the Treaty to project a form of accord and to keep a good correspondence betwixt his Master and the Tyrant but in truth to discover the intrigues of the Syracusan counsels and to be a Spy upon the affairs of Sicily to discover the easiest way of invading it and to practise the Tyrant to some destructive enterprizes Oxythemis had an handsome reception and great credit with Agathocles whose humours and inclinations he soon found and dexterously moved him to renew his attempts against Carthage and follow his pretensions in Africk This he eagerly prosecuted that so the Tyrant leaving Sicily his Master with more ease might attack it This seemed to Agathocles as the counsel of his Fortune for he was now free from any Troubles in the Island Syracuse by an open and continued Trade and some years of Peace had recovered so much Wealth as defaced all the marks of the former War He was now strengthned with the new alliance of a powerful Neighbour whose assistances Oxythemis after the Greek manner did augment and enlarge He therefore embraced the design and made preparations answerable unto it He had provided two hundred Vessels equipped with all necessary furniture for the transporting of his Forces and had begun Hostility by intercepting the Carthaginian Ships that carried provisions of Corn and other necessaries from Sicily and Sardinia to Africk But in the very beginnings of his design that Vengeance of Heaven which had been long due unto him did at last take hold of him and blasted his counsels with his Ruine which was thus effected The Tyrant being now old and doubting the chances of War and the varieties of Fortune which he had so often experienced would provide for the Succession in his ill-gotten dominion before he departed from Sicily Those whom propinquity of Blood the affections of the Tyrant and the Vulgar report marked out for the Honour were the younger Agathocles and Archagathus the Son of that Archagathus that was betraied by his Father and slain by the Souldiers in Africk Both these had great hopes and strong expectations to be the heirs of the Empire The first built his upon the indulgent Affections of the old Tyrant which he had gained by a specious observance continual presence accompanied with a quiet industry in all that was commanded though he were unfit for War and would wear out daies of action with words of Obedience Besides his late Embassie and magnificent reception in Greece had made him more splendid though they were but the arts of the Enemy not the effects of his Merits And it is not to be doubted but that Oxythemis favoured his choice whom he saw least able to hinder his Projects On the other side Archagathus founded his pretensions to the Succession because he was General of the Forces and was now with them about Aetna he had been in several Expeditions in which by his boldness and generous meen he had got the esteem of valiant and the affections of the Souldiery So that the old Tyrant seemed to hold but a precarious Empire of him which he could take away at his pleasure But the obsequiousness of the younger Agathocles did over-balance all these Merits in the judgement of his Father Therefore when Archagathus was abroad with the Army the Tyrant commends his Son Agathocles to the obedience of the Syracusans as the future hopes of all their Peace and Safety and whom he had designed for his Throne And that he might have the like reverence from the Army he sends him with a Letter to Archagathus commanding him to deliver up the charge of the Forces into the hands of his Uncle Archagathus seeing his hopes deluded and that all his glorious hazards were fruitless when the rewards of danger were conferred on him that was never near them conceives an inexpiable hatred both against his Grandfather and Rival and resolves to quench it with the blood of both To this end he sends presently a Messenger to Maenon his Correspondent at Court and with whom he had often treated of dangerous Secrets and had prepared him for any design he should advise him unto and desires him to poison the Old Tyrant and he himself would contrive the death of the Younger This Maenon was a native of Aegesta where Agathocles had acted those incredible Cruelties and in the Ruine of the City was taken with the other youth that were appointed to be sold for Slaves But the comeliness of his Person had preferred him to the Tyrant's own Lust who used him as a Bardacio This he took patiently and seemed to be well pleased with his emploiment and to gain the more Credit with the Tyrant and advantage of doing mischief did glory that he was admitted into the number of his Prince's most beloved Confidents and professed that the present Benefits had cancell'd the old Injuries But yet his soul did inwardly burn with a desire of revenge both for the abuse of his Body and the destruction of his City and therefore was watchful and studious of a fit opportunity to accomplish it Archagathus was not ignorant of his Discontents and had found him a fit engine for such attempts as his defeated hopes did stand in need of For to enterprize upon a Tyrant by a secret Conspiracy none