; you do, to trick youi- countrymen, what he did to deceive his enemies." After this, the people were eager to protect Pisistratus, and met in an assem- bly, where one Ariston making a motion that they should allow Pisistratus fifty clubmen for a guard to his person, Solon opposed it, and said, much to the same purport as what he has left us in his poems, You doat upon his words and taking phrase ; and again, — True, you are singly each a crafty soul, But all together make one empty fool. But observing the poor men bent to gratify Pisistratus, and tumultuous, and the rich fearful and getting out of harm's way, he departed, saying he was wiser than some and stouter than others; Λviser than those that did not understand the design, stouter than those that, though they understood it, were afraid to oppose the tyranny. Now, the people, having passed the law, were not nice with Pisistratus about the number of his clubmen, but took no notice of it, though he enlisted and kept as many as he would, until he seized the Acropolis. When that was done, and the city in an uproar, Megacles, with all his family, at once fled ; but Solon, though he was 200 SOLON. now very old, and had none to back him, yet came into the market-place and made a speech to the citizens, parti}' blaming their inadvertency and meanness of spirit, and in part urging and exhorting them not thus tamely to lose their liberty ; and likewise then spoke that memorable saying, that, before, it was an easier task to stop the rising tyranny, but now the greater and more glorious action to destroy it, when it was begun already, and had gathered strength. But all being afraid to side with him, he returned home, and, taking his arms, he brought them out and laid them in the porch before his door, with these words : " I have done my part to maintain my country and my laws," and then he busied himself no more. His friends advising him to fly, he refused, but wrote poems, and thus reproached the Athe- nians in them, — If now you suffer, do not blame the Powers, For they are good, and all the fault was ours. All the strongholds you put into his hands, And now his slaves must do what he commands. And many telling him that the tyrant would take his life for this, and asking what he trusted to, that he ven- tured to speak so boldly, he replied, " To my old age." But Pisistratus, having got the command, so extremely courted Solon, so honored him, obliged him, and sent to see him, that Solon gave him his advice, and approved many of his actions; for he retained most of Solon's laws, ob- served them himself, and compelled his friends to obey. And he himself, though already absolute ruler, being accused of murder before the Areopagus, came quietly to clear himself; but his accuser did not appear. And he added other laws, one of which is that the maimed in the wars sliould be maintained at the public charge ; this Heraclides Ponticus records, and that Pisistratus followed SOLON. 201 Solon's example in this, who had decreed it in the case of one Thersippns, that was maimed ; and Theo- phrastiis asserts that it Avas Pisistratus, not Solon, that made that law against laziness, which was the reason that the country was more productive, and the city tranquiller. Now Solon, having begun the great work in verse, the history or fable of the Atlantic Island, which he had learned from the wise men in Sais, and thought conveni- ent for the Athenians to know, abandoned it; not, as Plato says, by reason of want of time, but because of his age, and being discouraged at the greatness of the task ; for that he had leisure enough, such verses tes- tify, as Each day grow older, and learn something new and again, — But now the Powers of Beauty, Song, and Wine, Which are most men's delights, are also mine. Plato, willing to improve the story of the Atlantic Island, as if it were a fair estate that wanted an heir and came with some title to him, formed, indeed, stately entrances, noble enclosures, large courts, such as never yet introduced any story, fable, or poetic fiction ; but, beginning it late, ended his life before his work ; and the reader's regret for the unfinished part is the greater, as the satisfaction he takes in that which is complete is extraordinary. For as the city of Athens left only the temple of Jupiter Olympius unfinished, so Plato, amongst all his excellent works, left this only piece about the Atlantic Island im- perfect. Solon lived after Pisistratus seized the govern- ment, as Heraclides Ponticus asserts, a long time ; but Phanias the Eresian says not two full years ; for Pisistra- tus began his tyranny when Comias was archon, and Phanias says Solon died under Hegestratus, who succeeded 202 SOLON. Comias. The story that his ashes were scattered about the island Salamis is too strange to be easily believed, or be thought any thing but a mere fable ; and yet it is given, amongst other good authors, by Aristotle, the phi- losopher. POPLICOLA. Such was Solon. To him we compare Poplicola, who i*e- ceived this later title from the Eoman people for his merit, as a noble accession to his former name, Publiiis Valerius. He descended from Valerius, a man amongst the early citizens, reputed the principal reconciler of the differences betwixt the Romans and Sabines, and one that was most instrumental in persuading their kings to assent to peace and union. Thus descended, Publius Valerius, as it is said, whilst Rome remained under its kinglj government, ob- tained as great a name from his eloquence as from his riches, charitably employing the one in liberal aid to the poor, the other with integrity and freedom in the ser- vice of justice; thereby giving assurance, that, should the government fall into a republic, he would become a chief man in the community. The illegal and wicked accession of Tarquinius Superbus to the crown, Avith his making it, instead of kingly rule, the instrument of insolence and tyranny, having inspired the people with a hatred to his reign, upon the death of Lucretia (she killing herself after violence had been done to her), they took an occa- sion of revolt ; and Lucius Brutus, engaging in the change, came to Valerius before all others, and, with his zealous assistance, deposed the kings. And whilst the people inclined towards the electing one leader instead of their king, Valerius acquiesced, that to rule was rather Bru- (203) 204 POPLICOLA. tus's due, as the author of the democracy. But when the name of monarchy was odious to the people, and a divided power appeared more grateful in the prospect, and two were chosen to hold it, Valerius, entertaining hopes that he might he elected consul with Brutus, was disappointed ; for, instead of Valerius, notwithst;niding the endeavors of Brutus, Tarquinius Collatinus was chosen, the husband of Lucretia, a man noways his superior in merit. But the nobles, dreading the return of their king\s, who still used all endeavors abroad and solicitations at home, were resolved upon a chieftain of an intense hatred to them, and noways likely to yield. Now Valerius was troubled, that his desire to serve his country should be doubted, because he had sustained no private injury from the insolence of the tyrants. He withdrew from the senate and practice of the bar, quitting all public concerns ; which gave an occasion of discourse, and fear, too, lest his anger should reconcile him to the king's side, and he should prove the ruin of the state, tottering as yet under the uncertainties of a change. But Brutus being doubtful of some others, and determin- ing to give the test to the senate upon the altars, upon the day appointed Valerius came with cheerfulness into the forum, and was the first man that took the oath, in no way to submit or yield to Tarquin's propositions, but rigorously to maintain liberty ; which gave great satis- faction to the senate and assurance to the consuls, his actions soon after showing the sincerity of his oath. For ambassadors came from Tarquin, with popular and spe- cious proposals, whereby they thought to seduce the peo- ple, as though the king had cast off all insolence, and made moderation the only measure of his desires. To this embassy the consuls thought fit to give public audience, but Valerius opposed it, and would not permit that the poorer people, who entertained more fear of war than of POPLICOLA. 205 tyranny, should ΙιαΛ^θ any occasion ofFered them, or any temptations to new designs. Afterwards other ambassa- dors arrived, who declared their king would recede from his crown, and lay down his arms, only capitulating for a restitution to himself, his friends, and allies, of their moneys and estates to support them in their banishment. Now, several inclining to the request, and Collatinus in par- ticular iiivoring it, Brutus, a man of vehement and unbend- ing nature, rushed into the forum, there proclaiming his felloAv-consul to be a traitor, in granting subsidies to ty- ranny, and supplies for a war to those to whom it was monstrous to allow so much as subsistence in exile. This caused an assembly of the citizens, amongst Λvhom the first that spake Avas Caius Minucius, a private man, who advised Brutus, and urged the Romans, to keep the pro- perty, and employ it against the tyrants, rather than to remit it to the tj'rants, to be used against themselves. The Romans, however, decided that whilst they enjoyed the liberty they had fought for, they should not sacrifice peace for the sake of money, but send out the tyrants* property after them. This question, however, of his pro- perty, was the least part of Tarquin's design ; the demand sounded the feelings of the people, and was preparatory to a conspiracy which the ambassadors endeavored to excite, delaying their return, under pretence of selling some of the goods and reserving others to be sent away, till, in fine, they corrupted two of the most eminent fiim- ilies in Rome, the Aquillian, which had three, and the Vitellian, which had two senators. These all were, by the mother's side, nephews to Collatinus; besides which Brutus had a special alliance to the Vitellii from his mar- riage Avith their sister, by whom he had several children ; two of whom, of their own age, their near relations and daily companions, the Vitellii seduced to join in the plot, to ally themselves to the great house and royal hopes of 206 POPLTCOLA. the Tarquins, and gain emancipation from the violence and imbecility united of their father, whose austerity to offenders they termed violence, while the imbecility which he had long feigned, to protect himself from the tyrants, still, it appears, Avas, in name at least, ascribed to him. When upon these inducements the youths came to confer with the Aquillii, all thought it convenient to bind them- selves in a solemn and dreadful oath, by tasting the blood of a murdered man, and toucliing his entrails. For which design they met at the house of the Aquillii. The budd- ing chosen for the transaction was, as was natural, dark and unfrequented, and a slave named Vindicius had, as it chanced, concealed himself there, not out of design or any intelligence of the affair, but, accidentally being with- in, seeing with how much haste and concern they came in, he was afraid to be discovered, and placed himself be- hind a chest, where he Avas able to observe their actions and overhear their debates. Their resolutions were to kill the consuls, and they wrote letters to Tarquin to this effect, and gave them to the ambassadors, who were lodg- ing upon the spot with the Aquillii, and were present at the consultation. Upon their departure, Vindicius secretly quitted the house, but was at a loss what to do in the matter, for to arraign the sons before the father Brutus, or the nephews before the uncle Collatinus, seemed equally (as indeed it was) shocking; yet he knew no private Roman to whom he could intrust secrets of such importance. Unable, how- ever, to keep silence, and burdened with his knowledge, he went and addressed himself to Valerius, whose known freedom and kindness of temper were an inducement; as he was a person to whom the needy had easy access, and who never shut his gates against the petitions or indi- gences of humble people. But when Vindicius came and made a complete discovery to him, his brother Marcus POFLICOLA. 207 and his own wife being present, Valerius was struck with amazement, and by no means wonld dismiss the discov- erer, but confined him to the room, and placed his wife as a guard to the door, sending his brother in the interim to beset the king's palace, and seize, if possible, the wri- tings there, and secure the domestics, whilst he, with his constant attendance of clients and friends, and a great retinue of attendants, repaired to the house of the Aquil• Hi, Avho Λvere, as it chanced, absent from home ; and so, forcing an entrance through the gates, they lit upon the letters then lying in the lodgings of the ambassadors. Meantime the Aquillii returned in all haste, and, cominor to blows about the gate, endeavored a recovery of the letters. The other party made a resistance, and, throwing their gowns round their opponents' necks, at last, after much struggling on both sides, made their Λvay with their prisoners through the streets into the forum. The like en- gagement happened about the king's palace, where Mar- cus seized some other letters which it was designed should be conveyed away in the goods, and, laying hands on such of the king's people as he could find, dragged them also into the forum. When the consuls had quieted the tumult, Vindicius was brought out by the orders of Ya- lerius, and the accusation stated, and the letters were opened, to Avhich the traitors could make no plea. Most of the people standing mute and ^sorrowful, some only, out of kindness to Brutus, mentioning banishment, the tears of Collatinus, attended with Valerius's silence, gave some hopes of mercy. But Brutus, calling his two sons by their names, " Canst not thou," said he, " Titus, or thou, Tiberius, make any defence against the indictment ?" The question being thrice proposed, and no reply made, he turned himself to the lictors, and cried, " What remains is your duty." They immediately seized the youths, and, stripping them of their clothes, bound their hands behind 208 POPLICOLA. them, and scourged their bodies with their rods ; too tra- gical a scene for others to look at ; Brutus, however, ia said not to have turned aside his face, nor allowed the least glance of pity to soften and smoothe his aspect of rigor and austerity ; but sternly watched his children suffer, even till the lictors, extending them on the grouinl, cut off their heads Avith an axe ; then departed, commit- ting the rest to the judgment of his colleague. An action truly open alike to the highest commendation and the strongest censure ; for either the greatness of his virtue raised him above the impressions of sorrow, or the ex- travagance of his misery took away all sense of it ; but neither seemed common, or the result of humanity, but either divine or brutish. Yet it is more reasonable that our judgment should yield to his reputation, than that his merit should suffer detraction by the weakness of our judgment ; in the Romans' opinion, Brutus did a greater work in the establishment of the government than Rom- ulus in the foundation of the city. Upon Brutus's departure out of the forum, consterna- tion, horror, and silence for some time possessed all that reflected on Avhat was done ; the easiness and tardiness, however, of Collatinus, gave confidence to the Aquillii to request some time to ansAver their charge, and that Vin- dicius, their servant, should be remitted into their hands, and no lono-er harbored amono-st their accusers. The ο ο consul seemed inclined to their proposal, and was pro- ceeding to dissolve the assembly ; but Valerius would not suffer Vindicius, who was surrounded by his people, to be surrendered, nor the meeting to withdraw Avithout pun- ishing the traitors ; and at length laid violent hands upon the Aquillii, and, calling Brutus to his assistance, ex- claimed against the unreasonable course of Collatinus, to impose upon his colleague the necessity of taking aAvay the lives of his own sons, and yet have thoughts of grati- (POPLlfcOLA. 209 fy'ing some women with the lives of traitors and public enemies. Collatinus, displeased at this, and commanding Vindicius to be taken away, the lictors made their way through the crowd and seized their man, and struck all who endeavored a rescue. Valerius's friends headed the resistance, and the people cried out for Brutus, Avho, return- ing, on silence being made, told them he had been compe- tent to pass sentence by himself upon his own sons, but left the rest to the suffrages of the free citizens : " Let every man speak that wishes, and persuade whom he can." But there was no need of oratory, for, it being referred to the vote, they Λvere returned condemned by all the suf- frages, and were accordingly beheaded. Collatinus's relationship to the kings had, indeed, al- ready rendered him suspicious, and his second name, too, had made him obnoxious to the people, who Avere loth to hear the very sound of Tarquin; but after this had happened, perceiving himself an offence to every one, he relinquished his charge and departed from the city. At the new elections in his room, Valerius obtained, with high honor, the consulship, as a just reward of his zeal; of which he thought Vindicius deserved a share, Avhom he made, first of all freedmen, a citizen of Rome, and gave him the privilege of voting in what tribe soever he was pleased to be enrolled ; other freedmen received the right of suffrage along time after from Appius, who thus courted popularity; and from this Vindicius, a perfect manumission is called to this day vindicia. This done, the goods of the kings were exposed to plunder, and the palace to ruin. The pleasantest part of the field of Mars, which Tar- ({uin had owned, was devoted to the service of that god ; but, it happening to be harvest season, and the sheaves yet being on the ground, they thought it not proper to commit them to the Hail, or unsanctily theiD VOL. I. 14 210 POPLICOLA. with any use ; and, therefore, carrying them to the river- side, and trees withal that were cut down, they cast all into the water, dedicating the soil, free from all occupji- tion, to the deity. Now, these thrown in, one upon another, and closing together, the stream did not bear them f\\r, but where the first Λvere carried down and came to a bottom, the remainder, finding no farther con- veyance, were stopped and interwoven one with anothei ; the stream working the mass into a firmness, and wash- ing down fresh mud. This, settling there, became an accession of matter, as well as cement, to the rubbish, in- somuch that the violence of the waters could not remove it, but forced and compressed it all together. Thus its bulk and solidity gained it new subsidies, which gave it exten- sion enough to stop on its way most of what the stream brought down. This is now a sacred island, lying by the city, adorned with temples of the gods, and walks, and is called in the Latin tongue inter duos ponies. Though some say this did not happen at the dedication of Tarquin's field, but in after-times, Λvhen Tarquinia, a vestal priesir ess, gave an adjacent field to the public, and obtained great honors in consequence, as, amongst the rest, that of all women her testimony alone should be received ; she had also the liberty to marry, but refused it ; thus some tell the story. Tarquin, despairing of a return to his kingdom by the conspiracy, found a kind reception amongst the Tuscans, who, with a great army, proceeded to restore him. The consuls headed the Romans against them, and made their rendezvous in certain holy places, the one called the Arsian grove, the other the jEsuvian meadow. When they came into action, Aruns, the son of Tarquin, and Brutus, the Roman consul, not accidentally encountering each other, but out of hatred and rage, the one to avenge tyranny and enmity to his country, the other his banish- POPLICOLA. 211 ment, set spurs to their horses, and, engaging with more furj than forethought, disregarding their own security, fell together in the combat. This dreadful onset hardly was followed by a more favorable end ; both armies, doing and receiving equal damage, w^ere separated b}^ a storm. Valerius was much concerned, not knowing what the result of the day was, and seeing his men as well dis- mayed at the sight of their own dead, as rejoiced at the loss of the enemy ; so apparently equal in the number was the slaughter on either side. Each party, however, felt surer of defeat from the actual sight of their own dead, than they could feel of victory from conjecture about those of their adversaries. The night being come (and such as one may presume must follow such a bat- tle), and the armies laid to rest, they say that the grove shook, and uttered a voice, saying that the Tuscans had lost one man more than the Romans ; clearly a divine an- nouncement ; and the Romans at once received it with shouts and expressions of joy ; whilst the Tuscans, through fear and amazement, deserted their tents, and were for the most part dispersed. The Romans, falling upon the remainder, amounting to nearly five thousand, took them prisoners, and plundered the camp ; when they numbered the dead, they found on the Tuscans' side eleven thousand and three hundred, exceeding their own loss but by one man. This fight happened upon the last day of Feb- ruary, and Valerius triumphed in honor of it, being the first consul that drove in Avith a four-horse chariot ; which sight both appeared magnificent, and was received with an admiration free from envy or offence (as some suggest) on the part of the spectators; it would not otherwise have been continued with so much eniierness and emulation through all the after ages. The people applauded likewise the honors he did to his colleague, in adding to his obsequies a funeral oration; which was so 212 POPLICOLA. much liked by the Romans, and found so good a recep- tion, that it became customary for the best men to cele- brate the funerals of great citizens with speeches in their commendation ; and their antiquity in Rome is affirmed to be greater than in Greece, unless, with the orator Anaximenes, we make Solon the first author. Yet some part of Valerius's behavior did give offence and disgust to the people, because Brutus, whom they esteemed the father of their liberty, had not presumed to ride without a colleague, but united one and then another to him in his commission ; while Valerius, they said, centering all authority in himself, seemed not in any sense a successor to Brutus in the consulship, but to Tarquin in the tyranny ; he might make verbal ha- rangues to Brutus's memory, yet, when he was attended with all the rods and axes, proceeding down from a house than which the king's house that he had demo- lished had not been statelier, those actions showed him an imitator of Tarquin. For, indeed, his dwelling- house on the Velia Λvas somewhat imposing in appearance, hanging over the forum, and overlooking all transactions there ; the access to it was hard, and to see him far off coming down, a stately and royal spectacle. But Vale- rius showed how well it were for men in power and great offices to have ears that give admittance to truth before flattery ; for upon his friends telling him that he dis- pleased the people, he contended not, neither resented it, but while it was still night, sending for a number of work- people, pulled down his house and levelled it with the ground; so that in the morning the people, seeing and flock- ing together, expressed their wonder and their respect for his magnanimity, and their sorrow, as though it had been a human being, for the large and beautiful house which was thus lost to them by an unfounded jealousy, while its owner, their consul, without a roof of his own, haJ FOPLICOLA. 213 to beg a lodging with his friends. For his friends received him, till a place the people gave him was furnished Λvith a house, though less stately than his own, where now stands» the temple, as it is called, of Yica Pota. He resolved to render the government, as well as him- self, instead of terrible, familiar and pleasant to the peo- ple, and parted the axes from the rods, and always, upon his entrance into the assembly, lowered these also to the people, to show, in the strongest way, the republican foundation of the government; and this the consuls ob- serve to this day. But the humility of the man Λvas but a means, not, as they thought, of lessening himself, but merely to abate their envy by this moderation ; for what- ever he detracted from his authority he added to his real power, the people still submitting with satisfliction, which they expressed by calling him Poplicola, or people-lover, which name had the preeminence of the rest, and, there- fore, in the sequel of this narrative w ^ shall use no other. He gave free leave to any to sue for the consulship ; but before the admittance of a colleague, mistrusting the chances, lest emulation or ignorance should cross his designs, by his sole authority enacted his best and most important measures. First, he supplied the vacancies of the senators, whom either Tarquin long before had put to death, or the war lately cut off; those that he enrolled, they write, amounted to a hundred and sixty-four; after- wards he made several laws Λvhich added much to the people's liberty, in particular one granting offenders the liberty of appealing to the people from the judgment of the consuls; a second, that made it death to usurp anv magistracy without the people's consent ; a third, for the relief of poor citizens, which, taking off their taxes, encouraged their labors; another, against disobedience to the consuls, which was no less popular than the j-est, and rather to the benefit of the commonalty than to the 214 poplicola. advantage of the nobles, for it imposed upon disobedience the penalty of ten oxen and two sheep ; the price of a sheep being ten obols, of an ox, an hundred. For the use of money was then infrequent amongst the Romans, but their wealth in cattle great; even now pieces of property are called loeculia, from pecus, cattle ; and they had stamped upon their most ancient money an ox, a sheep, or a hog ; and surnamed their sons Suillii, Bubulci, Caprarii, and Porcii, from cajirce, goats, and porci, hogs. Amidst this mildness and moderation, for one excessive fault he instituted one excessive punishment; for he made it lawful without trial to take away any man's life that aspired to a tyranny, and acquitted the slayer, if he produced evidence of the crime ; for though it was not probable for a man, whose designs \vere so great, to escape all notice; yet because it was possible he might, although observed, by force anticipate judgment, which the usurpation itself would then preclude, he gave a license to any to anticijDate the usurper. He was honored likewise for the law touching the treasury ; for because it was necessary for the citizens to contribute out of their estates to the maintenance of wars, and he was unwilling himself to be concerned in the care of it, or to permit his friends, or indeed to let the public money pass into any private house, he allotted the temple of Saturn for the treasury, in which to this day they deposit the tribute- money, and granted the people the liberty of choosing two young men as quiB.stors, or treasurers. The first were Publius Veturius and Marcus Minucius; and a large sum was collected, for they assessed one hundred and thirty thousand, excusing orphans and widows from the payment. After these dispositions, he admitted Lucretius, the father of Lucretia, as his colleague, and gave him the precedence in the government, by resigning the fasces to him, as due to his years, which privilege of seniority continued to POPLICOLA. 215 our time. But within a few days Lucretius died, and in a new election Marcus Horatius succeeded in that honor, and continued consul for the remainder of the year. Now, whilst Tarquin was making preparations in Tus- cany for a second war against Uie Romans, it is siiid a great portent occurred. When Tarquin was king, and had all but completed the buildings of the Capitol, design- ing, whether from oracular advice or his own pleasure, to erect an earthen chariot upon the top, he intrusted the workmanship to Tuscans of the city Veii, but soon after lost his kingdom. The work thus modelled, the Tuscans set in a furnace, but the clay showed not those passive qualities which usually attend its nature, to subside and be condensed upon the evaporation of the moisture, but rose and s^velled out to that bulk, that, when solid and ■firm, notwithstanding the removal of the roof and open- ing the Λvalls of the furnace, it could not be taken out without much difficulty. The soothsayers looked upon this as a divine prognostic of success and power to those that should possess it ; and the Tuscans resolved not to deliver it to the Romans, who demanded it, but ansAvered that it rather belonged to Tarquin than to those who had sent him into exile. A few days after, they had a horse- race there, with the usual shows and solemnities, and as the charioteer, with his garland on his head, Avas quietly driving the victorious chariot out of the ring, the horses, upon no apparent occasion, taking fright, either by divine instigation or by accident, hurried aΛvay their driver at full speed to Rome ; neither did his holding them in pre- vail, nor his voice, but he was forced along with violence till, coming to the Capitol, he was thrown out by the gate called Ratumena. This occurrence raised Avonder and fear in the Veientines, λυΙιο now permitted the delivery of the chariot. The building of the temple of the Capitoline Japiter 216 POPLICOLA. had been vowed by Tarqiiin, the son of Deniaratus, when warring with the Sabines ; Tarquinius Superbus, his son or grandson, built, but could not dedicate it, because he lost his kingdom before it was quite finished. And now that it was completed wath all its ornaments, Poplicola was ambitious to dedicate it ; but the nobility envied him thai, honor, as, indeed, also, in some degree, those his prudence in makino; laws and conduct in wars entitled him to. Grudging him, at any rate, the addition of this, they urged Horatius to sue for the dedication, and, whilst Poplicola w^as engaged jn some military expedition, voted it to Horatius, and conducted him to the Capitol, as though, were Poplicola present, they could not have carried it. Yet, some write, Poplicola was by lot destined against his will to the expedition, the other to the dedication ; and what happened in the performance seems to intimate some ground for this conjecture ; for, upon the Ides of September, Λvhich happens about the full moon of the month Metagitnion, the people having assembled at the Capitol and silence being enjoined, Horatius, after the performance of other ceremonies, holding the doors, ac- cording to custom, was proceeding to pronounce the words of dedication, when Marcus, the brother of Popli- cola, who had got a place on purpose beforehand near the door, observing his opportunity, cried, " consul, thy son lies dead in the camp ; " which made a great impression upon all others who heard it, yet in nowise discomposed Horatius, who returned merely the reply, " Cast the dead out whither you please ; I am not a mourner ; " and so completed the dedication. The news was not true, but Marcus thought the lie might avert him from his perform- ance ; but it argues him a man of wonderful self-pos- session, whether he at once saw through the cheat, or, believing it as true, showed no discomposure. The same fortune attended the dedication of the second POPLICOLA. 217 temple, the first, as has been said, was built by Tarquiiij and dedicated byHoratius; it was burnt down in the civil wars. The second, Sylla built, and, dying before the dedi- cation, left that honor to Catulus; and w'hen this was demolished in the Vitellian sedition, Vespasian, with the same success that attended him in other thino;s, bes-an a third, and lived to see it finished, but did not live to see it again destroyed, as it presently was ; but was as fortunate in dying before its destruction, as Sylla was the reverse iti dying before the dedication of his. For immediately after Vespasian's death it was consumed by fire. The fourth, which now exists, was both built and dedicated by Domitian. It is said Tarquin expended forty thousand pounds of silver in the very foundations ; but the whole wealth o:' the richest private man in Rome ΛνοηΚΙ not discharge the cost of the gilding of this temple in our days, it amounting to above twelve thousand talents; the [illars were cut out of Pentelican marble, of a length most happily proportioned to their thickness ; these we saw at Athens ; but Λvhen they were cut anew at Rome and polished, they did not gain so much in embellishment, as they lost in symmetry, being rendered too taper and slender. Should any one who wonders at the costliness of the Capitol visit any one gallery in Domitian's palace, or hall, or bath, or the apartments of his concubines, Epicharmus's remark upon the prodigal, that 'T is not beneficence, but, truth to say, A mere disease of giving things away, would be in his mouth in application to Domitian. It is neither piety, he would say, nor magnificence, but, indeed, a mere disease of building, and a desire, like Midas, of converting every thing into gold or stone. And thus much for this matter. Tarquin, after the great battle wherein he lost his son 218 POrLICOLA. in combat with Brutus, fled to Clusium, and sought aid from Lars Porsenna, then one of the most powerful princes of Italy, and a man of worth and generosity ; who assured him of assistance, immediately sending his commands to Rouie that they should receive Tarquin as their king, and, upon the Romans' refusal, proclaimed war, and, having signified the time and place Λvllere he intended his attack, approached with a great army. Po- plicola was, in his absence, chosen consul a second time, and Titus Lucretius his colleague, and, returning to Rome, to show a spirit yet loftier than Porsenna's, built the city Sigliuria * when Porsenna was already in the neighbor- hood; and, walling it at great expense, there placed a colony of seven hundred men, as being little concerned at the war. Nevertheless, Porsenna, making a sharp assault, obliged the defendants to retire to Rome, who had almost in their entrance admitted the enemy into the city with them; only Poplicola by sallying out at the gate prevented them, and, joining battle by Tiber side, opposed the enemy, that pressed on with their mul- titude, but at last, sinking under desperate wounds, was carried out of the fight. The same fortune fell upon Lucretius, so that the Romans, being dismayed, retreated into the city for their security, and Rome was in great hazard of being taken, the enemy forcing their way on to the wooden bridge, where Horatius Codes, seconded by two of the first men in Rome, Herminius and Lartius, made head against them. Horatius obtained this name from the loss of one of his eyes in the wars, or, as others write, from the depressure of his nose, which, leaving nothing in the middle to separate them, made both eyes appear but as one ; and hence, intending to say Cyclops, * No such city is heard of in to Livy, was founded earher in any other author. Possibly it the reign of the last Tarquin. :>houl(l be Signia, which, according POPLICOLA. 