“Then, Cebes, beyond question, the soul is immortal and imperishable, and our souls will truly exist in another world!”
“I am convinced, Socrates,” said Cebes, “and have nothing more to object; but if my friend Simmias, or any one else, has any further objection, he had better speak out, and not keep silence, since I do not know to what other season he can defer the discussion, if there is anything which he wants to say or have said.”
“I have nothing more to say,” replied Simmias; “nor can I see any reason for doubt after what has been said. But I still feel and cannot help feeling uncertain in my own mind, when I think of the greatness of the subject and the feebleness of man.”
“Yes, Simmias,” replied Socrates, “that is well said; but O my friends! if the soul is really immortal, what care should be taken of her, not only in respect of the portion of time which is called life, but of eternity! And the danger of neglecting her from this point of view does indeed appear to be awful. If death had only been the end of all, the wicked would have had a good bargain in dying, for they would have been happily quit not only of their body, but of their own evil together with their souls. But now, inasmuch as the soul is manifestly immortal, there is no release or salvation from evil except the attainment of the highest virtue and wisdom. For the soul, when on her progress to the world below, takes nothing with her but nurture and education; and these are said greatly to benefit or greatly to injure the departed, at the very beginning of his pilgrimage in the other world.
“Wherefore, Simmias, seeing all these things, what ought not we to do that we may obtain virtue and wisdom in this life? Fair is the prize, and the hope great!
“A man of sense ought not to say that the description which I have given of the soul and her mansions is exactly true. But I do say that, inasmuch as the soul is shown to be immortal, he may venture to think that something of the kind is true. The venture is a glorious one, and he ought to comfort himself with words like these, which is the reason why I lengthen out the tale.
“Wherefore, I say, let a man be of good cheer about his soul, who has cast away the pleasures and ornaments of the body as alien to him, and has followed after the pleasures of knowledge in this life; who has arrayed the soul in her own proper jewels, which are temperance, and justice, and courage, and nobility, and truth—thus adorned, she is ready to go on her journey to the world below when her hour comes.
“You, Simmias and Cebes, and all other men, will depart at some time or other. Me already, as the tragic poet would say, the voice of fate calls. Soon I must drink the poison; and I think that I had better repair to the bath first, in order that the women may not have the trouble of washing my body after I am dead.”
When he had done speaking, Crito said: “And have you any commands for us, Socrates? anything to say about your children, or any other matter in which we can serve you?”
“Nothing particular,” he said: “only, as I have always told you, I would have you look to yourselves; that is a service which you may always be doing to me and mine as well as to yourselves.”
“We will do our best,” said Crito; “but in what way would you have us bury you?”
“In any way that you like; only you must get hold of me, and take care that I do not walk away from you.”
Then he turned to us, and added with a smile:—“I cannot make Crito believe that I am the same Socrates who have been talking and conducting the argument; he fancies that I am the other Socrates whom he will soon see, a dead body—and he asks, How shall he bury me? And though I have spoken many words in the endeavor to show that when I have drunk the poison I shall leave you and go to the joys of the blessed, these words of mine, with which I comforted you and myself, have had, as I perceive, no effect upon Crito.
“You must be my surety to him that I shall not remain, but go away and depart; and then he will suffer less at my death, and not be grieved when he sees my body being burned or buried. I would not have him sorrow at my hard lot, or say at the burial, ‘Thus we lay out Socrates,’ or ‘Thus we follow him to the grave or bury him;’ for false words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil. Be of good cheer then, my dear Crito, and say that you are burying my body only, and do with that as is usual, and as you think best.—Jowett.—(In this connection read Grote’s “Plato and the Other Companions of Socrates.”)
In his “Republic,” Plato indulges in a political dream, sketching an ideal government and embodying his conception of absolute justice. In his “Atlantis,” he describes a large island lying west of Europe, which some have tried to connect with America.
The Academic School long survived its founder; but little if any advance was made by his successors. Its fundamental tenets outlived Greece and Rome, to reappear in the schools of modern times. Many of them are in wonderful harmony with Christian doctrines; and such a resemblance to the Jewish Scriptures has been detected in the writings of their author that he has been called “the Attic Moses.”