are more proper instruments then such as have a charge about their Persons because they cannot be easily ruined but by those whom they most trust and none are fitter to be wrought to this then such as have been abused by their Masters in their bodies And therefore Aristotle saith that many of those hateful Beasts have been dispatch'd out of the world by their forced Pathicks Besides he that is to perform it must be a person of a firm spirit made so either by Nature or Passion and resolved either for Death or Revenge Maenon had all these requisites and therefore receiving the summons prepares for his work and acts it about the same time that his Correspondent had finish'd his For Archagathus not shewing any signs of Discontent but professing a ready submission to the Command of his Old and the pleasures of his New King invites his Uncle to a Sacrifice wherein he used his Grandfather's method of making Religion the preface to Villany in an Island somewhat distant from the quarters of the Army and there making him drunk he cuts his throat and casts his dead body into the Sea As if he would appease it for the pollutions of the Old Tyrant who had often defiled it with the carcasses of murdered innocents But the waves cast it back to the shore and it being known to the Inhabitants was taken up and conveyed to Syracuse there to vex the eyes and soul of his inhumane Father who by this time also felt the approaches of death For Agathocles being accustomed to pick his teeth after Supper rising from table called for his Pick-tooth which Maenon whose office it was to provide it had anointed with a most mortal poison The Tyrant using it
being no greater Liberty then to be well governed But the desire of Greatness was too importunate in Agathocles For ambitious spirits are not easily contented with what is offered to whom the present enjoyments seem contemptible when greater things may be hoped for and at last they endeavour too hastily to exceed their own hopes which is the ruine of many that might have attained to Supremacy had they not preferred too speedy and dangerous courses to such that are more slow yet sure mediums to power And therefore these arts which would have covered moderate crimes in others made him more suspected by his Citizens that he was a person of too bold hopes and no longer fit to dwell in a free City for he made use of all his Successes and abilities to render himself great in the common fame and popular among the Souldiers So that his Vertues as well as his Vices made him unfit for that Society For Industry and Sagacity are no less dangerous then Vanity and Luxury to a Common-wealth when they are used to attain a Tyranny To prevent therefore the ambitious designs of this and other her Citizens the Common-wealth of Syracuse had invited from Corinth Acestorides a person of a clear fame and unquestioned Honesty to take upon him the Government for a time that he might ballance the several Factions of their State and give vent to those swelling hopes of her most turbulent members who now were grown too big for a civil and ordinary management hoping to find him like to Timoleon that knew how both to conquer Tyrants and to submit to a civil Government a rare agreement in one breast for the nature of man is willing to indulge that in himself which he hates in another But Acestorides though he wanted not integrity for his trust yet failed in courage and resolution to perform it For finding Agathocles the greatest object at that time of the common jealousie and that Liberty and he were inconsistent in one City For that City cannot be accounted free where any one Citizen can terrifie the publick Magistrates he did not dare to remove him by a Trial and course of Justice but intended to take him off by a secret Conspiracy and therefore published an Edict whereby he banished him from that Commonwealth and commanding him to leave the City by night he laid an Ambush in the way that might kill him in his passage supposing the darkness would conceal the authors of his death and his Banishment would occasion an uncertainty in all reports that should be divulged whether he were alive or dead and so suspend the minds of the Vulgar rabble to whom his Vices as well as his Vertues had indeared him and who would be forward to mutiny in his revenge Agathocles that was not unacquainted with any fraudulent practices did easily suspect the plot and therefore to prevent it chuseth out one of his servants that was most like to himself in the outward proportion of body and harnasses him with his own armour mounts him upon his own horse and sends him out of the City that way which he conceived was forelaid and he himself disguised with poor and ragged apparel departs in a more unfrequented path Those that were appointed to dispatch him conjecturing by the arms and horse that they had encountred with their designed prey set upon the Servant and kill him supposing that they had rid Syracuse of their fears and hate But Agathocles's following actions soon made them sensible of their errour and did upbraid the weakness of Acestorides who did not dare to use the