219 by a mispronunciation they called him Codes. This Codes kept the bridge, and held back the enemy, till his own party broke it down behind, and then with his armor dropped into the river, and swam to the hither side, with a wound in his hip from a Tuscan spear. Poplicola, ad- miring his courage, proposed at once that the Romans should every one make him a present of a day's provi- sions, and afterwards gave him as much land as he could plough round in one day, and besides erected a brazen statue to his honor in the temple of Vulcan, as a requital for the lameness caused by his wound. But Porsenna laying close siege to the city, and a fam- ine raging amongst the Romans, also a new army of the Tuscans making incursions into the country, Poplicola, a third time chosen consul, designed to make, without sally- ing out, his defence against Porsenna, but, privately steal- ing forth against the new arm\' of the Tuscans, put them to flight, and slew five thousand. The story of Mucins is variously given ; we, like others, must follow the com- monly received statement. He was a man endowed with every virtue, but most eminent in war; and, resolving to kill Porsenna, attired himself in the Tuscan habit, and, using the Tuscan language, came to the camp, and ap- proaching the seat where the king sat amongst his nobles, but not certainly knowing the king, and fearful to inquire, drew out his sword, and stabbed one who he thought !iad most the appearance of king. Mucins was taken in the act, and wdiilst he \vas under examination, a pan of fire was brought to the king, who intended to sacrifice ; JMu- cius thrust his right hand into the flame, and whilst ic burnt stood looking at Porsenna with a steadfast and un- daunted countenance ; Porsenna at last in admiration dismissed him, and returned his sword, reaching it from his seat ; Mucins received it in his left hand, which occa- sioned the name of Scaevola, left-handed, and said, "I have 220 POPLICOLA. overcome the terrors of Porsenna, yet am vanquished hy his generosity, and gratitude obliges me to disclose what no punishment could extort;" and assured him then, that three hundred Romans, all of the same resolution, lurked about his camp, only waiting for an opportunity ; he, by lot appointed to the enterprise, was not sorry that he had miscarried in it, because so brave and good a man deserved rather to be a friend to the Romans than an enemy. To this Porsenna gave credit, and thereupon expressed an inclination to a truce, not, I presume, so much out of fear of the three hundred Romans, as in ad- miration of the Roman courage. All other writers call this man Mucins Scoevola, yet Athenodorus, son of San- don, in a book addressed to Octavia, CiBsar's sister, avers he w^as also called Postumus. Poplicola, not so much esteeming Porsenna's enmity dangerous to Rome as his friendship and alliance servicea- ble, was induced to refer the controversy wdth Tarquin to his arbitration, and several times undertook to prove Tarquin the worst of men, and justly deprived of his kingdom. But Tarquin proudly replied he would admit no judge, much less Porsenna, that had fallen away from his engagements ; and Porsenna, resenting this answer, and mistrusting the equity of his cause, moved also by the solicitations of his son Aruns, who was earnest for the Roman interest, made a peace on these conditions, that tliey should resign the land they had taken from the Tuscans, and restore all prisoners and receive back their djserters. To confirm the peace, the Romans gave as hostages ten sons of patrician parents, and as many daughters, amongst whom was Valeria, the daughter of Poplicola. Upon these assurances, Porsenna ceased from all acts of hostility, and the young girls went down to the river to bathe, at that part where the winding of the bank POPLICOLA. 221 formed a bay and made the waters stiller and quieter; and, seeing no guard, nor any one coming or going over, they were encouraged to swim over, notwithstanding the depth and violence of the stream. Some affirm that one of them, by name Cloelia, passing over on horseback, jjer- suaded the rest to swim after ; but, upon their safe arrival, presenting themselves to Poplicola, he neither praised nor approved their return, but was concerned lest he should appear less faithful than Porsenna, and this boldness in the maidens should argue treachery in the Romans ; so that, apprehending them, he sent them back to Porsenna. But Tarquin's men, having intelligence of this, laid a strong ambuscade on the other side for those that con- ducted them ; and wliile these were skirmishino: to^-ether, Valeria, the daughter of Poplicola, rushed through the enemy and fled, and with the assistance of three of her attendants made good her escape, whilst the rest were dangerously hedged in by the soldiers; but Aruns, Por- senna's son, upon tidings of it, hastened to their rescue, and, putting the enemy to flight, delivered the Romans. When Porsenna saw the maidens returned, demanding who was the author and adviser of the act, and under- standing Cloelia to be the person, he looked on her with a cheerful and benignant countenance, and, commanding one of his horses to be brought, sumptuously adorned, made her a present of it. This is produced as evidence by those who affirm that only Cloelia passed the river on horseback; those who deny it call it only the honor the Tuscan did to her courage; a figure, however, on horseback stands in the Via Sacra, as you go to the Pala tium, which some say is the statue of Cloelia, others of Valeria. Porsenna, thus reconciled to the Romans, gave them a fresh instance of his generosity, and conunanded his soldiers to quit the camp merely with their arms, leaving theii tents, full of corn and other stores, as a gif ( 222 lOPLICOLA. to the Romans. Hence, even down to our time, when there is a public sale of goods, they cry Porsenna's first, by wa}' of perpetual commemoration of his kindness. There stood, also, by the senate-house, a brazen statue of him, of plain and antique Avorkmanship. Afterwards, the Sabines making incursions upon the Ro mans, Marcus A'alerius, brother to Poplicola, Λvas made con- sul, and with him Postumius Tubertus. Marcus, through the management of affairs by the conduct and direct assistance of Poplicola, obtained two great victories, in the latter of which he slew thirteen thousand Sabines without the loss of one Roman, and was honored, as an accession to his triumph, with an house built in the Pola- tium at the public charge ; and whereas the doors of other houses opened inward into the house, they made this to open outward into the street, to intimate their perpetual public recognition of his merit by thus contin- ually making way for him. The same fashion in their doors the Greeks, they say, had of old universally, which appears from their comedies, where those that are going out make a noise at the door within, to give notice to those that pass by or stand near the door, that the opening the door into the street might occasion no sur- prisal. The year after, Poplicola was made consul the fourth time, wdien a confederacy of the Sabines and Latins threatened a war ; a superstitious fear also overran the city on the occasion of general miscarriages of their women, no single birth coming to its due time. Popli- cola, upon consultation of the Sibylline books, saciificing to Pluto, and renewing certain games commanded by Apollo, restored the city to more cheerful assurance in the gods, and then prepared against the menaces of men. There were appearances of great preparation, and of a formidable confederacy. Amongst the Sabines there was POPLICOLA. 223 one Appius Clausus, a man of a great wealth and strength of bod} , but most eminent for his high character and for his eloquence ; yet, as is usually the fate of great men, he could not escape the envy of others, which was much occasioned by his dissuading the war, and seeming to pro- mote the Roman interest, with a view, it was thought, lo obtaining absolute power in his own country for himself. Knowing how welcome these reports would be to the multitude, and hoΛv offensive to the army and the abet- tors of the Λvar, he was afraid to stand a trial, but, hav- ing a considerable body of friends and alHes to assist him, raised a tumult amongst the Sabines, which delayed the Avar. Neither was Poplicola wanting, not only to un- derstand the grounds of the sedition, but to promote and increase it, and he despatched emissaries with instructions to Clausus, that Poplicola was assured of his goodness and justice, and thought it indeed unworthy in any man, however injured, to seek revenge upon his fellow-citi- zens ; yet if he pleased, for his own security, to leave his enemies and come to Rome, he should be received, both in public and private, with the honor his merit deserved, and their own glory required. Appius, seriously weigh- ing the matter, came to the conclusion that it was the best resource which necessity left him, and advising with his friends, and they inviting again others in the same manner, he came to Rome, bringing five thousand families, with their wives and children ; people of the quietest and steadiest temper of all the Sabines. Popli- cola, informed of their approach, received them with all the kind offices of a friend, and admitted them at once to the franchise, allotting to every one two acres of land by the river Anio, but to Clausus twenty-five acres, and gave him a place in the senate; a, commencement of politi- cal power which he used so wisely, that he rose to the 224 POPLICOLA. highest reputation, was very influential, and left the Claudian house behind hiin, inferior to none in Rome. The departure of these men rendered things quiet amongst the Sabines; yet the chief of the community would not suffer them to settle into peace, but resented that Clausus now, by turning deserter, should disappoint that revenge upon the Romans, which, while at home, he had unsuccessfully opposed. Coming with a great army, they sat down before Fidenas, and placed an ambuscade of two thousand men near Rome, in wooded and hollow spots, with a design that some few horsemen, as soon as it was day, should go out and ravage the country, com- manding them upon their approach to the town so to retreat as to draw the enemy into the ambush. Poplicola, however, soon advertised of these designs by deserters, disposed his forces to their respective charges. Postu- mius Balbus, his son-in-law, going out with three thou- sand men in the evening, was ordered to take the hills, under which the ambush lay, there to observe their mo- tions ; his colleague, Lucretius, attended with a body of the lightest and boldest men, was appointed to meet the Sabine horse ; whilst he, with the rest of the army, encompassed the enemy. And a thick mist rising acciden- tally, Postumius, early in the morning, wath shouts from the hills, assailed the ambuscade, Lucretius charged the light-horse, and Poplicola besieged the camp ; so that on all sides defeat and ruin came upon the Sabines, and without any resistance the Romans killed them in their flight, their very hopes leading them to their death, for each division, presuming that the other was safe, gave up all thought of fighting or keeping their ground ; and these quitting the camp to retire to the ambuscade, and the ambuscade flying to the camp, fugitives thus met fugi- tives, and found those from whom they expected succor POPLICOLA. 225 as much in need of succor from themselves. The near- ness, however, of the city Fidena3 was the preservation of the Sabines, especially those that lied from the camp ; those that could not gain the city either perished in the field, or were taken prisoners. This victory, the Romans, lliough usually ascribing such success to some god, attrib- uted to the conduct of one captain ; and it was observed to be heard amongst the soldiers, that Poplicola had de- livered their enemies lame and blind, and only not in chains, to be despatched by their swords. From the spoil and prisoners great wealth accrued to the people. Poplicola. having completed his triumph, and bequeathed the city to the care of the succeeding consuls, died; thus closing a life Avhich, so far as human life may be, had been full of all that is good and honorable. The people, as though they had not duly rew\arded his deserts when alive, but still Λvere in his debt, decreed him a public interment, every one contributing his quadrans towards the charge ; the Λvomen, besides, by private consent, mourned a whole year, a signal mark of honor to his memory. He Avas buried, by the people's desire, within the city, in the part called Velia, where his posterity had likewise privilege of burial ; now, however, none of the family are interred there, but the body is carried thither and set down, and some one places a burning torch under it, and immediately takes it away, as an attestation of the de- ceased's privilege, and his receding from his honor; after which the body is removed. VOL. I. 15 COMPARISON OF POPLICOLA WITH SOLON. There is something singular in the present parallel, which has not occurred in any other of the lives; that the one should be the imitator of the other, and the other his best evidence. Upon the survey of Solon's sentence to Croesus in fjivor of Tellus's happiness, it seems more applicable to Poplicola; for Tellus, Λvhose virtuous life and dying well had gained him the name of the happiest man, yet Avas never celebrated in Solon's poems for a good man, nor have his children or any magistracy of his deserved a memorial ; but Poplicola's life Λvas the most eminent amongst the Romans, as well for the greatness of his virtue as his power, and also since his death many amongst the distinguished families, even in our daj^s, the Poplicolie, Messalie, and Valerii, after a lapse of six hundred years, acknowledge him as the foun- tain of their honor. Besides, Tellus, though keeping his post and fighting like a valiant soldier, was yet slain by his enemies ; but Poplicola, the better fortune, slew his, and saw his country victorious under his command. And his honors and triumphs brought him, which was Solon's ambition, to a happy end ; the ejaculation wdiich, in his verses ao;ainst Mimnermus about the continuance of man's life, he himself made, Mourned let me die ; and may I, when life ends, Occasion sighs and sorrows to my friends, is evidence to Poplicola's happiness ; his death did not (226) FOPLICOLA AND SOLON. 227 only draw tears from his friends and acquaintance, but wiiH the object of universal regret and sorrow through tlie whole city ; the women deplored his loss as that of a son, brother, or common father. "Wealth I would have," said Solon, "but wealth by Λvrong procure would not," })ecause punishment would follow. But Poplicola's riches were not only justly his, but he spent them nobly in doing good to the distressed. So that ' if Solon was reputed the wisest man, we must allow Poplicola to be the happiest ; for what Solon Avished for as the greatest and most perfect good, this Poplicola had, and used and enjoyed to his death. And as Solon may thus be said to \m\e contributed to Poplicola's glory, so did also Poplicola to his, by his choice of him -as his model in the formation of repub- lican institutions ; in reducing, for example, the exces- sive powers and assumption of the consulship. Several of his laws, indeed, he actually transferred to Eome, as his empo>vering the people to elect their officers, and allow- ing offenders the liberty of appealing to the people, as Solon did to the jurors. He did not, indeed, create a new senate, as Solon did, but augmented the old to almost double its number. The appointment of treasurers again, the quaestors, has a like origin; with the intent that the chief magistrate should not, if of good character, be with- drawn from greater matters; or, if bad, have the greater temptation to injustice, by holding both the government and treasury in his hands. The aversion to tyranny was stronger in Poplicola; anyone who attempted usurpation could, by Solon's law, only be punished upon conviction ; but Poplicola made it death before a trial. And though Solon justly gloried, tliat, when arbitrary power was abso- lutely offered to him by circumstances, and when his countrymen would have willingly seen hnn accept it, he }et declined it ; still Poplicola merited no less, who, re- 228 POPLICOLA AND SOLON. ceiving a despotic command, converted it to a ^jopulai office, and did not employ the whole legal power which he held. We must allow, indeed, that Solon was before Poplicola in observing that A people always minds its rulers best When it is neither humored nor oppressed. The remission of debts was peculiar to Solon ; it was his great means for confirming the citizens' liberty ; for a mere laΛV to give all men equal rights is but useless, if the poor must sacrifice those rights to their debts, and, in the very seats and sanctuaries of equality, the courts of justice, the offices of state, and the public discussions, be more than anywhere at the beck and bidding of the rich. A yet more extraordinary success was, that, although usually civil violence is caused by any remission of debts, upon this one occasion this dangerous but powerfid remedy actually put an end to civil violence already ex- isting, Solon's own private worth and reputation over- balancing all the ordinary ill-repute and discredit of the change. The beginning of his government was more glorious, for he was entirely original, and followed no man's example, and, without the aid of any ally, achieved his most important measures by his own conduct ; yet the close of Poplicola's life was more happy and desirable, for Solon saw the dissolution of his own commonwealth, Poplicola's maintained the state in good order down to the civil wars. Solon, leaving his laws, as soon as he had made them, engraven in wood, but destitute of a defender, departed from Athens ; whilst Poplicola, remaining, both in and out of office, labored to establish the government Solon, though he actually knew of Pisistratus's ambition, yet was not able to suppress it, but had to yield to usur- pation in its infancy; whereas Poplicola utterly sub- POPLICOLA AND SOLOX. 229 verted and dissolved a potent monarchy, strongly settled by long continuance ; uniting thus to virtues equal to those, and purposes identical with those of Solon, the good fortune and the power that alone could make them effec- tive. In militar}^ exploits, Daimachus of Platsea will not even allow Solon the conduct of the war aocainst the Meirari- ans, as Avas before intimated ; but Poplicola was victorious in the most important conflicts, both as a private soldier and commander. In domestic politics, also, Solon, in play, as it Avere, and by counterfeiting madness, induced the enterprise against Salamis ; whereas Poplicola, in the very beginning, exposed himself to the greatest risk, took arms against Tarquin, detected the conspiracy, and, being principally concerned both in preventing the escape of and afterwards punishing the traitors, not only expelled the tyrants from the city, but extirpated their xery hopes. And as, in cases calling for contest and resistance and manful opposition, he behaved with courage and resolu- tion, so, in instances where peaceable language, persua- sion, and concession were requisite, he was yet more to be commended ; and succeeded in gaining happily to re- conciliation and friendship, Porsenna, a terrible and invincible enemy. Some may, perhaps, object, that Solon recovered Salamis, which they had lost, for the Athenians ; whereas Poplicola receded from part of what the Romans were at that time possessed of; but judgment is to be made of actions according to the times in which they were performed. The conduct of a wise politician is ever suited to the present posture of affairs ; often by forego- ing a part he saves the whole, and by yielding in a small matter secures a greater; and so Poplicola, by restoring what the Romans had lately usurj)ed, saved their un- doubted patrimony, and procured, moreover, the stores of the enemy for those who were only too thankful to 230 POPLICOLA AND SOLON. secure their city. Permitting the decision of the contro- versy to his adversary, he not only got the victory, but likewise what he himself would willingly have given to purchase the victory, Porsenna putting an end to the war, and leaving them all the provision of his camp, from the sense of the virtue and gallant disposition of the Romans which their consul had impressed upon him TUEMISTOCLES. The birth of Themistocles was somewhat too obscure to do him honor. His father, Neocles, was not of the distinguished people of Athens, but of the township of Phrearrhi, and of the tribe Leontis; and by his mother's side, as it is reported, he was base-born. I am not of the noble Grecian race, I 'm poor Abrotonon, and born in Thrace ; Let the Greek Avomen scorn me, if they please, I was the mother of Themistocles. Yet Phanias writes that the mother of Themistocles was not of Thrace, but of Caria, and that her name was not Abrotonon, but Euterpe ; and Neanthes adds farther that she was of Halicarnassus in Caria. And, as illegitimate children, including those that were of the half-blood or had but one parent an Athenian, had to attend at the Cynosarges (a wrestling-place outside the gates, dedicated to Hercules, who Avas also of half-blood amongst the gods, having had a mortal Avoman for his mother), Themisto- cles persuaded several of the young men of high birth to accompany him to anoint and exercise themselves toge- ther at Cynosarges ; an ingenious device for destroy- ing the distinction between the noble and the base-born, and between those of the whole and those of the half 232 THEMISTOCLES. blood of Athens. However, it is certain that he was re- lated to the house of the Lycomedae; for Simonides records, that he rebuilt the chapel of Phlya, belonging to that family, and beautified it with pictures and other ornaments, after it had been burnt by the Persians, It is confessed by all that from his youth he was of a vehement and impetuous nature, of a quick apprehen- sion, and a strong and aspiring bent for action and great affairs. The holidays and intervals in his studies he did not spend in play or idleness, as other children, but would be always inventing or arranging some oration or declama- tion to himself, the subject of which was generally the excusing or accusing his companions, so that his master would often say to him, " You, my boy, will be nothing small, but great one way or other, for good or else for bad." He received reluctantly and carelessly instructions given him to improve his manners and behavior, or to teach him any pleasing or graceful accomplishment, but whatever was said to improve him in sagacity, or in management of affairs, he w^ould give attention to, be- yond one of his years, from confidence in his natural capacities for such things. And thus afterwards, when in company where people engaged themselves in what are commonly thought the liberal and elegant amuse- ments, he w^as obliged to defend himself against the observations of those who considered themselves highly accomplished, by the somewhat arrogant retort, that he certainly could not make use of any stringed instrument, could only, were a small and obscure city put into his hands, make it great and glorious. Notwithstanding this, Stesimbrotus says that Themistocles was a hearer of Anaxagoras, and that he studied natural philosophy un- der Melissus, contrary to chronology ; for Melissus com- manded the Samians in their siege by Pericles, who was much Themistocles's junior ; and with Pericles, also, Anaxa- THEMISTOCLES. 233 goras was intimate. They, therefore, might rather he credited, who report, that Themistocles was an admirer of Mnesiphilus the Phrearrhian, who was neither rhetori- cian nor natural philosopher, hut a professor of that which was then called wisdom, consisting in a sort of poli- tical shrewdness and practical sagacit}•, Λvllich had begun and continued, almost like a sect of philosophy, from So- lon ; but those who came afterwards, and mixed it with pleadings and legal artifices, and transformed the practi- cal part of it into a mere art of speaking and an exercise of words, were generally called sophists. Themistocles resorted to Mnesiphilus when he had already embarked in politics. In the first essays of his youth he was not regular nor happily balanced ; he alloΛved himself to follow mere nat- ural character, which, Λvithout the control of reason and instruction, is apt to hurry, upon either side, into sudden and violent courses, and very often to break aΛvay and determine upon the worst; as he afterwards owned him- self, saying, that the Avildest colts make the best horses, if they only get properly trained and broken in. But those who upon this fasten stories of their ΟΛνη inven- tion, as of his being disowned by his father, and that his mother died for grief of her son's ill fame, certainly ca- lumniate him ; and there are others who relate, on the contrary, how that to deter him from public business, and to let him see how the vidgar behave themselves to- wards their leaders when they have at hist no farther use of them, his father showed him tlie old galleys as they laj' forsaken and cast about upon the sea-shore. Yet it is evident that his mind was early imbued with the keenest interest in public aflairs, and the most passionate ambition for distinction. Eager from the first to obtain the highest place, he unhesitatingly accepted the hatred of the most poΛverful and influential leaders in 234 THEMTSTOCLES. the city, but more especially of Aristides, the hon of Lysi- machus, who always opposed him. And yet all this great enmity between them arose, it appears, from a very boy- ish occasion, both being attached to the beautiful Stesi- laus of Ceos, as Ariston the philosopher tells us ; ever af ter which, they took opposite sides, and were rivals in pol- itics. Not but that the incompatibility of their lives and manners may seem to have increased the difference, for Aristides was of a mild nature, and of a nobler sort of character, and, in public matters, acting always Avith a view, not to glory or popularity, but to the best inter- ests of the state consistently with safety and honesty, he was often forced to oppose Themistocles, and interfere against the increase of his influence, seeing him stirring up the people to all kinds of enterprises, and introducing various innovations. For it is said that Themistocles was so transported Λvith the thoughts of glory, and so inflamed watli the passion for great actions, that, though he was still young when the battle of Marathon M^as fought against the Persians, upon the skilful conduct of the gen- eral, Miltiades, being everywhere talked about, he wap observed to be thoughtful, and reserved, alone by him- self; he passed the nights without sleep, and avoided all his usual places of recreation, and to those who wondered at the change, and inquired the reason of it, he gaΛ^e the answer, that " the trophy of Miltiades w^ould not let him sleep." And when others were of opinion that the bat- tle of Marathon would be an end to the war, Themisto- cles thought that it was but the beginning of far greater conflicts, and for these, to the benefit of all Greece, he kept himself in continual readiness, and his city also in proper training, foreseeing from far before wdiat would happen. And, first of all, the Athenians being accustomed to divide amongst themselves the revenue proceeding THEMISTOCLES. 235 from the silver mines at Laiirium, he was the only mau that durst propose to the people that this distribution should cease, and that with the money ships should be built to make war against the ^ginetans, who were the most flourishing people in all Greece, and by the mem- ber of their ships held the sovereignty of the sea; and Themistocles thus was more easily able to persuade them, avoiding all mention of danger from Darius or the Per- sians, who were at a great distance, and their coming very uncertain, and at that time not much to be feared ; but, by a seasonable employment of the emulation and anger felt by the Athenians against the ^ginetans, he induced them to preparation. So that with this money an hun- dred ships were built, Avith which they afterwards fought against Xerxes. And, henceforward, little by little, turn- ing and drawing the city down towards the sea, in the belief, that, whereas by land they were not a fit match for their next neighbors, with their ships they might be able to repel the Persians and command Greece, thus, as Plato says, from steady soldiers he turned them into mari- ners and seamen tossed about the sea, and gave occasion for the reproach against him, that he took away from the Athenians the spear and the shield, and bound them to the bench and the oar. These measures he carried in the assembly, against the opposition, as Stesimbrotus relates, of Miltiades; and whether or no he hereby injured the purity and true balance of government, may be a ques- tion for philosophers, but that the deliverance of Greece came at that time from the sea, and that these galleys restored Athens again after it was destroyed, were others wanting, Xerxes himself would be sufficient evidence, who, though his land-forces were still entire, after his de- feat at sea, fled aAvay, and thought himself no longer able to encounter the Greeks ; and, as it seems to me, left Mar- 236 THEMTSTOCLES. donius behind him, not out of any hopes he could have to bring them into subjection, but to hinder them from pur- suing him. Themistocles is said to have been eager in the acquisi- tion of riches, according to some, that he might be the more liberal ; for loving to sacrifice often, and to be splendid in his entertainment of strangers, he required a plentiful revenue ; yet he is accused by others of having been parsimonious and sordid to that degree that he would sell provisions which v/ere sent to him as a present. He desired Diphilides, who was a breeder of horses, to give him a colt, and when he refused it, threatened that in a short time he would turn his house into a wooden * horse, intimating that he would stir up dispute and litiga- tion between him and some of his relations. He went beyond all men in the passion for distinction. When he was still young and unknown in the world, he entreated Epicles of Hermione, who had a good hand at the lute and was much sought after by the Athenians, to come and practise at home with him, being ambitious of having people inquire after his house and frequent his company. When he came to the Olympic games, and was so splendid in his equipage and entertainments, in his rich tents and furniture, that he strove to outdo Cimon, he displeased the Greeks, who thought that such magnifi- cence might be allowed in one who was a young man and of a great family but was a great piece of insolence in one as yet undistinguished, and without title or means for making any such display. In a dramatic contest, the play he paid for won the prize, which was then a matter that excited much emulation ; he put up a tablet in record of it, with the inscription, " Themistocles of Phrearrhi was at the charge of it; Phrynichus made it ; Adimautus was * Full of people ready for fighting, like the Trojan horse. THEMISTOCLES. 