My last preceding chapters have followed the history of the Sicilian Greeks through long years of despotism, suffering, and impoverishment, into a period of renovated freedom and comparative happiness, accomplished under the beneficent auspices of Timoleon, between 344-336 B. C. It will now be proper to resume the thread of events in Central Greece, at the point where they were left at the close of the preceding volume—the accession of Philip of Macedon in 360-359 B. C. The death of Philip took place in 336 B. C.; and the closing years of his life will bring before us the last struggles of full Hellenic freedom; a result standing in mournful contrast with the achievements of the contemporary liberator Timoleon in Sicily.
No such struggles could have appeared within the limits of possibility, even to the most far-sighted politician either of Greece or of Macedon—at the time when Philip mounted the throne. Among the hopes and fears of most Grecian cities, Macedonia then passed wholly unnoticed; in Athens, Olynthus, Thasus, Thessaly, and a few others, it formed an item not without moment, yet by no means of first-rate magnitude.
The Hellenic world was now in a state different from anything which had been seen since the repulse of Xerxes in 480-479 B. C. The defeat and degradation of Sparta had set free the inland states from the only presiding city whom they had ever learned to look up to. Her imperial ascendency, long possessed and grievously abused, had been put down by the successes of Epaminondas and the Thebans. She was no longer the head of a numerous body of subordinate allies, sending deputies to her periodical synods—submitting their external politics to her influence—placing their military contingents under command of her officers (xenagi)—and even administering their internal government through oligarchies devoted to her purposes, with the reinforcement, wherever needed, of a Spartan harmost and garrison. She no longer found on her northern frontier a number of detached Arcadian villages, each separately manageable under leaders devoted to her, and furnishing her with hardy soldiers; nor had she the friendly city of Tegea, tied to her by a long-standing philo-Laconian oligarchy and tradition. Under the strong revolution of feeling which followed on the defeat of the Spartans at Leuktra, the small Arcadian communities, encouraged and guided by Epaminondas, had consolidated themselves into the great fortified city of Megalopolis, now the centre of a Pan-Arcadian confederacy, with a synod (called the Ten thousand) frequently assembled there to decide upon matters of interest and policy common to the various sections of the Arcadian name. Tegea too had undergone a political revolution; so that these two cities, conterminous with each other and forming together the northern frontier of Sparta, converted her Arcadian neighbors from valuable instruments into formidable enemies.
But this loss of foreign auxiliary force and dignity was not the worst which Sparta had suffered. On her north-western frontier (conterminous also with Megalopolis) stood the newly-constituted city of Messênê, representing an amputation of nearly one-half of Spartan territory and substance. The western and more fertile half of Laconia had been severed from Sparta, and was divided between Messênê and various other independent cities; being tilled chiefly by those who had once been Periœki and Helots of Sparta.
In the phase of Grecian history on which we are now about to enter—when the collective Hellenic world, for the first time since the invasion of Xerxes, was about to be thrown upon its defence against a foreign enemy from Macedonia—this altered position of Sparta was a circumstance of grave moment. Not only were the Peloponnesians disunited, and deprived of their common chief; but Megalopolis and Messênê, knowing the intense hostility of Sparta against them—and her great superiority of force even reduced as she was, to all that they could muster—lived in perpetual dread of her attack. Their neighbors the Argeians, standing enemies of Sparta, were well-disposed to protect them; but such aid was insufficient for their defence, without extra-Peloponnesian alliance. Accordingly we shall find them leaning upon the support either of Thebes or of Athens, whichever could be had; and ultimately even welcoming the arms of Philip of Macedon, as protector against the inexpiable hostility of Sparta. Elis—placed in the same situation with reference to Triphylia, as Sparta with reference to Messênê—complained that the Triphylians, whom she looked upon as subjects, had been admitted as freemen into the Arcadian federation. We shall find Sparta endeavoring to engage Elis in political combinations, intended to ensure, to both, the recovery of lost dominion.[409] Of these combinations more will be said hereafter; at present I merely notice the general fact that the degradation of Sparta, combined with her perpetually menaced aggression against Messênê and Arcadia, disorganized Peloponnesus, and destroyed its powers of Pan-hellenic defence against the new foreign enemy now slowly arising.
The once powerful Peloponnesian system was in fact completely broken up. Corinth, Sikyon, Phlius, Trœzen, and Epidaurus, valuable as secondary states and as allies of Sparta, were now detached from all political combination, aiming only to keep clear, each for itself, of all share in collision between Sparta and Thebes.[410] It would appear also that Corinth had recently been oppressed and disturbed by the temporary despotism of Timophanes, described in my last chapter; though the date of that event cannot be precisely made out.
But the grand and preponderating forces of Hellas now resided, for the first time in our history, without, and not within, Peloponnesus; at Athens and Thebes. Both these cities were in full vigor and efficiency. Athens had a numerous fleet, a flourishing commerce, a considerable body of maritime and insular allies, sending deputies to her synod and contributing to a common fund for the maintenance of the joint security. She was by far the greatest maritime power of Greece. I have recounted in my last preceding volume, how her general Timotheus had acquired for her the important island of Samos, together with Pydna, Methônê, and Potidæa, in the Thermaic Gulf; how he failed (as Iphikrates had failed before him) in more than one attempt upon Amphipolis; how he planted Athenian conquest and settlers in the Thracian Chersonese, which territory, after having been attacked and endangered by the Thracian prince Kotys, was regained by the continued efforts of Athens in the year 358 B. C. Athens had sustained no considerable loss, during the struggles which ended in the pacification after the battle of Mantinea; and her condition appears on the whole to have been better than it had ever been since her disasters at the close of the Peloponnesian war.
The power of Thebes also was imposing and formidable. She had indeed lost many of those Peloponnesian allies who formed the overwhelming array of Epaminondas when he first invaded Laconia, under the fresh anti-Spartan impulse immediately succeeding the battle of Leuktra. She retained only Argos, together with Tegea, Megalopolis, and Messênê. The last three added little to her strength, and needed her watchful support; a price which Epaminondas had been perfectly willing to pay for the establishment of a strong frontier against Sparta. But the body of extra Peloponnesian allies grouped round Thebes was still considerable:[411] the Phokians and Lokrians, the Malians, the Herakleots, most of the Thessalians, and most (if not all) of the inhabitants of Eubœa; perhaps also the Akarnanians. The Phokians were indeed reluctant allies, disposed to circumscribe their obligations within the narrowest limits of mutual defence in case of invasion and we shall presently find the relations between the two becoming positively hostile. Besides these allies, the Thebans possessed the valuable position of Oropus, on the north-eastern frontier of Attica; a town which had been wrested from Athens six years before, to the profound mortification of the Athenians.
