an easier task to have stop'd the rising Tyranny but now the greater and more glorious action to destroy it when it was begun already and had gathered strength But all being afraid to side with him he return'd home and taking his Arms he brought them out and laid them in the Porch before his Door with these words To the utmost of my power I have striven for my Country and my Laws and then he busied himself no more His Friends advising him to fly he refus'd but writ a Poem and thus rattled the Athenians If now you smart blame not the heavenly powers For they are good the fault is onely ours We gave him all our Forts we took the Chain And now he makes us Slaves yet we complain And many telling him that the Tyrant would have his Head for this and asking to what he trusted that he ventur'd to speak so boldly he reply'd my old Age. But Pisistratus having gotten the command so honoured Solon obliged and kindly entertained him that Solon gave him his advice and approv'd many of his actions for he kept many of Solon's Laws observed them himself and compelled his Friends to obey And he himself though then in power being accus'd of Murther before the Areopagus came quietly to clear himself but his accuser let fall the Indictment And he added other Laws one of which is that the maim'd in the Wars should be maintain'd at the publick charge this Heraclides Ponticus delivers and that Pisistratus followed Solon's example in this who had before determin'd it in the case of one Thersippus that was maim'd and Theophrastus asserts that 't was Pisistratus not Solon that made that Law against Laziness which was the reason that the Country was better manur'd and the City not so clogg'd with Inhabitants Now Solon having begun a great Work in Verse the relation or Fable of the Atlantick Islands which he had learn'd from the wise Men in Sais and was convenient for the Athenians to know grew weary of it not as Plato says by reason of his multitude of business but his age and being discourag'd at the greatness of the task for these Verses testifie that he had leisure enough Now I grow old yet still I learn And again I mind a Song a Miss and glass of Wine These are most mens delights and these are mine But Plato willing to improve the story of the Islands as if 't were a fair Estate that wanted an Heir and descended to him makes them stately Entrances noble Enclosures large Courts such as no Essay no Fable no Fiction ever had before but beginning it late he ended his Life before his Work and so the Readers trouble for the unfinish'd part is the greater as the satisfaction he takes in that which is compleat is extraordinary for as the City of Athens left onely the Temple of Jupiter Olympius unfinish'd so Plato amongst all his excellent Works left this onely Piece about the Atlantick Islands imperfect Solon liv'd after Pisistratus seiz'd the Government as Heraclides Ponticus asserts a long time but Phanias the Ephesian says not full two years for Pisistratus began his Tyranny when Comias was Archon and Phanias says Solon dy'd under Hegestratus who succeeded Comias Now the story that his Ashes were scatter'd about the Island Salamis is too absur'd to be believ'd or be any thing but a mere Fable and yet 't is written by many considerable men and Aristotle the Philosopher The End of Solon 's Life POPLICOLA M Burghers delin et sculp THE LIFE OF P. VAL. POPLICOLA Englished from the Greek By Mr. Dodswell NOW Solon making such a Figure to him we compare Poplicola which later Title the Roman people entail'd upon his merit as a noble access to his former name Publius Valerius He descended from Valerius a man amongst our ancestours reputed the principal reconciler of the differences betwixt Roman and Sabine and one that with the greatest success perswaded their Kings to assent thereunto and from a state of hostility compos'd them into a friendly union To this man Publius Valerius owing his Birth as they write whilst Rome remain'd under its Kingly Government obtain'd a name as great from his eloquence as his riches the one courteously employing in a liberal distribution to the poor the other generously in the service of justice as thereby assuring should the Government fall into a Republick he would become a chief state in the Community It happen'd afterwards that the unjust and illegal aspiring of Tarquinius Superbus to the Crown with his making it instead of Kingly rule the instrument of insolence and tyranny mov'd the people into an hatred and regret of his reign insomuch that from the death of Lucretia she sacrificing her own life to the vengeance of his violence they took an occasion of revolt And L. Brutus fitting things for a change aided with the conduct of Valerius depos'd the Kings And whilst the people inclin'd towards the electing one Leader instead of their King Valerius acquiesc'd in this that to rule was rather Brutus's due as the Authour of the Democracy But the name of Monarchy growing odious to the people and to live under a divided power carrying a complacency in the prospect they chose two to the managery thereof which put Valerius in hopes that with Brutus he might be elected Consul but was disappointed for instead of Valerius notwithstanding the endeavours of Brutus Tarquinius Collatinus was chosen the Husband of Lucretia a man no ways more vertuous than Valerius But the Nobles dreading the return of their Kings who still us'd all endeavours abroad and solicitations at home were resolv'd upon a Chieftain of an intense hatred to them and no ways indulging to their interest Now Valerius was troubled that his service for his Country should be suspected to be misemployed because he sustained no private injury from the insolence of the Tyrants withdrew himself from the Senate and practice of the Bar quitting all publick concerns which gave an occasion of discourse and fear too lest through malice reconcil'd to the King's side he should prove the ruine of the State tottering as yet under the uncertainties of a change But Brutus being jealous of some others determin'd to give the Test to the Senate upon the Altars upon the day appointed Valerius came with cheerfulness into the Forum and was the first man that protested neither to contribute to or promote Tarquin's designs but rigorously to maintain his liberty which gave great satisfaction to the Senate and assurance to the Consuls his actions soon after shewing the sincerity of his Oath For Ambassadours came from Tarquin with Letters affecting a populacy and full of insinuating expressions whereby they thought to wheedle the people assuring them the King had cast off all insolence and made moderation the onely measure of his desires To this Embassy the Consuls thought fit to give publick audience but Valerius oppos'd it and would