Peripatetic School.—Aristotle.—The Peripatetic was an offshoot from the Academic School, its founder Aristotle having for twenty years studied under Plato. Its influence cannot be estimated; for 1,800 years, up to the revival of letters in modern times, its author was recognized as the supreme authority on every subject, whether by Moslem or Christian.
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) was born at the Thracian town of Stagi’ra. Inheriting from his father literary tastes as well as the means to gratify them, he selected Athens as the scene of his labors, and there, at the age of seventeen, he entered the Academy of Plato. So energetically did he apply himself, not as a servile follower but often as a pioneer in new paths of his own, that his master said he required the bit rather than the spur, and styled him the Intellect of the school. On one occasion, when none but this ardent pupil was present to hear his lecture, Plato proceeded as usual, saying that “so long as he had Aristotle for an audience, he had the better half of Athens.” His industry was proverbial; he grudged the time needed for repose, and used to sleep with a ball in his hand, that when it fell from his grasp by the relaxing of the muscles the noise would awaken him.
When Plato died, Aristotle retired from the Academy; and in 342 B.C. he received the following letter from Philip of Macedon, whose court he had visited as an ambassador:—
“Philip to Aristotle, wisheth health:
Be informed that I have a son, and that I am thankful to the gods, not so much for his birth, as that he was born in the same age with you; for if you will undertake the charge of his education, I assure myself that he will become worthy of his father, and of the kingdom which he will inherit.”
There was no declining such an invitation. At Stagira, his native town, Philip provided a school and the accustomed grove for instruction, in which the philosopher moulded the mind of Alexander the future Conqueror. The king of Macedon was more than satisfied with the results; and the royal pupil owned his indebtedness to his teacher, exclaiming, “Philip only gave me life, but Aristotle has taught me the art of living well!”
When, on the assassination of Philip, Alexander mounted the throne and embarked on that expedition which extended the sway of Macedon over half the known world, he showed his gratitude by making his instructor a munificent present equivalent to nearly $1,000,000, and employed two or three thousand men to fill his cabinets with specimens. Thus supplied with material and funds, Aristotle, established in Athens since 335 B.C. as a distinguished teacher despite his traditional lisp and insignificant appearance, vigorously prosecuted his scientific labors. At the Lyce’um, Apollo’s temple, he gave instruction to his disciples, walking up and down in the covered paths (peripatoi) about the building—whence the name of his school, Peripatetic. He mastered all existing knowledge, regarding learning as “an ornament to men in prosperity, a refuge in adversity;” and for thirteen years divided his time between his pupils and his literary work.
The news of Alexander’s sudden death was the signal for Aristotle’s enemies, no longer restrained by fear of his royal friend, to show their hand. Impiety was alleged against him; but mindful of the fate of Socrates, and, as he said, to prevent the Athenians from sinning a second time against philosophy, he retired to Chalcis on the island of Eubœa, where he died within a year.
Philosophy and Writing of Aristotle.—While to some extent following his master, from several of Plato’s doctrines Aristotle felt compelled to dissent; truth, he said, was dearer to him than any friend.[35] He did not accept the Ideal theory, but inclined to materialism or to pantheism, making reason divine and omnipresent. He doubted his own immortality, holding that the soul could not exist apart from the body, and that there is “nothing good or bad beyond to the dead.” His style was dry, elliptical, and full of technicalities; if we compare it with Plato’s, we have the opposite poles of the magnet.
Plato was all imagination, Aristotle was thoroughly practical. The inspiration of the one was a passionate love of wisdom; the forte of the other was power of analysis, a wonderful faculty of systemizing knowledge. The master captivated the heart; the pupil convinced the reason. “The philosophy of Plato,” says Dr. Draper, “is a gorgeous castle in the air; that of Aristotle is a solid structure laboriously founded on rock.”