But ever and above allies without Bœotia, Thebes had prodigiously increased the power of her city within Bœotia. She had appropriated to herself the territories of Platæa and Thespiæ on her southern frontier, and of Koroneia and Orchomenus near upon her northern; by conquest and partial expulsion of their prior inhabitants. How and when these acquisitions had been brought about, has been explained in my preceding volume:[412] here I merely recall the fact, to appreciate the position of Thebes in 359 B. C.—that these four towns, having been in 372 B. C. autonomous—joined with her only by the definite obligations of the Bœotian confederacy—and partly even in actual hostility against her—had now lost their autonomy with their free citizens, and had become absorbed into her property and sovereignty. The domain of Thebes thus extended across Bœotia from the frontiers of Phokis[413] on the north-west to the frontiers of Attica on the south.
The new position thus acquired by Thebes in Bœotia, purchased at the cost of extinguishing three or four autonomous cities, is a fact of much moment in reference to the period now before us; not simply because it swelled the power and pride of the Thebans themselves; but also because it raised a strong body of unfavorable sentiment against them in the Hellenic mind. Just at the time when the Spartans had lost nearly one-half of Laconia, the Thebans had annexed to their own city one-third of the free Bœotian territory. The revival of free Messenian citizenship, after a suspended existence of more than two centuries, had recently been welcomed with universal satisfaction. How much would that same feeling be shocked when Thebes extinguished, for her own aggrandizement, four autonomous communities, all of her own Bœotian kindred—one of these communities too being Orchomenus, respected both for its antiquity and its traditionary legends! Little pains was taken to canvass the circumstances of the case, and to inquire whether Thebes had exceeded the measure of rigor warranted by the war-code of the time. In the patriotic and national conceptions of every Greek, Hellas consisted of an aggregate of autonomous, fraternal, city-communities. The extinction of any one of these was like the amputation of a limb from the organized body. Repugnance towards Thebes, arising out of these proceedings, affected strongly the public opinion of the time, and manifests itself especially in the language of Athenian orators, exaggerated by mortification on account of the loss of Oropus.[414]
The great body of Thessalians, as well as the Magnetes and the Phthiot Achæans, were among those subject to the ascendency of Thebes. Even the powerful and cruel despot, Alexander of Pheræ, was numbered in this catalogue.[415] The cities of fertile Thessaly, possessed by powerful oligarchies with numerous dependent serfs, were generally a prey to intestine conflict and municipal rivalry with each other; disorderly as well as faithless.[416] The Aleuadæ, chiefs at Larissa—and the Skopadæ, at Krannon—had been once the ascendent families in the country. But in the hands of Lykophron and the energetic Jason, Pheræ had been exalted to the first rank. Under Jason as tagus (federal general), the whole force of Thessaly was united, together with a large number of circumjacent tributaries, Macedonian, Epirotic, Dolopian, etc., and a well-organized standing army of mercenaries besides. He could muster eight thousand cavalry, twenty thousand hoplites, and peltasts or light infantry in numbers far more considerable.[417] A military power of such magnitude, in the hands of one alike able and aspiring, raised universal alarm, and would doubtless have been employed in some great scheme of conquest, either within or without Greece, had not Jason been suddenly cut off by assassination in 370 B. C., in the year succeeding the battle of Leuktra.[418] His brothers Polyphron and Polydorus succeeded to his position as tagus, but not to his abilities or influence. The latter a brutal tyrant, put to death the former, and was in his turn slain, after a short interval, by a successor yet worse, his nephew Alexander, who lived and retained power at Pheræ, for about ten years (368-358 B. C.).
During a portion of that time Alexander contended with success against the Thebans, and maintained his ascendency in Thessaly. But before the battle of Mantineia in 362 B. C., he had been reduced into the condition of a dependent ally of Thebes, and had furnished a contingent to the army which marched under Epaminondas into Peloponnesus. During the year 362-361 B. C., he even turned his hostilities against Athens, the enemy of Thebes; carrying on a naval war against her, not without partial success, and damage to her commerce.[419] And as the foreign ascendency of Thebes everywhere was probably impaired by the death of her great leader Epaminondas, Alexander of Pheræ recovered strength; continuing to be the greatest potentate in Thessaly, as well as the most sanguinary tyrant, until the time of his death in the beginning of 359 B. C.[420] He then perished, in the vigor of age and in the fulness of power. Against oppressed subjects or neighbors he could take security by means of mercenary guards; but he was slain by the contrivance of his wife Thêbê and the act of her brothers:—a memorable illustration of the general position laid down by Xenophon, that the Grecian despot could calculate neither on security nor on affection anywhere, and that his most dangerous enemies were to be found among his own household or kindred.[421] The brutal life of Alexander, and the cruelty of his proceedings, had inspired his wife with mingled hatred and fear. Moreover she had learnt from words dropped in a fit of intoxication, that he was intending to put to death her brothers Tisiphonus, Pytholaus, and Lykophron—and along with them herself; partly because she was childless, and he had formed the design of re-marrying with the widow of the late despot Jason, who resided at Thebes. Accordingly Thêbê, apprising her brothers of their peril, concerted with them the means of assassinating Alexander. The bed-chamber which she shared with him was in an upper story, accessible only by a removable staircase or ladder; at the foot of which there lay every night a fierce mastiff in chains, and a Thracian soldier tattooed after the fashion of his country. The whole house moreover was regularly occupied by a company of guards; and it is even said that the wardrobe and closets of Thêbê were searched every evening for concealed weapons. These numerous precautions of mistrust, however, were baffled by her artifice. She concealed her brothers during all the day in a safe adjacent hiding-place. At night Alexander, coming to bed intoxicated, soon fell fast asleep; upon which Thêbê stole out of the room—directed the dog to be removed from the foot of the stairs, under pretence that the despot wished to enjoy undisturbed repose—and then called her armed brothers. After spreading wool upon the stairs, in order that their tread might be noiseless, she went again up into the bed-room, and brought away the sword of Alexander, which always hung near him. Notwithstanding this encouragement, however, the three young men, still trembling at the magnitude of the risk, hesitated to mount the stair; nor could they be prevailed upon to do so, except by her distinct threat, that if they flinched, she would awaken Alexander and expose them. At length they mounted, and entered the bed-chamber, wherein a lamp was burning; while Thêbê, having opened the door for them, again closed it, and posted herself to hold the bar. The brothers then approached the bed: one seized the sleeping despot by the feet, another by the hair of his head, and the third with a sword thrust him through.[422]
After successfully and securely consummating this deed, popular on account of the odious character of the slain despot, Thêbê contrived to win over the mercenary troops, and to insure the sceptre to herself and her eldest brother Tisiphonus. After this change, it would appear that the power of the new princes was not so great as that of Alexander had been, so that additional elements of weakness and discord were introduced into Thessaly. This is to be noted as one of the material circumstances paving the way for Philip of Macedon to acquire ascendency in Greece—as will hereafter appear.