237 archon." He was well liked by the common people, would salute every particular citizen by his own name, and always show himself a just judge in questions of business between private men ; he said to Simonides, the poet of Ceos, who desired something of him, when he was commander of the army, that Λvas not reasonable, " Simon- ides, you ΛνοηΗ be no good poet if you Avrote false mea- sure, nor should I be a good magistrate if for favor 1 made false law/' And at another time, laughing at Simonides, he said, that he w\as a man of little judgment to speak against the Corinthians, who were inhabitants of a great city, and to have his ΟΛνη picture drawn so often, having so ill-looking a fixce. Gradually growing to be great, and winning the favor of the people, he at last gained the day w^ith his faction over that of Aristides, and procured his banishment by ostracism. When the king of Persia Λvas now advanciny; against Greece, and the Athenians were in consultation who should be general, and many Avithdrew themselves of their own accord, being terrified with the greatness of the danger, there Avas one Epicydes, a popular speaker, son to Euphemides, a man of an eloquent tongue, but of a faint heart, and a slave to riches, who w'as desirous of the command, and was looked upon to be in a fair way to carry it by the number of votes; but Themistocles, fearing that, if the command should fall into such hands, all would be lost, bought off' Epicydes and his pretensions, it is said, for a sum of money. When the king of Persia sent messengers into Greece, with an interpreter, to demand earth and water, as an acknowledgment of subjection, Themistocles, by the con- sent of the people, seized upon the interpreter, and put him to death, for presuming to publish the barbarian orders and decrees in the Greek language; this is one of the ac- tions he is commended for, as also for what he did to Arth- 238 TIIEMISTOCLES. mius of Zelea, who brought gold from the king of Persia to corrupt the Greeks, and was, by an order from The- mistocles, degraded and disfranchised, he and his children and his posterity ; but that which most of all redounded to his credit was, that he put an end to all the civil wars of Greece, composed their differences, and persuaded ihem to lay aside all enmity during the war with the Pei'sians ; and in this great work, Chileus the Arcadian was, it is said, of great assistance to him. Having taken upon himself the command of the Athe- nian forces, he immediately endeavored to persuade the citizens to leave the city, and to embark upon their gal- leys, and meet Avith the Persians at a great distance from Greece ; but many being against this, he led a large force, together \vith the Lacedaemonians, into Tempe, that in this pass they might maintain the safety of Thessaly, which had not as yet declared for the king ; but when they returned without performing any thing, and it was known that not only the Thessalians, but all as far as Boeotia, was going over to Xerxes, then the Athenians more willingly hearkened to the advice of Themistocles to fight by sea, and sent him with a fleet to guard the straits of Artemisium. When the contingents met here, the Greeks would have the Lacedaemonians to command, and Eurybiades to be their admiral ; but the Athenians, who surpassed all the rest together in number of vessels, would not submit to come after any other, till Themistocles, perceiving the danger of this contest, yielded his own command to Eu- rybiades, and got the Athenians to submit, extenuating the loss by persuading them, that if in this war they be- haved themselves like men, he would answer for it after that, that the Greeks, of their own will, would submit to their command. And by this moderation of his, it is evi- dent that he was the chief means of the deliverance of THEMISTOCLES. 239 Greece, and gained the Athenians the glory of ahke sur- passing their enemies in valor, and their confederates in wisdom. As soon as the Persian armada arrived at Aphetoe, Eu- rybiades was astonished to see such a vast number of vessels before him, and, being informed that two hundi ed more were sailing rgund behind the island of Sciathus, he immediately determined to retire farther into Greece, and to sail back into some part of Peloponnesus, where their land army and their fleet might join, for he looked upon the Persian forces to be altogether unassailable by sea. But the Euboeans, fearing that the Greeks Avould forsake them, and leave them to the mercy of the enemy, sent Pelagon to confer privately with Themistocles, taking wdth him a good sum of money, which, as Herodotus reports, he accepted and gave to Eurybiades. In this affair none of his own countrymen opposed him so much as Architeles, captain of the sacred galley, who, having no money to supply his seamen, Λvas eager to go home ; but Themistocles so incensed the Athenians against him, that they set upon him and left him not so much as his sup- per, at Λvhich Architeles λνη^ much surprised, and took it very ill; but Themistocles immediately sent him in a chest a service of provisions, and at the bottom of it a talent of siWer, desiring him to sup to-night, and to-mor- row provide for his seamen ; if not, he would report it amongst the Athenians that he had received money from the enemy. So Phanias the Lesbian tells the story. Thoucj-h the fii-'hts betAveen the Greeks and Persians in ο ο the straits of Euboea were not so important as to make any final decision of the war, yet the experience which the Greeks obtained in them was of great advantage ; for thus, by actual trial and in real danger, they found out, that neither number of ships, nor riches and orna- ments, nor boasting shouts, nor barbarous songs of vie- 240 THEMISTOCLES. tory, were any way terrible to men that knew how to fight, and were resolved to come hand to hand with their enemies ; these things they were to despise, and to come up close and grapple Avith their foes. This, Pindar ap- pears to have seen, and says justly enough of the fight at Artemisium, that There the sons of Athens set The stone that freedom stands on yet. For the first step towards victory undoubtedly is to gain courage. Artemisium is in Euboea, beyond the city of Histioea, a sea-beach open to the north ; most nearly op- posite to it stands Olizon, in the country Avhich formerly was under Philoctetes ; there is a small temple there, dedicated to Diana, surnamed of the Dawn, and trees about it, around which again stand pillars of white mar- ble ; and if you rub them with your hand, they send forth both the smell and color of saflron. On one of the pil- lars these verses are engraved, — AVith numerous tribes from Asia's resrions broujiht The sons of Atliens on these waters fought ; Erecting, after they had quelled the Mede, To Artemis this record of the deed. There is a place still to be seen upon this shore, where, in the middle of a great heap of sand, they take out from the bottom a dark powder like ashes, or something that has passed the fire ; and here, it is supposed, the ship- wrecks and bodies of the dead were burnt. But when news came from Thermopylas to Artemisium, informing them that king Leonidas was slain, and that Xerxes had made himself master of all the passages by land, they returned back to the interior of Greece, the Athenians having the command of the rear, the place of TIIEMISTOCLES. 241 honor and clanger, and much elated by what had been done. As Themistocles sailed along the coast, he took notice of the harbors and fit places for the enemies' ships to come to land at, and engraved large letters in such stones as lie found there by chance, as also in others -which he set up on purpose near to the landing-places, or where they were to water; in wliich inscriptions he called upon the lonians to forsake the Medes, if itAvere possible, and come over to the Greeks, who were their proper founders and fathers, and Avere now hazarding all for their liberties; but, if this could not be done, at any rate to impede and disturb the Persians in all engagements. He hoped that these writings would prevail with the lonians to revolt, or raise some trouble by making their fidelity doubtful to the Persians. Now, though Xerxes had already passed through Dorifc' and invaded the country of Phocis, and was burning and destroying the cities of the Phocians, yet the Greeks sent them no relief; and, though the Athenians earnestly desired them to meet the Persians in Boeotia, before they could come into Attica, as they themselves had come foi'- ward by sea at Artemisium, they gave no ear to their request, being Avholly intent upon Peloponnesus, and re- solved to gather all their forces together within the Isthmus, and to build a wall from sea to sea in that narrow neck of land; so that the Athenians were enraged to see themselves betrayed, and at the same time aillicted and dejected at their own destitution. For to fight alone against such a numerous army was to no purpose, and the only expedient ηοΛν left them was to leave their city and cling to their ships ; wliich the people were very un- willing to submit to, imagining that it would signify little now to gain a victory, and not understanding how there could be deliverance any longer after they had once for VOL. I. 16 242 TIIEMISTOCLES. saken the temples of their gods and exposed the tombs and monuments of their ancestors to the fury of their enemies. Themistocles, being at a loss, and not able to draw the people over to his opinion by any human reason, set his machines to work, as in a theatre, and emplo^'ed prodigies and oracles. The serpent of Minerva, kept in the inner part of her temple, disappeared ; the priest^! gave it out to the people that the offerings which were set for it Avere found untouched, and declared, by the suggestion of Themistocles, that the goddess had left the cit}^, and taken her flight before them towards the sea. And he often urged them with the oracle ■■'■ Avhich bade them trust to walls of wood, showing them that walls of wood could signify nothing else but ships ; and that the island of Salamis was termed in it, not miserable or unhappy, but had the epithet of divine, for that it should one day be associated w^ith a great good for- tune of the Greeks. At length his opinion prevailed, and he obtained a decree that the city should be committed to the protection of Minerva, " queen of Athens ; " that they who were of age to bear arms should embark, and that each should see to sending away his children, women, and slaves Avhere he could. This decree being confirmed, most of the Athenians removed their parents, wives, and children to Troezen, Avhere they were received Avith eager good-will by the Troezenians, who passed a vote, that they should be maintained at the pub- lic charge, by a daily payment of two obols to every one, * " While all things else are and an host of men on foot, coming taken," said the oracle, "Avithin the from the mainland ; retire turning boundary of Cecrops and the covert thy back ; one day yet thou shaU of divine Cithieron, Zeus grants shoAv thy face. Ο divine Salamis, to Athena that the wall of wood but thou shalt slay children of alone shall remain uncaptured ; women, either at the scattering of that sliall help thee and th3'- Demeter or at the gathering." children. Stay not for horsemen THEMISTOCLES. 243 and leave be given to the children to gather fruit where they pleased, and schoolmasters paid to instruct them. This vote was proposed by Nicagoras. There was no public treasure at that time in Athens ; but the council of Areopagus, as Aristotle says, distributed to every one that served, eight drachmas, which was a great help to the manning of the fleet; but Clidemus as- cribes this also to the art of Themistocles. When the Athenians were on their way down to the haven of Pirieus, the shield Avith the head of Medusa was missing; and he, under the pretext of searching for it, ransackeil all places, and found among their goods considerable sums of money concealed, Λvhich he applied to the public use ; and with this the soldiers and seamen were \ye\] provided for their voyage. When the whole city of Athens were going on board, it afforded a spectacle worthy of pity alilie and admira- tion, to see them thus send away their fathers and chil- dren before them, and, unmoved with their cries and tears, pass over into the island. But that which stirred compassion most of all was, that many old men, by rea- son of their great age, were left behind ; and even the tame domestic animals could not be seen without some pity, running about the town and howling, as desirous to be carried along with their masters that had kept them ; among which it is reported that Xanthippus, the father of Pericles, had a dog that would not endure to stay be- hind, but leaped into the sea, and swam along by the gal ley's side till he came to the island of Salamis, where he fainted away and died, and that spot in the island, which is still called the Dog's GraA'^e, is said to be his. Among; the o-reat actions of Themistocles at this crisis, the recall of Aristides was not the least, for, beibre the war, he had been osti-acized b}^ A\g party which Themi- stocles headed, and was in banishment; but now, percei• 244 THEMISTOCIES. ving that the people regretted his absence, and Avere fear- ful that he might go over to the Persians to revenge him- self, and thereby ruin the affairs of Greece, Themistocles proposed a decree that those who were banished for π time might return again, to give assistance by word and deed to the cause of Greece λν'ύΐι the rest of their fellow- citizens, Eurybiades, by reason of the greatness of Sparta, Λvas admiral of the Greek fleet, but yet Λ\%α8 faint>hearted in time of danger, and willing to weigh anchor and set sail for the isthmus of Corinth, near Λvhich the land army lay encamped ; Λvhich Themistocles resisted ; and this was the occasion of the well-known words, when Eurybiades, to check his impatience, told him that at the Olympic games they that start up before the rest are lashed ; " And they," replied Themistocles, " that are left behind are not crowned." Again, Eurybiades lifting up his staff as if he were going to strike, Theinistocles said, " Strike if you will, but hear;" Eurybiades, wondering much at his moderation, desired him to speak, and Themistocles now brouiiht him to a better understandinir. And Avhen one who stood by him told him that it did hot become those Λνΐιο had neither city nor house to lose, to persuade others to relinquish their habitations and forsake their countries, Themistocles gave this reply : " We have in- deed left our houses and our walls, base fellow, not thinkinsc it fit to become slaves for the sake of thino;s that have no life nor soul ; and yet our city is the greatest of all Greece, consisting of two hundred galleys, Avhicli are here to defend you, if you please ; but if you run away and betray us, as you did once before, the Greeks shall soon hear news of the Athenians possessing as fair a country, and as large and free a city, as tliat they have lost." These expressions of Themistocles made Eu- rybiades suspect that if he retreated the Athenians wOuld THEMISTOCLES. 245 fall off from him. When one of Eretria began to oppose him, he said, "Have you any thing to say of M-ar, that are like an ink-fish ? you have a sword, but no heart." '■'" Some say that while Themistocles w\as thus speakin'^ things upon the deck, an owl Λvas seen flying to tiie i-igljt hand of the fle'^t, which came and sate upon the top of the mast ; and this happy omen so far disposed the Greeks to follow his advice, that they presently prepai-cil to fight. Yet, Λvhen the enemy's fleet was arrived at tlie haven of Phalerum, upon the coast of Attica, and with the number of their ships concealed nil the shore, and when they saw the king himself in person come down with, his land army to the sea-side, with all his forces united, then the good counsel of Themistocles was soon forgotten, and the Peloponnesians cast their eyes again towards the isthmus, and took it Λ^er3^ ill if any one spoke against their returning home ; and, resolving to de- part that night, the pilots had order \vliat course to steer. Themistocles, in great distress that the Greeks should retire, and lose the advantage of the narrow seas and strait passage, and slip home every one to his own city, considered with himself, and contrived that stratagem that was carried out by Sicinnus. This Sicinnus was a Persian captive, but a great lover of Themistocles, and the attendant of his children. Upon this occasion, he sent him privately to Xerxes, commanding him to tell the king, that Themistocles, the admiral of tlie Athenians, having espoused his interest, Avished to be the first to in- form him that the Greeks were ready to make their escape, and that he counselled him to hinder their flight, to set upon them while they were in this confusion and at a distance from their land army, and hereby destroy all their forces by sea. Xerxes was very joyful at thi^ * The Tcnf/n's, loliizo. or cuttle- lair•' shaped like a sword, and \va.- fish, is said to have a l)t)iie or carti- coiiceived to have no iiearl. 246 THEMISTOCLES. message, and received it as from one who wished him all that was good, and immediately issued instructions to the commanders of his ships, that they should instantly set out with two hundred galleys to encompass all the islands, and enclose all the straits and passages, that none of the Greeks might escape, and that they should afterwards follow with the rest of their fleet at leisure. This being done, Aristides, the son of Lysimachus, was the first man that perceived it, and w^ent to the tent of Themistocles, not out of any friendship, for he had been formerly ban- ished ty his means, as has been related, but to inform him how they were encompassed by their enemies. The- mistocles, knowing the generosity of Aristides, and much struck by his visit at that time, imparted to him all that he had transacted by Sicinnus, and entreated him, that, as he would be more readily believed among the Greeks, he would make use of his credit to help to induce them to stay and fight their enemies in the narrow seas. Aristi- des applauded Themistocles, and went to the other com- manders and captains of the galleys, and encouraged them to engage ; yet they did not perfectly assent to him, till a galley of Tenos, which deserted from the Per- sians, of which. Panastius was commander, came in, while they were still doubting, and confirmed the neΛVS that all the straits and passages Avere beset ; and then their rage and fury, as w^ell as their necessity, provoked them all to fio'ht. As soon as it was day, Xerxes placed himself high up, to view his fleet, and how it was set in order. Phano- demus says, he sat upon a promontory above the temple of Hercules, where the coast of Attica is separated fiora the island by a narrow channel ; but Acestodorus writes, that it was in the confines of Megara, upon those hills which are called the Horns, where he sat in a chair of gold, with mau3^ secretaries about liira to write down all that was done in the fiirht. THEMISTOCLES. 247 When Themistocles was about to sacrifice, close lo the admiral's galley, there were three prisoners brouglit to him, fine looking men, and richly dressed in ornamented clothing and gold, said to be the children of Artaycte.s and Sandauce, sister to Xerxes. As soon as the prophet Euphrantides saw them, and observed that at the same time the fire blazed out from the offerings with a more than ordinary flame, and that a man sneezed on the right, which was an intimation of a fortunate event, he took Themistocles by the hand, and bade him consecrate the three young men for sacrifice, and offer them up with prayers for victory to Bacchus the Devourer : so should the Greeks not only save themselves, but also obtain victory. Themistocles was much disturbed at this strauire and terrible prophecy, but the common people, λυΙιο, in any difficult crisis and great exigency, ever look for relief rather to strange and extravagant than to reason- able means, calling upon Bacchus with one voice, led the captives to the altar, and compelled the execution of the sacrifice as the prophet had commanded. This is reported by Phanias the Lesbian, a philosopher well read in history. The number of the enemy's ships the poet iEschylus gives in his tragedy called the Persians, as on his certain knowledice, in the following; words — XerxGii, I know, did into battle lead One thousand ships ; of more than usual speed Seven and two hundred. So is it agreed. The Athenians had a hundred and eighty; in every ship eighteen men fought upon tlie deck, four of whom were archers and the rest men-at-arms. As Themistocles had fixed upon the most advantageous place, so, with no less sagacity, he chose the best time of fighting; for he would not run the prows of his galleys against the Persians, nor begin the fight till the time of 248 THEMISTOCLES. day was come, when there regularly blows in a fresh breeze from the open sea, and brings in with it a strong swell into the channel ; which was no inconvenience to the Greek ships, which were low-built, and little above the water, but did much hurt to the Persians, which had high sterns and lofty decks, and were heavy and cumbrous in their movements, as it presented them broadside to the quick charges of the Greeks, who kept their eyes upon the motions of Themistocles, as their best example, and more particularly because, opposed to his ship, Ariainencs, admiral to Xerxes, a brave man, and by far the best and worthiest of the king's brothers, was seen throwing darts and shooting arrows from his huge galley, as fi'om the walls of a castle. Aminias the Decelean and Sosicles the Pedian, who sailed in the same vessel, upon the ships meet- inir stem to stem, and transfixino; each the other with their brazen prows, so that they were fastened together, when Ariamenes attempted to board theirs, ran at him with their pikes, and thrust him into the sea ; his bod}^, as it floated amongst other shipwrecks, was known to Artemisia, and carried to Xerxes. It is reported, that, in the middle of the fight, a great flame rose into tlie air above the city of Eleusis, and that sounds and voices were heard through all the Thriasian plain, as far as the sea, sounding like a number of men accompanying and escorting the mystic lacchus, and that a mist seemed to form and rise from the place from whence the sounds came, and, passing forward, fell upon the gal- leys. Others believed that they saw apparitions, in the shape of armed men, reaching out their hands from the island of ^gina before the Grecian galleys; and supposed they were the jEacidse, whom they had invoked to their aid before the battle. The first man that took a ship was Lycomedes the Athenian, captain of a galley, who cut down its ensign, and dedicated it to Apollo the Laurel- crowned. And as the Persians fought in a narrow arm TIIEMISTOCLES. 249 of the sea, and could bring but part of their fleet to fi»dit, and fell foul of one another, the Greeks thus e(|ualled them in strength, and fought with them till the evening, forced them back, and obtained, as says Simonides, tliat noble and himous victory, than which neither amongst tlie Greeks nor barbarians was ever known more <'-lorious exploit on the seas; by the joint valor, indeed, and zeal of all who fought, but by the wisdom and sagacity of Tliemistocles. After this sea-fight, Xerxes, enraged at his ill-fortune, attempted, by casting great heaps of earth and stones into the sea, to stop up the channel and to make a dam, upon which he might lead his land-forces over into the island of Salamis. Themistocles, being desirous to try the opinion of Aristides, told him that he proposed -to set sail for the Hellespont, to break the bridge of ships, so as to shut up, he said, Asia a prisoner within Europe ; but Aristides, dis- liking the design, said, "We have hitherto fought with an enemy who has regarded little else but his pleasui-e and luxury; but if Λve shut him up within Greece, and drive him to necessity, he that is master of such great forces λυΙΙΙ no longer sit quietly with an umbrelki of gold over his head, looking upon the fight for his pleasure; but in such a strait will attempt all things; he Avill be resohite, and appear himself in person upon all occasions, he will soon correct his errors, and supply what he has formerly omitted through remissness, and will be better advised in all things. Therefore, it is noways our interest, Themi- stocles," he said, "to take away the bridge that is already made, but rather to build another, if it were possible, that he might make his retreat with the more expedition." To which Themistocles answ^ered, 'vlf this be recjuisite, we must immediately use all diligence, art, and industry, to rid ourselves of him as soon as may be;" and to this pur- 250 THExMlSTOCLES. pose lie found out among the captives one of the king of Persia's eunuchs, named Arnaces, whom he sent to the king, to inform him that the Greeks, being now victorious by sea, had decreed to sail to the Hellespont, where the boats were fastened together, and destroy the bridge; but that Themistocles, being concerned for the king, re- vealed this to him, that he might hasten towards the Asiatic seas, and pass over into his own dominions ; and in the mean time would cause delays, and hinder the con- federates from pursuing him. Xerxes no sooner heard this, but, being very much terrified, he proceeded to re- treat out of Greece with all speed. The prudence of Themistocles and Aristides in this w^as afterwards more fully understood at the battle of Plataea, where Mardo- nius, with a very small fraction of the forces of Xerxes, put the Greeks in danger of losing all. Herodotus writes, that, of all the cities of Greece, ^gina was held to have performed the best service in the war; while all single men yielded to Themistocles, though, out of envy, unwillingly ; and when they re- turned to the entrance of Peloponnesus, where the sev- eral commanders delivered their suffrages at the altar, to determine who was most worthy, every one gave the first vote for himself and the second for Themistocles. The Lacedaemonians carried him with them to Sparta, where, giving the rewards of valor to Eurybiades, and of wisdom and conduct to Themistocles, they crowned him with olive, presented him with the best chariot in the city, and sent three hundred young men to accompany him to the confines of their country. And at the next Olympic games, when Themistocles entered the course, tlie spectators took no farther notice of those who were contesting the prizes, but spent the whole day in looking upon him, showing him to the strangers, admiring him, and applauding him by clapping their hands, and other TIIEMLSTUCLES. Ο'Λ expressions of joy, so that he hhnself, much gratified, confessed to his friends that he then reaped tlie fruit of all his labors for the Greeks. He was, indeed, by nature, a great lover of honor, as is evident from the anecdotes recorded of him. Wlien chosen admiral by the Athenians, he would not (piite conclude any single matter of business, either public or private, but deferred all till the day they Avere to set sail, that, by despatching a great quantity of business all at once, and having to meet a great variety of people, he might make an appearance of greatness and power. \'iew- ing the dead bodies cast up by the sea, he perceived bracelets and necklaces of gold about them, yet passed on, only showing them to a friend that followed him, saying, "Take you these things, for you are not Themi- stocles." He said to Antiphates, a handsome young man, who had formerly avoided, but now in his glory courted him, " Time, young man, has taught us both a lesson." He said that the Athenians did not honor him or admire him, but made, as it were, a sort of plane-tree of him ; shel- tered themselves under him in bad weather, and, as soon as it was fine, plucked his leaves and cut his branches. When the Seriphian told him that he had not obtained this lienor by himself, but by the greatness of his city, he replied, " You speak truth ; I should never have been famous if I had been of Seriphus; nor you, had you been of Athens." When another of the generals, who thought he had performed considerable service for the Athenians, boastingly compared his actions with tlios(; of Themistocles, he told him that once upon a tiuie the Day after the Festival found fault witii the Festival : " On you there is nothing but hurry and trouble and prepara- tion, but, when 1 come, everybody sits down (piietly and enjo3's himself;" which the Festival admitted Avas true, but " if 1 had not come first, you would not have come at 252 TIIEMISTOCLEo. all." " Even so," he said, " if Themistocles had not come before, where had you been now ? " Laughing at his own son, who got his mother, and, by his mother's means, his father also, to indulge him, he told him that he had the most power of any one in Greece : " For the Athenians command the rest of Greece, I command the Athenians, your mother commands me, and you command your mother." Loving to be singular in all things, when he had land to sell, he ordered the crier to give notice that there Avere good neighbors near it. Of two who made love to his daughter, he preferred the man of worth to the one who was rich, saying he desired a man without riches, rather than riches without a man. Such was the character of his sayings. After these things, he began to rebuild and fortify the city of Athens, bribing, as Theopompus reports, the Lace- dasmonian ephors not to be against it, but, as most relate it, overreaching and deceiving them. For, under pre- text of an embassy, he went to Sparta, where, upon the Lacedaemonians charging him with rebuilding the walls, and Poliarchus coming on purpose from ^gina to de- nounce it, he denied the fact, bidding them to send peo- ple to Athens to see whether it were so or no ; by which delay he got time for the building of the wall, and also placed these ambassadors in the hands of his countrymen as hostages for him ; and so, when the LacediBmonians knew the truth, they did him no hurt, but, suppressing all display of their anger for the present, sent him away. Next he proceeded to establish the harbor of Piraeus, oliservino; the o-reat natural advantages of the locality and desirous to unite the whole city with the sea, and to reverse, in a manner, the policy of ancient Athenian kings, who, endeavoring to withdraw their subjects from the sea. and to accustom them to live, not by sailing THEMLSTOCLES. 253 about, but bj^ planting and tilling the earth, spread tbe story of the dispute between Minerva and Neptune for the sovereignty of Athens, in which Minerva, by pro- ducing to the judges an olive tree, was declared to have won ; whereas Theinistocles did not only knead up, as Aristophanes says, the port and the city into one, but made the city absolutely the dependant and the adjunct of the port, and the land of the sea, which increased the power and confidence of the people against the nobility; the authority coming into the hands of sailors and boat- swains and pilots. Thus it was one of the orders of the thirty tyrants, that the hustings in the assembly, which had faced towards the sea, should be turned lound to- wards the land ; implying their opinion that the empire by sea had been the origin of the democracy, and that the firming population were not so much opposed to oligarchy. Themistocles, however, formed yet higher designs with a view to naval supremacy. For, after the departure of Xerxes, when the Grecian fleet was arrived at Pagasa), wdiere they wintered, Themistocles, in a public oration to the people of Athens, told them that he had a de- sign to perform something that would tend greatly to their interests and safety, but was of such a nature, that it could not be made generall}'' public. The Athenians ordered him to impart it to Aristides only; and, if he approved of it, to put it in practice. And when Themi- stocles had discovered to him that his design was to burn the Grecian fleet in the haven of Pagasa3, Aristides, com- ing out to the people, gave this report of the stratagem contrived by Theuiistocles, that no proposal coidd be more politic, or more dishonorable; on which the Ailie- uians commanded Themistocles to think no farther oC it. AVlien the Lacedyemonians proposed, at the geiK-ral 254 THEMISTOCLES. council of the Amphictyonians, that the representatives of those cities Avhich ΛνβΓβ not in the league, nor had fought f gainst the Persians, should be excluded, The- mistocles, fearing that, the Thessalians, with those of Thebes, Argos, and others, being thrown out of the coun- cil, the Lacedremonians would become wholly masters of the votes, and do Λvhat the}^ pleased, supported the depu- ties of the cities, and prevailed with the members then sitting to alter their opinion in this point, showing them tliat there were but one and thirty cities which had par- taken in the war, and that most of these, also, were A'ery small ; how intolerable would it be, if the rest of Greece should be excluded, and the general council should come to be ruled by two or three great cities. By this, chiefly, he incurred the displeasure of the Lacedaemonians, whose honors and favors were now shoAvn to Cinion, with a view to making him the opponent of the state policy of Themistocles. He was also burdensome to the confederates, sailing about the islands and collecting money from them. He- rodotus saj^s, that, requiring money of those of the island of Andros, he told them that he had brought with him two goddesses, Persuasion and Force ; and they answered him that tl ey liiid also two great goddesses, Λvhich prohi- bited them from giving hhn any money, Poverty and Impossibility. Timocreon, the Rhodian poet, reprehends him somewhat bitterly for being wrought upon by money to let some Avho were banished return, while abandoning himself, λυΙιο Avas his guest and friend. The verses are these : — Pausanias you may praise, and Xanlliippus he be for, For Leutychidas, a third ; Aristides, I proclaim, From the sacred Athens came, The one true man of all ; for Themistocles Latona doth abhor. ο TilEMISTOCLES. 