Aristotle’s style is devoid of ornament, and his subjects are too abstruse for the general run of readers; but he was a keen observer and a close reasoner. A few paragraphs from his Rhetoric, in which he analyzes the peculiarities of old age, will show how well he understood human nature.
THE DISPOSITION OF THE OLD.
“Those who are advanced in life, having been deceived in a greater number of instances, err in everything more on the side of defect than they ought. And they always suppose, but never know certainly; and, questioning everything, they always subjoin a perhaps, or a possibly. And they are apt to view things in an unfavorable light; for a disposition thus to view things, is the judging of everything on the worse side.
Moreover, they are apt to be suspicious from distrust, and they are distrustful from their experience. And on this account they neither love nor hate with great earnestness; but, conformably to the remark of Bias, they both love as though about to hate, and hate as though about to love. And they are pusillanimous, from their having been humbled by the course of life; for they raise their desires to nothing great or vast, but to things only which conduce to the support of life.
And they are illiberal; for property is one of the necessaries; and they are at the same time aware, from their experience, of the difficulty of its acquisition, and of the ease with which it is lost. They are timid and apprehensive of everything; for their disposition is the reverse of that of the young; for they have been chilled by years, but the young are warm in their temperament; so that their age has paved the way to timidity; for fear is a certain kind of chill.
And they are attached to life, and particularly at its last closing day, from the circumstance that desire is of some object which is absent, and that men more especially desire that of which they stand in need.
They have self-love more than is fitting; for this too is a kind of littleness of spirit. And they live in a greater degree than they ought by the standard of expediency, and not of what is honorable, by reason of their self-love: for what is expedient is good relatively to one’s self, but what is honorable is good absolutely.
Again, they are not easily inspired with hope, on account of their experience; for the majority of things are but paltry; wherefore the generality turn out inferior to the expectation; and once more, on account of their timidity they are apt to despond. And they live more in memory than in hope; for the remnant of life is brief, but what has passed is considerable; and hope indeed is of what is to come; whereas memory is of things gone by. The very reason, this, of their garrulity; for they never cease talking of that which has taken place, since they are delighted in awakening the recollections of things.
And their anger is keen, but faint. And some of their desires have abandoned them. Others are faint; so that neither are they liable to the influence of desire, nor apt to act in conformity to it, but with a view to gain; on which account men of this age appear to be naturally temperate, for both their desires have relaxed, and they are enslaved to gain.
The old have moreover a tendency to pity, but not on the same principle with the young; for the latter are thus disposed from their love of human nature; the former from their imbecility. Whence they are querulous, and neither facetious nor fond of mirth; for querulousness is the very reverse of fondness for mirth. Such is the disposition of those in advanced life.”—Theodore Buckley.
The writings of Aristotle exhausted the fields of art and science; 400 treatises, most of which have perished, at one time bore his name. Rhetoric, psychology or mental science, and natural history, owed to him their origin. In his “Organon” was first presented the method of deduction,—the process by which the mind reasons down from general propositions to particular cases, by means of the syllogism, the organ or instrument of reasoning. Men had thus arrived at conclusions for ages, without any knowledge of Aristotle’s formulæ, just as they had talked correctly though ignorant of analytical grammar. It was reserved for the Stagirite to discover the laws by which they drew conclusions, and thus at once to found and perfect Logic. This was the science of reasoning, as contrasted with Plato’s dialectics or method of discussing. (See Benn’s “The Greek Philosophers.”)
Nor was Aristotle unacquainted with Induction, the great lever of modern philosophy. This process, which reverses the steps of deduction,[36] and reasons from particular cases up to general laws, was employed in his researches, but was not fully developed till twenty centuries later in the “Novum Organon” of Lord Bacon, opening the way to a new era in scientific investigation.
Aristotle willed his writings to his disciple Theophrastus, whom we shall next consider; and for many years they were kept from the world, while numerous imitations and forgeries gained the popular ear through the prestige of Aristotle’s name. It was not till 50 B.C. that a complete edition of the genuine works was published, and then at Rome. Meanwhile the Lyceum had waned; its later heads were men of mediocre ability, and the Peripatetic School was superseded in popular estimation by the Epicurean and the Stoic.