It was in the year 360-359 B. C., that Perdikkas, elder brother and predecessor of Philip on the throne of Macedonia, was slain, in the flower of his age. He perished, according to one account, in a bloody battle with the Illyrians, wherein four thousand Macedonians fell also; according to another statement, by the hands of assassins and the treacherous subornation of his mother Eurydikê.[423] Of the exploits of Perdikkas during the five years of his reign we know little. He had assisted the Athenian general Timotheus in war against the Olynthian confederacy, and in the capture of Pydna, Potidæa, Torônê, and other neighboring places; while on the other hand he had opposed the Athenians in their attempt against Amphipolis, securing that important place by a Macedonian garrison, both against them and for himself. He was engaged in serious conflicts with the Illyrians.[424] It appears too that he was not without some literary inclinations—was an admirer of intellectual men, and in correspondence with Plato at Athens. Distinguished philosophers or sophists, like Plato and Isokrates, enjoyed renown, combined with a certain measure of influence, throughout the whole range of the Grecian world. Forty years before, Archelaus king of Macedonia had shown favor to Plato,[425] then a young man, as well as to his master Sokrates. Amyntas, the father both of Perdikkas and of Philip, had throughout his reign cultivated the friendship of leading Athenians, especially Iphikrates and Timotheus; the former of whom he had even adopted as his son; Aristotle, afterwards so eminent as a philosopher (son of Nikomachus the confidential physician of Amyntas[426]), had been for some time studying at Athens as a pupil of Plato; moreover Perdikkas during his reign had resident with him a friend of the philosopher—Euphræus of Oreus. Perdikkas lent himself much to the guidance of Euphræus, who directed him in the choice of his associates, and permitted none to be his guests except persons of studious habits; thus exciting much disgust among the military Macedonians.[427] It is a signal testimony to the reputation of Plato, that we find his advice courted, at one and the same time, by Dionysius the younger at Syracuse, and by Perdikkas in Macedonia.
On the suggestion of Plato, conveyed through Euphræus, Perdikkas was induced to bestow upon his own brother Philip a portion of territory or an appanage in Macedonia. In 368 B. C. (during the reign of Alexander elder brother of Perdikkas and Philip), Pelopidas had reduced Macedonia to partial submission and had taken hostages for its fidelity; among which hostages was the youthful Philip, then about fifteen years of age. In this character Philip remained about two or three years at Thebes.[428] How or when he left that city, we cannot clearly make out. He seems to have returned to Macedonia after the murder of Alexander by Ptolemy Alorites; probably without opposition from the Thebans, since his value as a hostage was then diminished. The fact that he was confided (together with his brother Perdikkas) by his mother Eurydikê to the protection of the Athenian general Iphikrates, then on the coast of Macedonia—has been recounted in a previous chapter. How Philip fared during the regency of Ptolemy Alorites in Macedonia, we do not know; we might ever suspect that he would return back to Thebes as a safer residence. But when his brother Perdikkas, having slain Ptolemy Alorites, became king, Philip resided in Macedonia, and even obtained from Perdikkas (as already stated), through the persuasion of Plato, a separate district to govern as subordinate. Here he remained until the death of Perdikkas in 360-359 B. C.; organizing a separate military force of his own (like Derdas in 382 B. C., when the Lacedæmonians made war upon Olynthus;[429]) and probably serving at its head in the wars carried on by his brother.
The time passed by Philip at Thebes, however, from fifteen to eighteen years of age, was an event of much importance in determining his future character.[430] Though detained at Thebes, Philip was treated with courtesy and respect. He resided with Pammenes, one of the principal citizens; he probably enjoyed good literary and rhetorical teaching, since as a speaker, in after life, he possessed considerable talent;[431] and he may also have received some instruction in philosophy, though he never subsequently manifested any taste for it, and though the assertion of his having been taught by Pythagoreans merits little credence. But the lesson, most indelible of all, which he imbibed at Thebes, was derived from the society and from the living example of men like Epaminondas and Pelopidas. These were leading citizens, manifesting those qualities which insured for them the steady admiration of a free community—and of a Theban community, more given to action than to speech; moreover they were both of them distinguished military leaders—one of them the ablest organizer and the most scientific tactician of his day. The spectacle of the Theban military force, excellent both as cavalry and as infantry under the training of such a man as Epaminondas, was eminently suggestive to a young Macedonian prince; and became still more efficacious when combined with the personal conversation of the victor of Leuktra—the first man whom Philip learnt to admire, and whom he strove to imitate in his military career.[432] His mind was early stored with the most advanced strategic ideas of the day, and thrown into the track of reflection, comparison, and invention, on the art of war.