absurd and contradictious to one another I pretend not this passage to be Translated word for word but 't is the sence of the whole tho the order of the Sentence be inverted The other is more plain 'T is in his Comment on the Word EI or those two Letters inscrib'd on the Gates of the Temple at Delphos Where having given the several opinions concerning it as first that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fignifies if because all the questions which were made to Apollo began with If as suppose they ask'd if the Grecians should overcome the Persians if such a Marriage shou'd come to to pass c. And afterwards that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 might signifie thou art as the second person of the present tense of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 intimating thereby the being or perpetuity of being belonging to Apollo as a God in the same sense that God express'd himself to Moses I am hath sent thee Plutarch subjoyns as inclining to this latter opinion these following words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sayes he signifies thou art one for there are not many Deities but only one Continues I mean not one in the aggregate sense as we say one Army or one Body of Men constituted of many individuals but that which is must of necessity be one and to be implies to be One One is that which is a simple being uncompounded or free from mixture Therefore to be One in this sense is only consistent with a Nature pure in it self and not capable of alteration or decay That he was no Christian is manifest Yet he is no where found to have spoken with contumely of our Religion like the other Writers of his Age and those who succeeded him Theodoret says of him that he had heard of our holy Gospel and inserted many of our Sacred Mysteries in his Works which we may easily believe because the Christian Churches were then spread in Greece and Pliny the younger was at the same time conversant amongst them in Asia tho that part of our Authors Workes is not now extant from whence Theodoret might gather those passages But we need not wonder that a Philosopher was not easie to embrace the divine Mysteries of our Faith A modern God as our Saviour was to him was of hard digestion to a Man who probably despis'd the vanities and fabulous Relations of all the old Besides a Crucfy'd Saviour of Mankind a Doctrine attested by illiterate Disciples the Author of it a Jew whose Nation at that time was despicable and his Doctrine but an innovation among that despis'd people to which the Learned of his own Country gave no credit and which the Magistrates of his Nation punish'd with an ignominious death the Scene of his Miracles acted in an obscure Corner of the world his being from Eternity yet born in time his Resurrection and Ascension these and many more particulars might easily choke the Faith of a Philosopher who believ'd no more than what he cou'd deduce from the principles of Nature and that too with a doubtful Academical assent or rather an inclination to assent to probability which he judg'd was wanting in this new Religion These circumstances consider'd tho they plead not an absolute invincible ignorance in his behalf yet they amount at least to a degree of it for either he thought them not worth weighing or rejected them when weigh'd and in both cases he must of necessity be ignorant because he cou'd not know without Revelation and the Revelation was not to him But leaving the Soul of Plutarch with our Charitable wishes to his Maker we can only trace the rest of his opinions in Religion from his Philosophy Which we have said in the General to be Platonick tho it cannot also be denyed that there was a tincture in it of the Electick Sect which was begun by Potamon under the Empire of Augustus and which selected from all the other Sects what seem'd most probable in their opinions not adhering singularly to any of them nor rejecting every thing I will only touch his belief of Spirits In his two Treatises of Oracles the one concerning the reason of their Cessation the other enquiring why they were not given in verse as in former times he seems to assert the Pythagorean Doctrine of Transmigration of Souls We have formerly shewn that he own'd the the Unity of a Godhead whom according to his Attributes he calls by several names as Jupiter from his Almighty Power Apollo from his Wisdom and so of the rest but under him he places those beings whom he styles Genii or Daemons of a middle nature betwixt Divine and Human for he thinks it absur'd that there shou'd be no mean betwixt the two extreams of an Immortal and a Mortal Being That there cannot be in nature so vast a flaw without some intermedial kind of life partaking of them both as therefore we find the intercourse betwixt the Soul and body to be made by the Animal Spirits so betwixt Divinity and humanity there is this species of Daemons Who having first been Men and following the strict Rules of vertue had purg'd off the grossness and faeculency of their earthly being are exalted into these Genii and are from thence either rais'd higher into an Aetherial life if they still continue vertuous or tumbled down again into Mortal Bodies and sinking into flesh