sword of Justice against him whom he thought unworthy to live and put the security and Liberty of the Commonwealth upon the uncertainty of a Plot. Agathocles being gone the unsteady multitude grow weary of that warre which he had perswaded them unto against the Banditi who assisted by the power of Carthage were able to renew their invasions after many defeats Therefore they immediately receive them into the City again and conclude a Peace with the Carthaginians but revoked not the sentence of Banishment against Agathocles which now by the return of his enemies he conceived would be irreversible He therefore hath recourse to his old auxiliaries of Thieves and desperate Vagabonds whom necessity and his former conduct had fitted for any Villany who readily flocked about him in hopes of more licentious rapines and to these he gathers all the disbanded Souldiers whom the present Peace had made useless and forming an Army of these he grew terrible both to the Carthaginians and Syracusans wasting their Territories firing their Villages and plundering the weaker and unfenced Towns and Cities And that he might colour his outrages with some pretext of Justice he espoused the quarrels of all those Cities that were either enemies to or emulous of the power of Syracuse to this end was made Praetor of the Murgantines who had an ancient hatred against them and had been his sanctuary in his Banishment Under the species of their quarrel he did so eagerly prosecute the warre and his own designs that he took Leontium and blocked up Syracuse it self This reduced them to such streights that they were forced to seek for succour and aid from Amilcar the Carthaginian General He either to keep alive those flames wherewith the Sicilians did consume one the other was willing to adde some fewel to the fire or else in humanity and of a generous spirit would assist a noble though adverse City when distressed by her own Citizens sending thither such a sufficient supply as made Agathocles despair by force to bring it to his subjection He therefore applies himself to his more safe and secret arts of deceit and desires Amilcar that he would mediate betwixt him and Syracuse that he might be restored again to his own City and houshold Gods and not be necessitated by such unpleasing waies to preserve his life and liberty But together with these honest pretexts he made more obliging promises of service and gratitude to Amilcar if he would be the happy instrument of his return home Amilcar undertakes the office and easily perswades the wretched Syracusans to consent to that which without his assistance they should be forced to submit unto upon more unequal conditions His restitution therefore was agreed unto by the People upon some seturity of their Peace and Liberty which to give them he was led into the Temple of Ceres the most sacred Deity among the Sicilians and there solemnly swore that he would doe nothing contrary to the Democratical Government of Syracuse This was the onely security which they could at that time have from Agathocles Which is indeed a sufficient tie upon such souls as are indued with a sense of Vertue or have any fear of a Deity but Oaths are too weak fetters to restrain ambitious Spirits or such as intend a Tyranny For He that resolves to be unjust towards men will slight the testimony and vengeance of Heaven But
trifles away his time in composing a peace betwixt them and Glaucias an Illyrian King that then did besiege their City From thence he sails to Tarentum where to lose time more precious then unnecessary aid could be to the Sicilians by the credit of his birth and Country he prevails with that City to enter into the Sicilian league and to send twenty ships against the Syracusan Tyrant And after so much loss of time which was emploied in these Treaties he comes to Agrigentum where with much applause as is usual to the Glorious assertors of Liberty and great expectation he did enter upon his command This expectation and opinion of the people which wise men esteem prejudicial to any emploiment because many can never correspond fully unto it men usually desiring more then can be acquired which doth in time turn to their dishonour and infamy this great undertaker did labour to increase by his confident boasts that he would speedily ruine the Syracusan Potter and finish that just war But they soon found how vain were his boasts and their hopes For they perceived how he neglected all the desirable opportunities of performing his trust and as if he were forgetful of his enterprize the Dignity of his Extract and the Honour of his City he did endeavour to erect a more heavy Tyranny then that which he was desired to pull down He was wholly debauched to every Lust and as it were with the air he had changed the Laconian Temperance and moderation eminent Vertues in the highest fortune into Lasciviousness and Pride more like a soft Persian then an hardy Spartan abusing the plenty and Beauties of Sicily with his Lusts and riots by which profuse courses and by stealth he also consumed the common Treasure for the war Nor did he abstain from blood and injuries as if