When transferred from Thebes to the subordinate government of a district in Macedonia under his elder brother Perdikkas, Philip organized a military force; and in so doing had the opportunity of applying to practice, though at first on a limited scale, the lessons learnt from the illustrious Thebans. He was thus at the head of troops belonging to and organized by himself—when the unexpected death of Perdikkas opened to him the prospect of succeeding to the throne. But it was a prospect full of doubt and hazard. Perdikkas had left an infant son; there existed, moreover, three princes, Archelaus, Aridæus, and Menelaus,[433] sons of Amyntas by another wife or mistress Gygæa, and therefore half-brothers of Perdikkas and Philip: there were also two other pretenders to the crown—Pausanias (who had before aspired to the throne after the death of Amyntas), seconded by a Thracian prince—and Argæus, aided by the Athenians. To these dangers was to be added, attack from the neighboring barbaric nations, Illyrians, Pæonians, and Thracians—always ready[434] to assail and plunder Macedonia at every moment of intestine weakness. It would appear that Perdikkas, shortly before his death, had sustained a severe defeat, with the loss of four thousand men, from the Illyrians: his death followed, either from a wound then received, or by the machinations of his mother Eurydikê. Perhaps both the wound in battle and the assassination, may be real facts.[435]
Philip at first assumed the government of the country as guardian of his young nephew Amyntas the son of Perdikkas. But the difficulties of the conjuncture were so formidable, that the Macedonians around constrained him to assume the crown.[436] Of his three half-brothers he put to death one, and was only prevented from killing the other two by their flight into exile; we shall find them hereafter at Olynthus. They had either found, or were thought likely to find, a party in Macedonia to sustain their pretensions to the crown.[437]
The succession to the throne in Macedonia, though descending in a particular family, was open to frequent and bloody dispute between the individual members of that family, and usually fell to the most daring and unscrupulous among them. None but an energetic man, indeed, could well maintain himself there, especially under the circumstances of Philip’s accession. The Macedonian monarchy has been called a limited monarchy; and in a large sense of the word, this proposition is true. But what the limitations were, or how they were made operative, we do not know. That there were some ancient forms and customs, which the king habitually respected, we cannot doubt;[438] as there probably were also among the Illyrian tribes, the Epirots, and others of the neighboring warlike nations. A general assembly was occasionally convened, for the purpose of consenting to some important proposition, or trying some conspicuous accused person. But though such ceremonies were recognized and sometimes occurred, the occasions were rare in which they interposed any serious constitutional check upon the regal authority.[439] The facts of Macedonian history, as far as they come before us, exhibit the kings acting on their own feelings and carrying out their own schemes—consulting whom they please and when they please—subject only to the necessity of not offending too violently the sentiments of that military population whom they commanded. Philip and Alexander, combining regal station with personal ability and unexampled success, were more powerful than any of their predecessors. Each of them required extraordinary efforts from their soldiers, whom they were therefore obliged to keep in willing obedience and attachment; just as Jason of Pheræ had done before with his standing army of mercenaries.[440] During the reign of Alexander the army manifests itself as the only power by his side to which even he is constrained occasionally to bow; after his death, its power becomes for a time still more ascendent. But so far as the history of Macedonia is known to us, I perceive no evidence of coördinate political bodies, or standing apparatus (either aristocratical or popular) to check the power of the king—such as to justify in any way the comparison drawn by a modern historian between the Macedonian and English constitutions.
The first proceeding of Philip, in dealing with his numerous enemies, was to buy off the Thracians by seasonable presents and promises; so that the competition of Pausanias for the throne became no longer dangerous. There remained as assailants the Athenians with Argæus from seaward, and the Illyrians from landward.
But Philip showed dexterity and energy sufficient to make head against all. While he hastened to reorganize the force of the country, to extend the application of those improved military arrangements which he had already been attempting in his own province, and to encourage his friends and soldiers by collective harangues,[441] in a style and spirit such as the Macedonians had never before heard from regal lips—he contrived to fence off the attack of the Athenians until a more convenient moment.
He knew that the possession of Amphipolis was the great purpose for which they had been carrying on war against Macedonia for some years, and for which they now espoused the cause of Argæus. Accordingly he professed his readiness at once to give up to them this important place, withdrawing the Macedonian garrison whereby Perdikkas had held it against them, and leaving the town to its own citizens. This act was probably construed by the Athenians as tantamount to an actual cession; for even if Amphipolis should still hold out against them, they doubted not of their power to reduce it when unaided. Philip farther despatched letters to Athens, expressing an anxious desire to be received into her alliance, on the same friendly terms as his father Amyntas before him.[442] These proceedings seem to have had the effect of making the Athenians lukewarm in the cause of Argæus. For Mantias the Athenian admiral, though he conveyed that prince by sea to Methônê, yet stayed in the seaport himself, while Argæus marched inland—with some returning exiles, a body of mercenaries, and a few Athenian volunteers—to Ægæ or Edessa;[443] hoping to procure admission into that ancient capital of the Macedonian kings. But the inhabitants refused to receive him; and in his march back, to Methônê, he was attacked and completely defeated by Philip. His fugitive troops found shelter on a neighboring eminence, but were speedily obliged to surrender. Philip suffered the greater part of them to depart on terms, requiring only that Argæus and the Macedonian exiles should be delivered up to him. He treated the Athenian citizens with especial courtesy, preserved to them all their property, and sent them home full of gratitude, with conciliatory messages to the people of Athens. The exiles, Argæus among them, having become his prisoners, were probably put to death.[444]
The prudent lenity exhibited by Philip towards the Athenian prisoners, combined with his evacuation of Amphipolis, produced the most favorable effect upon the temper of the Athenian public, and disposed them to accept his pacific offers. Peace was accordingly concluded. Philip renounced all claim to Amphipolis, acknowledging that town as a possession rightfully belonging to Athens.[445] By such renunciation he really abandoned no rightful possession; for Amphipolis had never belonged to the Macedonian kings; nor had any Macedonian soldiers ever entered it until three or four years before, when the citizens had invoked aid from Perdikkas to share in the defence against Athens. But the Athenians appeared to have gained the chief prize for which they had been so long struggling. They congratulated themselves in the hope, probably set forth with confidence by the speakers who supported the peace, that the Amphipolitans alone would never think of resisting the acknowledged claims of Athens.