after they have lost that purity which constituted their glorious being And this sort of Genii are those who as our Author imagines presided over Oracles Spirits which have so much of their terrestrial principles remaining in them as to be subject to passions and inclinations usually beneficent sometimes Malevolent to Mankind according as they refine themselves or gather dross and are declining into Mortal Bodies The Cessation or rather the decrease of Oracles for some of them were still remaing in Plutarchs time he Attributes either to the death of those Daemons as appears by the story of the Egyptian Thamus who was Commanded to declare that the great God Pan was dead or to their forsaking of those places where they formerly gave out their Oracles from whence they were driven by stronger Genii into banishment for a certain Revolution of Ages Of this last nature was the War of the Gyants against the Gods the dispossession of Saturn by Jupiter the banishment of Apollo from Heaven the fall of Vulcan and many others all which according to our Authours were the battles of these Genii or Daemons amongst themselves But supposing as Plutarch evidently does that these Spirits administer'd under the Supream Being the affairs of Men taking care of the vertuous punishing the bad and sometimes communicating with the best as particularly the Genius of Socrates always warn'd him of approaching dangers and taught him to avoyd them I cannot but wonder that every one who has hitherto written Plutarchs Life and particularly Rualdus the most knowing of them all should so confidently affirm that these Oracles were given by bad Spirits according
carefull and experienc'd that without using Swadling-bands their Children were all streight well proportion'd and beautifull and besides they us'd them to any sort of meat and sometimes to bear the want of it not to be afraid of the dark or to be alone nor to be wayward and peevish and crying as they are generally in other Countries through the impertinent care and fondness of those who look to them Upon this account Spartan Nurses were often bought up or hir'd by people of other Countries and it is reported that she who suckled Alcibiades was a Spartan but if he was fortunate in his Nurse he was not so in his School-master for his Guardian Pericles as Plato tells us chose a Slave for that Office call'd Zopyrus nothing better than those that row'd in a Galley Lycurgus was of another mind he would not have Masters bought out of the Market nor such as should sell their pains nor would he have any thing mercenary in so important a charge Nor was it lawfull for the Father himself to breed up the Children after his own fancy but as soon as they were seven years old they were to be enroll'd in certain Companies and Classes where they all liv'd under the same Orders and Discipline doing their exercises and recreating themselves together Of these he who shew'd the most conduct and courage was made Captain they had their eyes always upon him obeyed his orders and underwent patiently whatsoever punishment he inflicted so that the whole course of their education was one continued exercise of a ready and perfect obedience The old men too were Spectatours of their performances and oft-times hatch'd quarrels and set them together by the ears that by those early indications they might perfectly learn their natures and know which would be valiant which a coward when they should come to more dangerous encounters as for Learning they gave them just enough to serve their turn their chief care was to make them good Subjects to fit them to endure the fatigues of long and tedious marches and never to return without victory from the field To this end as they grew in years their exercises were proportionably increas'd their heads were shav'd they were accustomed to go bare-foot and for the most part to play naked After they were twelve years old they were no longer allow'd to wear double garments one plain Coat serv'd them a whole year and being but very seldom bath'd and trimm'd they were none of the neatest and cleanliest persons in the world They lodg'd together in little Bands upon Beds made of the Rushes which grew by the Banks of the River Eurotas and because their points were sharp they were to break them off with their Hands without a Knife if it were a hard Winter they mingled some Thistle-down with their Rushes this kept them warm and as well contented they were with it as if it had been the best Feather-bed in the world By that time they were come to this age there was not any of the more hopefull Lads who had not a lover to bear him company The old men too had an eye upon them coming often to the Schools to hear and see them contend either in wit or strength with one another and this they did as seriously and with as much concern as if they were their Fathers their Tutours or their Magistrates so that there scarcely passed a moment without putting them in mind of their duty nor was there any place so privileg'd but that they were punish'd if they had neglected it Besides all this there was always one of the best and honestest men in the City appointed to undertake the charge and governance of them he again rang'd them into several little Bands and set over each of them for their Captain the discreetest and most metall'd of those they call'd Irenes which were usually twenty years old and those who were about eighteen were call'd Mell-Irenes as much as to say who would shortly be Men This young man therefore was their Captain when they fought and their Master at home using them for the offices of his House sending the sturdiest of them to fetch Wood and the weaker and less able to gather Salads and Herbs and these they must either go without or steal them and this they did by creeping into the Gardens or conveying themselves very cunningly and closely into the Eating-houses and it concern'd them so to doe for if they were taken in the fact they were whip'd without mercy and that not for want