those who had called him for Liberty knew nothing of it beyond the empty name And to perpetuate his Tyranny he resolved to murder Sosistratus who was the most likely to head the Sicilian fury against him For he was the most eminent of the Syracusan Exiles and had often commanded the Armies of his Commonwealth with honour and success being of the Nobless of that City of a present courage and resolution not unacquainted with the Arts and practices of Tyranny therefore the more able to observe oppose such designs The Spartan having no colour to make him fall by the sword of Justice nor daring to assault him by open force uses the fatal caresses of a Tyrant and invites him to a Feast where when he had disarmed him by wine and gluttony he causes him to be murdered The news of this Murder being divulged the whole City was filled with uproar and the Syracusan Exiles whose hopes and fortunes were built upon this war and were therefore the most impatient at every disappointment were highly inraged at the Death of Sosistratus whom the common Calamity had indeared to them and from whose valour and conduct they hoped for a more speedy return home These first assault Acrotatus and by their example many more were drawn to the same attempt So that the whole City being gathered together by this tumult vote him out of his Office and Command and to confirm their Decrees they assault him with such weapons as their present fury administred as stones and the like and dealt with him as a common Enemy never to be reconciled unto For their offences are most hainous who disappoint the conceived hopes of a soft and just Government and the minds of men being frustrated in their reasonable expectancies of good are thereby the more implacable Acrotatus seeing himself unequal to the peoples violence fled out of Agrigentum by night and with ignominy hasted to Sparta leaving behind him a discontented City and all his broken hopes of Tyranny of which he was more desirous then capable For to impose Slavery upon a people without a force greater then their resistance requires a dexterous wit to manage all occurrences to the present advantage tedious arts and time to form a party to get some fame of valour and vertue and to be esteemed tender of the peoples rights Otherwise though any one by the advantage of a trust may assume a Principality and Tyranny yet he cannot long hold it without such foundations And as things that suddenly spring and grow have the shallower rooting and are soonest pulled up so such sudden Tyrants are easily deposed Which was the fortune of Acrotatus who by rioting and injuries would enjoy the Pleasures of Tyranny before he had acquired the Power None are more apt to attempt upon the Liberty of the people then such who are vitious and debauched for they commonly think Principality but a security of great crimes yet none are less able to compass their design For he that will dare to attempt that which no honest man will must be able to doe such things which none but a prudent and stout man can perform Cato's observation of Caesar that he was the onely sober person that did endeavour the overthrow of the Common-wealth was an Augury and fear of his success in that design Those that are otherwise qualified though they may disquiet and expose their Cities to ruine by their vain attempts yet can never establish themselves in any Grandeur nor meet with any other issue of their Designs then Destruction or Ignominy as this Spartan did This evil management of Acrotatus was not unknown to Agathocles therefore he provoked them not to fight but waits when his enemies would fall by their own vices wherein he was not deceived for the league was soon broken and the associated Cities divided their Army and recalled their forces For confederacies consifting of several communities have several interests and if they last so long till they have some prosperous success yet are they then broken by envy and jealousies But commonly the first adverse encounter immediately creates a fear that dissolves them and every one by private counsels will endeavour to provide for their own safety Whence it comes to pass that the forces of many Confederates are less considerable though more numerous then those which one single Power is able to form and raise And thus it happened with these Confederates for the Tarentines recalled home their ships and the Sicilian Cities not thriving in their first heat against the Tyrant would no longer tempt their Fortune but by the mediation of Amilcar who was able to force the dissenters and impose an agreement they conclude a peace with the Syracusan The Carthaginian not intending to diminish the Greatness of Agathocles as conceiving together with his power the envy and hatred of him would be increased and so at last he would fall as an easie and rich prey to the Punick Empire and thinking by this Peace he might secure the rights of his own City without the hazards of war concludes a Peace upon these Articles That Heraclea Selinus and Himera which were Greek Colonies