Philip was thus relieved from enemies on the coast, and had his hands free to deal with the Illyrians and Pæonians of the interior. He marched into the territory of the Pæonians (seemingly along the upper course of the river Axius), whom he found weakened by the recent death of their king Agis. He defeated their troops, and reduced them to submit to Macedonian supremacy. From thence he proceeded to attack the Illyrians—a more serious and formidable undertaking. The names Illyrians, Pæonians, Thracians, etc., did not designate any united national masses, but were applied to a great number of kindred tribes or clans, each distinct, separately governed, and having its particular name and customs. The Illyrian and Pæonian tribes occupied a wide space of territory to the north and north-west of Macedonia, over the modern Bosnia nearly to the Julian Alps and the river Save. But during the middle of the fourth century before Christ, it seems that a large immigration of Gallic tribes from the westward was taking place, invading the territory of the more northerly Illyrians and Pæonians, circumscribing their occupancy and security, and driving them farther southward; sometimes impelling them to find subsistence and plunder by invasions of Macedonia or by maritime piracies against Grecian commerce in the Adriatic.[446] The Illyrians had become more dangerous neighbors to Macedonia than they were in the time of Thucydides; and it seems that a recent coalition of their warriors, for purposes of invasion and plunder, was now in the zenith of its force. It was under a chief named Bardylis, who had raised himself to command from the humble occupation of a charcoal burner; a man renowned for his bravery, but yet more renowned for dealings rigidly just towards his soldiers, especially in the distribution of plunder.[447] Bardylis and his Illyrians had possessed themselves of a considerable portion of Western Macedonia (west of Mount Bermius), occupying for the most part the towns, villages, and plains,[448] and restricting the native Macedonians to the defensible, yet barren hills. Philip marched to attack them, at the head of a force which he had now contrived to increase to the number of ten thousand foot and six hundred horse. The numbers of Bardylis were about equal; yet on hearing of Philip’s approach, he sent a proposition tendering peace, on the condition that each party should retain what it actually possessed. His proposition being rejected, the two armies speedily met. Philip had collected around him on the right wing his chosen Macedonian troops, with whom he made his most vigorous onset: manœuvring at the same time with a body of cavalry so as to attack the left flank of the Illyrians. The battle, contested with the utmost obstinacy on both sides, was for some time undecided; nor could the king of Macedon break the oblong square into which his enemies had formed themselves. But at length his cavalry were enabled to charge them so effectively in flank and rear, that victory declared in his favor. The Illyrians fled, were vigorously pursued with the loss of seven thousand men, and never again rallied. Bardylis presently sued for peace, and consented to purchase it by renouncing all his conquests in Macedonia; while Philip pushed his victory so strenuously, as to reduce to subjection all the tribes eastward of Lake Lychnidus.[449]
These operations against the inland neighbors of Macedonia must have occupied a year or two. During that interval, Philip left Amphipolis to itself, having withdrawn from it the Macedonian garrison as a means of conciliating the Athenians. We might have expected that they would forthwith have availed themselves of the opening and taken active measures for regaining Amphipolis. They knew the value of that city: they considered it as of right theirs; they had long been anxious for its repossession, and had even besieged it five years before, though seemingly only with a mercenary force, which was repelled mainly by the aid of Philip’s predecessor Perdikkas. Amphipolis was not likely to surrender to them voluntarily; but when thrown upon its own resources, it might perhaps have been assailed with success. Yet they remained without making any attempt on the region at the mouth of the river Strymon. We must recollect (as has been narrated in my last preceding volume[450]), that during 359 B. C., and the first part of 358 B. C., they were carrying on operations in the Thracian Chersonese, against Charidemus and Kersobleptes, with small success and disgraceful embarrassment. These vexatious operations in the Chersonese—in which peninsula many Athenians were interested as private proprietors, besides the public claims of the city—may perhaps have absorbed wholly the attention of Athens, so as to induce her to postpone the acquisition of Amphipolis until they were concluded; a conclusion which did not arrive (as we shall presently see) until immediately before she became plunged in the dangerous crisis of the Social War. I know no better explanation of the singular circumstance, that Athens, though so anxious, both before and after, for the possession of Amphipolis, made no attempt to acquire it during more than a year after its evacuation by Philip; unless indeed we are to rank this opportunity among the many which she lost (according to Demosthenes[451]) from pure negligence; little suspecting how speedily such opportunity would disappear.
In 358 B. C., an opening was afforded to the Athenians for regaining their influence in Eubœa; and for this island, so near their own shores, they struck a more vigorous blow than for the distant possessions of Amphipolis. At the revival of the maritime confederacy under Athens (immediately after 378 B. C.), most of the cities in Eubœa had joined it voluntarily; but after the battle of Leuktra (in 371 B. C.), the island passed under Theban supremacy. Accordingly Eubœans from all the cities served in the army of Epaminondas, both in his first and his last expedition into Peloponnesus (369-362 B. C.).[452] Moreover, Orôpus, the frontier town of Attica and Bœotia—immediately opposite to Eubœa, having been wrested from Athens[453] in 366 B. C. by a body of exiles crossing the strait from Eretria, through the management of the Eretrian despot Themison—had been placed in the keeping of the Thebans, with whom it still remained. But in the year 358 B. C., discontent began in the Eubœan cities, from what cause we know not, against the supremacy of Thebes; whereupon a powerful Theban force was sent into the island to keep them down. A severe contest ensued, in which if Thebes had succeeded, Chalkis and Eretria might possibly have shared the fate of Orchomenus.[454] These cities sent urgent messages entreating aid from the Athenians, who were powerfully moved by the apprehension of seeing their hated neighbor Thebes reinforced by so large an acquisition close to their borders. The public assembly, already disposed to sympathize with the petitioners, was kindled into enthusiasm by the abrupt and emphatic appeal of Timotheus son of Konon.[455] “How! Athenians (said he), when you have the Thebans actually in the island, are you still here debating what is to be done, or how you shall deal with the case? Will you not fill the sea with triremes? Will you not start up at once, hasten down to Peiræus, and haul the triremes down to the water?” This animated apostrophe, reported and doubtless heard by Demosthenes himself, was cordially responded to by the people. The force of Athens, military as well as naval, was equipped with an eagerness, and sent forth with a celerity, seldom paralleled. Such was the general enthusiasm, that the costly office of trierarchy was for the first time undertaken by volunteers, instead of awaiting the more tardy process of singling out those rich men whose turn it was to serve, with the chance of still farther delay from the legal process called Antidosis or Exchange of property,[456] instituted by any one of the persons so chosen who might think himself hardly used by the requisition. Demosthenes himself was among the volunteer trierarchs; he and a person named Philinus being co-trierarchs of the same ship. We are told that in three or in five days the Athenian fleet and army, under the command of Timotheus,[457] were landed in full force on Eubœa; and that in the course of thirty days the Thebans were so completely worsted, as to be forced to evacuate it under capitulation. A body of mercenaries under Chares contributed to the Athenian success. Yet it seems not clear that the success was so easy and rapid as the orators are fond of asserting.[458] However, their boast, often afterwards repeated, is so far well-founded, that Athens fully accomplished her object, rescued the Eubœans from Thebes, and received the testimonial of their gratitude in the form of a golden wreath dedicated in the Athenian acropolis.[459] The Eubœan cities, while acknowledged as autonomous, continued at the same time to be enrolled as members of the Athenian confederacy, sending deputies to the synod at Athens; towards the general purposes of which they paid an annual tribute, assessed at five talents each for Oreus (or Histiæa) and Eretria.[460]
On the conclusion of this Eubœan enterprise, Chares with his mercenaries was sent forward to the Chersonese, where he at length extorted from Charidemus and Kersobleptes the evacuation of that peninsula and its cession to Athens, after a long train of dilatory manœuvres and bad faith on their part. I have in my last preceding volume, described these events, remarking at the same time that Athens attained at this moment the maximum of her renewed foreign power and second confederacy, which had begun in 378 B. C.[461] But this period of exaltation was very short. It was speedily overthrown by two important events—the Social war and the conquests of Philip in Thrace.