255 The liar, traitor, cheat, who, to gain his filthy pay, Tiraocreon, his friend, neglected to restore To his native Rliodian shore ; Tliree silver talents took, and departed (curses with him) on his way, Restoring people here, expelling there, and killing here, Filling evermore his purse : and at the Isthmus gave a treat, To be laughed at, of cold meat. Which they ate, and prayed the gods some one else might give the feast another year. But after the sentence and banishment of Themistocles, Timocreon reviles him yet more immoderately and wildly in a poem which begins thus : — Unto all the Greeks repair Ο Muse, and tell these verses there, As is fitting and is fair. The story is, that it Λvas put to the question whether Timocreon should be banished for sidiniz; with the Per- sians, and Themistocles gave his vote against him. So when Themistocles was accused of intriguing with the Medes, Timocreon made these lines upon him : — So now Timocreon, indeed, is not the sole friend of the ]Mede, There are some knaves besides ; nor is it only mine that fails, But other foxes have lost tails. — When the citizens of Athens beg-an to listen willino-lv to Ο Ο * those who traduced and reproached him, he was forced, with somewhat obnoxious frequency, to put them in mind of the great services he had performed, and ask tliose who were oftended with him Avhether they were weary with receiving benefits often from tlie same person, s(» renderinsi himself more odious. And he vet more pro- voked the people by building a temple to Diana witii the epithet of Aristobule, or Diana of Best Counsel ; intimating thereby, that he had giveu the best ccMUisel, 256 TIIEMISTOCLES. not only to the Athenians, but to all Greece. He built this temple near his own house, in the district called Melite. where now the public officers carry out the bodies of such as are executed, and throw the halters and clothes of those that are strangled or otherwise put to death. There is to this day a small figure of Themi.slo- cles in the temple of Diana of Best Counsel, which represents him to be a person, not only of a noble mind, but also of a most heroic aspect. At length the Athe- nians banished him, making use of the ostracism to hum- ble his eminence and authority, as they ordinarily did with all whom they thought too powerful, or, by their greatness, disproportionable to the equality thought requisite in a popular government. For the ostracism was instituted, not so much to punish the offender, as to mitigate and pacify the violence of the envious, who delighted to hum- ble eminent men, and who, by fixing this disgrace upon them, might vent some part of their rancor. Themistocles being banished from Athens, while he stayed at Argos the detection of Pausanias happened, Avhich gave such advantage to his enemies, that Leobotes of Agraule, son of Alcmceon, indicted him of treason, the Spartans supporting him in the accusation. When Pausanias went about this treasonable design, he concealed it at first from Themistocles, though he were his intimate friend ; but Λvhen he saw him expelled out of the commonwealth, and how impatiently he took his ban- ishment, he ventured to communicate it to him, and desired his assistance, sho\ving him the king of Persia's letters, and exasperating him against the Greeks, as a villanous, ungrateful people. However, Themistocles immediately rejected the proposals of Pausanias, and wholly refused to be a party in the enterprise, though he never revealed his communications, nor disclosed the con- spiracy to any man. either hoping that Pausanias would THEMISTOCLES. 257 desist from his intentions, or expecting thiit so inconsider- ate an attempt after such chimerical objects would be dis- covered by other means. After that Pausanias was put to death, letters and wri- tings being found concerning this matter, which rendered Themifetocles suspected, the Lacedcemonians were clamor- ous against him, and his enemies among the Athenians accused him ; when, being absent from Athens, he made his defence by letters, especially against the points that had been previously alleged against him. In answer to the malicious detractions of his enemies, he merely wrote to the citizens, urging that he who was always ambitious to govern, and not of a character or a disposition to serve, would never sell himself and his country into slavery to a barbarous and hostile nation. Notwithstanding this, the people, being persuaded by his accusers, sent officers to take him and bring him ;iway to be tried before a council of the Greeks, but, having timely notice of it, he passed over into the island of Cor- ey ra, where the state was under obligations to him ; for, beino; chosen as arbitrator in a difference between them and the Corinthians, he decided the controversy by order- ing the Corinthians to pay down twenty talents, and de- claring the town and island of Leucas a joint colony from both cities. From thence he fled into Epirus, and, (be Athenians and Lacedaimonians still pursuing him, he threw himself upon chances of safety that seemed all but desperate. For he tied for refuge to Ad π ictus, king of the Molossians, who had formerly made some request to the Athenians, when Themistocles was in tlie height of his authority, and had been disdainfully used and insulted l)y him, and had let it appear plain enough, tliat, could he lay hold of him, he would take his revenge. Yet in this misfortune, Themistocles, fearing the recent hatred of his neighbors and fellow-citizens more than VOL. I. 17 258 THEMISTOCLES. the old displeasure of the king, put himself at his mercy, and became an humble suppliant to Admetus, after a pe- culiar manner, different from the custom of other coun- tries. For taking the king's son, λ\\\ο was then a child, in his arms, he laid himself down at his hearth, this being the most sacred and only manner of supplication, among tlie Molossians, which was not to be refused. And some say that his wife, Phthia, intimated to Themistocles this way of petitioning, and placed her young son with him before the hearth ; others, that king Admetus, that he might be under a religious obligation not to deliver him up to his pursuers, prepared and enacted with him a sort of stage-play to this effect. At this time, Epicrates of Acharnos privately conveyed his wife and children out of Athens, and sent them hither, for which afterwards Cimon condemned him and put him to death ; as Stesim- brotus reports, and yet somehow, either forgetting this himself, or making Themistocles to be little mindful of it, says presently that he sailed into Sicily, and desired in marriage the daughter of Hiero, tyrant of Syracuse, promising to bring the Greeks under his power ; and, on Hiero refusing him, departed thence into Asia ; but this is not probable. For Theophrastus Avrites, in his work on Monarchy, that when Hiero sent race-horses to the Olympian games, and erected a pavilion sumptuously furnished, Themi- stocles made an oration to the Greeks, incitiug them to pull down the tyrant's tent, and not to suffer his horses to run. Thucydides says, that, passing over land to the ^gnean Sea, he took ship at Pydna in the bay of Therme, not being known to any one in the ship, till, being terri- fied to see the vessel driven by the winds near to Naxos, v/hich was then besieged by the Athenians, he made him- self known to the master and pilot, and, partly entreating them, partly threatening that if they \vent on sliore he THEMISTOCLES. 250 would accuse them, and make the Athenians to boheve that they did not take him in out of ignorance, but tliat he liad corrupted them with money from the becrinninf, he compelled them to bear off and stand out to sea, and sail forward towards the coast of Asia. A great part of his estate was privately conveyed away by his friends, and sent after him by sea into Asia ; besides which, there was discovered and confiscated to the value of fourscore talents, as Theophrastus writes; Theo- pompus says an hundred ; though Tliemistocles was never worth three talents before he was concerned in pubhc affairs. When he arrived at Cyme, and understood that all along the coast there were many laid wait for hiui, and particularly Ergoteles and Pythodorus (for the game wa:« worth the hunting for such as were thankful to make money by any means, the king of Persia having ofiered by public proclamation two hundred talents to him that should take him), he fled to JEgSQ, a small city of the JEo- Hans, where no one knew him but only his hoi^t Nico- genes, Λνΐιο was the richest man in ^EoHa, and well known to the great men of Inner Asia. While Tliemistocles lay hid for some days in his house, one night, after a sacrifice and supper ensuing, Olbius, the attendant upon Niro- genes's children, fell into a sort of frenzy and fit of ins})i- ration, and cried out in verse, — Night sluiU speak, and night instruct thee, By the voice ot" night conduct thee. After this, Tliemistocles, going to bed, dreamed that he saw a snake coil itself up upon his belly, and so creep to his neck ; then, as soon as it touched his J'acc, it turned into an eagle, which spread its wings over him, and took him up and flew away with him a great dis- tance ; then there appeared a herald's golden Λ\Ίΐη J, and 2G0 THEMISTOCLES. upon this at last it set him down securely, after infinite terror and disturbance. His departure was effected by Nicogenes by the follow- ing artifice ; the barbarous nations, and amongst them the Persians especially, are extremely jealous, severe, and suspicious about their Λvomen, not only their wives, but also their bought slaves and concubines, whom they keep so strictly that no one ever sees them abroad; they spend their lives shut up within doors, and, when they take a journey, are carried in close tents, curtained in on all sides, and set upon a wagon. Such a travelling car- riage being prepared for Themistocles, they hid him in it, and carried him on his journey, and told those whom they met or spoke with upon the road that they were conveying a young Greek woman out of Ionia to a noble- man at court. Thucydides and Charon of Lampsacus say that Xerxes was dead, and that Themistocles had an interview with his son ; but Ephorus, Dinon, Clitarchus, Heraclides, and many others, write that he came to Xerxes. The chro- nological tables better agree with the account of Thucy- dides, and yet neither can their statements be said to be quite set at rest. When Themistocles was come to the critical point, he applied himself first to Artabanus, commander of a thou- sand men, telling him that he was a Greek, and desired to speak with the king about important affairs concerning which the king was extremely solicitous. Artabanus an? swered him, " stranger, the laws of men are different^ and one thing is honorable to one man, and to others another ; but it is honorable for all to honor and observe their own laws. It is the habit of the Greeks, we are told, to honor, above all things, liberty and equality ; but amongst our many excellent laws, we account this the most excellent, to honor the king, and to worship him, a.s THEMISTOCLES. 201 the image of the great preserver of the universe ; if then, you shall consent to our laws, and fall down before the khig and worship him, you may both see him and speak to him ; but if your mind be otherwise, you must make use of others to intercede for you, for it is not the national custom here for the king to give audience to any one that doth not fall down before him." Themi- stocles, hearing this, replied, " Artabanus, I that come hither to increase the power and glory of the king, will not only submit myself to his laws, since so it hath pleased the god Avho exalteth the Persian empire to this greatness, but will also cause many more to be wor- shippers and adorers of the king. Let not this, therefore, be an impediment why I should not communicate to the king what I have to impart." Artabanus asking him, "Who must we tell him that you are? for j'our words signify you to be no ordinary person," Themistocles an- swered, "No man, Artabanus, must be informed of this before the king himself" Thus Phanias relates ; to which Eratosthenes, in his treatise on Riches, adds, that it was by the means of a woman of Eretria, who was kept by Artabanus, that he obtained this audience and interview with him. When he was introduced to the king, and had paid his reverence to him, he stood silent, till the king command- ing the interpreter to ask him who he was, he replied, " king, I am Themistocles the Athenian, driven into banishment by the Greeks. The evils that I have done to the Persians are numerous; but my benefits to them yet greater, in \vitlihulding the Greeks from jnu-suit, so soon as the deliverance of my own country allowed me lo show kindness also to you. I come with a mind suited to my present calamities ; prepared alike lor I'avors and for anger; to welcome your gracious reconciliation, ;ui(l to deprecate your wrath. Take my own country mm lor 262 THEMISTOCLES. witnesses of the services I have done for Persia, and make use of this occasion to show the world your virtue, rather than to satisfy your indignation. If you save me, you will save your suppliant; if otherwise, will destroy an enemy of the Greeks." He talked also of divine admo- nitions, such as the vision which he saw at Nicogenes'g house, and the direction given him by the oracle of Do dona, where Jupiter commanded him to go to him that had a name like his, by which he understood that he was sent from Jupiter to him, seeing that they both were great, and had the name of khigs. The king heard him attentively, and, though he ad- mired his temper and courage, gave him no answer at that time ; but, Λνΐιβη he was with his intimate friends, rejoiced in his great good fortune, and esteemed himself very happy in this, and prayed to his god Arimanius, that all his enemies might be ever of the same mind with the Greeks, to abuse and expel the bravest men amongst them. Then he sacrificed to the gods, and presently fell to drinking, and was so well pleased, that in the night, in the middle of his sleep, he cried out for joy three times, " I have Themistocles the Athenian." In the morning, calling together the chief of his court, he had Themistocles brought before him, who expected no good of it, when he saw, for example, the guards fiercely set against him as soon as they learnt his name, and giving him ill language. As he came forward towards the king, who was seated, the rest keeping silence, pass- ing by Roxanes, a commander of a thousand men, he heard him, with a slight groan, say, without stirring out of his place, " You subtle Greek serpent, the king's good genius hath brought thee hither." Yet, when he came into the presence, and again fell down, the king saluted him, and spake to him kindly, telling him he was now in- debted to him two hundred talents ; for it was just and THEMISTOCLES. 2G3 reasonable that he should receive the reward which \v;i> proposed to whosoever should bring Themistocles ; and promising much more, and encouraging him, he com- manded him to speak freely what he would concernini^ the affairs of Greece. Themistocles replied, that a man's discourse was like to a rich Persian carpet, the beautiful figures and patterns of which can only be shown by spread- ing and extending it out ; when it is contracted and folded up, they are obscured and lost; and, therefore, he desired time. The king being pleased with the comparison, and bidding him take what time he would, he desired a year; in which time, having learnt the Persian language suih- ciently, he spoke with the king by himself without the help of an interpreter, it being supposed that he dis- coursed only about the affairs of Greece ; but thei-e hap- pening, at the same time, great alterations at court, and removals of the king's favorites, he drew upon himself the envy of the great people, who imagined that he had taken the boldness to speak concerning them. For the favors shown to other strangers Λvere nothing in compaiison with the honors conferred on him ; the king invited him to partake of his own pastimes and recreations both at home and abroad, carrying him Λvith him a-hunting, and made him his intimate so far that he permitted him to see the queen-mother, and converse frequently with her. By the king's command, he also was made acquainted with the Maiiian learninoj. When Demaratus the LacedLemonian, being ordered l)y the king to ask whatsoever he pleased, and it should im- mediately be granted him, desired that he might make his public entrance, and be carried in state througli the city of Sardis, with the tiara set in the royal manner upon his head, Mithropaustes, cousin to the king, touched him on the head, and told him that he had no brains for the royal tiara to cover, and if Jupiter should give him liLs 264 THEMISTOCLES. lightning and thunder, he would not any the more be Jupiter for that ; the king also repulsed him with anger resolving never to be reconciled to him, but to be inexo- rable to all supplications on his behalf. Yet Themistocles pacified him, and prevailed with him to forgive him. And it is reported, that the succeeding kings, in whose reigns there was a greater communication between the Greeks and Persians, when they invited any considerable Greek into their service, to encourage him, would write, and promise him that he should be as great with them as Themistocles had been. They relate, also, how Themisto- cles, when he was in great prosperity, and courted by many, seeing himself splendidly served at his table, turned to his children and said, "Children, we had been undone if we had not been undone." Most writers say that he had three cities given him, Magnesia, Myus, and Lampsacus, to maintain him in bread, meat, and Avine. Neanthes of Cyzicus, and Phanias, add two more, the city of Palaiscepsis, to provide him with clothes, and Percote, with bedding and furniture for his house. As he was going down towards the sea-coast to take measures against Greece, a Persian whose name was Epixyes, governor of the upper Phrygia, laid wait to kill him, having for that purpose provided a long time before a number of Pisidians, who were to set upon him when he should stop to rest at a city that is called Lion's-head. But Themistocles, sleeping in the middle of the day, saw the Mother of the gods appear to him in a dream and say unto him, " Themistocles, keep back from the Lion's- head, for fear you fall into the lion's jaws ; for this ad- vice I expect that your daughter Mnesiptolema should be my servant." Themistocles was much astonished, and, when he had made his vows to the goddess, left the broad road, and, making a circuit, went another way, changing his intended station to avoid that place, and at THEMISTOCLES. 2Cjo night took up his rest in the fields. But one of the sumpter-horses, which carried the furniture for his tent, having fallen that day into the river, his servants spread out the tapestry, which was wet, and hung it up to dry ; in the mean time the Pisidians made towards them witli their swords drawn, and, not discerning exactly by the moon what it was that was stretched out. thoudit it to be the tent of Themistocles, and that they should find him resting himself within it ; but when they came near, and lifted up the hangings, those who watched there fell upon them and took them. Themistocles, having escaped this great danger, in admiration of the goodness of the goddess that appeared to him, built, in memory of it, a temple in the city of Magnesia, which he dedicated to Dindymene, Mother of the gods, in which he conse- crated and devoted his daughter Mnesiptolema to her service. When he came to Sardis, he visited the temples of the gods, and observing, at his leisure, their buildings, orna- ments, and the number of their offerings, he saw in the temple of the Mother of the gods, the statue of a virgin in brass, two cubits high, called the water-bringer. The- mistocles had caused this to be made and set up when he was surveyor of waters at Athens, out of the fines of those whom he detected in drawing off* and diverting the public water by pipes for their private use ; and whether he had some regret to see this image in cap- tivity, or was desirous to let the Athenians see in what great credit and authority he was with the king, he en- tered into a treaty with the governor of Lydia to per- suade him to send this statue back to Athenf?, which so enraged the Persian officer, that he told him he would write the king word of it. Themistocle>, being afirighted liereat, got access to his wives and concubines, b}- pre- sents of money to whom, he appeased the fury of the gov- 266 THEMISIOCLES. ernor; and afterwards behaved with more reserve aud circumspection, fearing the envy of the Persians, and did not, as Theopompus writes, continue to travel about Asia, but Uved quietly in his own house in Magnesia, where for a long time he passed his days in great security, being courted by all, and enjoying rich presents, and honored equally with the greatest persons in the Persian empire ; the king, at that time, not minding his concerns with Greece, being taken up with the affairs of Inner Asia. But when Egypt revolted, being assisted by the Athe- nians, and the Greek gallej^s roved about as far as Cyprus and Cilicia, and Cimon had made himself master of the seas, the king turned his thoughts thither, and, bending his mind chiefly to resist the Greeks, and to check the growth of their power against him, began to raise forces, and send out commanders, and to despatch messengers to Themistocles at Magnesia, to put him in mind of his pro- mise, and to summon him to act against the Greeks. Yet this did not increase his hatred nor exasperate him against the Athenians, neither was he any way elevated with the thoughtsof the honor and powerful command he was to have in this war ; but judging, perhaps, that the object would not be attained, the Greeks having at that time, beside other great commanders, Cimon, in particular, who was gaining wonderful military successes ; but chiefly, being ashamed to sully the glory of his former great actions, and of his many victories and trophies, he determined to put a con- clusion to his life, agreeable to its previous course. He sacrificed to the gods, and invited his friends; and, having entertained them and shaken hands with them, drank bull's blood, as is the usual story ; as others state, a poi- son producing instant death; and ended his days in the city of Magnesia, having lived sixty-five years, most of which he had spent in politics and in the wars, in govern- ment and command. The king, being informed of the THEiiUSTOCLES. 2G7 cause and manner of his death, admired him more than ever, and continued to show kindness to his friends and relations. Themistocles left three sons by Archippe, daughter to Lysander of Alopece, — Archeptolis, Polyeuctus, and Cleo- phantus. Plato the philosopher mentions the last as a most excellent horseman, but otherwise insignificant person ; of two sons yet older than these, Neocles and Diodes, Neocles died when he was young by the bite of a horse, and Diodes was adopted by his grandfather, Ly- sander. He had many daughters, of Λνΐιοηι Mnesiptolema, whom he had by a second marriage, was wife to Arche- ptolis, her brother by another mother ; Italia was married to Panthoides, of the island of Chios ; Sybaris to Nico- medes the Athenian. After the death of Themistocles, his nephew, Phrasicles, went to Magnesia, and married, with her brothers' consent, another daughter, Nicomache, and took charge of her sister Asia, the youngest of all the children. The Magnesians possess a splendid sepulchre of The- mistocles, placed in the middle of their market-place. It is not worth while taking notice of what Ando- cides states in his Address to his Friends concerning his remains, how the Athenians robbed his tomb, and threw his ashes into the air; for he feigns this, to exas- perate the oligarchical faction against the people ; and there is no man living but knows that Phylarchus simply invents in his history, Λvhere he all but uses an actual stage machine, and brings in Neocles and Demopolis as the sons of Themistocles, to incite or move compassion, as if he were writing a tragedy. Diodorus the cosmographer says, in his work on Tombs, but by conjecture rather than of certain knowledge, that near to the haven of Pira3us, where the land runs out like an elbow from the promon- tory of Alcimus, when you have doubled the cape and 268 THEMISTOCLES. passed inward where the sea is always calm, there is a large piece of masonry, and upon this the tomb of The- mistocles, in the shape of an altar ; and Plato the come- dian confirms this, he believes, in these verses, — Thy tomb is fairly placed upon the strand, Where merchants still shall greet it with the land ; Still in and out 't will see them come and go, And watch the galleys as they race below. Various honors also and privileges were granted to the kindred of Themistocles at Magnesia, which were observed down to our times, and were enjoyed by another The- mistocles of Atliens, with whom I had an intimate ac- quaintance and friendship in the house of Ammonius the philosopher. C A Μ I LLUS. Among the many remarkable things that are related of Furius Camillus, it seems singular and strange above all, that he, who continually was in the highest com- mands, and obtained the greatest successes, was five times chosen dictator, triumphed four times, and was styled a second founder of Rome, yet never was so much as once consul. The reason of which was the state and temper of the commonwealth at that time ; for the peo- ple, being at dissension Avith the senate, refused to return consuls, but in their stead elected other magistrates, called military tribunes, who acted, indeed, with full consular power, but were thought to exercise a less obnoxious amount of authority, because it was divided among a larger number; for to have the management of affairs intrusted in the hands of six persons rather than two was some satisfaction to the opponents of oligarchy. This was the condition of the times when Camillus was in the height of his actions and glory, and, although the government in the meantime had often proceeded to con- sular elections, yet he could never persuade himself to be consul against the inclination of the people. In all his other administrations, Avhich were many and various, lie so behaved himself, that, when alone in autlioi ity. he exercised his power as in common, but tlio honor of all OO sj: (2G9 ) 270 CAMILLUS. actions recloiinded entirely to himself, even when in joint commission with others ; the reason of the formei' was his moderation in command ; of the latter, his great judg- ment and wisdom, Λvhich gave him without controversy the first place. The house of tlie Furii was not, at that time, of any considerable distinction ; he, by his own acts, first raised himself to honor, serving under Postumius Tubertus, dictator, in the great battle against the ^quians and \^olscians. For riding out from the rest of the army, and in the charge receiving a Avound in his thigh, he for all that did not quit the fight, but, letting the dart drag in the wound, and engaging Avith the bravest of the enemy, put them to flight ; for Avhich action, among other re- wards bestowed on him, he was created censor, an office in those days of great repute and authority. During his censorship one very good act of his is recorded, that, whereas the wars had made many widows, he obliged such as had no wives, some by fair persuasion, others by threatening to set fines on their heads, to take them in marriage ; another necessary one, in causing orphans to be rated, Avho before were exempted from taxes, the fre- quent wars requiring more than ordinary expenses to maintain them. What, hoAvever, pressed them most was the siege of Veii. Some call this people Veientani. This was the head city of Tuscan}^, not inferior to Rome, either in number of arms or multitude of soldiers, inso- much that, presuming on her wealth and luxury, and pri- ding herself upon her refinement and sumptuousness, she engaged in many honorable contests with the Romans for glory and empire. But now they had abandoned their former ambitious hopes, having been weakened by great defeats, so that, having fortified themselves with high and strong walls, and furnished the city Avith all sorts of weapons offensive and defensive, as likewise with 1 CAMILLUS. -71 corn and all manner of provisions, they cheerfiilh' on- rlured a siege, which, though tedious to them, was no less troublesome and distressing to the besieo:ers. For the Romans, having never been accustomed to stay away from home, except in summer, and for no great length of time, and constantly to winter at home, were then first com- pelled by the tribunes to build forts in the enem^^'s country, and, raising strong works about their camp, to join winter and summer together. And now, the seventh year of the Avar drawing to an end, the commanders began to be suspected as too slow and remiss in driving on the siege, insomuch that they were discharged and others chosen for the war, among whom was Camillus, then second time tribune. But at present he had no hand in the siege, the duties that fell ])y lot to him being to make war upon the Faliscans and Capenates, who, taking advantage of the Romans being occupied on all hands, had carried ravages into their country, and, through all the Tuscan war, given them much annoyance, but were ηοΛν reduced by Camillus, and with great loss shut up Avithin their Avails. And now, in the very heat of the Avar, a strange phe- nomenon in the Alban lake, which, in the absence of any known cause and explanation by natural reasons, seemed as great a prodigy as the most incredible that are report- ed, occasioned great alarm. It was the beginning of autunni, and the summer noAV ending had, to all observa- tion, been neither rainy nor much troubled with southern winds; and of the many lakes, brooks, and springs of all sorts with which Italy abounds, some were wholly dried up, others drew very little water with them; all the rivers, as is usual in summer, ran in a very low and hollow channel. But the Alban lake, that is fed by no other waters but its own, and is on all sides encircled 272 CAMILLUS. with fruitful mountains, without any cause, unless it were divine, began visibly to rise and swell, increasing to the feet of the mountains, and by degrees reaching the level of the very tops of them, and all this without any waves or agitation. At first it was the wonder of shepherds and herdsmen ; but when the earth, which, like a great dam, held up the lake from falling into the lower grounds, through the quantity and weight of water was broken doAvn, and in a violent stream it ran through the ploughed fields and plantations to discharge itself in the sea, it not only struck terror into the Romans, but was thought by all the inhabitants of Italy to portend some extraordinary event. But the greatest talk of it was in the camp that besieged Veii, so that in the town itself, also, the occurrence became ΙίηοΛνη. As in long sieges it commonly happens that parties on both sides meet often and converse with one another, so it chanced that a Roman had gained much confidence and familiarity with one of the besieged, a man versed in ancient prophecies, and of repute for more than ordi- nary skill in divination. The Roman, observing him to be overjoyed at the story of the lake, and to mock at the siege, told him that this was not the only prodigy that of late had happened to the Romans ; others more wonder- ful yet than this had befallen them, which he was willing to communicate to him, that he might the better provide for his private interests in these public distempers. The man greedily embraced the proposal, expecting to hear some wonderful secrets ; but when, by little and little, he had led him on in conversation, and insensibly drawn liim a good way from the gates of the city, he snatched him up by the middle, being stronger than he, and, by the assistance of others that came running from the camp, seized and delivered him to the commanders. The CAMILLUS. 