the remains of that Army he beats his Conquerours Two emulous Cities Carthage and Syracuse both at one time Conquerours and conquered streightned and besieged by their mutual forces The loss of the Carthaginians in this Battel was very great but uncertain for some say it was but one thousand others relate three and others six thousand Agathocles bought this great Victory with but little blood for he lost at most but two hundred and others say but two The Carthaginians amazed at this unexpected overthrow by so weak an Enemy referred their misfortune to the anger of their neglected Gods They conceived Hercules the Patron of their City to be offended with them because they had long disused to send the Tenths of all their Revenues to that God at Tyre from whence they were extracted which they had most religiously observed at the first Plantation of their Colony But when their State was increased by a continued Prosperity and their Riches grown to a vast height their Covetousness also inlarging with their Wealth they envied their Gods so great a summe as their Tenths did then amount unto and therefore sent little or nothing either thinking their Gods would be pleased with the parsimony of their Idolaters and not delighted in an un-emploied Treasure or else that by their present Felicity they were now able to stand by themselves without the care of their Gods Such is the common weakness of humane minds as to think the present fortune puts them out of a dependance on Heaven and so great their Ingratitude that proud with their happiness they conceive themselves the authours of their own fortunes and neglect the testimonies of acknowledging from whose bounty they derived their Blessings And being thus insolent towards their Gods they grow injurious to men and so open all the Avenues to destruction This Salust observes of his Romans who in their first beginnings were Magnificent in their Devotions Parsimonious in their Families and Faithful to their Friends but when their Greatness feared no rival and their fortune had left no Enemy first the love of Riches then Ambition of Command taught them to neglect their Gods and be perfidious to men destroied their Religion corrupted their Converse debauched their Discipline and at last overthrew their Commonwealth For Religion being the Reverence of a Deity which is supposed able to reward and punish according to the merits of the Worshippers is productive of good Orders These cement the minds of men and lay the obligations of a solid faith which fits them for great actions by a mutual confidence which seldome fails of good success But where Religion is contemned there the people are not far from ruine or some heavy scourge for that being the foundation of Society when it is once shaken by contempt the whole fabrick cannot be stable nor lasting But Religious rites that are worn out by Prosperity when security makes men more desirous of pleasures then careful of Religion are recovered by Adversity And Fear though it does not as the Atheists say make Gods yet it revives their worship For these Carthaginians awakened with the clamours of their Misfortunes sent a great summe of mony with other most precious offerings to Hercules and Golden Shrines for all their other Gods at Tyre thinking to buy off their fury and corrupt their Justice And neglecting no part of their barbarous Superstition they endeavoured to reconcile their Saturn also whom they conceived peevish likewise For whereas of old they were used to sacrifice to him their most beautifull and hopeful Children nobly or honestly born they had of late put him off with common and supposititious births Therefore by a cursed Superstition which extinguished humanity such is the fury of a devillish Worship that when it is most exact it increases their Crimes they chose two hundred Children of their most eminent Nobless for a publick Sacrifice Besides many others that lay under some misfortune or were affraid of some great accusations offered their blood for their Cities safety which were no less then three hundred All these were consumed in a Sacrifice For being bound and laid upon the arms of their Idol which was a great Image of brass with his hands stretch'd downwards to the earth the unhappy wretches rowled off and fell into a furnace of fire that was underneath This cruel Superstition the Carthaginians had brought from Tyre from whence the Jews also derived their worship of Moloch Though they were thus busie in their Religious yet were they not negligent in their Secular provisions for they sent to Amilcar in Sicily that he should speedily send them what forces he could spare and withal they sent to him by the same Messengers the brazen beaks of Agathocles's Ships which their Admiral had brought to Carthage with instructions how he should use them Amilcar having received the news commands the Messengers to suppress the misfortunes of their City and to divulge in his own Army that Agathocles with his whole party were utterly lost And some of the same men he sends into Syracuse to move them to a surrender of the Town which could not now hope for any succours for Agathocles was totally overthrown and his Ships taken and burnt at Carthage for