The Athenian confederacy, recently strengthened by the rescue of Eubœa, numbered among its members a large proportion of the islands in the Ægean as well as the Grecian seaports in Thrace. The list included the islands Lesbos, Chios, Samos (this last now partially occupied by a body of Athenian Kleruchs or settlers), Kos and Rhodes; together with the important city of Byzantium. It was shortly after the recent success in Eubœa, that Chios, Kos, Rhodes, and Byzantium revolted from Athens by concert, raising a serious war against her, known by the name of the Social War.
Respecting the proximate causes of this outbreak, we find, unfortunately, little information. There was now, and had always been since 378 B. C., a synod of deputies from all the confederate cities habitually assembling at Athens; such as had not subsisted under the first Athenian empire in its full maturity. How far the Synod worked efficiently, we do not know. At least it must have afforded to the allies, if aggrieved, a full opportunity of making their complaints heard; and of criticising the application of the common fund, to which each of them contributed. But I have remarked in the preceding volume, that the Athenian confederacy, which had begun (378 B. C.) in a generous and equal spirit of common maritime defence,[462] had gradually become perverted, since the humiliation of the great enemy Sparta at Leuktra, towards purposes and interests more exclusively Athenian. Athens had been conquering the island of Samos—Pydna, Potidæa, and Methônê, on the coast of Macedonia and Thrace—and the Thracian Chersonese; all of them acquisitions made for herself alone, without any advantage to the confederate synod—and made, too, in great part, to become the private property of her own citizens as kleruchs, in direct breach of her public resolution, passed in 378 B. C., not to permit any appropriation of lands by Athenian citizens out of Attica.
In proportion as Athens came to act more for her own separate aggrandizement, and less for interests common to the whole confederacy, the adherence of the larger confederate states grew more and more reluctant. But what contributed yet farther to detach them from Athens, was, the behavior of her armaments on service, consisting in great proportion of mercenaries, scantily and irregularly paid; whose disorderly and rapacious exaction, especially at the cost of the confederates of Athens, are characterized in strong terms by all the contemporary orators—Demosthenes, Æschines, Isokrates, etc. The commander, having no means of paying his soldiers, was often compelled to obey their predatory impulses, and conduct them to the easiest place from whence money could be obtained; indeed, some of the commanders, especially Chares, were themselves not less ready than their soldiers to profit by such depredations.[463] Hence the armaments sent out by Athens sometimes saw little of the enemy whom they were sent to combat, preferring the easier and more lucrative proceeding of levying contributions from friends, and of plundering the trading-vessels met with at sea. Nor was it practicable for Athens to prevent such misconduct, when her own citizens refused to serve personally, and when she employed foreigners, hired for the occasion, but seldom regularly paid.[464] The suffering, alarm, and alienation arising from hence among the confederates, was not less mischievous than discreditable to Athens. We cannot doubt that complaints in abundance were raised in the confederate synod; but they must have been unavailing, since the abuse continued until the period shortly preceding the battle of Chæroneia.
Amidst such apparent dispositions on the part of Athens to neglect the interests of the confederacy for purposes of her own and to tolerate or encourage the continued positive depredations of unpaid armaments—discontent naturally grew up, manifesting itself most powerfully among some of the larger dependencies near the Asiatic coast. The islands of Chios, Kos, and Rhodes, together with the important city of Byzantium on the Thracian Bosphorus, took counsel together, and declared themselves detached from Athens and her confederacy. According to the spirit of the convention, sworn at Sparta, immediately before the battle of Leuktra, and of the subsequent alliance, sworn at Athens, a few months afterwards[465]—obligatory and indefeasible confederacies stood generally condemned among the Greeks, so that these islands were justified in simply seceding when they thought fit. But their secession, which probably Athens would, under all circumstances, have resisted, was proclaimed in a hostile manner, accompanied with accusations of treacherous purposes on her part against them. It was moreover fomented by the intrigues, as well as aided by the arms, of the Karian prince Mausôlus.[466] Since the peace of Antalkidas, the whole Asiatic coast had been under the unresisted dominion either of satraps or subordinate princes dependent upon Persia, who were watching for opportunities of extending their conquests in the neighboring islands. Mausôlus appears to have occupied both Rhodes and Kos; provoking in the former island a revolution which placed it under an oligarchy, not only devoted to him, but farther sustained by the presence of a considerable force of his mercenary troops.[467] The government of Chios appears to have been always oligarchical; which fact was one ground for want of sympathy between the Chians and Athens. Lastly, the Byzantines had also a special ground for discontent; since they assumed the privilege of detaining and taxing the corn-ships from the Euxine in their passage through the Bosphorus[468]—while Athens, as chief of the insular confederacy, claimed that right for herself, and at any rate protested against the use of such power by any other city for its own separate profit.