2 / ο man, reduced to this necessity, and sensible now that destiny was not to be avoided, discovered to them the secret oracles of Veii ; that it was not possible the city should be taken, until the Alban lake, which now broke forth and had found out new passages, Avas drawn back from that course, and so diverted that it could not minirle with the sea. The senate, having heard and satisfied themselves about the matter, decreed to send to Delphi, to ask counsel of the god. The messengers were persons of the highest repute, Licinius Cossus, Valerius Potitus, and Fabius Ambustus; who, having made their voyage by sea and consulted the god, returned with other an- swers, particularly that there had been a neglect of some of their national rites relating to the Latin feasts; but the Alban Avater the oracle commanded, if it were possible, they should keep from the sea, and shut it up in its an- cient bounds ; but if that was not to be done, then they should carry it off by ditches and trenches into the lower grounds, and so dry it up ; which message being deliv- ered, the priests performed what related to the sacriiices, and the people went to work and turned tlie water. And now the senate, in the tenth year of the war, taking away all other commands, created Camillus dictar tor, who chose Cornelius Scipio for his general of horse. And in the first place he made vows unto the gods, that, if they would grant a happy conclusion of the Avar, he would celebrate to their honor the great games, and dedi- cate a temple to the goddess whom the Komans call Matuta the Mother, though, from the ceremonies which are used, one Avould think she was Leucothea. For they take a servant-maid into the secret part of the tem- ple, and there cuff her, and drive her out again, and they embrace their brothers' children in place of their own ; and, in general, the ceremonies of the sacrifice remind one of the nursing of Bacchus by Ino, and the calamities ^•OL. I. 18 274 CAMILLUS occasioned by her husband's concubine* Camillus, hav- ing made these vows, marched into the country of the Faliscans, and in a great battle overthrew them and the Capenates, their confederates; afterwards he turned to the siege of Veii, and, finding that to take it by assault would prove a difficult and hazardous attempt, proceeded to cut mines under ground, the earth about the city being easy to break up, and allowing such depth for the works as would prevent their being discovered bv the enemy. This design going on in a hopeful way, he openly gave assaults to the enemy, to keep them to the walls, whilst they that worked underground in the mines were, with- out being perceived, arrived within the citadel, close to the temple of Juno, which was the greatest and most honored in all the city. It is said that the prince of the Tuscans was at that very time at sacrifice, and that the priest, after he had looked into the entrails of the beast, cried out with a loud voice that the gods Avould give the victory to those that should complete those offerings; and that the Romans Avho were in the mines, hearing the words, inunediately pulled down the floor, and, ascending with noise and clashing of weapons, frighted away the enemy, and, snatching up the entrails, carried them to Camillus. But this may look like a fable. The city, however, being taken by storm, and the soldiers busied in pillaging and gathering an infinite quantity of riches and spoil, Camillus, from the high tower, viewing what was done, at first wept for pity ; and when they that were by congratulated his good success, he lifted up his hands to heaven, and broke out into this prayer : " most mighty * Ino, daughter of Cadmus and in his Roman Questions, in a fit of Harmonia, nursed her sister Se- frantic jealousy of her husband's mele's child, the infant Bacchus, and concubine, an ^tolian servant- afterwards, according to the story maid, killed her own child, followed by Plutarch both here and CAMILLUS. Ζ/ο Jupiter, and ye gods that are judges of good and evil actions, ye know that not without just cause, but con- strained by necessity, we have been forced to rev(!nge ourselves on the city of our unrighteous and wicked ene- mies. But if, in the vicissitude of things, there be any calamity due, to counterbalance this great felicity, I bcf that it may be diverted from the city and army of the Romans, and foil, with as little hurt as may be, upon my own head." Having said these words, and just turning about (as the custom of the Romans is to turn to the right after adoration or prayer), he stumbled and fell, to the astonishment of all that w^ere present. But, recover- ing himself presenth from the fall, he told them that he had received Avhat he had prayed for, a small mischance, in compensation for the greatest good fortune. Having sacked the city, he resolved, according as he had \OWpd, to carry Juno's image to Rome ; and, the workmen being ready for that purpose, he sacrificed to the goddess, and made his supplications that she would be pleased to accept of their devotion toward her, and giaciously vouchsafe to accept of a place among the gods that presided at Rome ; and the statue, they say, an- swered in a low voice that she was ready and willing to go. Livy writes, that, in praying, Camilliis touched the goddess, and inΛύted her, and that some of the standers-by cried out that she was willing and would come. They who stand up for the miracle and endeavor to maintain it have one great advocate on their side in the wondorfid fortime of the city, which, from a small and contemptil)le beginning, could never have attained to that greatness and power without many signal manifestations of the divine presence and cooperation. Other wonders of tiie like nature, drops of sweat seen to stand on statues, groans heard from them, the figures seen to turn round and to close their eyes, are recorded by many ancient 276 CAMILLUS. historians ; and we ourselves could relate divers wonder- ful things, which we have been told by men of our own time, that are not lightly to be rejected ; but to give too easy credit to such things, or wholly to disbelieve them, is equally dangerous, so incapable is human infirmity of keeping any bounds, or exercising command over itself, running off sometimes to superstition and dotage, at other times to the contempt and neglect of all that is supernatural. But moderation is best, and to avoid all extremes. Camillus, however, whether puffed up Avith the great- ness of his achievement in conquering a city that was the rival of Rome, and had held out a ten years' siege, or exalted with the felicitations of those that were about him, assumed to himself more than became a civil and legal magistrate ; among other things, in the pride and haughtiness of his triumph, driving through Rome in a chariot draAvn Λvith four white horses, which no general either before or since ever did ; for the Romans consider such a mode of conveyance to be sacred, and specially set apart to the king and father of the gods. This alienated the hearts of his fellow-citizens, who were not accustomed to such pomp and display. The second pique they had against him was his oppo- sing the law by which the city was to be divided ; for the tribunes of the people brought forward a motion that the people and senate should be divided into two parts, one of Λvhich should remain at home, the other, as the lot sliould decide, remove to the new-taken city. By which means they should not only have much more room, but, by the advantage of two great and magnificent cities, be better able to maintain their territories and their fortunes in general. The people, therefore, who were numerous and indigent, greedily embraced it, and crowded continu- ally to the forum, with tumultuous demands to have it CAMILLUS. 277 put to the vote. But the senate and the noblest citizens, judging the proceedings of the tribunes to tend rather to a destruction than a division of Rome, greatly averse to it, went to Camillus for assistance, who, fearing the result if it came to a direct contest, contrived to occupy the people with other business, and so staved it off. He thus became unpopular. But the greatest and most ap- parent cause of their dislike against him arose from the tenths of the spoil ; the multitude having here, if not a just, yet a plausible case against him. For it seems, as he went to the siege of \^eii, he had vowed to Apollo that if he took the city he would dedicate to him the tenth of the spoil. The city being taken and sacked, whether he was loath to trouble the soldiers at that time, or that throuiih the multitude of business he had forg-otten his vow, he suffered them to enjoy that part of the spoils also. Some time afterwards, when his authority was laid down, he brought the matter before the senate, and the priests, at the same time, reported, out of the sacrifices, that there were intimations of divine anger, requiring propitiations and offerings. The senate decreed the obli- gation to be in force. But seeing it was difficult for every one to produce the very same things they had taken, to be divided anew, they ordained that every one upon oath should bring into the public the tenth part of his gains. This occasioned many annoyances and hardships to the soldiers, who were poor men, and had endured much in the war, and now were forced, out of what they had gained and spent, to bring in so great a proportion. Camillus, being assaulted by their clamor and tumults, lor want of a better excuse, betook himself to the poorest of defences, confessing he had forgotten his vow ; they in turn complained that lie had vowed the tenth of the enemy's goods, and now levied it out of the tenths of the citizens. Nevertheless, e"\ ery 278 CAMILLUS. one having brought in his due proportion, it was decreed that out of it a bowl of massy gold should be made, and sent to Delphi. And when there was great scarcity of gold in the city, and the magistrates were considering where to get it, the Roman ladies, meeting together and consulting among themselves, out of the golden ornaments they wore contributed as much as went to the making the oiFerino;, which in weiorht came to eio;ht talents of gold. The senate, to give them the honor they had deserved, ordained that funeral orations should be used at the obse- quies of women as well as men, it having never before been a custom that any woman after death should receive any public eulogy. Choosing out, therefore, three of the noblest citizens as a deputation, they sent them in a ves- sel of war, well manned and sumptuously adorned. Storm and calm at sea may both, they say, alike be dangerous ; as they at this time experienced, being brought almost to the very brink of destruction, and, beyond all expecta- tion, escaping. For near the i!^les of ^olus the Avind slacking, galleys of the Lipareans came upon them, taking them for pirates ; and, when they held up their hands as suppliants, forbore indeed from violence, but took their ship in tow, and carried her into the harbor, Λvhere they exposed to sale their goods and persons as lawful prize, they being pirates; and scarcely, at last, by the virtue and interest of one man, Timesitheus by name, who was in office as general, and used his utmost persuasion, they were, with much ado, dismissed. He, however, himself sent out some of his own vessels with them, to accom- pany them in their voyage and assist them at the dedica- tion ; for which he received honors at Rome, as he had deserved. And now the tribunes of the people again resuming their motion for the division of the city, the war against the Faliscans luckily broke out, giving liberty to the chief CAMILLUS. 279 citizens to choose what magistrates they pleased, and to appohit Camillus miUtary tribune, with five colleao;ues; affairs then requiring a commander of authority and repu- tation, as well as experience. And when the people had ratified the election, he marched with his forces into the territories of the Faliscans, and laid siege to Falerii, a well-fortified city, and plentifully stored with all neces- saries of war. And although he perceived it would be no small work to take it, and no little time would be required for it, yet he was willing to exercise the citizens and keep them abroad, that they might have no leisure, idling at home, to follow the tribunes in factions and sedi- tions ; a very common remedy, indeed, with the Romans, who thus carried off, like good physicians, the ill humors of their commonwealth. The Falerians,'== trusting; in the strength of their city, which was well fortified on all sides, made so little account of the siege, that all, with the ex- ception of those that guarded the walls, as in times of peace, walked about the streets in their common dress; the boys went to school, and were led by their master to play and exercise about the town walls ; for the Falerians, like the Greeks, used to have a single teacher for many ])upils, wishing their children to live and be brought up from the beginning in each other's company. This schoolmaster, designing to betray the Falerians by their children, led them out every day under the town wall, at first but a little way, and, when they had exer- cised, brought them home again. Afterwards by degrees he drew them farther and fiirther, till by practice he had made them bold and fearless, as if no danger Λvas about them ; and at last, having got them all together, he brought them to the outposts of the Eomans, and de- livered them up, demanding to be led to Camillus. * The Falerians, in this narra- the Faliscans, the nation in pen• live, are the people of the town ; eral. 280 CAMILLUS. Where being come, and standing in the middle, he said that he was the master and teacher of these children, but, preferring his favor before all other obligations, he was come to deliver up his charge to him, and, in that, the whole city. When Camillas had heard him out, he was astounded at the treachery of the act, and, turning to the standers-by, observed, that " war, indeed, is of necessity attended with much injustice and violence ! Certain laws, however, all good men observe even in war itself, nor is victory so great an object as to induce us to incur for its sake obligations for base and impious acts. A great general should rely on his ΟΛΥη Anrtue. and not on other men's vices." Which said, he commanded the officers to tear off' the man's clothes, and bind his hands behind him, and give the boys rods and scourges, to punish the traitor and drive him back to the city. By this time the Falerians had discovered the treachery of the school- master, and the city, as was likely, Λvas full of lamenta- tions and cries for their calamit}^, men and women of worth running in distraction about the walls and gates; when, behold, the boys came whipping their master on, naked and bound, calling Camillus their preserver and god and father. Insomuch that it struck not only into the parents, but the rest of the citizens that saw Avhat was done, such admiration and love of Camillus's justice, that, immediately meeting in assembly, they sent ambas- sadors to him, to resign whatever they had to his disposal. Camillus sent them to Rome, where, being brought into the senate, they spoke to this purpose : that the Romans, preferring justice before victory, had taught them rather to embrace submission than liberty; they did not so much confess themselves to be inferior in strength, as they must acknowledge them to be superior in virtue. The senate remitted the whole matter to Camillus, to judge and order as he thought fit ; who, taking a sum of ni()ne}' CAMILLUS. 2S1 of the Falerians, and, making a peace with the whole nation of the Faliscans, returned home. But the soldiers, who had expected to have the pillage of the city, when they came to Rome empty-handed, railed against Camillus among their fellow-citizens, as a hater of the people, and one that grudged all advantac-e to the poor. Afterwards, when the tribunes of the peo- ple again brought their motion for dividing the city to the vote, Camillus appeared openly against it, shrinking from no impopularity, and inveighing boldly against the promoters of it, and so urging and constraining the mul- titude, that, contrary to their inclinations, they rejected the proposal; but yet hated Camillus. Insomuch that, though a great misfortune befell him in his family (one of his two sons dying of a disease), commiseration for this could not in the least make them abate of their malice. And, indeed, he took this loss with immoderate sorrow, being a man naturally of a mild and tender dis- position, and, when the accusation was preferred against him, kept his house, and mourned amongst the women of his flimily. His accuser was Lucius Apuleius; the charge, appro- priation of the Tuscan spoils ; certain brass gates, part of those spoils, were said to be in his possession. The peo- ple Λvere exasperated against him, and it Λvas plain they would take hold of any occasion to condemn him. Gath- ering, therefore, together his friends and fellow-soldiers, and such as had borne command with him, a considerable number in all, he besought them that they would not suffer him to be unjustly overborne by shameful accusa- tions, and left the mock and scorn of his enemies. His friends, having advised and consulted among themselves, made answer, that, as to the sentence, they did not see how they could help him, but that they would contrilnite to whatsoever fine should be set upon him. Not able tc 282 CAMILLUS. endure so great an indignity, lie resolved iii his anger to leave the city and go into exile ; and so, having taken leave of his wife and his son, he went silently to the gate of the city, and, there stopping and turning round, stretched out his hands to the Capitol, and prayed to the- gods, that if, Λvithout any fault of his own, but merely through the malice and violence of the peoj)le, he was driven out into banishment, the Romans might quickly repent of it ; and that all mankind might witness their need for the assistance, and desire for the return of Ca- m ill us. Thus, like Achilles, having left his imprecations on the citizens, he went into banishment ; so that, neither ap- pearing nor making defence, he was condemned in the sum of fifteen thousand asses, which, reduced to silver, makes one thousand five hundred drachmas ; for the as was the money of the time, ten of such copper pieces making the denarius, or piece of ten. And there is not a Roman but believes that immediately upon the prayers of Catnillus a sudden judgment followed, and that he received a revenge for the injustice done unto him ; wdiich though we cannot think was pleasant, but rather grievous and bitter to him, yet was very remark- able, and noised over the wdiole world; such a punish- ment visited the city of Rome, an era of such loss and danger and disgrace so quickly succeeded ; whether it thus fell out by fortune, or it be the office of some god not to see injured virtue go unavenged. The first token that seemed to threaten some mischief to ensue was the death of the censor Julius ; for the Romans have a religious reverence for the office of a censor, and esteem it sacred. The second was, that, just before Camillus went into exile, Marcus Caedicius, a person of no great distinction, nor of the rank of senator, but esteemed a good and respectable man, reported to the C AMI LLCS. 283 military tribunes a thing ΛνοΓΐΙι/ their consideration : that, going along the night before in the street called the New Way, and being called by somebody in a loud voice, he turned about, but could see no one, but heard a voice greater than human, Λvhich said these Avoids, " Go, Marcus Caedicius, and early in the morning tell the mili- tary tribunes that they are shortly to expect the Gauls." But the tribunes made a mock and sport with the story, and a little after came Camillus's banishment. The Gauls are of the Celtic race, and are reported to have been compelled by their numbers to leave their country, which Avas insufficient to sustain them all, and to have gone in search of other homes. And being, many thousands of them, young men and able to bear arms, and carrying Avith them a still greater number of women and young children, some of them, passing the Riphcean mountains, fell upon the Northern Ocean, and possessed themselves of the farthest parts of Europe; others, seating themselves between the Pyrenean moun- tains and the Alps, lived there a considerable time, near to the Senones and Celtorii ; but, afterwards tasting wine which was then first brought them out of Italy, they were all so much taken with the liquor, and transported with the hitherto unknown delight, that, snatching up their arms and taking their families along with them, they marched directly to the Alps, to find out the country which jnelded such fruit, pronouncing all others barren and useless. He that first brought wine among them and was the chief instigator of their coming into Italy is said to have been one Aruns, a Tuscan, a man of noble extraction, and not of bad natural character, but involved in the following misfortune. He was guardian to an orphan, one of the richest of the country, and much admired for his beauty, whose name was Lucumo. From his childhood he had been bied up with Aruns in his Jam- 284 CAMILLUS. ily, and when now grown up did not leave his house, pro- fessing to wish for the enjoyment of his society. And thus for a great W' hile he secretly enjoyed Aruns's wife, corrupt- ing her, and himself corrupted by her. But when they were both so far gone in their passion that they could neither refrain their lust nor conceal it, the young man seized the woman and openly sought to carry her away. The husband, going to law, and finding himself overpowered by the interest and money of his opponent, left his coun- try, and, hearing of the state of the Gauls, went to them, and was the conductor of their expedition into Italy. At their first coming they at once possessed themselves of all that country which anciently the Tuscans inhabited, reaching from the Alps to both the seas, as the names themselves testify; for the North or Adriatic Sea is named from the Tuscan city Adria, and that to the south tiie Tuscan Sea simply. The whole country is rich in fruit trees, has excellent pasture, and is well watered with rivers. It had eighteen large and beautiful cities, well provided with all the means for industry and wealth, and all the enjoyments and pleasures of life. The Gauls cast out the Tuscans, and seated themselves in them. But this was long before. The Gauls at this time were besieging Clusium, a Tus- can city. The Clusinians sent to the Romans for succor, desiring them to interpose with the barbarians hy letters and ambassadors. There were sent three of the family of the Fabii, persons of high rank and distinction in the city. The Gauls received them courteously, from respect to the name of Roaie, and, giving over the assault which was then making upon the walls, came to conference with them ; when the ambassadors asking what injury the^^ had received of the Clusinians that they thus invaded their city, Brennus, king of the Gauls, laughed and made answer, " The Clusinians do us injury, in that, being able I CAMILLUS. 280 only to till a small parcel of ground, they must needs possess a great territory, and will not yield any part to us who are strangers, many in number, and poor. In the ^ame nature, Romans, formerly the Albans, Fidenates, ami Ardeates, and now lately the Veientines and Ca- penates, and many of the Faliscans and A^olseians, did you injury ; upon whom ye make Λvar if they do not yield you part of Λvhat they possess, make slaves of them, waste and spoil their country, and ruin their cities ; neither in so doing are cruel or unjust, but follow that most ancient of all laws, which gives the possessions of the fee- ble to the strong ; which begins with God and ends in the beasts ; since all these, by nature, seek, the stronger to have advantage over the weaker. Cease, therefore, to pity the Clusinians whom we besiege, lest ye teach the Gauls to be kind and compassionate to those that are op- pressed by you." 13y this answer the Romans, perceiving that Brennus was not to be treated with, went into Clu- sium, and encouraged and stirred up the inhabitants to make a sally with them upon the barbarians, which they did either to try their strength or to show their own. The sally being made, and the fight growing hot about the walls, one of the Fabii, Quintus Ambustus, being well mounted, and setting spurs to his horse, made full against a Gaul, a man of huge bulk and stature, whom he saw ridinii out at a distance from the rest. At the first he was not recognized, through the quickness of the conllict and the glittering of his armor, that precluded any view of him; but when he had overthrown the Gaul, and was going to gather the spoils, Brennus knew him ; and, in- voking the gods to be witnesses, that, contrary to the known and common law of nations, Avhich is holily ob- served by all mankind, he who had come as an ambassador had now engaged in hostility against him, he drew off his men, and, bidding Clusium farewell, led his armj 286 CAMILLUS. diroctly to Rome. But not wishing that it should look as if they took arh^antage of that injury, and were ready to embrace any occasion of quarrel, he sent a herald to demand the man in punishment, and in the mean time marched leisurely on. The senate being met at Eome, among many others that spoke against the Fabii, the priests called fecials were the most decided, λυΙιο, on the religious ground, urged the senate that they shoidd lay the whole guilt and penalty of the fact upon him that committed it, and so exonerate the rest. These fecials Numa Pompilius, the mildest and justest of kings, constituted guardians of peace, and the judges and determiners of all causes by which war may justifiably be made. The senate referring the whole matter to the people, and the priests there, as well as in the senate, pleading against Fabius, the multi- tude, however, so little regarded their anthorit}^, that in scorn and contempt of it they chose Fabius and the rest of his brothers military tribunes. The Gauls, on hearing this, in great rage threw aside every delay, and hastened on with all the speed they could make. The places through which they marched, terrified Λvith their numbers and the splendor of their preparations for Avar, and in alarm at their violence and fierceness, began to give up their territories as already lost, with little doubt but their cities would quickly follow ; contrary, however, to expec- tation, they did no injury as they passed, nor took any •^.hing from the fields ; and, as they went by any city, cried jut that they Avere going to Rome; that the Romans Duly were their enemies, and that they took all others for their friends. Whilst the barbarians Avere thus hastening with all speed, the military tribunes brought the Romans into the field to be ready to engage them, being not inferior to the Gauls in number (for they were no less than forty I CAMILLUS. 287 thousand foot), but most of them raw soldiers, and such as had never handled a weapon before. Besides, they had wholly neglected all religious usages, had not ob- tained favorable sacrifices, nor made inquiries of the prophets, natural in danger and before battle. No less did the multitude of commanders distract and confound their proceedings; frequently before, upon less occasions, they had chosen a single leader, with the title of dictator, being sensible of what great importance it is in critical times to have the soldiers united under one general with the entire and absolute control placed in his hands. Add to all, the remembrance of CamiHus's treatment, which made it now seem a dangerous thing for officers to com- mand without humoring their soldiers. In this condition they lei"t the city, and encainped by the i-iver Allia, about ten miles from Eome, and not far from the place where it falls into the Tiber; and here the Gauls came upon them, and, after a disgraceful resistance, devoid of order and discipline, they were miserably defeated. The left wing was immediately driven into the river, and there destroyed ; the right had less damage by declining the shock, and from the low grounds getting to the tops of the hills, from whence most of them afterwards dropped into the city ; the rest, as many as escaped, the enemy being Aveary of the slaughter, stole by night to Veii. giv- ing up Rome and all tliat was in it for lost. This battle Λvas fouiiht about the summer solstice, the moon being at full, the very same day in which the sad disaster of the Fabii had happened, when three hundred of that name Λvere at one time cut off by the Tuscans. But from this second loss and defeat the day got the name of Alliensis, from the river Allia, and still retains it. The question of unlucky days, whether we should con- sider any to be so, and whether Heraclitus did well in upbraiding Hesiod for distinguishing tliem into fortunate 288 CAMILLUS. and unfortunate, as ignorant that the nature of everj day is the same, I have examined in another place ; but upon occasion of the present subject, I think it will not be amiss to annex a few examples relating to this matter. On the fifth of their month Hippodromius, which corre- sponds to the Athenian HccatombaBon, the Boeotians gained twO signal victories, the one at Leuctra, the othei• at Ceressus, about three hundred years before, when they overcame Lattamyas and the Thessalians, both which asserted the liberty of Greece. Again, on the sixth oi Boedromion. the Persians were worsted by the Greeks at Marathon ; on the third, at Plataea, as also at Mycale ; on the twenty-fifth, at Arbela. The Athenians, about the full moon in Boedromion, gained their sea-victory at Naxos under the conduct of Chabrias ; on the twentieth, at Salamis, as we have shown in our treatise on Days. Thargelion was a very unfortunate month to the barba- rians, for in it Alexander overcame Darius's generals on the Granicus ; and the Carthaginians, on the twenty- fourth, were beaten by Timoleon in Sicily, on which same day and month Troy seems to have been taken, as Ephorus, Callisthenes, Damastes, and Phylarchus state. On the other hand, the month Metagitnion, which in Boeotia is called Panemus, was not very lucky to the Greeks; for on its seventh day they were defeated by Antipater, at the battle in Cranon, and utterly ruined ; and before, at Chceronea, were defeated by Philip ; and on the very same day, same month, and same year, those that went with Archidamus into Italy were there cut off by the barbarians. The Carthaginians also observe the twenty- first of the same month, as bringing with it the largest number and the severest of their losses. I am not igno- rant, that, about the Feast of Mysteries, Thebes was de- stroyed the second time by Alexander; and after that, upon the very twentieth of Boedromion, on which day CAMILLUS. 289 they lead forth the mystic lacchus, the Athenians received a garrison of the Macedonians. On the selfsame day the Romans lost their army under Ccepio by the Cimbrians, and in a subsequent 3'ear, under the conduct of Lucullus, overcame the Armenians and Tigranes. King Attalu.s and Pompey died both on their birthdays. One could reckon up several that have had variety of fortune on the same day. This day, meantime, is one of the unfortu- nate ones to the Romans, and for its sake two others * in every month ; fear and superstition, as the custom of it is, more and more prevailing. But I have discussed this more accurately in my Roman Questions. And now, after the battle, had the Gauls immediately pursued those that fled, there had been no reniedy but Rome must have wholly been ruined, and all those who remained in it utterly destroyed ; such was the terror that those who escaped the battle brought with them into the city, and with such distraction and confusion were themselves in turn infected. But the Gauls, not im- agining their victory to be so considerable, and overtaken with the present joy, fell to feasting and dividing the spoil, by Λvllich means they gave leisure to those who were for leaving the city to make their escape, and to those that remained, to anticipate and prepare lor their coming. For they λυΙιο resolved to stay at Rome, aban- doning the rest of the city, betook themselves to the Capitol, Avhich they fortified with the help of missiles and new works. One of their principal cares was of their holy things, most of which they conveyed into the Capi- tol. But the consecrated fire the vestal virgins took, and * The day after the Ides, on after the Nones, Avere in ev.T)• which, in the month of July, the inontli aceoiinted unhicky. ΤΙκ army marched out, and al-hts and pleasures as were not, however, unedifying. Besides that every year he sent out threescore galleys, on board oi which there went numbers of the citizens, who were in pay eight montiis, learning at the same time and practising the art of seamanship. He sent, moreover, a thousand of them into the ("iier- sonese as planters, to share the land among them by lot, and five hundred more into the isle of Naxos, and half 334 PERICLES. that number to Andros, a thousand into Thrace to dwell among the Bisaltre, and others into Italy, when the city Sybaris. which now Avas called Thurii, was to be repeopled. And this he did to ease and discharge the city of an idle, and, by reason of their idleness, a busy, meddling crowd of people; and at the same time to meet the necessities and restore the fortunes of the poor townsmen, and to intimidate, also, and check their allies from attempting any change, by posting such garrisons, as it were, in the midst of them. That Λ\^ιίο1ι gave most pleasure and ornament to the city of Athens, and the greatest admiration and oven aston- ishment to all strangers, and that which now is Greece's only evidence that the power she boasts of and her ancient wealth are no romance or idle story, was his con- struction of the public and sacred buildings. Yet this was that of all his actions in the government which his enemies most looked askance upon and cavilled at in the popular assemblies, crying out how that the common- wealth of Athens had lost its reputation and was ill- spoken of abroad for removing the common treasure of the Greeks from the isle of Delos into their own custody ; and how that their fairest excuse for so doing, namely, that they took it away for fear the barbarians should seize it, and on purpose to secure it in a safe place, this Pericles had made imavailable, and how that " Greece cannot but resent it as an insufferable affront, and con- sider herself to be tyrannized over openly, when she sees the treasure, which was contributed by her upon a neces- sity for the war, Λvantonly lavished out by us upon oiu^ city, to gild her all over, and to adorn and set her forth, as it were some vain woman, hung romid with precious stones and figures and temples, which cost a world of money." Pericles, on the other hand, informed tlie people, that I PERICLES. 335 they were in no way obliged to give any account of those moneys to their allies, so long as they maintained their defence, and kept off the barbarians from attacking them ; while in the mean time they did not so much as supply one horse or man or ship, but only found money for the service ; " which money," said he, " is not theirs that give it, but theirs that receive it, if so be they perform the conditions upon which they receive it." And that it was good reason, that, now the city was sufficiently provided and stored with all things necessary for the war, they should convert the overplus of its wealth to such under- takings, as would hereafter, Avhen completed, give them eternal honor, and, for the present, while in process, freely supply all the inhabitants with plenty. With their variety of workmanship and of occasions for service, which sum- mon all arts and trades and require all hands to be em- ployed about them, they do actually put the whole cit}^ in a manner, into state-pay ; while at the same time she is both beautified and maintained by herself For as those who are of age and strength for war are provided for and maintained in the armaments abroad by their pay out of the public stock, so, it being his desire and design that the undisciplined mechanic multitude that stayed at home should not go Avithout their share of public salaries, and yet should not have them given them for sittino; still and doinsj nothing:, to that end he thouoht fit to bring in among them, with the approbation of the people, these vast projects of buildings and designs ot works, that would be of some continuance before they were finished, and would give employment to numerous arts, so that the part of the people that stayed at home might, no less than those that were at sea or in garri- sons or on expeditions, have a fair and just occasion of receiving the benefit and having their share of the pub lie moneys. 