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own, except when, as in his masterly account of the horrors which civil war had poured out upon Corcyra,* the thought of the ruin which jarring and selfish strife had brought upon unhappy Greece, forces from him the language of indignant sorrow. The practice which later writers introduced of mixing up their own opinions with the statement of facts which it is their

office simply to record, had not yet commenced, and it is not in the narrative, but the speeches of Thucydides, that we must look for the opinions of this grave and judicious writer. Fully to enter into the spirit of these latter, we must remember the birthplace and events during the life of the historian. He was a native of Athens-"a citizen of no mean city," "the eye of Greece; mother of arts and eloquence" -of small extent and scanty population, and yet one which has influenced the destinies of mankind. Her inhabitants were lively and intelligent to a degree of which we, who live in a grosser clime, can scarce form a conception ;-and this it will be requisite to bear in mind, if we would rightly appreciate the character of Athenian oratory. Their keen perception of the beautiful, exhibited itself in their philosophy, their poetry, their sculpture, and their architecture. Every free citizen was born to a glorious inheritance, and was surrounded by objects which, while they gratified his vanity, purified and refined his taste.

Proud in the consciousness that his native town was one of the leading states of Greece, and that he individually was one of the arbiters of her fortunes, he identified himself thoroughly with her interests, and felt that the ends of his own ambition were best served when her greatness was most advanced. The prosperity of his own city bore much more immediately upon the comfort and happiness of a Grecian citizen than we are apt to think, from the fact that, beyond its walls, he had no country on which his patriotism could expand itself, and the small territory of Greece, with whose general welfare that of his particular state ought to have been identified, was occupied by enemies too often as irreconcilably hostile as if they

* Thuc. iii, 82, et seq. † Ib. ii. 60.

had nothing in common with himself in name, language, and religion. Such an appeal, therefore, as that of Pericles, when he defended himself before his countrymen, who at that time were, as Thucydides tells us-πανταχόθεν τη γνωμη αποροι καθεστωτες—on the brink of despair-must have come home to their feelings with no ordinary forceκαλως μεν γαρ φερομενος ανηρ το καθ' ἑαυτον, διαφθειρομένης της πατρίδος ουδεν ἧσσον ξυναπολλυται κακοτυχων δε εν ευτυχούσῃ πολλω μάλλον διασώζεται.

Thucydides lived in the zenith of Athenian power. He was forty years of age at the period of the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war; and Athens, since the Persian invasion, and foolish conduct of Pausanias, which alienated the inferior states from the Lacedæmonian interest, had gradually, during the fifty years which had elapsed, been attaining the great object of her ambition, the yovia, or lead in Greece. Αθηναιοι την τε αρχην εγκρατίστην και τεστήσαντο, και αυτοί επί μέγα εχώρησαν

duvauras. Her natural advantages and resources are ably stated by Pericles in the first book, and in the chapter of the second where Thucydides introduces that illustrious Athenian, as strongly urging his fellow-citizens to retire from the open country within their walls, and not risk the issue of the war on the chances of a battle. Her naval force was the finest in the world. Her colonies and dependent § cities were numerous and wealthy, from which there accrued a yearly revenue that averaged 600 talents. Her treasury in the Acropolis contained 6000 talents of coined silver money, besides a large quantity of gold and silver, which, in the shape of sacred offerings and ornaments, was laid up in the temples, and estimated at the value of 500 talents of gold, and which Pericles told his countrymen might be employed without sacrilege in cases of emergency for the defence of their native land. The heavy armed force and cavalry were likewise numerous and well appointed.

Such was the condition of Athens at the outset of the Peloponnesian war-a war in which she would as

Ib. i. 118. § Φόρου ὑπηκοοι.