This revolt, the beginning of what is termed the Social War, was a formidable shock to the foreign ascendency of Athens. Among all her confederates, Chios was the largest and most powerful, the entire island being under one single government. Old men, like Plato and Isokrates, might perhaps recollect the affright occasioned at Athens fifty-four years before (B. C. 412) by the news of the former revolt of Chios,[469] shortly after the great disaster before Syracuse. And probably the alarm was not much less, when the Athenians were now apprised of the quadruple defection among their confederates near the Asiatic coast. The joint armament of all four was mustered at Chios, whither Mausôlus also sent a reinforcement. The Athenians equipped a fleet with land-forces on board, to attack the island; and on this critical occasion we may presume that their citizens would overcome the reluctance to serve in person. Chabrias was placed in command of the fleet, Chares of the land-force; the latter was disembarked on the island, and a joint attack upon the town of Chios, by sea and land at the same moment, was concerted. When Chares marched up to the walls, the Chians and their allies felt strong enough to come forth and hazard a battle, with no decisive result; while Chabrias at the same time attempted with the fleet to force his way into the harbor. But the precautions for defence had been effectively taken, and the Chian seamen were resolute. Chabrias, leading the attack with his characteristic impetuosity, became entangled among the enemy’s vessels, was attacked on all sides, and fell gallantly fighting. The other Athenian ships either were not forward in following him, or could make no impression. Their attack completely failed, and the fleet was obliged to retire, with little loss apparently, except that of the brave admiral. Chares with his land-force having been again taken aboard, the Athenians forthwith sailed away from Chios.[470]
This repulse at Chios was a serious misfortune to Athens. Such was the dearth of military men and the decline of the military spirit, in that city, that the loss of a warlike citizen, daring as a soldier and tried as a commander, like Chabrias, was never afterwards repaired. To the Chians and their allies, on the other hand, the event was highly encouraging. They were enabled, not merely to maintain their revolt, but even to obtain fresh support, and to draw into the like defection other allies of Athens,—among them, seemingly, Sestos, and other cities on the Hellespont. For some months they appear to have remained masters of the sea, with a fleet of one hundred triremes, disembarking and inflicting devastation on the Athenian islands of Lemnos, Imbros, Samos, and elsewhere, so as to collect a sum for defraying their expenses. They were even strong enough to press the town of Samos, by close siege, until at length the Athenians, not without delay and difficulty, got together a fleet of one hundred and twenty triremes, under the joint command of Chares, Iphikrates with his son Menestheus, and Timotheus. Notwithstanding that Samos was under siege, the Athenian admirals thought it prudent to direct their first efforts to the reduction of Byzantium; probably from the paramount importance of keeping open the two straits between the Euxine and the Ægean, in order that the corn-ships, out of the former, might come through in safety.[471] To protect Byzantium, the Chians and their allies raised the siege of Samos, and sailed forthwith to the Hellespont, in which narrow strait both fleets were collected,—as the Athenians and Lacedæmonians had been during the closing years of the Peloponnesian war. A plan of naval action had been concerted by the three Athenian commanders, and was on the point of taking place, when there supervened a sudden storm, which in the judgment both of Iphikrates and Timotheus, rendered it rash and perilous to persist in the execution. They therefore held off, while Chares, judging differently, called upon the trierachs and seamen to follow him, and rushed into the fight without his colleagues. He was defeated, or at least was obliged to retire without accomplishing anything. But so incensed was he against his two colleagues, that he wrote a despatch to Athens accusing them of corruption and culpable backwardness against the enemy.[472]
The three joint admirals were thus placed not merely in opposition, but in bitter conflict, among themselves. At the trial of accountability, undergone by all of them not long afterwards at Athens, Chares stood forward as the formal accuser of his two colleagues, who in their turn also accused him. He was seconded in his attack by Aristophon, one of the most practised orators of the day. Both of them charged Iphikrates and Timotheus with having received bribes from the Chians and Rhodians,[473] and betrayed their trust; by deserting Chares at the critical moment when it had been determined beforehand to fight, and when an important success might have been gained.
How the justice of the case stood, we cannot decide. The characters of Iphikrates and Timotheus raise strong presumption that they were in the right and their accuser in the wrong. Yet it must be recollected that the Athenian public, (and probably every other public,—ancient or modern,—Roman, English, or French), would naturally sympathize with the forward and daring admiral, who led the way into action, fearing neither the storm nor the enemy, and calling upon his colleagues to follow. Iphikrates and Timotheus doubtless insisted upon the rashness of his proceedings, and set forth the violence of the gale. But this again would be denied by Chares, and would stand as a point where the evidence was contradictory; captains and seamen being produced as witnesses on both sides, and the fleet being probably divided into two opposing parties. The feelings of the Athenian Dikasts might naturally be, that Iphikrates and Timotheus ought never to have let their colleague go into action unassisted, even though they disapproved of the proceeding. Iphikrates defended himself partly by impeaching the behavior of Chares, partly by bitter retort upon his other accuser Aristophon. “Would you (he asked), betray the fleet for money?” “No,” was the reply. “Well, then, you, Aristophon, would not betray the fleet; shall I, Iphikrates do so?”[474]
The issue of this important cause was, that Iphikrates was acquitted, while Timotheus was found guilty and condemned to the large fine of one hundred talents. Upon what causes such difference of sentence turned, we make out imperfectly. And it appears that Iphikrates, far from exonerating himself by throwing blame on Timotheus, emphatically assumed the responsibility of the whole proceeding; while his son, Menestheus tendered an accurate account within his own knowledge, of all the funds received and disbursed by the army.[475]
The cause assigned by Isokrates, the personal friend of Timotheus, is, the extreme unpopularity of the latter in the city. Though as a general and on foreign service, Timotheus conducted himself not only with scrupulous justice to every one, but with rare forbearance towards the maritime allies whom other generals vexed and plundered,—yet at home his demeanor was intolerably arrogant and offensive, especially towards the leading speakers who took part in public affairs. While recognized as a man of ability and as a general who had rendered valuable service, he had thus incurred personal unpopularity and made numerous enemies; chiefly among those most able to do him harm. Isokrates tells us that he had himself frequently remonstrated with Timotheus (as Plato admonished Dion), on this serious fault, which overclouded his real ability, caused him to be totally misunderstood, and laid up against him a fund of popular dislike sure to take melancholy effect on some suitable occasion. Timotheus (according to Isokrates), though admitting the justice of the reproof, was unable to conquer his own natural disposition.[476] If such was the bearing of this eminent man, as described by his intimate friend, we may judge how it would incense unfriendly politicians and even indifferent persons who knew him only from his obvious exterior. Iphikrates, though by nature a proud man, was more discreet and conciliatory in his demeanor, and more alive to the mischief of political odium.[477] Moreover, he seems to have been an effective speaker[478] in public, and his popularity among the military men in Athens was so marked, that on this very trial many of them manifested their sympathy by appearing in arms near the Dikastery.[479] Under these circumstances, we may easily understand that Chares and Aristophon might find it convenient to press their charge more pointedly against Timotheus than against Iphikrates; and that the Dikastery, while condemning the former, may have been less convinced of the guilt of the latter, and better satisfied in every way to acquit him.[480]
A fine of one hundred talents is said to have been imposed upon Timotheus, the largest fine (according to Isokrates), ever imposed at Athens. Upon his condemnation he retired to Chalkis, where he died three years afterwards, in 354 B. C. In the year succeeding his death, his memory was still very unpopular; yet it appears that the fine was remitted to his family, and that his son Konon was allowed to compromise the demand by a disbursement of the smaller sum of ten talents for the repairs of the city walls. It seems evident that Timotheus by his retirement evaded payment of the full fine; so that his son Konon appears after him as one of the richest citizens in Athens.[481]
The loss of such a citizen as Timotheus was a fresh misfortune to her. He had conducted her armies with signal success, maintained the honor of her name throughout the eastern and western seas, and greatly extended the list of her foreign allies. She had recently lost Chabrias in battle; a second general, Timotheus, was now taken from her; and the third, Iphikrates, though acquitted at the last trial, seems, as far as we can make out, never to have been subsequently employed on military command. These three were the last eminent military citizens at Athens; for Phokion, though brave and deserving, was not to be compared with either of them. On the other hand, Chares, a man of great personal courage, but of no other merit, was now in the full swing of reputation. The recent judicial feud between the three Athenian admirals had been doubly injurious to Athens, first as discrediting Iphikrates and Timotheus, next as exalting Chares, to whom the sole command was now confided.