336 PERICLES. The materials were stone, brass, ivory, gold, ebony cypress-wood ; and the arts or trades that wrouglit and fashioned them were smiths and carpenters, moulders, (bunders and braziers, stone-cutters, dyers, goldsmiths, ivory-workers, painters, embroiderers, turners ; those again that conveyed them to the town for use, mer- chants and mariners and ship-masters by sea, and by land, cartwrights, cattle-breeders, waggoners, rope-makers, flax-workers, shoe-makers and leather-dressers, road- makers, miners. And every trade in the same nature, as a captain in an army has his particular company ol soldiers under him, had its own hired company of jour- neymen and laborers belonging to it banded together as in array, to be as it were the instrument and body for the performance of the service. Thus, to say all in a word, the occasions and services of these public works distributed plenty through every age and condition. As then grew the works up, no less stately in size than exquisite in form, the workmen striving to outvie the material and the design with the beauty of their work- manship, yet the most wonderful thing of all was the rapidity of their execution. Undertakings, any one of which singly might have required, they thought, for their completion, several successions and ages of men, were every one of them accomplished in the height and prime of one man's political service. Although they say, too, that Zeuxis once, having heard Agatharchus the pain- ter boast of despatching his work with speed and ease, replied, "I take a long time." For ease and speed in doing a thing do not give the work lasting solidity or exactness of beauty ; the expenditure of time allowed to a man's pains beforehand for the production of a thing is repaid by way of interest with a vital force for its pre- servation when once produced. For which reason Peri- cles's works are especially admired, as having been made fl PERICLES. 337 quickly, to last long. For every particular piece of his work was immediately, even at that time, for its beauty and elegance, antique ; and yet in its vigor and freshness looks to this day as if it were just executed. There is a sort of bloom of newness upon those works of his, pre- serving them from the touch of time, as if they had some perennial spirit and undying vitality mingled in the com- position of them. Phidias had the oversight of all the works, and was surveyor-general, though upon the various portions other great masters and workmen were employed. For Calli- crates and Ictinus built the Parthenon ; the chapel at Eleusis, where the mysteries were celebrated, was begun by Coroebus, who erected the pillars that stand upon the floor or pavement, and joined them to the architraves ; and after his death Metagenes of Xypete added the frieze and the upper line of columns ; Xenocles of Cholargus roofed or arched the lantern on the top of the temple of Castor and Pollux ; and the long wall, which Socrates says he himself heard Pericles propose to the people, was un- dertaken by Callicrates. This work Cratinus ridicules, a8 long in finishing, — 'T is long since Pericles, if words would do it, Talk'd up the Λναΐΐ ; yet adds not one mite to it. The Odeum, or rausic-room, which in its interior was full of seats and ranges of pillars, and outside had its roof made to slope and descend from one single point at the top, Λvas constructed, we are told, in imitation of the king of Persia's Pavilion ; this likewise by Pericles's order ; which Cratinus again, in his comedy called The Thracian Women, made an occasion of raillery, — VOL. I. 22 338 PERICLES. So, we see here, Jupiter Long-pate Pericles appear. Since ostracism time, he 's laid aside his head, And wears the new Odeum in its stead. Pericles, also, eager for distinction, then first obtained the decree for a contest in musical skill to be held yearly at the Panathenaea, and he himself, being chosen judge, arranged the order and method in which the competitors should sing and play on the flute and on the harp. And both at that time, and at other times also, they sat in this music-room to see and hear all such trials of sliill. The propyloea, or entrances to the Acropolis, were fin- ished in five years' time, Mnesicles being the principal architect. A strange accident happened in the course of building, which showed that the goddess was not averse to the work, but was aiding and cooperating to bring it to perfection. One of the artificers, the quickest and the handiest workman among them all, with a slip of his foot fell down from a great height, and lay in a miserable con- dition, the physicians having no hopes of his recovery. When Pericles was in distress about this, Minerva ap- peared to him at night in a dream, and ordered a course of treatment, Avliich he applied, and in a short time and with great ease cured the man. And upon this occasion it was that he set up a brass statue of Minerva, surnamed Health, in the citadel near the altar, which they say Λvas there before. But it was Phidias who wrought the god- dess's image in gold, and he has his name inscribed on the pedestal as the workman of it; and indeed the whole work in a manner was under his charge, and he had, as we have said already, the oversight over all the artists and w^orkmen, through Pericles's friendship for him ; and this, indeed, made him much envied, and his patron shame- fully slandered with stories, as if Phidias were in the PERICLES. 339 habit of receiving, for Pericles's use, freeborn women that came to see the works. The comic writers of the town, when they had got hold of this story, made much of it, and bespattered him Avith all the ribaldry they could invent, charging him falsely with the w^ife of Menippus, one who was his friend and served as lieutenant under him in the wars; and with the birds kept by Pyrilampes, an acquaintance of Pericles, who, they pretended, used to give presents of peacocks to Pericles's female friends. And ho\v can one wonder at any number of strano-e assertions from men whose whole lives were devoted to mockery, and who w^ere ready at any time to sacrifice the reputation of their superiors to vulgar envy and spite, as to some evil genius, when even Stesimbrotus the Thasian has dared to lay to the charge of Pericles a monstrous and fabulous piece of criminality with his son's wife ? So verv difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anv thing by history, Λvhen, on the one hand, those λυΙιο after- wards write it find long periods of time intercepting their view, and, on the other hand, the contemporary records of any actions and lives, partly through envy and ill-will, partly through favor and flattery, pervert and distort truth. When the orators, wdio sided Avith Thucydides and his party, were at one time crying out, as their custom was, against Pericles, as one who squandered away the public money, and made havoc of the state revenues, he rose in the open assembly and put the question to the people, whether they thought that he had laid out much ; and they saying, "Too much, a great deal," "Then," said he, "since it is so, let the cost not go to your account, but to mine; and let the inscription upon the buildings stand in my name." When they heard him say thus, Avhethcr it W(!re out of a surprise to see the greatness of his spirit, or out of emulation of the glory of the works, they cried 340 PERICLES. iiloud, bidding him to spend on, and lay out what he thought fit from the pubUc purse, and to spare no cost. till all were finished. At length, coming to a final contest Λvith Thucydides, which of the two should ostracize the other out of the country, and having gone through this peril, he threw his antagonist out, and broke up the confederacy that had been organized against him. So that now all schism and division being at an end, and the city brought to evenness and unity, he got all Athens and all affairs that pertained to the Athenians into his ΟΛνη hands, their tributes, their armies, and their galleys, the islands, the sea, and their wide-extended power, partly over other Greeks and partly over barbarians, and all that empire, which they possessed, founded and fortified upon subject nations and royal friendships and alli- ances. After this he was no longer the same man he had beer, before, nor as tame and gentle and familiar as formerly with the populace, so as readily to yield to their pleasures and to comply with the desires of the multitude, as a steersman shifts with the winds. Quitting that loose, remiss, and, in some cases, licentious court of the popular will, he turned those soft and flowery modulations to the austerity of aristocratical and regal rule ; and employing this uprightly and undeviatingly for the country's best interests, he was able generally to lead the people along, with their own wills and consents, by persuading and showing them what was to be done ; and sometimes, too, urging and pressing them forward extremely against their will, he made them, whether they would or no, yield submission to what was for their advantage. In which, to say the truth, he did but like a skilful physician, who, in a complicated and chronic disease, as he sees occasion, at one while alloAvs his patient the moderate use of such things as please him. PERICLES. 341 at another while gives him keen pams and drugs to work the cure. For there arising and growing up, as was nat- ural, all manner of distempered feelings among a people which had so vast a command and dominion, he alone, as a great πΊaster, knowing how to handle and deal fitly Avitli each one of them, and, in an especial manner, making that use of hopes and fears, as his two chief ruddei*s, with the one to check the career of their confidence at au}^ time, with the other to raise them up and cheer them when under any discouragement, plainly showed by this, that rhetoric, or the art of speaking, is, in Plato's language, the government of the souls of men, and that her chief busi- ness is to address the affections and passions, Avhich are as it Λvere the strings and keys to the soul, and require a skilful and careful touch to be played on as they should be. The source of this predominance was not barely his power of language, but, as Thucydides assures us, the rep- utation of his life, and the confidence felt in his character; his manifest freedom from every kind of corruption, and superiority to all considerations of money. Notwithstand- ing he had made the city Athens, which was great of itself, as great and rich as can be imagined, and though he were himself in power and interest more than equal to many kings and absolute rulers, who some of them also be- queathed by will their power to their children, he, for his part, did not make the patrimony his father left him greater than it was by one drachma. Thucydides, indeed, gives a plain statement of the great- ness of his power ; and the comic poets, in their spiteful manner, more than hint at it, styling his companions and friends the new Pisistratidue, and calling on him to abjure any intention of usurpation, as one whose eminence was too great to be any longer proportionable to and com- patible with a democracy or popular government. And 342 PElUCLEe. Teleclides says the Athenians had surrendered up to him — The tribute of the cities, and with them, the cities too, to do with them as he pleases, and undo ; To build up, if he likes, stone walls around a town ; and again, if so he likes, to pull them down ; Their treaties and alliances, power, empire, peace, and war, their wealth and their success forevermore. Nor was all this the luck of some happy occasion ; nor was it the mere bloom and grace of a policy that flourished for a season; but having for forty years together main- tained the first place among statesmen such as Ephialtes and Leocrates and Myronides and Cimon and Tolmides and Thucydides were, after the defeat and banishment of Thucydides, for no less than fifteen years longer, in the exercise of one continuous unintermitted command in the office, to which he was annually reelected, of General, he preserved his integrity unspotted ; though otherwise he was not altogether idle or careless in looking after his pecuniary advantage ; his paternal estate, which of right belonged to him, he so ordered that it might neither through negligence be wasted or lessened, nor yet, being so full of business as he was, cost him any great trouble or time with taking care of it ; and put it into such a way of management as he thought to be the most easy for himself, and the most exact. All his yearly products and profits he sold together in a lump, and supplied his liousehold needs afterward by buying every thing that lie or his family wanted out of the market. Upon which account, his children, when they grew to age, were not w^ll pleased with his management, and the women that lived Avith him were treated with little cost, and com plained of this w^ay of housekeeping, where, every thing PERICLES. 343 was ordered and set down from day to day, and reduced to the greatest exactness ; since there was not there, as is usual in a great fiimily and a plentiful estate, any thing to spare, or over and above; but all that went out or came in, all disbursements and all receipts, proceeded as it were by number and measure. His manager in all this was a single servant, Evangelus by name, a man either naturally gifted or instructed by Pericles so as to excel every one in this art of domestic economy. All this, in truth, was very little in harniony with Anaxagoras's wisdom ; if, indeed, it be true that he, b^' a kind of divine impulse and greatness of spirit, voluntarily quitted his house, and left his land to lie fallow and to be grazed by sheep like a common. But the life of a contem- plative philosopher and that of an active statesman are, I presume, not the same thing ; for the one merely employs, upon great and good objects of thought, iin intelligence that requires no aid of instruments nor supply of any external materials ; whereas the other, who tempers and applies his virtue to human uses, may have occasion for affluence, not as a matter of mere necessity, but as a noble thing ; Λvhich was Pericles's case, who relieved nu- merous poor citizens. However, there is a story, that Anaxagoras himseli^ while Pericles was taken up with public affairs, lay neg- lected, and that, now being grown old, he Avrapped him- self up with a resolution to die for want of food ; which being by chance brought to Pericles's ear, lie was horror- struck, and instantly ran thither, and used all the argu- ments and entreaties he could to him, lamenting not so much Anaxasforas's condition as his own, should he lose such a counsellor as he had found him to be ; and that, upon this, Anaxagoras unfolded his robe, and showing himself, made answer : " Pericles," said he, " even those who have occasion for a lamp supply it with oil." 344 PERICLES. The Lacedgemonians beginning to show themseh^e« troubled at the growth of the Athenian power, Pericles, on the other hand, to elevate the people's spirit yet more, and to raise them to the thought of great actions, pro- posed a decree, to summon all the Greeks in Avhat part soever, whether of Europe or Asia, every city, little as well as great, to send their deputies to Athens to a general as- sembly, or convention, there to consult and advise con- cerning the Greek temples which the barbarians had burnt down, and the sacrifices which were due from them upon vows they had made to their gods for the safety of Greece when they fought against the barbarians ; and also concerning the navigation of the sea, that they might henceforw^ard all of them pass to and fro and trade securely, and be at peace among themselves. Upon this errand, there were twenty men, of such as were above fifty years of age, sent by commission ; five to summon the lonians and Dorians in Asia, and the islanders as far as Lesbos and Rhodes; five to visit all the places in the Hellespont and Thrace, up to Byzantium ; and other five besides these to go to Boeotia and Phocis and Peloponnesus, and from hence to pass through the Locrians over to the neighboring continent, as far as Acarnania and Ambracia ; and the rest to take their course throuiih Euboea to the Qitasans and the Malian Gulf, and to the Achaeans of Phthiotis and the Thessaliaus; all of them to treat with the people as they passed, and to persuade them to come and take their part in the de- bates for settling the peace and jointly regulating the affairs of Greece. Nothing was effected, nor did the cities meet by their deputies, as was desired; the Lacedaemonians, as it it^ said, crossing the design underhand, and the attempt be- ing disappointed and baffled first in Peloponnesus. I thought fit, however, to introduce the mention of it, to J PERICLES. 345 show the spirit of the man and +he greatness of his thoughts. In his military conduct, he gained a great reputation for wariness ; he would not by his good-will eno-ao-e in any fight which had much uncertainty or hazard ; he did not envy the glory of generals Avhose rash adventures fortune favored Λvith brilliant success, however they were admired by others; nor did he think them worthy his imitation, but always used to say to his citizens that, so far as lay in his power, they should continue innnortal, and live forever. Seeing Tolmides, the son of Tolmseus, upon the confidence of his former successes, and flushed with the honor his military actions had procured him, making preparation to attack the Boeotians in their own country, when there was no likely opportunity, and that he had prevailed with the bravest and most enterprising of the youth to enlist themselves as volunteers in the ser- vice, who besides his other force made up a thousand, he endeavored to withhold him and to advise him from it in the public assembly, telling him in a memorable saying of his, which still goes about, that, if he would not take Peri- cles's advice, yet he would not do amiss to wait and be ruled by time, the wisest counsellor of all. This sajing, at that time, was but slightly commended ; but within a few days after, when news was brought that Tolmides himself had been defeated and slain in battle near Coronea, and that many brave citizens had fallen with him, it gained him great repute as Avell as good-will among the people, for wisdom and for love of his countrymen. But of all his expeditions, that to the Chersonese gave most satisfaction and pleasure, having proved the safety of the Greeks who inhabited there. For not only by car- rying along \vith him a thousand fresh citizens of Athens he gave new strength and vigor to the cities, but also by belting the neck of land, which joins the peninsula to the 346 PERICLES. continent, with bulwarks and forts from sea to sea, he put a stop to the inroads of the Tliracians, who lay all about the Chersonese, and closed the door against a continual and grievous war, with which that country had been long harassed, lying exposed to the encroachments and influx of barbarous neighbors, and groaning under the evils of a predatory population both upon and within its borders. Nor was he less admired and talked of abroad for his sailing round the Peloponnesus, having set out from Pegae, or The Fountains, the port of Megara, with a hundred gal- leys. For he not only laid waste the sea-coast, as Tol- mides had done before, but also, advancing far up into main land with the soldiers he had on board, by the terror of his appearance drove many within their walls ; and at Nemea, Avitli main force, routed and raised a trophy over the Sicyonians, who stood their ground and joined battle with him. And having taken on board a supply of soldiers into the galleys, out of Achaia, then in league with Athens, he crossed with the fleet to the opposite continent, and, sailing along by the mouth of the river Achelous, overran Acarnania, and shut up the OEniadae within their city walls, and having ravaged and w^asted their country, weighed anchor for home with the double advantage of having shown himself formidable to his enemies, and at the same time safe and energetic to his fellow-citizens ; for there was not so much as any chance- miscarriage that happened, the whole voyage through, to those who were under his charge. Entering also the Euxine Sea with a large and finely equipped fleet, he obtained for the Greek cities any new arrangements they wanted, and entered into friendly re- lations with them ; and to the barbarous nations, and kings and chiefs round about them, displayed the greatness of the power of the Athenians, their perfect ability and con• m PEKICLES. 347 fidence to sail wherever they had a mhid, and to bring the whole sea under their control. He left the Sinopians thirteen ships of war, with soldiers under the command of Lamachus, to assist them against Timesileus the tyrant ; and when he and his accomplices had been thrown out, obtained a decree that six hundred of the Athenians that were willing should sail to Sinope and plant themselves there with the Sinopians, sharing among them the houses and land which the tyrant and his party had previously held. But in other things he did not comply with the giddy impulses of the citizens, nor quit his own resolutions to follow their fancies, when, carried away with the thouglit of their strength and great success, they were eager to interfere agani in Egypt, and to disturb the king of Per- sia's maritime dominions. Nay, there were a good many who were, even then, possessed with that unblest and inauspicious passion for Sicily, which afterward the ora- tors of Alcibiades's party blew up into a flame. There were some also who dreamt of Tuscany and of Carthage, and not without plausible reason in their present large dominion and the prosperous course of their affairs. But Pericles curbed this passion for foreign conquest, and unsparingly pruned and cut down their ever busy fancies for a multitude of undertakings; and directed their power for the most part to securing and consolida- ting wiiat they had already got, supposing it would be quite enough for them to do, if they could keep the La- cediBinonians in check; to whom he entertained all along a sense of op230sition ; which, as upon many other occa- sions, so he particularly showed by what he did in \he time of the holy war. The Lacedaemonians, having gone with an army to Delphi, restored Apollo's temple, whicli the Phocians had got into their possession, to the Del- phiaus ; immediately after their departure, Pericles, with 348 PERICLES. another army, came and restored the Phocians. And the Lacedaemonians having engraven the record of their pri- vileg-e of consultino; the oracle before others, which tlie Delphians gave them, upon the forehead of the brazen wolf which stands there, he, also, having received from the Phocians the like privilege for the Athenians, had it cut upon the same wolf of brass on his right side. That he did well and wisely in thus restraining the ex- ertions of the Athenians within the compass of Greece, the events themselves that happened afterward bore sufh- cient witness. For, in the first place, the Euboeans re- volted, against whom he passed over with forces ; and then, immediately after, news came that the Megarians were turned their enemies, and a hostile army was upon the borders of Attica, under the conduct of Plistoanax, king of the Lacedaemonians. Wherefore Pericles came with his army back again in all haste out of Euboea, to meet the war «which threatened at home ; and did not venture to engage a numerous and brave army eager for battle ; but perceiving that Plistoanax was a very young man, and governed himself mostly by the counsel and advice of Cleandrides, whom the ephors had sent wdth him, by reason of his youth, to be a kind of guardian and assistant to him, he privately made trial of this man's integrity, and, in a short time, having corrupted him with money, prevailed with him to withdraw the Peloponnesians out of Attica, When the army had retired and dispersed into their several states, the Lacedaemonians in anger fined their king in so large a sum of money, that, unable to pay it, he quitted Lacedaemon ; while Cleandrides fled, and had sentence of death passed upon him in his ab- sence. This was the father of Gylippus, λυΙιο overpowered the Athenians in Sicily. And it seems that this covet- ousness was an hereditary disease transmitted from father to son ; for Gylippus also afterwards was caught in ibu] PERICLES. 349 practices, and expelled from Sparta for it. But this we nave told at large in the account of Lysander. When Pericles, in giving up his accounts of this expe- dition, stated a disbursement of ten talents, as laid out upon fit occasion, the people, Λvithout any question, noi troubling themselves to investigate the m3'stery, freely allowed of it. And some historians, in which number is Theophrastus the philosopher, have given it as a truth that Pericles every year used to send privately the sum of ten talents to Sparta, with w^hicli he complimented those in office, to keep off the war; not to purchase peace neither, but time, that he might prepare at leisure, and be the better able to carry on war hereafter. Immediately after this, turning his forces against the revolters, and passing over into the island of Eaboea with fifty sail of ships and five thousand men in arms, he reduced their cities, and drove out the citizens of the Chalcidians. called Hippobotce, horse-feeders, the chief persons for wealth and reputation among them ; and removing all the HistiiBans out of the country, brought in a plantation of Athenians in their room ; making them his one exam- ple of severit}^, because they had cnptured an Attic ship and killed all on board. After this, having made a truce between the Athenians and Lacedcemonians for thirty years, he ordered, by pub- lic decree, the expedition against the Isle of Samos, on the ground, that, when they were bid to leave off their war with the Mdesians, they had not complied. And as these measures ai?ainst the Samians are thought to have been taken to please Aspasia, this may be a lit point lor in- quiry about the woman, what art or charming faculty she had that enabled her to captivate, as she did, the greatest statesmen, and to give the philosophers occasion to speak so much about her, and that, too, not to her disparage- ment. That she was a Milesian by birth, the daughter 350 PERICLES. of Axioclius, is a thing acknowledged. And they say it was in emuhation of Thargeha, a courtesan of the old Ionian times, that she made her addresses to men of great power. Thargelia was a great beauty, extremely charm- ing, and at the same time sagacious ; she had numerous suitors among the Greeks, and brought all who had to do with her over to the Persian interest, and by their means, being men of the greatest power and station, sowed the seeds of the Median faction up and down m several cities.* Aspasia, some say, was courted and caressed by Pericles upon account of her knowledge and skill in politics Socrates himself would sometimes go to visit her, and some of his acquaintance with him; and those who fre- quented her company would carry their wives with them to listen to her. Her occupation Avas any thing but cred- itable, her house being a home for young courtesans, ^schines tells ns also, that Lysicles, a sheep-dealer, a man of low birth and character, by keeping Aspasia com- pany after Pericles's death, came to be a chief man in Athens. And in Plato's Menexenus, though λυο do not take the introduction as quite serious, still thus much seems to be historical, that she had the repute of being resorted to by many of the Athenians for instruction in the art of speaking. Pericles's inclination for her seems, however, to have rather proceeded from the passion of love. He had a wife that was near of kin to him, who had been married first to Hipponicus, by whom she had Callias, surnamed the Rich ; and also she brought Peri- cles, while she lived with him, two sons, Xanthippus and Paralus. Afterwards, when they did not well agree nor like to live together, he parted with her, with her own consent, to another man, and himself took Aspasia, and * She was married, says Atheiiieus, to fouiteen husbands ; a woman of great beauty and intellect. PERICLES. 351 loved her with wonderful affection ; every da}', both aa lie went out and as he came in from the market-place, he saluted and kissed her. In the comedies she goes by the nicknames of the new Omphale and Deianira, and again is styled Juno. Crati- nus, in downright terms, calls her a harlot. To find liim a Juno tlio goddess of lust Bore that harlot past sharne, Aspasia by name. It should seem, also, that he had a son by hei• ; Eupolis, in his Demi, introduced Pericles asking after his safety, and Myronides replying, " Mj son ? " " He lives ; a man he had been long, But that the harlot-mother did him wrong." Aspasia, they sny, became so celebrated and renowned, that Cyrus also, who made Λvar against Artaxerxes for the Persian monarchy, siave her whom he loved the best of all his concubines the name of Aspasia, wlio Ijefore that was called Milto. She was a Phoccean by birtli, the daughter of one Hermotimus, and, Avhen Cyrus fell in battle, was carried to the king, and had great influence at court. These things coming into my memory as I am writing this story, it would be unnatural for me to omit :hem. Pericles, however, was particularly charged with having proposed to the assembly the war against the Samians, from favor to the Milesians, upon the entreaty ol" Aspasia. For the two states were at Avar for the possession of Priene ; and the Samians, getting the better, refused to lay down their arms and to have the controversy betwixt them decided by arbitration before the Athenians. Peri- cles, therefore, fittino; out a fleet, went and bn.'ke up ου: PERICLES. the oligarchical government at Samos, and, taking fifty of the principal men of the town as hostages, and as many of their children, sent them to the isle of Lemnos, there to be kept, though he had offers, as some relate, of a talent a piece for himself from each one of the hostages, and of many other presents from those who were anxious not to have a democracy. Moreover, Pissuthnes the Pei- sian, one of the king's lieutenants, bearing some good-will to the Samians, sent him ten thousand pieces of gold to excuse the city. Pericles, however, would receive none of all this ; but after he had taken that course with the Samians which he thought fit, and set up a democracy among them, sailed back to Athens. But they, however, immediately revolted, Pissuthnes having privily got away their hostages for them, and pro- vided them with means for the war. Whereupon Pericles came out with a fleet a second time against them, and found them not idle nor slinking away, but manfully resolved to try for the dominion of the sea. The issue was, that, after a sharp sea-fight about the island called Tragia, Pericles obtained a decisive victory, having with forty-four ships routed seventy of the enemy's, twenty of w^liich were carrying soldiers. Together with his victory and pursuit, having made himself master of the port, he laid siege to the Samians, and blocked them up, who yet, one way or other, still ventured to make sallies, and fight under the city walls. But after that another greater fleet from Athens was arrived, and that the Samians were now shut up with a close leaguer on every side, Pericles, taking with him sixty galleys, sailed out into the main sea, with the inten- tion, as most authors give the account, to meet a squadron of Phoenician ships that were coming for the Samians' relief, and to fight them at as great distance as could be from the island ; but, as Stesimbrotus says, with a design PERICLES. ο ο ο of putting over to Cyprus ; which does not seem to be probable. But whichever of the two was his intent, it seems to have been a miscalculation. For on his departure, Melissus, the son of Ithagenes, a philosopher, being at that time general in Samos, despising either the small num- ber of the ships that were left or the inexperience of the commanders, prevailed with the citizens to attack tlie Athenians. And the Samians having won the battle, and taken several of the men prisoners, and disabled several of the ships, were masters of the sea, and brought into port all necessaries they wanted for the war, which they had not before. Aristotle says, too, that Pericles him- self had been once before this worsted by this Melissus in a sea-fight. The Samians, that they might requite an affront which had before been put upon them, branded the Athenians, whom they took prisoners, in their foreheads, with the fig- ure of an owl. For so the Athenians had marked them before Avith a Samiena, which is a sort of ship, low and fiat in the prow, so as to look snub-nosed, but wide and large and well-spread in the hold, by which it both carries a large cargo and sails well. And it was so called, because the first of that kind was seen at Samos, having been built by order of Polycrates the tyrant. These brands upon the Samians' foreheads, they say, are the allusion in the passage of Aristophanes, where he says, — For, oh, the Samians are a lettered people. Pericles, as soon as news was brought him of the disas- ter that had befallen his army, made all the haste he could to come in to their relief, and having defeated Me- lissus, who bore up against him, and put the enemy to fiight, he immediatoJy proceeded to hem tliein in with a wall, resolving to master them and take the town, lathei VOL. 1. 