an evidence of which they shewed the brazen beaks which had his mark upon them and were generally known to be his The people through the present miseries of the Siege were the more capable of any though false terrours and such as desired a change of the State were most greedy after news These thronging about the Punick Messengers and place of the Treaty had got some inkling of the news it was soon divulged for in a publick expectation all were impatient of any great secret and easily believed And the Commanders in the Town labouring to suppress did increase the fame of it for all discourses being forbidden were the more multiplied and those who if it had been lawful would have related no more then the truth because it was not safe did by their ill-suppressed fears and secret whisperings make more heavy things to be conjectured The Governours of the Garrison suspecting some Sedition and Mutinies might be formed by these sad tidings as soon as ever they had dismissed which was speedily the Carthaginian Envoies forced out of the Town all the unprofitable mouths and all whom they suspected as friends or kindred of the Banditi which were about eight thousand This filled the whole City with tears and confusion and every house had something to bewail either the supposed deaths of Agathocles and their friends that were with him or else the misery of those that were now to be driven from their City and houshold-gods and exposed to the cruelty of a besieging Enemy These sad considerations forced many bitter execrations upon ambitious Tyrants and their hateful ministers But Amilcar that was a Generous Enemy and had a greater sense of humanity then was in the breasts of Agathocles's agents did safely permit those expulsed
their faithless Leader the perfidious Agathocles The Guard that was upon the Tyrant no less amazed then the rest hearing him named and imagining that the multitude did call upon them to bring their Prisoner forth did immediately lead him into the midst of the Army loaden with chains This sudden spectacle did strangely affect the minds of the multitude Some were moved with Pity and Reverence of him who had so long commanded them For great emploiments leave a lustre even upon that person that hath lost them and Majesty doth accompany those in their distresses whom Fortune hath before proposed to admiration And sometimes if they be vertuous persons they like the Sun appear greatest at their setting and the refraction of a moist cloud of tears doth serve to enlarge their Greatness Marius's glory in his former commands could not be stifled in the Dungeon at Minturnae but once more overcame the Cimbrian Slave that was appointed to be his Executioner Mithridates's imprisonment had not so disarmed him but that the authority of his looks and the memory of his former Empire did affright the Gaul that was sent to murder him till by his own hands he confirmed the trembling Slave to execute the wicked commands of his perfidious Son Though Agathocles had no Vertues that deserved Pity yet his fortunes did excite a Reverence Others moved with the fear of the Enemy and hope of his Conduct joined with the rest and together cried out that they should take off his Chains and set him free This unexpected mercy and deliverance together with the miserable sight of the Army's fears and confusions would have wrought a commiseration in any breast that had had the least sense of humanity to have provided for the common safety or obliged to the same fate But Perfidiousness acknowledges no Merits and every Tyrant doth abjure Gratitude and Justice Therefore Agathocles was no sooner out of his Chains but while the Army was yet in confusion and none at leisure to observe him he makes hast to the shore And because he had before indangered his own preservation by endeavouring to save one of his Sons he now hates that natural Affection and leaves them both to endure the punishments of his Villany and with some few of his servants gets into a Ship and undiscovered sails away The Souldiers hearing of his escape seize upon both his Sons with their blood to satisfie for their Father's Crimes Archagathus thought to stop the execution by asking Arcesilaus that was the Tyrant's friend whom grief and indignation had now made the forwardest to revenge What Agathocles would doe to his Children that should murder his Sons The Syracusan answered it was enough for him that his Children did live some time after Agathocles's were slain And therefore to reap this comfort he speedily sheaths his sword in Archagathus's body Heraclidas was killed by those that had been the Souldiers of Ophellas The Greeks observed in this execution the exact Justice of Heaven that in the same moneth and on the same day that Agathocles had contrary to all faith and rites of Hospitality murdered Ophellas and seized upon his Army did he lose his own Army and had both his Sons slain Providence like a just Law-giver exacting double punishment for so great a Crime for he that had wickedly killed one Friend had two Sons justly destroied Thus having satisfied their Revenge they provide for their Safety and