Theophrastus, of Lesbos (374-287 B.C.), a pupil of Plato and afterward of Aristotle, succeeded the latter, by his appointment, as head of the Lyceum. During his time, he maintained the high reputation of the school, attracting many to it from all parts of Greece by his eloquence. That he might address a still larger audience, he wrote numerous treatises on philosophy and natural history.
His “Moral Characters,” which have descended to us, show up in lively colors such representative personages as the Gabbler, the Niggard, the Noodle, the Grumbler, the Swell, the Poltroon, the Slanderer, the Newsmonger, the Clown, etc., from whom, it seems, that Greek society was not exempt any more than our own. These were the first character-sketches ever made; they served as models to La Bruyère in French, to Sir Thomas Overbury and others in English literature. As specimens, we cull the most pointed portions of the sections on the Flatterer and the Unseasonable Man.
THE FLATTERER.
“Flattery may be considered as a mode of companionship, degrading but profitable to him who flatters.
The Flatterer is a person who will say as he walks with another, ‘Do you observe how people are looking at you? This happens to no man in Athens but you. A compliment was paid to you yesterday in the Porch. More than thirty persons were sitting there; the question was started, Who is our foremost man? Every one mentioned you first, and ended by coming back to your name.’
Then he will request the company to be silent while the great man is speaking, and will praise him, too, in his hearing, and mark his approbation at a pause with ‘True;’ or he will laugh at a frigid joke, and stuff his cloak into his mouth as if he could not repress his amusement.
He will request those whom he meets to stand still until ‘his Honor’ has passed. He will buy apples and pears, and bring them in, and give to the children in the father’s presence; adding, with kisses, ‘Chicks of a good father.’ Also, when he assists at the purchase of slippers, he will declare that the foot is more shapely than the shoe. If his patron is approaching a friend, he will run forward and say, ‘He is coming to you;’ and then, turning back, ‘I have announced you.’
He is the first of the guests to praise the wine; and to say, as he reclines next the host, ‘How delicate is your fare! and (taking up something from the table) ‘Now this—how excellent it is!’ He will say that his patron’s house is well built, that his land is well planted, and that his portrait is a good likeness.”—Jebb.
MR. MALAPROP.
“Unseasonable behavior is such a manner of conversation as is very troublesome to those with whom you converse.
A man that acts unseasonably will intrude himself upon his friend, when he is engaged in earnest business, and consult him about his own private concerns. When his mistress lies dangerously ill of a fever, he’ll make her a visit and carry himself gayly. If he stands in need of a surety, he begs that favor of one who has just smarted for being bound to another. If he is summoned for a witness in any cause, he appears in court immediately after judgment has been given.
When he is invited to a wedding, he takes the opportunity to rail at the fair sex. If he meets a friend who has just come home from a long journey, he’ll press him to take a walk. He is ever ready and punctual, as soon as a shop-keeper has sold his goods, to help him to a customer that would have given more.
If he happens to be in a place where a servant is chastised, all the comfort he gives him is to tell him that he also had formerly a boy whom he chastised in the same manner, and that the poor lad so resented this usage that he immediately made way with himself. If he is accidentally present at an arbitration, where the contending parties desire to have the matter in dispute between them amicably settled, instead of promoting a reconciliation, he sets them together by the ears, and makes the difference ten times greater than it was before.”—Gally.
The Stoic School was so called from the Painted Portico (stoa) at Athens, where its founder Zeno, the Cyprian, taught for fifty-eight years (318-260 B.C.). It was based on high moral principles, but was not free from errors. Duty was all in this philosophy; virtue alone, happiness. Mastery of self, contempt alike for pleasure and pain, were leading doctrines.
Fate governed the world, even God himself. Yet Zeno did not allow this doctrine to excuse shortcomings or interfere with individual responsibility. When his slave, detected in theft, besought exemption from chastisement on the plea that it was fated for him to steal, he replied, “Yes, and it was also fated for you to be flogged.”