23 354 PERICLES. with some cost and time, than with the wounds and hazards of his citizens. But as it was a hard matter to keep back the Athenians, who were vexed at the delay, and were eagerly bent to fight, he divided the whole multitude into eight parts, a>nd arranged by lot that that part which had the white bean should have leave to feast and take their ease, while the other seven were fig;htinsr> And this is the reason, they say, that people, when at any time they have been merry, and enjoyed themselves, call it white day, in allusion to this white bean. Ephorus the historian tells us besides, that Pericles made use of engines of battery in this siege, being much taken Avith the curiousness of the invention, with the aid and presence of Artemon himself, the engineer, who, being lame, used to be carried about in a litter, where the works required his attendance, and for that reason was called Periphoretus. But Heraclides Ponticus disproves this out of Anacreon's poems, where mention is made of this Ar- temon Periphoretus several ages before the Samian Avar, or any of these occurrences. And he says that Artemon, being a man who loved his ease, and had a great appre- hension of danger, for the most part kept close within doors, having two of his servants to hold a brazen shield over his head, that nothing might fall upon him from above ; and if he were at any time forced upon necessity to go abroad, that he was carried about in a little hang- ing bed, close to the very ground, and that for this reason he was called Periphoretus. In the ninth month, the Samians surrendering them- selves and delivering up the town, Pericles pulled down their walls, and seized their shipping, and set a fine of a large sum of money upon them, part of which they paid down at once, and they agreed to bring in the rest by a certain time, and gave hostages for security. Duris the Samian makes a trasrical drama out of these events. II PERICLES. 355 charging the Athenians and Pericles with a great deal of cruelty, which neither Thucydides, nor Ephoriis, nor Ari- stotle have given any relation of, and prol^ably with little regard to truth ; how, for example, he brought the captains and soldiers of the galleys into the market-place at Mile- tus, and there having bound them, fast to boards for ten days, then, when they were already all but half dead, gave order to have them killed by beating out their brains Λvith clubs, and their dead bodies to be fluno• out into the open streets and fields, unburied, Duris, how- ever, who even Λvhere he has no private feeling concerned, is not wont to keep his narrative within the limits of truth, is the more likely upon this occasion to have exag- gerated the calamities which befell his country, to create odium against the Athenians. Pericles, however, after the reduction of Samos, returning back to Athens, took care that those who died in the war should be honorably buried, and made a funeral harangue, as the custom is, in their commendation at their graves, for which he gained great admiration. As he came down from the stage on which he spoke, the rest of the Avomen came and compli- mented him, taking him by the hand, and crowning him with garlands and ribbons, like a victorious athlete in the games ; but Elpinice, coming near to him, said, " These are brave deeds, Pericles, that you have done, and such as deserve our chaplets; who have lost us many a Avorthy citizen, not in a war with Phoenicians or Medes, like my brother Cimon, but for the overthrow of an allied and kindred city." As Elpinice spoke these words, he, smiling quietly, as it is said, returned her answer with this verse, — Old women shoiiUl not sock to be perfumed. Ton says of him, that, upon this exploit of his, conquer- 356 PERICLES. ing the Samians, he indulged very high and proud thoughts of himself: whereas Agamemnon was ten years a taking a barbarous city, he had in nine months* time vanquished and taken the greatest and most powerful of the lonians. And mdeed it was not without reason that he assumed this glory to himself, for, in real truth, there was much uncertainty and great hazard in this war, if so be, as Thucydides tells us, the Samian state were within a very little of wresting the whole power and domin- ion of the sea out of the Athenians' hands. After this was over, the Peloponnesian war beginning to break out in full tide, he advised the people to send help to the Corcyraeans, who were attacked by the Co- rinthians, and to secure to themselves an island possessed of great naval resources, since the Peloponnesians were already all but in actual hostilities against them. The people readily consenting to the motion, and voting an aid and succor for thera, he despatched Laced aemonius, Cimon's son, having only ten ships Avith him, as it were out of a design to affront him ; for there was a great ivindness and friendship betwixt Cimon's family and the Lacedaemonians ; so, in order that Lacedaemonius might lie the more open to a charge, or suspicion at least, of favoring the Lacedaemonians and playing false, if he per- formed no considerable exploit in this service, he allowed him a small number of ships, and sent him out against his will ; and indeed he made it somewhat his business to hinder Cimon's sons from rising in the state, professing that by their very names they Avere not to be looked upon as native and true Athenians, but foreigners and strangers, one being called Lacedaemonius, another Thes- sal us, and the third Eleus ; and they were all three oi them, it was thought, born of an Arcadian woman. Be- ing, however, ill spoken of on account of these ten gal- leys, as having afforded but a small supply to the people PERICLES. 357 that were in need, and yet given a great advantage to those who might comphiin of the act of intervention, Pericles sent out a larger force afterward to Corcyra, which arrived after the fight was over. And when now the Corinthians, angry and indignant with the Athenians, accused them publicly at Lacedoemon, the Megarians joined with them, complaining that they were, contrary to common right and the articles of peace sworn to among the Greeks, kept out and driven aw^ay from every market and from all ports under the control of the Athe- nians. The ^ginetans, also, professing to be ill-used and treated with violence, made supplications in private to the Lacedaemonians for redress, though not daring openly to call the Athenians in question. In the mean time, also, the city Potidsea, under the dominion of the Athenians, but a colony formerly of the Corinthians, had revolted, and was beset with a formal siege, and w^as a further oc- casion of precipitating the war. Yet notΛvithstanding all this, there being embassies sent to Athens, and Archidamus, the king of the Lacedae- monians, endea\'^oring to bring the greater part of the com- plaints and matters in dispute to a fair determination, and to pacify and allay the heats of the allies, it is very likely that the war w^ould not upon any other grounds of quarrel have fallen upon the Athenians, could they have been prevailed with to repeal the ordinance against the Mega- rians, and to be reconciled to them. Upon which account, since Pericles was the nian who mainly opposed it, and stirred up the people's passions to persist in their conten- tion with the Megarians, he was regarded as the sole cause of the war. They say, moreover, that ambassadors \vent, by order, from Lacedcemon to Athens about this very business, and that when Pericles was urcring a certain law which 358 PERICLES. made it illegal to take down or withdraw the tablet of the decree, one of the ambassadors, Polyalces hy Hame, said, " Well, do not take it down then, but turn it ; there is no law, I suppose, which forbids that ; " * which, though prettily said, did not move Pericles from his resolution. There may have been, in all likelihood, something of a secret grudge and private animosity which he had against the Megarians. Yet, upon a public and open charge against them, that they had appropriated part of the sacred land on the frontier, he proposed a decree that a herald should be sent to them, and the same also to the Lacedaemonians, with an accusation of the Megarians ; an order which certainly shows equitable and friendly pro- ceedino; enouorh. And after that the herald who was! sent, by name Anthemocritus, died, and it was believed that the Megarians had contrived his death, then Cha- rinus proposed a decree against them, that there should be an irreconcilable and implacable enmity thenceforward betwixt the two commonwealths; and that if any one of the Megarians should but set his foot in Attica, he should be put to death ; and that the commanders, when they take the usual oath, should, over and above that, swear that they will twice every year make an inroad into the Me- garian country; and that Anthemocritus should be bu- ried near the Thriasian Gates, which are now called the Dipylon, or Double Gate. On the other hand, the Megarians, utterly denying and disowning the murder of Anthemocritus, throw the whole matter upon Aspasia and Pericles, availing themselves of the famous verses in the Acharnians, * The woi'd for taking down, in two senses. " If you may not take I lie literal sense, is also the techni- it down, turn it, with its face to the cal term for revoking, or repealing; wall." liencH the Spaxtans play upon the PERICLES. 359 To Megara some of our madcaps ran, And stole Simastha thence, their courtesan. Which exploit the Megarians to outdo, Came to Aspasia's house, and took ofi" two. The true occasion of the quarrel is not so easy to finrl out. But of inducing the refusal to ajmul the decree, all alike charge Pericles. Some say he met the request with a positive refusal, out of high spirit and a view of the state's best interests, accounting that the demand made in those embassies was designed for a trial of their com- pliance, and that a concession would be taken for a con- fession of weakness, as if they durst not do otherwise ; while other some there are who say that it was rather out of arrogance and a wilful spirit of contention, to show liis own strength, that he took occasion to slight the Lacedce- monians. The worst motive of all, which is confirmed by most witnesses, is to the following effect. Phidias the Moulder had, as has before been said, undertaken to make the statue of Minerva. Now he, being admitted to friendship with Pericles, and a great favorite of his, had many enemies upon this account, who envied and ma- ligned him ; who also, to make trial in a case of his, what kind of judges the commons would prove, should there l)e occasion to bring Pericles himself bcibre them, having tampered with Menon, one who had been a workman with Phidias, stationed him in the market-i)lace, with a ])etition desiring pu1)lic security upon his discovery and impeachment of Phidias. The people admitting the man to tell his story, and the prosecution proceeding in the assembly, there was nothing of theft or cheat proved against him ; for Phidias, from the very first beginning, by the advice of Pericles, had so wrought and wrapt the gold that was used in the work about the statue, that they might take it all off and make out the just weight of i1, which Pericles at that time bade the accusers do. 860 PERICLES. But the reputation of his works was what brought envy upon Phidias, especially that where he represents the fight of the Amazons upon the goddesses' shield, he had introduced a likeness of himself as a bald old man hold- ing up a great stone with both hancls, and had put in a very fine representation of Pericles fighting with an Amazon. And the position of the hand, which holds out the spear in front of the face, was ingeniously contrived to conceal in some degree the likeness, which, meantime, showed itself on either side. Phidias then was carried away to prison, and there died of a disease ; but, as some say, of poison, administered by the enemies of Pericles, to raise a slander, or a suspicion, at least, as though he had procured it. The informer Menon, upon Glycon's proposal, the people made free from payment of taxes and customs, and ordered the generals to take care that nobody should do him any hurt. About the same time, Aspasia was indicted of impiety, upon the complaint of Hermippus the comedian, who also laid further to her charge that she received into her house freeborn women for the uses of Pericles. And Dio- pithes proposed a decree, that public accusation should be laid against persons who neglected religion, or taught new doctrines about things above,* directing suspicion, by means of Anaxagoras, against Pericles himself The people receiving and admitting these accusations and complaints, at length, by this means, they came to enact a decree, at the motion of Dracontides, that Pericles should bring in the accounts of the moneys he had ex- pended, and lodge them with the Prytanes ; and that the judges, carrying their suffrage from the altar in the Acro- * " Supei'a ac coelestia," as Cicero religion was based on certain con- translates the words meteora and ceptions of such phenomena, any metarsia, whence we have formed tampering with wliich was, therp- onr meteorology. The whole Gi*eek fore, quickly resented. PERICLES. oc>\ polls, should examine and determine the business in the city. This last clause Hagnon took out of the decree, and moved that the causes should be tried before fifteen hundred jurors, Λvhether they should be styled prosecu- tions for robbery, or bribery, or any kind of malversation. Aspasia, Pericles begged off, shedding, as ^schines says, many tears at the trial, and personally entreating the jurors. But fearing how it might go with Anaxagoras, he sent him out of the city. And finding that in Phidias's case he had miscarried with the people, being afraid of impeachment, he kindled the Λvar, which hitherto had lin- gered and smothered, and blew it up into a flame ; hoping, by that means, to disperse and scatter these complaints and charges, and to allay their jealousy ; the city usually throwing herself upon him alone, and trusting to his sole conduct, upon the urgency of great affiiirs and public dangers, by reason of his authority and the sway he bore. These are given out to have been the reasons which induced Pericles not to suffer the people of Athens to yield to the proposals of the Lacedaemonians ; but their truth is uncertain. The Lacedieraonians, for their part, feeling sure that if they could once remove him, they might be at what terms they pleased with the Athenians, sent them word that they should expel the "Pollution" Avitli Λvhich Pericles on the mother's side was tainted, as Thucydides tells us. But the issue proved quite contrary to what those who sent the messfge expected; instead of bringing Pericles under suspicion and reproach, they raised him into yet greater credit and esteem Λvith the citizens, as a man whom their enemies most hated and feared. In the same way, also, before Aichidamus, λυΙιο was at the head of the Peloponnesians, made his invasion into Attica, he told the Athenians beforehand, that if Archidamus, while he laid 362 PERICLES. waste the rest of the country, should forbear and spare his estate, either on the ground of friendship or right of hospitality that was betwixt them, or on purpose to give his enemies an occasion of traducing him, that then he did freely bestow upon the state all that his land and the buildings upon it for the public use. The Lace- daemonians, therefore, and their allies, with a great army, invaded the Athenian territories, under the conduct of king Archidamus, and laying waste the country, marched on as far as Acharnae, and there pitched their camp, pre- suming that the Athenians would never endure that, but would come out and fight them for their country's and their honor's sake. But Pericles looked upon it as dan- gerous to engage in battle, to the risk of the city itself, against sixty thousand men-at-arms of Peloponnesians and Boeotians ; for so many they were in number that made the inroad at first; and he endeavored to appease those who were desirous to fight, and were grieved and discontented to see how things went, and gave them good words, saying, that " trees, when they are lopped and cut, grow up again in a short time but men, being once lost, can- not easily be recovered." He did not convene the people into an assembly, for fear lest they should force him to act against his judgment; but, like a skilful steersman or pilot of a ship, who, when a sudden squall comes on, out at sea, makes all his arrangements, sees that all is tight and fiist, and then follows the dictates of his skill, and minds the business of the ship, taking no notice of the tears and entreaties of the sea-sick and fearful passengers, so he, having shut up the city gates, and placed guards at all posts for security, followed his own reason and j udgment, little regarding those that cried out against him and were angry at his management, although there were a great many of his friends that urged him with requests, and many of his enemies threatened and accused him for PEKICLES. 3β3 doing as he did, and many made songs and lampoons upon him, which were sung about the town to his dis- grace, reproaching him with the cowardly exercise of his office of general, and the tame abandonment of every thing to the enemy's hands. Cleon, also, already was among his assailants, making use of the feeling against him as a step to the leadership of the people, as appears in the anapiestic verses of Her- mippus. Satyr-king, instead of swords, "Will you always handle words ? Very brave indeed we find them, But a Teles * lurks behind them. Yet to gnash your teeth you're seen, When the little dagger keen. Whetted every day anew. Of sharp Cleon touches you. Pericles, however, was not at all moved by any attacks, but took all patiently, and submitted in silence to the disgrace they threw upon him and the ill-will they bore him ; and, sending out a fleet of a hundred galleys to Peloponnesus, he did not go along with it in person, but stayed behind, that he might watch at home and keep the city under his own control, till the Pelopon- nesians broke up their camp and were gone. Yet to soothe the common people, jaded and distressed with the war, he relieved them with distributions of public moneys, and ordained new divisions of subject land. For hav- ing turned out all the people of ^Egina, he parted the island among the Athenians, according to lot. Some comfort, also, and ease in their miseries, they might re- ceive from what their enemies endured. For the fleet, * Apparently some notorious coward. 364 PERICLEIS. sailing round the Peloponnese, ravaged a great deal of the country, and pillaged and plundered the towns and smaller cities; and by land he himself entered with an army the Megarian country, and made havoc of it all. Whence it is clear that the Peloponnesians, though they did the Athenians much mischief by land, yet suffering as much themselves from them by sea, would not have protracted the war to such a length, but would quickly have given it over, as Pericles at first foretold they would, had not some divine power crossed human pur- poses. In the first place, the pestilential disease, or plague, seized upon the city, and ate up all the flower and prime of their youth and strength. Upon occasion of which, the people, distempered and afflicted in their souls, as well as in their bodies, were utterly enraged like madmen against Pericles, and, like patients grown delirious, sought to lay violent hands on their physician, or, as it were, their fatlier. They had been possessed, by his enemies, with the belief that the occasion of the plague was the crowd- ing of the country people together into the town, forced as they were now, in the heat of the summer-weather, to dwell many of them together even as they could, in small tenements and stifling hovels, and to be tied to a lazy course of life Avithin doors, whereas before they lived in a pure, open, and free air. The cause and author of all this, said they, is he who on account of the war has poured a multitude of people from the country in upon us within the walls, and uses all these many men that he has here upon no employ or service, but keeps them pent up like cattle, to be overrun with infection from one another, affording them neither shift of quarters noi any refreshment. With the design to remedy these evils, and do the en- emy some inconvenience, Pericles got a hundred and fifty PERICLES. 305 galleys reaclj^ and having embarked many tried soldiers, both foot and horse, was about to sail out, giving great hope to his citizens, and no less alarm to his enemies, upon the sight of so great" a force. And now the vessels hav- ing their complement of men, and Pericles being gone aboard his own galley, it happened that the sun was eclipsed, and it grew dark on a sudden, to the affright of all, for this was looked upon as extremely ominous. Per- icles, therefore, perceiving the steersman seized with fear and at a loss Avhat to do, took his cloak and held it up before the man's f ice, and, screening him with it so that he could not see, asked him whether he imagined there was any great hurt, or the sign of any great hurt in this, and he answering No, " Why," said he, " and what does that diifer from this, only that what has caused that darkness there, is something greater than a cloak ? " This is a story which philosophers tell their scholars. Pericles, however, after putting out to sea, seems not to have done any other exploit befitting such preparations, and Avhen he had laid siege to the holy city Epidaurus, which gave him some hope of surrender, miscarried in his design by reason of the sickness. For it not only seized upon the Athe- nians, but upon all others, too, that held any sort of com- munication with the army. Finding after this the Athe- nians ill affected and highly displeased with him, he tried and endeavored Λvhat he could to appease and re-encour- age them. But he could not pacify or allay their anger, nor persuade or prevail with them any way, till they freely passed their votes upon him, resumed their power, took away his command from him, and fined iiim in a sum of money; which, by their account tliat say least, was fifteen talents, while they Avho reckon most, name fifty. The name prefixed to the accusation was Cleon, as Idomeneus tells us; Simmias, according t(» ΊΊιβ- ophrastus; and Herachdes Ponticus gives it as LMcraiida.s. 366 PERICLES. After this, public troubles were soon to leave liini un- molested ; the people, so to say, discharged their passion m their stroke, and lost their stings in the wound. But his domestic concerns were in an unhappy condition many of his friends and acquaintance having died in the plague time, and those of his family having long since been in disorder and in a kind of mutiny against him. For the eldest of his lawfully begotten sons, Xan- thippus by name, being naturally prodigal, and marrying a young and expensive wife, the daughter of Tisander, son of Epilycus, was highly offended at his father's econ- omy in making him but a scanty allowance, by little and little at a time. He sent, therefore, to a friend one day, and borrowed some money of him in his fathej' Pericles's name, pretending it was by his order. The man comina: afterward to demand the debt, Pericles was SO iiir from yielding to pay it, that he entered an action against him. Upon which the 3^oung man, Xanthippus, thought himself so ill used and disobliged, that he openly reviled his father ; telling first, by Λvay of ridicule, stories about his conΛ^ersations at home, and the discourses he had with the sophists and scholars that came to his house. As for instance, how one who Λvas a practiser of the five games of skill,''' having witli a dart or javelin un- awares against his will struck and killed Epitimus the Pharsalian, his father spent a Avhole day with Protago- ras in a serious dispute, whether the javelin, or the man that threΛV it, or the masters of the games who appointed these sports, were, according to the strictest and besi reason, to be accounted the cause of this mischance. Be- sides this, Stesimbrotus tells us that it was Xanthippus who spread abroad among the people the infamous storj• * These are recorded in a pentameter verse by Simonides. Halma, podokeien, discon, aconta, Leaping, and swiftness of ioot, paleu. wrestling, the discus, the (hut. TKRICLES. 3G7 concerning his own wife ; and in general that this difTer- ence of the young man's with his father, and the breach betwixt them, continued never to be healed or made up till his death. For Xanthippus died in the plague time of the sickness. At which time Pericles also lost his sister, and the greatest part of his relatione and friends, and those who had been most useful and serviceable to him in managing the affairs of state. However, he did not shrink or give in upon these occa- sions, nor betray or lower his high spirit and the greatnes.s of his mind under all his misfortunes ; he was not even so much as seen to weep or to mourn, or even attend the burial of any of his friends or relations, till at last he lost his only remaining legitimate son. Subdued by this blow, and yet striving still, as far as he could, to maintain his prin- ciple, and to preserve and keep up the greatness of his soul Avhcn he came, however, to perform the ceremony of putting a garland of flowers upon the head of the corpse, he was vanquished by his passion at the sight, so that he burst into exclamations, and shed copious tears, having never done an}^ such thing in all his life before. The city having made trial of other generals for the conduct of war, and orators for business of state, when they found there was no one who w^•ls of weight enough for such a charge, or of authority sufficient to be trusted with so great a command, regretted the loss of him, and invited him again to address and advise them, and to re- assume the office of general. He, however, lay at home in dejection and mourning ; but was persuaded by Alci- biades and others of his friends to come al)road and show himself to the people ; who having, upon his appearance, made their acknowledgments, and apologized for their untowardly treatment of him, he undertook the j)ublic affairs once more ; and, being chosen general, requested that the statute concerninii base-born chiMreu. which he 3t)8 PERICLES. himself had formerly caused to be made, might be sus- pended ; that so the name and race of his family might not, for absolute want of a lawful heir to succeed, be wholly lost and extinguished. The case of the statute was thus : Pericles, when long ago at the height of his power in the state, having then, as has been said, chil- dren lawfully begotten, proposed a law that those oiilv should be reputed true citizens of Athens who were born of such parents as were both Athenians. After this, the king of Egypt having sent to the people, by way of pres- ent, forty thousand bushels of wheat, which were to be shared out among the citizens, a great many actions and suits about legitimacy occurred, by virtue of that edict ; cases which, till that time, had not been known nor taken notice of; and several persons suiFered by false accusa- tions. There were little less than five thousand who were convicted and sold for slaves; those who, enduring the test, remained in the government and passed muster for true Athenians were found upon the poll to be fourteen thousand and forty persons in number. It looked strange, that a laAV, which had been carried so far against so many people, should be cancelled again by the same man that made it ; yet the present calamity and distress which Pericles labored under in his family broke through all objections, and prevailed Avith the Athenians to pity him, as one whose losses and misfor- tunes had sufficiently punished his former arrogance and haughtiness. His sufferings deserved, they thought, their pity, and even indignation, and his request was such as became a man to ask and men to grant ; they gave him permission to enroll his son in the register of his fraternity, giving him his own name. This son afterward, after having defeated the Peloponnesians at Arginusa?, was, with his fellow-generals, put to death by the people. About the time when his son was enrolled, it should PERICLES. 360 seem, the plague seized Pericles, not with sharp and vio lent fits, as it did others that had it, hut with a dull and lingering distemper, attended with various changes and alterations, leisurely, by little and little, wasting the strength of his body, and undermining the noble faculties of his soul. So that Theophrastus, in his Morals, when discussing whether men's characters change with their cir- cumstances, and their moral habits, disturbed b}^ the ailings of their bodies, start aside from the rules of virtue, has left it upon record, that Pericles, when he was sick, showed one of his friends that came to visit him, an amu- let or charm that the women had hung about his neck ; as much as to say, that he was very sick indeed when he would admit of such a foolery as that was. When he was now near his end, the best of the citizens and those of his friends who were left alive, sitting about him, Avere speaking of the greatness of his merit, and his power, and reckoning up his famous actions and the num- ber of his victories ; for there >vere no less than nine tro- phies, which, as their chief commander and conqueror of their enemies, lie had set up, for the honor of the city. They talked thus together among themselves, as though he were unable to understand or mind what the}^ said, but had now lost his consciousness. He had listened, how- ever, all the \vhile, and attended to all, and speaking out among them, said, that he Λvondered they should com- mend and take notice of things Avhich were as much owing to fortune as to any thing else, and had happened to many other commanders, and, at the same time, should not speak or make mention of that which was the most excellent and greatest thing of all. " For," said he, " no Athenian, through my means, ever wore mourning." He was indeed a character deserving our high admira- tion, not only for his equitable and mild temper, which all along in the many affairs of his life, and the great VOL. I. 24 370 PERICLES. animosities which he iiicurred, he constantly maintained ; but also for the high spirit and feeling which made him regard it the noblest of all his honors that, in the exer- cise of such immense power, he never had gratified his envy or his passion, nor ever had treated any enemy as irreconcilably opposed to him. And to me it appears that this one thing gives that otherwise childish and arro- gant title a fitting and becoming significance ; so dispas- sionate a temper, a life so pure and unblemished, in the height of power and place, might well be called Olym- pian, in accordance with our conceptions of the divine beings, to whom, as the natural authors of all good and of nothing evil, we ascribe the rule and government of the world. Not as the poets represent, who, while con- founding us with their ignorant fancies, are themselves confuted by their own j)oems and fictions, and call the place, indeed, where they say the gods make their abode, a secure and quiet seat, free from all hazards and com- motions, untroubled with winds or with clouds, and equally through all time illumined with a soft serenity and a pure light, as though such were a home most agreeable for a blessed and immortal nature ; and yet, in the mean while, affirm that the gods themselves are full of trouble and enmity and anger and other passions, which no way become or belong to even men that have any understanding. But this will, perhaps, seem a subject fitter for some other consideration, and that ouo-ht to be treated of in some other place. The course of public affairs after his death produced a quick and speedy sense of the loss of Pericles. Those who, while he lived, resented his great authority, as that which eclipsed themselves, presently after his quitting the stage, making trial of other orators and demagogues, readily acknowledged that there never had been in nature such a disposition as his Avas, more moderate and reasona- PERICLES. 371 ble in the height of that state he took upon him, or more grave and impressive in the mildness which he used. And that invidious arbitrary power, to Avhich iormerly they gave the name of monarchy and tyranny, did then appear to have been the chief bulwark of public safety ; so great a corruption and such a flood of mischief and vice followed, which he, by keeping weak and low, had withheld from notice, and had prevented from attaining incurable height through a licentious impunity. Γ ABI US. Having related the memorable actions of Pericles, our history now proceeds to the life of Fabius. A son of Hercules and a nymph, or some woman of that country, who brought him forth on the banks of Tiber, was, it is said, the first Fabius, the founder of the numerous and distinguished family of the name. Others will have it that they were first called Fodii, because the first of the race delighted in digging pit-falls for wild heists, fode?