therefore chusing new Officers by them they treat with the Carthaginians and conclude a Peace upon these Articles That the Sicilians should deliver up all those places which had been taken in Africk That for the surrender they should receive three hundred talents That such of them as would serve the State of Carthage should be taken into pay That those who desired to return to Sicily should be transported thither and have houses and places to live in assigned to them at Soluns which was a City of their Dominion in the Island This Composition was faithfully observed to those that did submit unto it but such as were left in Garrisons and would not surrender vainly hoping the deceitful Tyrant would shortly relieve them were soon reduced by force The Captains whereof they crucified but yoked the common Souldiers like beasts to plough that ground and repair by their labours that Country which they had wasted by their arms This was the issue of the African War which had continued four years all which time Carthage with undaunted courage and various success maintained her Liberty and laboured to preserve her Empire against a subtle industrious and bloody Tyrant And Agathocles had the trial of the vicissitudes of all humane affairs having a long time been the terrour of Africk He had broken many Armies ruined great Cities depopulated large Countries moistned the parching Sands with blood humbled the Pride of Carthage and scarce left them any thing but their own walls yet was twice a Prisoner to his own Souldiers and in danger of death from his own Army and at last blotted out all the honour of his Atchievements by a most cursed Perfidiousness and too great a desire of Life deserting a brave Army betraying his own Sons ignominiously flying with one Ship and few attendants trembling in the memory of his Chains and the terrours of his Enemies as if he had been designed to be the example not onely of the Crimes but also of the Punishments of a Tyrant Stripped of all his forces with shame and fury Agathocles lands in Sicily where like a dying Viper his last bites were most fierce Ruine and destruction of others being the last pleasures of a falling Tyrant And as if the air and soil of Africk that is fertile of Monsters had made him more Monster then he was before that miserable Island felt a sharper fit of Cruelty when he was thus half destroied then when he was in his more flourishing fortune He seemed now not so greedy of the Rewards of Wickedness as delighted with Wickedness it self not being more angry that he had lost his own then that he had not got another's substance or that every one had not lost as well as he The first that felt his Inhumanity was the City of Aegesta towards which he leads out those Forces he had and demands a contribution so heavy as would wholly have impoverished the City though it was great and populous and had ten thousand families in it This Injustice did so exasperate the Aegestans that they often met among themselves to complain of such usage That though they were in Confederacy with him and so should be willing to relieve the necessities of their Associate yet were they not his Slaves that he should conceive all their goods to be his own They acknowledged that a League with a more potent party was but a kind of Subjection yet were they not so absolutely to obey as if they had been conquered by him The Tyrant was not ignorant of these complaints which their Grief made
they had any relation to those whom they desired to grieve were all driven to the Sea-shore Where that promiscuous multitude that forced Pity from every eye but those of their Butchers while they did expect the stroke of death did wash that place with their tears first that afterwards was to be polluted with their blood and by their cries and supplications drowned both the noise of the City and the Waves Thus tortured with the expectation of Death and the horrid spectacle of their murdered Friends who preceded in the execution they had at last all their Throats cut and their bodies were thrown into the Sea which for a great space was coloured with blood and the marks of the Cruelty were carried to far-distant Coasts And which was most inhumane none dared to bewail the miserable nor bury those carcasses which the waves refused to hide but cast back on the shore lest they should be thought of kin to the murdered and be forced to the same destiny so that the Commerce of humane Nature was broke and Cruelty grew the higher from Commiseration Upon such actions as these does the security of Usurpers depend so that those that have had any sense of Vertue or Humanity do rather chuse to perish in an obscure Privacy then aim at Power that must be obtained and preserved by so much Impiety and so great Misery to mankind Syracuse and Aegesta being thus made sensible of the Tyrant's return who like a dismal Plague brought death and destruction wheresoever he went he goes to all the other Cities that were either under his Dominion or in Confederacy with him and by extorting Mony from them taking off the suspected and re-inforcing his Garisons he labours to keep them from a