suredly have triumphed if the great statesman who alone seemed able "to wield the fierce democracy" had lived, or her giddy and unthinking populace had been content to follow out the wise policy which his prudence had foreshown. But the curse of democracy was upon her, and she became the sport of the eddying passions of the multitude. Throughout the whole of the instructive history of this period, while we admire the courageous spirit and untiring energies of the Athenian people, we blush to see them, with all the versatility of a mob, yielding to the will of the demagogue of the day, and at one moment, in obedience to the brawling and brutal Cleon, voting the massacre of the hapless citizens of Mitylene, and at another responding with loud acclamations to the ambitious views of the young and hot-headed Alcibiades. Here lay the weakness of Athens. Within her walls democracy ran riot. "The many" were her absolute masters, and revelled in the exercise of uncontrolled and irresponsible power. On the stormy waves of popular applause the favourite of the hour rode triumphant, and the people did his bidding with reckless alacrity. Hobbes has defined democracy to be "an aristocracy of orators, interrupted only by the monarchy of a single orator;" and this applies with peculiar aptitude to the Grecian republics, and preeminently to Athens. Nature had been prodigal to her inhabitants in intellectual gifts. They were as quickwitted and intelligent as they were wayward and capricious. The poet and the orator had no difficulty in making them apprehend the drift of any allusion. On the stage no innuendo was ever lost to the ear of the multitude, and the slightest reference to the public men and measures of the time was unerringly caught, though masked by the broad humour and licentious wit of Aristophanes.

The character of the Athenians is brought out by Thucydides in strong contrast with that of their rivals the Lacedemonians; and we know no passage in the ancient writers where so lively a description is given of the distinguishing features of those two

leading states, as in the speech of the Corinthian legates when urging upon the Lacedemonians the necessity of espousing their quarrel with Athens. The whole oration is valuable, as throwing light upon the different fortunes of the two republics, resulting from their very different lines of policy; but we have in a few words a masterly sketch given of their opposite temperaments and characters. It is such an analysis of national character as we ought to be thoroughly acquainted with, if we would righly understand Grecian history. Athens and Sparta were rivals and enemies. Democracy and oligarchy scowled hatred on one another. Both were evil, and both contributed to ruin Greece.

When such was the character of the audience, we may cease to wonder at the nature of the speeches which were addressed to them, and can understand how the sharpened arrows of eloquence never missed their mark. We may believe that less of the refined logic and elaborate reasoning which we find in the orations of Thucydides is the work of the historian than at first view would seem likely, and from the remarks which have been premised, we may be better able to appreciate their worth.

But if the superficial student of Greek literature thinks that the speeches which occur in the history of the Peloponnesian war are within the sphere of his comprehension, he is mistaken. They are difficult in no ordinary degree. Cicero himself says of them, "Ipsæ illæ conciones ita multas habent abditasque sententias, vix ut intelligantur." We know few specimens of the Greek language in which it is frequently so impossible to be quite sure of the correct interpretation, and in which it is so hopeless in many instances to reconcile the construction with the known idioms of the language. They ought to be the study of the statesman; and yet they are accessible only to the scholar, and too often they are abandoned to the pedant, who is too busily occupied with the husk to pay much attention to the kernel. It is a matter deeply to be regretted, that so much of the spirit

Thục. i. 69.

and beauty of the ancient classics should be lost to many of those whose critical knowledge of the language is most exact. It is lamentable that by the youth of Britain, the glorious relics of the literature of Greece and Rome should be so frequently known solely with reference to academic reputation, and that microscopic accuracy should be so often attained at the expense of a liberal and instructive acquaintance with the spirit of the past. Those who are so careful about syllables think little of "the mind, the music, breathing" in the words, and are content with the dry bones of antiquity, instead of the living and informing soul. This is an old complaint, and has been well stated by Casaubon in his masterly preface to Polybius a piece of composition which we recommend to the serious attention and study of every young classical scholar. We would not be misunderstood. We have already deprecated the idea that shallow scholarship can essay to master the difficulties of the Greek language; and without an intimate and well practised knowledge of its constructions, and the peculiar force of some of its words in their most subtle significations, passages whose sense is so interwoven with the context as to be necessary for its elucidation, must remain a sealed book to the man who has not taken the pains to acquire minute and critical knowledge. We do not undervalue the labours of the grammarian and philologist-the latter of whom has of late appeared as one of the most useful auxiliaries in the cause of truth and knowledge; we only wish to point out that there is something above and beyond these, simply in themselves, which is to them what the body is to the clothing; what the building is to the bricks and mortar employed in its construction. Let our public schools inculcate upon the young the necessity of sound and accurate scholarship-for they have to rear the sapling-but let our universities remember that language is but the vehicle of thought, and that from them we expect to see fruit "good for the use of man" growing upon the

tree.