Suicide, in Zeno’s creed, was justifiable when a man had outlived his usefulness, and the great philosopher practised as he preached; for, having received a severe fall at the age of ninety-eight, he quietly remarked, “I obey the summons,” and went and hanged himself.
Zeno enjoyed public confidence at home as well as the respect of foreign princes; among his disciples were enrolled some of the greatest men of Greece and Rome. Nothing remains of his writings.
The Cynics derived their name from the gymnasium of Cynosarges, near the Lyceum, where they gathered to listen to Antisthenes, a pupil of Socrates. This extremist perverted his master’s theory of virtue, which he made to consist in a comfortless life, a renunciation of pleasure, and a contemptuous and even shameless independence of manners. Yet Socrates saw pride even through the holes of Antisthenes’ shabby robe.
Antisthenes was not much in metaphysics. He was puzzled by abstract generalizations, and to Plato’s Idealism opposed an uncompromising Realism. “Plato,” he said, “I can see a horse, and I can see a man, but horsehood and manhood I cannot see.”—“True,” replied Plato, “you have the eye that can see a horse and a man; but the eye which can see horsehood and manhood you lack.”
Of the many works of this first Cynic philosopher, scarcely anything is left. They were probably steeped in gall, for his powers of sarcasm were unsurpassed; he dealt trenchant blows at what he considered folly, wherever he found it. He ridiculed the want of judgment displayed at Athens in the selection of generals, by counselling the Athenians to vote their asses horses. “That is absurd,” was the reply. “No more so,” he retorted, “than to think you have made ignoramuses generals, by simply lifting up the hand. “Once when annoyed at a speaker’s dilating on the joys of the future state, he abruptly demanded, “Why don’t you die, then?”
His successor, Diogenes, carried out the rôle. Soured by the disgraceful failure of his father, he turned to the ascetic philosophy of the Cynics, and took a morbid pleasure in outraging society by his infringements on decency. His satirical remarks, which cut to the quick, earned him the title of “the Dog” by way of eminence. He slept wherever he happened to be, on stoops or in a tub; and eschewing artificial wants, he felt so rebuked when he saw a boy drinking through his hands and receiving his pottage in a hollowed loaf, that he threw away his cup and platter.
Into such snarling, insolent, and offensive misanthropes did the Cynics degenerate, that the name of their sect was popularly traced to the dogs (in Greek cynes) they so much resembled.—To this complexion did the noble philosophy of Socrates come at last.
Political Eloquence, like the drama, history, and philosophy, attained perfection in the golden age. Public speaking was a natural accomplishment of the Greeks; and from the days of Homer down, soldiers, legislators, and statesmen, had been distinguished as orators. In Pericles, who made eloquence a study, we are introduced to one of the world’s most polished speakers. (Consult Jebb’s “Attic Orators.”)
But the cultivation of rhetoric and oratory as an art was first popularized by Gorgias of Leonti´ni (see Map, p. 304), who about 427 B.C. transplanted it from Sicily and saw it flourish in Athenian soil as it had never flourished before. Gorgias founded a school of eloquence at Athens, which was thronged by the great men of the time, eager to acquire the persuasive arts of the Sicilian teacher. Thus rhetoric became a fashionable accomplishment; and to such account was it turned by the taste and genius of the Attic Greeks that they soon produced the greatest orators of history.
Among these was the graceful and elegant Lysias (lish’e-ăs—458-378 B.C.), compared by Quintilian to a pure fountain rather than a great river; and Isæus, the leading barrister of Athens and preceptor of Demosthenes. Greater than either as a teacher and writer of orations for others, though through timidity he rarely appeared in public himself, was Isocrates, founder of a school from which Cicero said, “as from the Trojan horse, princes only proceeded;” to use his own figure, he was a whetstone which imparted the power of cutting to other things, but cut not itself. Finally, to this category belonged the great rivals Æschines and Demosthenes, foremost of the Attic orators.