Revolt which either his Wickedness or his contemptible Overthrow might excite them unto But yet he could not prevent the effect of misfortunes which shakes the faith and cancels the obligations that are between wicked persons For Pasiphilus either by the inconstancy of his nature or fearing his Master's ruine and willing therefore to provide for his own safety did revolt to Dinocrates and as a pledge of his faith delivered up to him all those strong holds and forces which he commanded for the Tyrant This did so strangely affect in jealous Agathocles and present to his fancy such terrible consequences that mad with fear lest Pasiphilus might have more Complices he thought of quitting the Tyranny and therefore presently sends to treat with Dinocrates and propounds to him these conditions of Peace That he would part with his Kingdome and restore liberty to the Syracusans That Dinocrates should return to his own City That there should be granted to Agathocles for his security the two Garrisons of Thermae and Cephaloedium with the territories thereunto belonging These Articles being divulged afforded matter of discourse to the Speculativi Some applauded the Moderation of the man and attributed this prudence of temporizing with his fortune to his long experience in various successes which uses to render the great Actors in the world more wary and suspicious of future Events and the more prosperous they have been the less will they permit to Chance That although he might hope for a change of his present low condition yet he was also to fear a greater fall On the other side some required his Constancy and wondered at his change from himself that whereas in former Perils he seemed alwaies of a present courage and tenacious of hope yet now he should be so transported with fear that he did not dare to hazard one encounter for that which he had by such difficult Crimes got and hitherto preserved And which was most strange that he should despise his own advantages being still Master of Syracuse and many other strong holds stored with no small Treasure furnished with a force that was not contemptible in Number but yet more considerable in Experience and the arts of War They therefore concluded that he was never endued with true Valour and that his former resolutions were either but the insolencies of a present fortune or the eager hopes of a future which were but spurious signs not genuine effects of a brave Generosity And as good men prevail by Vertue so many base persons do sometimes by their Vices Another sort judged that all these Overtures of Peace were but to conceal more secret practices in his Enemies Army that Dinocrates had hitherto either basely or falsely by various delaies betraied the seasons of war to his adversaries and that this Treaty was but to continue him in that negligence That the Tyrant knew well enough how dangerous it was for a private person to have once born the name of a King and that such when they part with their power do abjure their safety for if not the publick Hatred yet private Revenge forbids Security The memory of Dionysius was yet fresh who when he had lost Syracuse and was besieged in his own Works and did so despond that he offered to redeem his life with a voluntary Exile out of Sicily was yet encouraged to a pertinacy by his friend Eloris who told him that Tyranny was a specious Epitaph and by his Father in law Megacles who dictated this Apophthegm that a Tyrant should rather be drawn by the heels out of his Government then voluntarily to recede from it Which so confirmed that Tyrant who was in greater distress then the present that he retained his power and weathered out the Storm that threatned his shipwreck That sure this wily Monster was as far from intending what he did offer as ever his unfaithful Soul used to keep a distance from his Tongue The event gave some credit to this last conjecture for it happened that the Treaty came to no effect For whether Agathocles did seriously intend it or no yet Dinocrates's Ambition made it frustrate Peace cannot please those whose desires are immoderate or corrupt and the desire of Greatness where it is extinguishes all other Affections Dinocrates was no less desirous to be a Monarch then Agathocles had been and was as little pleased that the Democracy should be restored at Syracuse where none that were Great could ever be safe His present command of twenty thousand foot and three thousand horse together with the disposal of all the Cities that were of the League of which he was called the General but in truth was little less then the Lord was not to be parted with for the privacy of Peace which equally obscures the brave and base and makes no difference betwixt noble and ignoble Spirits Syracuse was indeed his native City but she would be no better then his Enemy that would reduce him to the equality of a Private person make him obnoxious to the harangues of unquiet Demagogues and the censures of the giddy Rabble Upon these considerations he was as untoward to admit of Peace as he had been negligent in prosecuting the War and therefore found out many difficulties in the