^e being still the Latin for to dig, and fossa for a ditch, and that in process of time, by the change of the two letters they grew to be called Fabii. But be these things true or false, certain it is that this family for a long time yielded a great number of eminent persons. Our Fabius, who was fourth in descent from that Fabius Rullus who first brought the honorable surname of Maximus into his family, was also, by way of personal nickname, called Verrucosus, from a wart on his upper lip ; and in his childhood they in like manner named him Ovicula, or The Lamb, on account of his extreme mildness of temper. His slowness in speaking, his long labor and jDains in learning, his deliberation in entering into the sports of other children, his easy submission to everybody, as if he had no will of his own, made those who judged superfi- cially of him, the greater number, esteem him insensible and stupid j and few only saw that this tardiness pro- (372) FABIUS. 37 ceecled from stability, and discerned the greatness of his mind, and the lionlikeness of his temper. But as soon as he came into employments, his virtues exerted and showed themselves ; his reputed want of eneri(] 382 FABIUS. with Hannibal and not to abandon the captives, he de- spatched his son to Rome to sell land, and to bring with him the price, sufficient to discharge the ransoms ; which was punctually performed by his son, and delivery accord- ingly made to him of the prisoners, amongst whom many, when they were released, made proposals to repay the monej^ ; which Fabius in all cases declined. About this time, he was called to Rome by the priests, to assist, according to the dut}^ of his office, at certain sacrifices, and was thus forced to leave the command of the army with Minucius; but before he parted, not onl}• charged him as his commander-in-chief, but besought and entreated him, not to come, in his absence, to a battle wdth Hannibal. His commands, entreaties, and advice were lost upon Minucius ; for his back was no sooner turned but the new general immediately sought occasions to attack the enemy. And notice being brought him that Hannibal had sent out a great part of his army to forage, he fell upon a detachment of the remainder, doing great execution, and driving them to their very camp, with no little terror to the rest, who apprehended their breaking in upon them ; and when Hannibal had recalled his scat- tered forces to the camp, he, nevertheless, without any loss, made his retreat, a success which aggravated his boldness and presumption, and filled the soldiers with rash confidence. The news spread to Rome, wdiere Fabius, on being; told it, said that what he most feared was Minu- cius's success : but the people, highly elated, hurried to the forum to listen to an address from Metilius the tri- bune, in which he infinitely extolled the valor of Minu- cius, and fell bitterly upon Fabius, accusing him for want not merely of courage, but even of loyalty ; and not only him, but also many other eminent and considerable persons ; saying that it Avas they that had brought the Carthaginians into Italy, with the design to destroy the I FABIUS. )00 liberty of the people ; for which end they h:ul at onne put the supreme authority into the hands of a single per- son, who by his slowness, and delays might give Hannibal leisure to establish himself in Italy, and the people of Carthage time and opportunity to supply him Λvith fresh succors to complete his conquest. Fabius came forward with no intention to answer Itie tribune, but only said, that they should expedite the sacrifices, that so he might speedily return to the army to punish Minucius, who had presumed to fight contrary to his orders; words which inunediately possessed the people with the belief that Minucius stood in danger of his life. For it was in the power of the dictator to imprison and to put to death, and they feared that Fabius, of a mild temper in general, would be as hard to be appeased wdien once irritated, as he was slow to be pro- voked. Nobody dared to raise his voice in opposition Metilius alone, whose office of tribune gave him security to say what he pleased (for in the time of a dictatorship that magistrate alone preserves his authority), boldly applied himself to the people in the behalf of Minucius: that they should not suffer him to be made a sacrifice to the enmity of Fabius, nor permit him to be destroyed, like the son of Manlius Torquatus, who was beheaded by his father for a victory fought and triumphantly won against order ; he exhorted them to take away iVom Fabius that absolute power of a dictator, and to put it into more worthy hands, better able and more iuciined to use it for the public good. These impressions very much prevailed upon the people, though not so far as wholly to dispossess Fabius of the dictatorship. But they decreed that Minucius should have an equal author- ity with the dictator in the conduct of the war; which was a thing then without precedent, though a little later it was again practised after the disaster at Canute ; when 384 FABIUS. the dictator, Marcus Junius, being with the army, they chose at Rome Fabius Buteo dictator, that he might create new senators, to supply the numerous places of those who were killed. But as soon as, once acting in public, he had filled those vacant places with a sufficient number, he immediately dismissed his lictors, and with- drew from all his attendance, and, mingling like a com- mon person with the rest of the people, quietly went about his own affairs in the forum. The enemies of Fabius thought they had sufficiently humiliated and subdued him by raising Minucius to be his equal in authority ; but they mistook the temper of the man, who looked upon their folly as not his loss, but like Diogenes, who, being told that some persons derided him, made answer, " But I am not derided," meaning that only those were really insulted on Λνΐιοηι such insults made an impression, so Fabius, with great tranquillity and unconcern, submitted to Λvhat happened, and contributed a proof to the argument of the philosophers that a just and good man is not capable of being dishonored. His only vexation arose from his fear lest this ill counsel, by supplying opportunities to the diseased military ambition of his subordinate, should damage the public cause. Lest the rashness of Minucius should now at once run headlong into some disaster, he returned back with all privacy and speed to the army ; where he found Minu- cius so elevated Λvith his new dignity, that, a joint- authority not contenting him, he required by turns to have the command of the army every other day. This Fabius rejected, but Avas contented that the army should bo divided ; thinking each general singly would better command his part, than partially command the whole. The first and fourth legion he took for his own division, the second and third he delivered to Minucius ; so also of the auxiliary forces each had an equal share. FABIUS. 385 Minucius, thus exalted, could not contain hini.self from boasting of his success in humiliating the high and power- ful office of the dictatorship. Fabius quietly reminded him that it was, in all Avisdom, Hannibal, and not Fabius, whom he had to combat; but if he must needs contend with his colleague, it had best be in diligence and can• for the preservation of Rome ; that it might not be said, a man so favored by the people served them worse than he who had been ill-treated and disgraced by them. The young general, despising these admonitions as the false humility of age, immediately removed with the body of his army, and encamped by himself Hannibal, who was not ignorant of all these passages, lay Avatchinc his advantage from them. It happened that between his army and that of Minucius there was a certain eminence, which seemed a very advantageous and not difficult post to encamp upon ; the level field around it appeared, from a distance, to be all smooth and even, though it had many inconsiderable ditches and dips in it, not discerni- ble to the eye. Hannibal, had he pleased, could easily have possessed himself of this ground ; but lie had re- served it for a bait, or train, in proper season, to draw the Romans to an engagement. Now that Minucius and Fabius were divided, he thought the opportunity f lir for his purpose; and, therefore, having in the night time lodged a convenient number of his men in these ditches and hollow places, early in the morning he sent forth a small detachment, who, in the sight of Minucius, pro- ceeded to possess themselves of the rising ground. Ac- cording to his expectation, Minucius swallowed the bait, and first sends out his light troops, and after them soiue horse, to dislodge the enemy; and, at last, when he saw- Hannibal in person advancing to the assistance of liis men, marched down Avith his whole army drawn up He eno-aired with the troops on liie t'uiinencc, and sus VOL. I. 2-5 886 FABIUS. tained their missiles ; the combat for some time was equal; but as soon as Hannibal perceived that the whole army wns now sufficiently advanced Λvithin the toils he had set for them, so that their backs were open to his men wdiom he had posted in the hollows, he gave the signal ; upon which they rushed forth from various quar- ters, and Avitli loud cries furiously attacked Minucius in the rear. The surprise and the slaughter was great, and struck universal alarm and disorder throuo-h the whole army. Minucius himself lost all his confidence ; he looked from officer to officer, and found all alike unpre- pared to face the danger, and yielding to a flight, which, however, could not end in safety. The Numidian horse- men were already in full victory riding about the plain, cutting; down the fuejitives. Fabiiis was not ignorant of this danger of his country- men ; he foresaw what would happen from the rashness of Minucius, and the cunning of Hannibal ; and, there- fore, kept his men to their arms, in readiness to wait the event ; nor w^ould he trust to the reports of others, but he himself, in front of his camp, viewed all that passed. When, therefore, he saw the army of Minucius encompassed by the enemy, and that by their countenance and shifting their ground, they appeared more disposed to flight than to resistance, with a great sigh, striking his hand upon his thigh, he said to those about him, " Hercules ! how much sooner than I expected, though later than he seemed to desire, hath Minucius destroyed himself!" He then commanded the ensigns to be led forward and the army to follow, telling them, •' We must make haste to rescue Minucius, who is a valiant man, and a lover of his country ; and if he hath been too forw\ard to engage the enemy, at another time we will tell him of it." Thus, at the head of his men, Fabius marched up to the enemy, and first cleared the plain of the Numidians ; and next FABIUS. 387 fell upon those who were charging the Romans in the rear, cutting down all that made opposition, and oblioin^' the rest to save themselves by a hasty retreat, lest they should be environed as the Romans had been. Han- nibal, seeing so sudden a change of affairs, and Fabius, beyond the force of his age, opening his way through the ranks up the hill-side, that he might join Minucius, warily forbore, sounded a retreat, and drew off his men into their camp ; while the Romans on their part were no less contented to retire in safety. It is reported that upon this occasion Hannibal said jestingly to his friends : " Did not I tell you, that this cloud which always hovered upon the mountains would, at some time or other, come down Λvith a storm upon us?" Fabius, after his men had picked up the spoils of the field, retired to his own camp, without saying any harsh or reproachful thing to his colleague ; who also on his part, gathering his army together, spoke and said to them : " To conduct great matters and never commit a fault is above the force of human nature ; but to learn and improve by the faults we have committed, is that which becomes a good and sensible man. Some reasons I may have to accuse fortune, but I have many more to thank her ; for in a few hours she hath cured a lonir mistake, and tauscht me that I am not the man λυΙιο should com- mand others, but have need of another to command me ; and that we are not to contend for victory over those to whom it is our advantage to yield. Therefore in every thing else henceforth the dictator must be your com- mander; only in showing gratitude towards him I will still be your leader, and always be the first to obey his orders," Havinu; said this, he commanded the Roma)i eagles to move forward, and all his men to follow him to the camp of Fabius. The soldiers, then, as he entered, stood amazed at the novelty of the sight, and were nnx- 388 FABIUS. ions and doubtful what the meaning might be. When he came near the dictator's tent, Fabius went forth to meet him, on which he at once laid his standards at his feet, calling him with a loud voice his father ; while the soldiers with him saluted the soldiers here as their pa- trons, the term employed by freedmen to those who gave them their liberty. After silence was obtained, Minucius said, " You have this day, dictator, obtained two victories ; one by your valor and conduct over Hannibal, and another by your wasdom and goodness over your colleague ; by one victory you preserved, and by the other instructed us ; and when we were already suffering one shameful defeat from Hannibal, by another welcome one from you we were restored to honor and safety. 1 can address you by no nobler name than that of a kind father, though a father's beneficence falls short of that 1 have received from you. From a father I individually received the gift of life ; to you I owe its preservation not for myself only, but for all these who are under me." After this, he threw himself into the arms of the dicta- tor ; and in the same manner the soldiers of each army embraced one another with gladness and tears of joy. Not long after, Fabius laid down the dictatorship, and consuls were again created. Those who immediately suc- ceeded, observed the same method in managing the Λvar, and avoided all occasions of fighting Hannibal in a pitched battle ; they only succored their allies, and pre- served the towns from falling off to the enemy. But afterwards, when Terentius Varro, a man of obscure birth, but very popular and bold, had obtained the consulship, h(i soon made it appear that by his rashness and igno- rance he would stake the whole commonwealth on the hazard. For it was his custom to declaim in all assem- blies, that, as long as Rome employed generals like Fabius there never ΛνοηΜ be an end of the war; vaunting thnt FABIUS 389 whenever he should get sight of the enemy, he woulil that same day free Italy from the strangers. With tliL'se promises he so prevailed, that he raised a greater army than had ever yet been sent out of Rome. There were enlisted eighty-eight thousand fighting men j but what gave confidence to the populace, only terrified the wise and experienced, and none more than Fabius ; since if so great a body, and the flower of the Roman youth, should be cut oflT. they could not see any new resource for the safety of Rome. They addressed themselves, therefore, to the other consul, iEniilius Paulus, a man of great expe- rience in war, but unpopular, and fearful also of the peo- ple, who once before upon some impeachment had con- demned him ; so that he needed encouragement to with- stand his colleague's temerity. Fabius told him, if he would profitably serve his country, he must no less oppose Varro's ignorant eagerness than Hannibal's con- scious readiness, since both alike conspired to decide the fate of Rome by a battle. " It is more reasonable," he said to him, " that you should believe me than Varro, in matters relating to Hannibal, wdien I tell you, that if ibr this year you abstain from fighting with liim, either his army Avill perish of itself, or else he will be glad to depart of his own will. This evidently appears, inasmuch as, notwithstanding his victories, none of the countries or towns of Italy come in to him, and his army is not now the third part of what it was at first." To this Paulus is said to have replied, "Did I only consider myself, I should rather choose to be exposed to the weapons of Hannibal than once more to the suff"rages of my fellow- citizens, who are urgent for what you disapprove; yet since the cause of Rome is at stake, I will rather seek in my conduct to please and obey Fabius than all the world besides." These good measures were defeated by the impor 390 FABIUS. tunity of Varro ; whom, when they were both come to the army, nothing would content but a separate com- mand, that each consul should have his day ; and when his turn came, he posted his army close to Hannibal, at a village called Cannae, by the river Aufidus. It was no sooner day, but he set up the scarlet coat flying over his tent, which was the signal of battle. This boldness of the consul, and the numerousness of his army, double theirs, startled the Carthaginians; but Hannibal com- manded them to their arms, and with a small train rode out to take a full prospect of the enemy as they were now forming in their ranks, from a rising ground not fir distant. One of his followers, called Gisco, a Cartha- ginian of equal rank with himself, told him that the numbers of the enemy were astonishing; to which Han- nibal replied, with a serious countenance, " There is one thing, Gisco, yet more astonishing, which you take no notice of;" and when Gisco inquired what, answered, that " in all those great numbers before us, there is not one man called Gisco." This unexpected jest of their general made all the company laugh, and as they came down from the hill, they told it to those whom they met, which caused a general laughter amongst them all, from which they were hardly able to recover themselves. The army, seeing Hannibal's attendants come back from viewing the enemy in such a laughing condition, con- cluded that it must be profound contempt of the enemy, that made their general at this moment indulge in such hilarity. According to his usual manner, Hannibal employed stratagems to advantage himself In the first place, he so drew up his men that the wind was at their backs, which at that time blew with a perfect storm of violence, and, sweeping over the great plains of sand, carried before it tt cloud of dust over the Carthaginian army into the FABIUS. 391 faces of the Eomans, which much disturbed them in the fight. In the next phace, all his best men he put into his wings; and in the body, which was somewhat more advanced than the wings, placed the worst and the weak- est of his army. He commanded those in the wino-s. that, when the enemy had made a thorough charge upon that middle advanced body, which he knew would recoil, as not being able to withstand their shock, and when the Romans, in their pursuit, should be far enough en'rao-ed within the two Avings, they should, both on the right and the left, charge them in the flank, and endeavor to encompass them. This appears to have been the chief cause of the Roman loss. Pressing upon Hannibal's iront, which gave ground, they reduced the form of his army into a perfect half-moon, and gave ample opportunity to the captains of the chosen troops to charge them right and left on their flanks, and to cut off and destroy all who did not fall back before the Carthat>;inian wimrs united in their rear. To this general calamity, it is also said, that a strange mistake among the cavahy much con- tributed. For the horse of ^milius receiving a hurt and throwing his master, those about him immediately alighted to aid the consul ; and the Roman troops, seeing their com- manders thus quitting their horses, took it for a sign that they should all dismount and charge the enemy on foot At the sight of this, Hannibal was heard to say, "This pleases me better than if they had been delivered to me bound hand and foot." For the particulars of this en- gagement, we refer our reader to those authors who have written at large upon the subject. The consul Yarro, with a thin company, fled to A^'enu- sia ; ^milius Paulus, unable any longer to oppose the flight of his men, or the pursuit of the enemy, his body all covered witli Avounds, and his soul no less wounded ,\vith grief, sat himself down upon a stone, expecting th« 392 FABIUS. kindness of a despatching blow. His foce was so disfig- ured, and all his person so stained with blood, that his very friends and domestics passing by knew him not. At last Cornelius Lentulus, a young man of patrician race, perceiving who he was, alighted from his horse, and, tendering it to him, desired him to get up and save a life so necessary to the safety of the commonwealth, which, at this time, would dearly want so great a captain. But nothing could prevail upon him to accept of the offer ; he obliged young Lentulus, with tears in his eyes, to remount his horse ; then standing up, he gave him his hand, and commanded him to tell Fabius Maximus that iEmilius Paulus had followed his directions to his very last, and had not in the least deviated from those measures which were agreed between them; but that it was his hard fate to be overpowered by Varro in the first place, and secondly by Hannibal. Having despatched Lentulus with this commission, he marked where the slaughter was greatest, and there threw himself upon the swords of the enemy. In this battle it is reported that fifty thousand Romans were slain, four thousand prisoners taken in the field, and ten thousand in the camp of both consuls. The friends of Hannibal earnestly persuaded him to follow up his victory, and pursue the flying Romans into the very gates of Rome, assuring him that in five days' time he might sup in the capitol ; nor is it easy to imag- ine what consideration hindered him from it. It would seem rather that some supernatural or divine interven- tion caused the hesitation and timidity which he now displayed, and which made Barcas, a Carthaginian, tell him with indignation, "You know, Hannibal, how to gain a victory, but not how to use it." Yet it produced a marvellous revolution in his affairs; he, who hitherto had not one town, market, or seaport in his possession, who had nothing for the subsistence of his men but what FAB I us. 393 he pillaged from day to day, who had no place υί' retreat or basis of operation, but was roving, as it were, with a huge troop of banditti, now became master of the best provinces and towns of Italy, and of Capua itself, next to Rome the most flourishing and opulent city, all which came over to him, and submitted to his authority. It is the saying of Euripides, that " a man is in ill-case when he must try a friend," and so neither, it would seem, is a state in a good one, when it needs an able general. And so it was wdth the Romans ; the counsels and actions of Fabius, which, before the battle, they had branded as cowardice and fear, now, in the other extreme they accounted to have been more than human wisdom ; as though nothing but a divine power of intellect could have seen so far, and foretold, contrary to the judgment of all others, a result which, even now it had arrived, was hardly credible. In him, therefore, they placed their whole remaining hopes ; his wisdom w'as the sacred altar and temple to w^hich they fled for refuge, and his coun- sels, more than any thing, preserved them from dispersing and deserting their city, as in the time when the Gauls took possession of Rome. He, whom they esteemed fearful and pusillanimous when they were, as they thought, in a prosperous condition, was now the only man, in this general and unbounded dejection and confu- sion, who showed no fear, but walked the streets with an assured and serene countenance, addressed his fellow-citi- zens, checked the women's lamentations, and the public gatherings of those who wanted thus to vent their sor- rows. He caused the senate to meet, he heartened up the magistrates, and was himself as the soul and life of every office. He placed guards at the gates of the city to stop the frighted multitude from flying ; he regulated and con- fined their mournings for their slain friends, both as to 394 ■ FABIUS. time and place ; ordering that each family should perform such observances within private walls, and that they should continue only the space of one month, and then the whole city should be purified. The feast of Ceres happening to fall within this time, it was decreed that the solemnity should be intermitted, lest the fewness, and tlie sorrowful countenance of those who should celebrate it, might too much expose to the people the greatness of their loss ; besides that, the worship most acceptable to the iiods is that which comes from cheerful hearts. Bui those rights which were proper for appeasing their anger, and procuring auspicious signs and presages, were by the direction of the augurs carefully performed. Fabius Pictor, a near kinsman to Maximus, was sent to consult the oracle of Delphi ; and about the same time, two vestals having been detected to have been violated, the one killed her- self, and the other, according to custom, was buried alive. Above all, let us admire the high spirit and equanimity of this Roman commonwealth ; that when the consul Varro came beaten and flying home, full of shame and humiliation, after he had so disgracefully and calamitously managed their affiiirs, yet the whole senate and people went forth to meet him at the gates of the city, and received him with honor and respect. And, silence being commanded, the magistrates and chief of the senate, Fabius amongst them, commended him before the people, because he did not despair of the safety of the common- wealth, after so great a loss, but was come to take the government into his hands, to execute the laws, and aid his fellow-citizens in their prospect of future deliverance. When word was brought to Rome that Hannibal, after the fight, had marched with his army into other parts of Italy, the hearts of the Romans began to revive, and they proceeded to send out generals and armies. The most distinguished commands were held by Fabius Maximus FABIUS. 395 and Claudius Marcellus, both generals of great fame, though upon opposite grounds. For Marcellus, as we have set forth in his life, was a man of action and high spirit, ready and bold with his own hand, and, as Homer describes his \varriors, fierce, and delighting in fights. Boldness, enterprise, and daring, to match those of Hanni- bal, constituted his tactics, and marked his engagements. But Fabius adhered to his former principles, still per- suaded that, by following close and not fighting him, Hannibal and his army would at last be tired out and consumed, like a wrestler in too high condition, whose very excess of strength makes him the more likely sud- denly to give way and lose it. Posidonius tells us that the Romans called Marcellus their sword, and Fabius their buckler ; and that the vigor of the one, mixed w^ith the steadiness of the other, made a happy compound that proved the salvation of Rome. So that Hannibal found by experience that, encountering the one, he met with a rapid, impetuous river, which drove him back^ and still made some breach upon him ; and by the other, though silently and quietly passing by him, he was insen- sibly washed away and consumed ; and, at last, was brought to this, that he dreaded Marcellus when he was in motion, and Fabius when he sat still. During the whole course of this Λvar, he had still to do with one or both of these generals ; for each of them w^as five times consul, and, as praetors or proconsuls or consuls, they had always a part in the government of the army, till, at last, Marcellus fell into the trap which Hannibal had laid for him, and was killed in his fifth consulship. But all his craft and subtlety were unsuccessful upon Fabius, who only once was in some danger of being caught, when counterfeit letters came to him from the principal inhabitants of Metapontum, with promises to deliver up their town if he would come before it with 396 FABIUS. his iirrny, and intimations that they should expect him, This train had almost drawn him in; he resolved to niiirch to them with part of his army, and was diverted only by consulting the omens of the birds, which he found to be inauspicious ; and not long after it was dis- covered that the letters had been forged by Hannibal, who, for his reception, had laid an ambush to entertain him. This, perhaps, w^e must rather attribute to tho favor of the gods than to the prudence of Fabius. In preserving the towns and allies from revolt' by fair and gentle treatment, and in not using rigor, or showing a suspicion upon every light suggestion, his conduct was remarkable. It is told of him, that, being informed of a certain Marsian, eminent for courage and good birth, who had been speaking underhand with some of the soldiers about deserting, Fabius was so far from using severity against him, that he called for him, and told him he was sensible of the neglect that had been shown to his merit and good service, which, he said, w^as a great fault in the commanders who reward more by favor than by desert ; " but henceforward, whenever you are aggrieved," said Fabius, " I shall consider it your fault, if you apply your- self to any but to me;" and when he had so siDoken, he bestowed an excellent horse and other presents upon him ; and, from that time forwards, there \vas not a faith- fuller and more trusty man in the whole army. With good reason he judged, that, if those who have the gov- ernment of horses and dogs endeavor by gentle usage to cure their angry and untractable tempers, rather than by cruelty and beating, much more should those who have the command of men try to bring them to order and discipline by the mildest and fairest means, and not treat them worse than gardeners do those wild plants, which, with care and attention, lose gradually the savageness of their nature, and bear excellent fruit. FABIUS. 397 At another time, some of his officers informed him that one of their men wresent them to the goddess. Ino had been kinder to her sister's children than to her own. Thus Ovid says, Non tamen banc pro stirpe sua pia mater adoret: Ipsa parum felix visa fuisse parens: Alterius prolem melius mandabltis illi: Utilior Baccho quam fuit ipsa suis. Page 288. — The twenfij-ffth of Boedromion, the day of the battle of Arbela, should be the twenty-sixth ; and the day which the Carthaginians observe, the twenly-first of Metagitniou, should, perhaps, be corrected to the twenty-second. Hesiod's account of fortunate and unfortunate days is appended to his Works and Days, from Avhence Virgil took the hint for his in the Georgics. Page 290. — The Greek gives the past tense in the sentence, Others say that this fire Λvas kept burtnng, &c. ; but it should, probably, be altered all through into the present. Page 291. — Doliola is the Latin name of the place called the Barrels. "It was thought best," says Livy ( V. 40), " to bury them in barrels in the chapel adjoining the house of the flamen of Quirinus, in the spot where now it is con sidcred an offi'nce against religion to spit." Life of Pericles, page 327. — Plato's expression, " so strong a draught of liberty," occurs in the 8th book of the Republic, (p. 562). Tlie author of the verses that follow is unknown. Page 328. — The quotation from Plato is from the passage in the Phscdrus, where Socrates argues that the knowledge of nature, and, in particular, of the 414 APPENDIX. soul, is as necessary to the perfect master of rhetoric, as the knowledire of the body is to the physician. Pericles is said to thunder and lighten in the Achar- uians of Aristophanes (530). Page 337. — Socrates says ne heard Pericles propose to the people the buildlnw of the long wall — more properly the middle wall, a subsequent addition to the long walls — in the Gorgias of Plato, {p. 456 a). The Odeum was burnt in the time of the siege of Athens by Sylla, to be described in Sylla's life. Page 341. — The quotation from Plato is again out of the Phasdrus, (p. 261). Rhetoric is a psychagogia — a magic power of swaging and carrying about the souls of men by the use of words. Page 348. — The brazen wolf dl Delphi was famous. A man who carried off some treasure from the temple, went to hide it in the thick woods of Parnassus. A wo f fell upon him and killed him ; and for many days after came daily into the city and howled. At last the people followed him, discovered the gold, and set up this image of the wolf. — {Pausanias, X. 14.) Page 353. — Aristophanes's line about the Samians is from his lost comedy of the Babylonians. Page 354. — Most Ukely the engineer was called Periphoretus, or the carried- about, for the very reason that the name was already famihar from Anacreon'g verses. Page 356. — Cimon is said to have given these names to his sons in honor of the states whom he represented, as Proxenus, at Athens. Page 358. — The story of Anthemocritus is not alluded to by any contemporary writer. Yet Pausanias also relates it, and speaks of his monument as still re- maining on the Sacred Road, going to Eleusis; just as described here, outside the Dipylon. The famous verses in the Acharnians are the 524th and fol- lowing. Page 368. — Sold for slaves may have been Plutarch's expression, but the fact itself cannot be believed ; and it would not be difficult to correct the one word in which the assertion is made. Page 370. — Olympus, where they say the gods have their ever secure abode, m'curs in the Odyssey (F/. 42), and the phrase of the secure abode or seat is repeated by Pindar, {Nem. VI. 3). Life ov Fakius, page 393. — This is probably a fragment, of which no more is known. No existing hne of Euripides can very well be identified with it. Page 400. — This brazen colossal statue of Hercules was the work, we are told by Strabo {VI. c. 3), of Lysippus. He speaks of it as still standing in hia time in the Capitol, as the offering of Fabius Maximus, the taker of the city. Page 404. — " Long shaken on the seas restored the state," is said of CEdipus, in the beginning of the CEiUpus Tyrannus. KND OF VOL I. CENTRAL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY University of California, San Diego DATE DUE nrr.C ?/.Λ DEC 1 19R1 ■ "Wg§4 , ^, ^ 39 UCSD Libr. mm ' W^ \j^ '# ( ? 1 >rj:. r''A-. 1^ '