Demosthenes (384-322 B.C.—it is worth remembering that his dates are identical with Aristotle’s) stands alone in the power of his eloquence. Born in Attica, he was left fatherless at the age of seven, but inherited a large fortune. The bulk of this his guardians made away with; although they engaged the best talent in the land to superintend the education of their ward. When Demosthenes arrived at his majority, he brought suit against them, and wrote his maiden speeches with such skill as to obtain a judgment in his favor.
The study of oratory now became the passion of his life. By indomitable perseverance he overcame what to many would have proved insuperable difficulties—shortness of breath, a sickly constitution, a weak and stammering utterance, and awkwardness in gesticulating. He practised on the sea-shore till his voice rose clear and full above the breakers; he placed pebbles in his mouth while declaiming to correct his articulation, and improved his breathing by running up steep hills. A friendly mirror helped him to make his gestures effective; and he spent months at a time in a room underground, occupied in study, or in copying the history of Thucydides to strengthen his style. Thus, in spite of every natural disadvantage, he placed himself by his own efforts “at the head of all mighty masters of speech.” He lived to receive the homage, not only of those Athenians who had hissed the early performances of “the stammerer,” but of crowds gathered from all quarters of Greece.
Conciseness, precision, clearness, compact reasoning, power of invective, and vehemence compared to that of a torrent carrying everything before it, were characteristic of the orations of Demosthenes. Sixty-one of these (probably not all genuine) are still extant, the most famous being the twelve “Philippics,” delivered against Philip of Macedon, who was insidiously plotting the subversion of Grecian liberty. Demosthenes penetrated his designs, disdained his bribes, and for fourteen years struggled nobly against him. His impassioned utterances at last roused the slumbering patriotism of his countrymen, and, joined by the Thebans, they met Philip at Chæronea—but only to be hopelessly defeated. The fate of Greece was sealed. Demosthenes fled from the field and escaped to Athens, where he delivered the funeral eulogy on the slain.
The success of Philip strengthened the Macedonian sympathizers in Athens, at the head of whom was the orator Æschines, accused by Demosthenes of being in the pay of Macedon. When, therefore, Ctesiphon proposed that the services of Demosthenes be rewarded with a golden crown, Æschines opposed the measure. After a delay of six years, during which we may be sure both orators strained every nerve to prepare for the decisive struggle, the final contest took place before a vast and excited concourse. The fiery vigor of Demosthenes, in the most splendid effort of ancient eloquence, swept away like feathers the arguments, the wit, the sarcasm, of his opponent; Æschines was utterly discomfited.
The elaborate speech “On the Crown” is the masterpiece of Demosthenes; we give parts of the peroration.
FROM DEMOSTHENES’ ORATION ON THE CROWN.
“Do you then, Æschines, ask me for what merit I claim public honors? I will tell you. It is because, when all the statesmen in Greece had been corrupted, beginning with yourself, first by Philip and then by Alexander, I was never induced nor tempted by opportunity, nor by fair speeches, nor by the magnitude of proffered bribes, nor by hope, nor by fear, nor by favor, nor by any other consideration, to swerve a hair’s-breadth from the course which I believed to be right and for the public good. Never, in weighing my public counsels, have I, like you, inclined to the scale in which hung my private advantage; but all that I have done has been done straightforwardly, incorruptly, and with singleness of purpose. While I have been charged with affairs of greater magnitude than any of my contemporaries, the whole of my administration has been pure, honest, disinterested. These are the grounds on which I claim to be honored.