One reason of the difficulties which

perplex the student in perusing the History of the Peloponnesian war is, that Thucydides was eminently a thinker. His sentences are not written currente calamo, nor are they such as he who runs may read. Few writers have compressed so much matter into so small a space. Bacon has said that "some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested." That of Thucydides is of the last kind; and to be relished, the appetite cf the reader must be vigorous and healthy. The indolence of mankind is the great obstacle to the acquisition of useful knowledge. Two thousand years ago it was said by the historian, οὕτως αταλαιπωρος ή ζήτησις της αληθείας, και επι τα έτοιμα μαλλον τρέπονται*. In his speeches, grammatical accuracy and the complaint may still be made. is necessary to apprehend the argument-although at times the sentences violate the idiom of the language-difficulties of construction. He does and careful attention to interpret the not affect the epigrammatic and causstant anxiety to be terse, frequently tic brevity of Tacitus, who, in his conbecomes obscure. That writer seems to have been oppressed with the nature of the events and characters which his pen recorded, and to have shunned a of their depravity, he conveys by more ample delineation. Conscious innuendo and sarcasm the opinion he had formed, but did not choose more openly to express.

In the use and whereby his own sentiments are exforce of disjunctive prepositions, pressed in the latter clause of his sentence, he has no rival but Gibbon. He is close and reserved from deliberation and choice. fess we see a kind of congruity between And we conbrandt, he appears at first sight to the subject and the style. Like Remhave concealed his portraitures; but if we examine the picture, we find gible. He did not merely chronicle every lineament distinct and intelli

events.

aphorisms, which, even in our day, He propounded political have a living application. But still we are not blind to his faults as an author. His sententious maxims are too elliptical; and, in supplying a

* Thuc, i, 20.

sense, there is too often a danger of mistaking his meaning. It is a style which few can imitate with success, and when unsuccessful it becomes affectation.

Thucydides is the second of the Greek historians, in point of time, whose works have come down to us; and he had to make use of a language whose strength had not yet been de veloped. Plato had not enriched it with his magnificent and gorgeous diction, and proved its wondrous flexibility. Herodotus had indeed preceded; but for his lively and garrulous gossip, a far meaner language would have sufficed. Another difficulty is occasioned by the fondness which Thucydides displays for antithesis. We hardly know any writer in whom so many instances of false antithesis are to be found. This is a species of bad taste which is very likely to mislead the reader, who sees words put into apparent opposition between which there is no real repugnancy. The point and brilliancy which such a mode of writing seems to confer, is like the golden apple of Hippolyte, and too often tempts the writer from his course. Few can handle it with success. Perhaps Junius is the best example of the power with which it can invest language. In Thucydides, however, it is frequently a mere jingle of words, or interchange of expressions, which, though opposed in form, are the same in substance. Again, he is frequently very negligent of construction; and, while we are upon this subject, we may take the opportunity of protesting against the spirit which actuates so many of the commentators, especially the German. They appear to study the Greek language with the conviction, that every ancient writer observed rigidly and unerringly the rules of composition. They cannot fancy such a thing as an error in idiom; and unless every passage appears in the manuscripts from which the text is taken, framed according to critical square and rule, they assume that there has been some error on the part of the copyist, and exhaust their invention in devising emendations. But why should we not suppose, that in many cases the ancients themselves violated the laws of strict grammar, as we know is the case with some of the best of our own writers? Why should we fetter them

so tightly in the chains which we have ourselves forged out of their own remains? We are not now speaking of passages, where, in the original state, the meaning cannot be made out. Such are a fair field for critical sagacity. It is evident that the writer did not wish to be unintelligible; and therefore we are bound to suppose that there has been some corruption of the text, and in this case conjectural emendations are not only legitimate but necessary. But we confess that we have no eye which is grievously offended at an awkward construction when the sense is clear, and would in general much rather admit that the passage was originally faulty, than place it upon the Procrustean bed of a commentator, to be cut and pared until it suited his fastidious taste.