In the succeeding year, 356 B. C., Chares conducted another powerful fleet to attack the revolted allies. Being however not furnished with adequate funds from home to pay his troops, chiefly foreign mercenaries, he thought it expedient, on his own responsibility, to accept an offer from Artabazus (satrap of Daskylium and the region south of the Propontis), then in revolt against the Persian king.[482] Chares joined Artabazus with his own army, reinforced by additional bodies of mercenaries recently disbanded by the Persian satraps. With this entire force he gave battle to the king’s troops under the command of Tithraustes, and gained a splendid victory; upon which Artabazus remunerated him so liberally, as to place the whole Athenian army in temporary affluence. The Athenians at home were at first much displeased with their general, for violating his instructions, and withdrawing his army from its prescribed and legitimate task. The news of his victory, however, and of the lucrative recompense following it, somewhat mollified them. But presently they learned that the Persian king, indignant at such a gratuitous aggression on their part, was equipping a large fleet to second the operations of their enemies. Intimidated by the prospect of Persian attack, they became anxious to conclude a peace with the revolted allies; who, on their part, were not less anxious to terminate the war. Embassies being exchanged, and negotiations opened, in the ensuing year (355 B. C., the third of the war), a peace was sworn, whereby the Athenians recognized the complete autonomy, and severance from their confederacy, of the revolted cities, Chios, Rhodes, Kos, and Byzantium.[483]
Such was the termination of the Social War, which fatally impaired the power, and lowered the dignity, of Athens. Imperfectly as we know the events, it seems clear that her efforts to meet this formidable revolt were feeble and inadequate; evincing a sad downfall of energy since the year 412 B. C., when she had contended with transcendent vigor against similar and even greater calamities, only a year after her irreparable disaster before Syracuse. Inglorious as the result of the Social War was, it had nevertheless been costly, and left Athens poor. The annual revenues of her confederacy were greatly lessened by the secession of so many important cities, and her public treasury was exhausted. It is just at this time that the activity of Demosthenes as a public adviser begins. In a speech delivered this year (355 B. C.), he notes the poverty of the treasury; and refers back to it in discourses of after time as a fact but too notorious.[484]
But the misfortunes arising to Athens from the Social War did not come alone. It had the farther effect of rendering her less competent for defence against the early aggressions of Philip of Macedon.
That prince, during the first year of his accession (359 B. C.), had sought to conciliate Athens by various measures, but especially by withdrawing his garrison from Amphipolis, while he was establishing his military strength in the interior against the Illyrians and Pæonians. He had employed in this manner a period apparently somewhat less than two years; and employed it with such success, as to humble his enemies in the interior, and get together a force competent for aggressive operations against the cities on the coast. During this interval, Amphipolis remained a free and independent city; formally renounced by Philip, and not assailed by the Athenians. Why they let slip this favorable opportunity of again enforcing by arms pretensions on which they laid so much stress—I have before partially (though not very satisfactorily) explained. Philip was not the man to let them enjoy the opportunity longer than he could help, or to defer the moment of active operations as they did. Towards the close of 358 B. C., finding his hands free from impediments in the interior, he forthwith commenced the siege of Amphipolis. The inhabitants are said to have been unfavorably disposed towards him, and to have given him many causes for war.[485] It is not easy to understand what these causes could have been, seeing that so short a time before, the town had been garrisoned by Macedonians invoked as protectors against Athens; nor were the inhabitants in any condition to act aggressively against Philip.
Having in vain summoned Amphipolis to surrender, Philip commenced a strenuous siege, assailing the walls with battering-rams and other military engines. The weak points of the fortification must have been well known to him, from his own soldiers who had been recently in garrison. The inhabitants defended themselves with vigor; but such was now the change of circumstances, that they were forced to solicit their ancient enemy Athens for aid against the Macedonian prince. Their envoys Hierax and Stratokles, reaching Athens shortly after the successful close of the Athenian expedition to Eubœa, presented themselves before the public assembly, urgently inviting the Athenians to come forthwith and occupy Amphipolis, as the only chance of rescue from Macedonian dominion.[486] We are not certain whether the Social War had yet broken out; if it had, Athens would be too much pressed with anxieties arising out of so formidable a revolt, to have means disposable even for the tempting recovery of the long-lost Amphipolis. But at any rate Philip had foreseen and counterworked the prayers of the Amphipolitans. He sent a courteous letter to the Athenians, acquainting them that he was besieging the town, yet recognizing it as belonging of right to them, and promising to restore it to them when he should have succeeded in the capture.[487]
Much of the future history of Greece turned upon the manner in which Athens dealt with these two conflicting messages. The situation of Amphipolis, commanding the passage over the Strymon, was not only all-important—as shutting up Macedonia to the eastward and as opening the gold regions around Mount Pangæus—but was also easily defensible by the Athenians from seaward, if once acquired. Had they been clear-sighted in the appreciation of chances, and vigilant in respect to future defence, they might now have acquired this important place, and might have held it against the utmost efforts of Philip. But that fatal inaction which had become their general besetting sin, was on the present occasion encouraged by some plausible, yet delusive, pleas. The news of the danger of the Amphipolitans would be not unwelcome at Athens—where strong aversion was entertained towards them, as refractory occupants of a territory not their own, and as having occasioned repeated loss and humiliation to the Athenian arms. Nor could the Athenians at once shift their point of view, so as to contemplate the question on the ground of policy alone, and to recognize these old enemies as persons whose interests had now come into harmony with their own. On the other hand, the present temper of the Athenians towards Philip was highly favorable. Not only had they made peace with him during the preceding year, but they also felt that he had treated them well both in evacuating Amphipolis and in dismissing honorably their citizens who had been taken prisoners in the army of his competitor Argæus.[488] Hence they were predisposed to credit his positive assurance, that he only wished to take the place in order to expel a troublesome population who had wronged and annoyed him, and that he would readily hand it over to its rightful owners the Athenians. To grant the application of the Amphipolitans for aid, would thus appear, at Athens, to be courting a new war and breaking with a valuable friend, in order to protect an odious enemy, and to secure an acquisition which would at all events come to them, even if they remained still, through the cession of Philip. It is necessary to dwell upon the motives which determined Athens on this occasion to refrain from interference; since there were probably few of her resolutions which she afterwards more bitterly regretted. The letter of assurance from Philip was received and trusted; the envoys from Amphipolis were dismissed with a refusal.