As for the fortifications and intrenchments which you have sneered at, I deem myself entitled to thanks and gratitude on that behalf. Wherefore should I not? But I am far, indeed, from placing such services in the same category with my general policy. It is not with stones nor with bricks that I have fortified Athens; it is not upon such works that I chiefly value myself; but if you would truly appreciate my fortifications, you will find them in arms, cities, territories, harbors, ships, and men to avail themselves of these advantages. These are the outworks which I have thrown up before Attica, according to the best of human foresight; by these have I fortified the whole country, not merely the circuit of the Piræus and the city. Nor was I defeated by the calculations or preparations of Philip; far from it: but the generals and the forces of our allies were defeated by Fortune. * * *
If my measures had been successful—O heaven and earth! we must, beyond all question, have become a first-rate power, as we well deserved to be. If they have failed, we have left to us our honor. No reproach can attach to the state or to its policy, but Fortune must bear the blame, who has so ordered our affairs. Never, never, will the patriotic citizen desert his country’s cause, and, hiring himself to her foes, watch his opportunities of injuring her; never will he malign the statesman who in his utterances and his measures has consistently maintained his country’s honor; nor will he nurse and treasure up resentment for private wrongs; nor, lastly, will he maintain a dishonest and a treacherous silence, as you have often done. * * *
No part, Æschines, have you taken in any measure for strengthening the country’s resources. What alliance has been ever obtained for the state through your instrumentality? What succor? What acquisition of good-will from others, or credit for ourselves? What embassy? What public service that has added to our national renown? What public affairs, whether domestic, Hellenic, or foreign, have been brought by you to a successful issue? What ships have you furnished? What arms? What dockyards? What fortifications? What cavalry? In what one respect have you been useful? What pecuniary contribution have you ever made upon public grounds for the benefit of either the rich or the poor? None.
You were not deterred by your poverty, but by your anxiety to do nothing opposed to the interests of those for whose benefit all your policy has been designed. But what are the occasions of your brilliant displays, the exhibition of your youthful vigor? When aught is to be spoken against your countrymen, then is your voice best tuned, then is your memory most accurate; then you act your part to perfection. * * *
Every well-affected citizen, Athenians, (in such terms I am able to speak of myself least invidiously) is bound to possess two qualities: when in authority, the fixed resolve to maintain the honor and pre-eminence of his country; under all circumstances and at all times, loyalty. This Nature can command—to another power belong strength and success. By this spirit you find me to have been uniformly actuated.
Observe—never when I was demanded for extradition, nor when Amphictyonic suits were prosecuted against me, nor when threats, nor when promises were brought to bear upon me, nor when these miscreants were let loose like wild beasts upon me—never was I induced to abandon one jot or tittle of my loyalty to you. From first to last I took the straight and true path of statesmanship—that of complete devotion to the maintenance and furtherance of the honor, the power, and the glory of my country. Never was I beheld strutting about the Forum, radiant with joy and exultation at foreign success, gesticulating congratulations to those who might be expected to report them elsewhere. Nor have I heard the tidings of our good fortune with dismay and lamentations, and prostration to the earth, like these impious men who inveigh against their country without perceiving that their invective is directed against themselves, whose eyes are cast abroad, who felicitate themselves on foreign success purchased by the calamities of Greece, and avow their anxiety to secure its permanence.
Never, O ye Heavenly Powers! never may such designs obtain favor at your hands! Rather, if it be possible, inspire even these men with better thoughts, and turn their hearts; but if their moral plague be incurable, cut them off from among us, and drive them forth to destruction, sure and swift, over land and over sea: while to us who are spared ye vouchsafe the speediest deliverance from our impending alarms, and abiding security!”—Sir Robert Collier.
Twice after the reverse of Chæronea Demosthenes succeeded in arraying his country against Macedon—at the assassination of Philip and on the death of Alexander. When news of Alexander’s decease reached Greece, the orator was in exile, having been unjustly convicted of taking Macedonian treasure; yet he did his utmost to arm the Grecian cities, and was in consequence recalled to Athens by the fickle people. But it was all in vain.
At last, marked for destruction by the Macedonian regent Antip’ater, and doomed to death by his cowardly fellow-citizens whose necks were now under the tyrant’s heel, he fled to the temple of Neptune on Calaure’a and there found relief from his troubles in a quill of poison which he kept ready for an emergency. In Demosthenes, Athens lost an incorruptible patriot—antiquity, one of her noblest characters. The Athenians erected to his memory a brazen statue on which was inscribed:—
Æschines (389-314 B.C.), of whose early life little is known, after his defeat at the hands of Demosthenes, went into exile. We are told that his victorious rival magnanimously forgave him, and even offered him money for the journey; which led Æschines to exclaim: “How I regret leaving a country where I have found an enemy so generous that I must despair of ever meeting with a friend who shall be like him!”