Now, Thucydides abounds in anacolutha. He begins a paragraph weighty in sense and argument, and frequently forgets at the end of it what construction he had used. The hypothesis of his sentence sometimes wants an apodosis. It seems as though his words were overcharged with matter, and, while struggling to convey his meaning, were unable to confine themselves within the laws of grammatical propriety. That these are faults must be at once conceded; but when we admit them to be so, much of the apparent difficulty vanishes. Instead of wasting our time in a fruitless attempt to reconcile solecisms with the received canons of grammar, we should look upon them as instances where the writer has been careless in his use of language, and proceed at once to an attentive consideration of his meaning. These faults, in the style of Thucydides, occur principally in his speeches; and of these the young student ought to be made aware. His narrative is, in general, clear and unembarrassed. It is only when the historian assumes the tone of the philosopher that he becomes obscure; and this obscurity is not so much real as apparent. A little familiarity with his idiom suffices to make the sense plain, except in a few passages which have cruelly tormented the ingenuity of commenta tors. But we must repeat what we have before urged, that no one can hope to appreciate and enjoy the lessons of political wisdom which are scattered so largely throughout this inestimable history-no one is competent to derive

his full share of the instruction which was there intended for posterity, who has not taken the pains to make himself a sound and accurate scholar. It was a sense of this which dictated the words of the epitaph in which Thucydides is made to say

.

Ειμι γαρ ου παντεσσι βατος one great advantage to be gained from an attentive study of these speeches is this. We shall then see the kind of arguments which swayed the minds of the Grecian multitudes, We shall know the motives displayed which resulted in actions of which the massacre at Mitylene and the defeat at Syracuse were part. We shall learn a salutary lesson, speaking trumpet-tongued, of the evils of democratic power. We shall gain an insight into the characters of the leading men of those times, and know something of the contexture of their minds from the counsels they

recommended. We shall be taught to appreciate the worth of such creeping reptiles as Cleon-men who live by popular excitement-whose trade is" agitation," whose element is confusion-and who array the passions of the multitude against the good and great men whom posterity will delight to honour. We shall find in these orations the most valuable commen tary upon the excellences and defects of the Grecian republics, and be better able to understand their social economy. We have in them the deliberate opinions of a profound thinker and careful observer upon contemporary events during the most interesting period of Grecian history-and these ought to be studied with attention by the practical statesman, and not left to the ignorance of the schoolboy, or the syllabic accuracy of the academician preparing for his degree.

WIT AND WISDOM.

AN ALLEGORY.

Translated from an Ancient Greek Palimpsest.

WISDOM was the daughter of Knowledge by Reflection: Wit was the son of Genius by Mirth. From an early age they were designed by Jupiter to be united in marriage; and the songs of the Fates predicted, from their union, the most signal benefits to gods and men. Both of the children were very beautiful, and their attractions increased with their advancing years, though distinguished by a harmonious contrast of character, corresponding to the difference of their mental dispositions. The beauty of the girl was majestic and severe, yet sweet and serene; that of the boy was ardent and joyous, yet noble and intelligent. They were fond of each other's society, as if conscious that each stood in need of qualities abounding in the one but deficient in the other; and it was evident that, if knit together by a firm and confiding love, they would be elevated to excellences which they could not singly attain, and preserved from errors to which they would separately be liable.

So desirable an event, however, was opposed by conflicting factions among the gods. Momus, the maternal uncle of Wit, had little relish

for the society of Wisdom or her friends, except for the purpose of laughing at them: and he was supported in his views by Venus, Mars, and Bacchus, who, liking to amuse themselves with Wit, and being averse to seriousness or sobriety, had no. I wish that their favourite should be spoiled by a matrimonial connexion, particularly with so demure a lady. On the other hand, Minerva, who had always taken a peculiar charge of Wisdom, was desirous that her ward should either, like herself, follow a life of celibacy, or at least form a graver connexion than that which was likely to be found with Wit and his relations. Juno adopted the same sentiments, partly from being too proud to appreciate the powers of Wit, and partly from making it a rule on all occasions to take the opposite side of the question from Venus. These different parties, though at variance with each other in their tastes and objects, concurred cordially in resisting the marriage of the young people; and Jupiter hesitated to follow his own inclinations in the face of so formidable an opposition.

Apollo and the Muses were the

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