Æschines afterward established himself as a teacher of oratory in Rhodes. Here he once repeated to his pupils his famous oration against Ctesiphon in the contest for the crown, which filled them with wonder that so able an orator should have been defeated. But when at their request he read the reply of Demosthenes, his audience rose to their feet with eager acclamations; and the orator, forgetting all jealousy in his admiration, cried: “What would you have said, had you heard the wild beast himself roaring it out?”
The oration against Ctesiphon is one of three familiarly known in antiquity as “the Three Graces”—a title indicative of the refinement and easy flow of the author’s style, deficient as it was in the energy and vehemence of his great rival.
Ion (flourished 450 B.C.): a history and lyrics, as well as tragedies; called “the Eastern Star,” from the first words of an ode he was composing when death overtook him.
Achæus (born 484 B.C.): tragic and satirical pieces.
Ag’athon the Athenian: received his first tragic prize, 416 B.C.; his masterpiece was “the Flower.”
Callis’tratus (flourished 420 B.C.): author of the convivial ode celebrating the memory of Harmodius and Aristogiton (p. 158).
Crati’nus (519-423 B.C.): called the Cup-lover from his excesses; 21 comedies; 9 prizes; with his last comedy, “the Wine-flask,” he gained the first prize, triumphing over “the Clouds” of Aristophanes.
Eu’polis: 15 plays; his first comedy was represented 429 B.C.
Crates (450 B.C.): 14 comedies; the first poet to represent drunkenness on the Athenian stage.
Meton, the Athenian astronomer (flourished 430 B.C.): founder of the Lunar Cycle of 19 solar years, which he discovered to be nearly equal to 235 revolutions of the moon round the earth. From the “Metonic Cycle” the Greeks computed their festivals; it is still used by the Western churches in fixing Easter.
Hippoc’rates (460-357 B.C.), born on the island of Cos, “the Father of Medicine:” knew little of anatomy; discovered the critical days in fevers.
Education recognized as all-important in ancient Greece, and even made compulsory by the great lawgivers. In Homer’s time, children taught obedience, respect for the aged, and modesty of deportment; sons instructed in the use of weapons and gymnastic exercises; daughters, in domestic economy and virtue. Homer’s epics long the chief text-books on all subjects.
Reading and writing, accomplishments of the earliest periods. An ignorant Greek an anomaly. Even among the Spartans, who affected contempt for literature, reading and writing were practised. The magistrates and their officers were provided with wooden cylinders of the same size; when one desired to communicate, he wound a strip of parchment round his cylinder and wrote his message thereon; then, removing the strip, he sent it to the other party, who was enabled to read it by rolling it upon his own cylinder in the same folds.
In the golden age, common schools were the glory of Greece; the rudiments of education everywhere taught. The importance of grammar urged by Plato, who was the first to explain the difference between nouns and verbs; articles and conjunctions distinguished by Aristotle, and also differences of number and case. The foundation of scientific grammar laid by the Stoics, who recognized eight parts of speech. Those who could afford it completed their education at the Lyceum, Academy, or some other celebrated school, often paying most extravagantly for instruction in rhetoric and philosophy. Some teachers charged their pupils as much as $2,000 apiece for a course of lectures. Foreign languages were never studied by the Greeks.
Many private libraries were established during the golden age, but no circulating or public libraries. As early as 400 B.C. Athens carried on quite a trade in manuscripts, one quarter of the market-place being called “the book-mart.” Books were generally abundant and cheap, being copied by slaves, but rare works were very costly. Plato paid $1,600 for three books. (The reader is referred to Becker’s “Charicles; or, Illustrations of the Private Life of the Ancient Greeks.”)
Wooden tablets for accounts sold for 18 cts. each about 400 B.C. A small blank book of two wax tablets was worth less than a penny. Pencils are said to have been invented 408 B.C. by Apollodorus, the self-styled “Prince of Painters.”