of honesty but for want of wit because they did not lay their design well and were not fine and cunning in their faculty They stole too all other meat they could lay their hands on looking out sharp and watching all opportunities when people were asleep or more careless than usual If they were caught they were not onely punish'd with whipping but hunger too being reduc'd to their ordinary which was but very slender and so contriv'd on purpose that being press'd by hunger they might cast about to help themselves by some subtile conveyance or adventurous action and this was the principal design of their hard fare another there was not inconsiderable that they might grow the better in tallness for the vital spirits not being over-burthened and oppressed by too great a quantity of nourishment which necessarily discharges it self into thickness and breadth do by their natural lightness and agility mount upwards and the substance of the Body not being gross or in two great a quantity does more easily follow the fashioning hand of Nature whereas gross and over-fed Bodies are stubborn and untractable and she can at best make but a bungling piece of work of them This we find by experience in Women which take Physick whilst they are with Child for though the Children be by that means made something leaner and of a less size yet are they for the most part lovely of aspect and extraordinary well shap'd the remaining matter after the separation of the grosser humours being more supple and pliable and recipient of its form which is always exact and perfect in its kind when the matter is capable of it But whether this be the true reason or not I leave it to be determin'd by the College of Physicians To return from whence we have digressed the Lacedemonian Children were so very cautious and fearfull of being discovered that a youth having stoln a young Fox and hid it under his Coat suffered it to tear out his very Bowels with its Teeth and Claws and so dy'd upon the place rather than he would discover it what is practis'd to this very day in Lacedaemon is enough to gain credit to this story for my self have seen several of them endure whipping to death at the foot of the Altar of Diana sirnamed Orthia The Iren or under-master us'd to stay a little with them after Supper and one of them he bid to sing a Song
out A Lad being offered some Cocks of the Game so hardy that they would dye upon the place said that he car'd not for Cocks that would dye hardy but for such that would live and kill others Another would by no means be carried home in a Chair as he saw some others were because said he I cannot conveniently rise in it to pay respect to my betters In short their answers were so sententious and pertinent that one said well that to be a Philosopher or a Lacedemonian signified the same thing And though they were a very active people they exercised their Minds much more than their Bodies Nor were they less carefull to sing and compose well than to express themselves in proper terms and to speak to the point And their very Songs had such a life and spirit in them that they enflam'd and ravish'd mens minds with a desire to doe great and good Actions the style of them was plain and without affectation the subject always serious and moral most usually it was in praise of such men as had dy'd in the bed of honour for defence of their Country or in derision of those who would not venture their lives willingly in so good a cause the former they declared happy and almost Gods and the latter they describ'd as most miserable and below the condition of men In these Verses too they talk'd high of what feats they would doe or had done and vaunted of themselves as the bravest and most valiant people in the world The expression was different and sutable to their several ages for you must understand that they had three Choirs of them in their solemn Festivals the first of the old Men the second of the young Men and the last of the Children to give a taste of them the old Men began thus We have been though now spent and old Hardy in Field in Battel Bold The young men answered them singing We are so now let who dares try We 'll conquer or in combat dye The Children came last and said What ever ye can doe or tell We one day will you both excell Indeed if we will take the pains to consider their Compositions and the Airs on the Flute to which they were set when they march'd on to Battel we shall find that Terpander and Pindar had reason to say that Musick was not incompatible with but rather an help and incentive to Valour The first says thus of them Justice goes in procession through their Streets And Mars the Muses in sweet consort meets And Pindar Blest Sparta in whose State we find Things almost inconsistent join'd In quiet times your Martial toils not cease And Wars adorn'd with the soft arts of Peace Gray-headed Wisedom reigns in your Debates And well-bred Youth with equal Fire Handle their Arms or touch their Lyre Ye Gods the Musick of well ordered States So that these two Poets describe the Spartans as being no less musical than warlike and the Spartan Poet himself confirms it Our Sports prelude to War and Musicks charms Inspire deliberate Valour to our Arms. And even before they engag'd in Battel the King did first sacrifice to the Muses in all likelihood to put them in mind of the manner of their education and of the severe judgment that would be pass'd upon their actions and thereby to animate them to the performance of some gallant Exploit sometimes too the Lacedemonians abated a little the severity of their manners in favour of their young men suffering them to curle and perfume their Hair and to have costly Arms and fine Clothes and as well pleas'd they were to see them marching out full of metal and spirit to an Engagement as the other Graecians were to see their trim'd Horses neighing and pressing for the course And therefore when they came to be well-grown Lads they took a great deal of care of their Hair to have it parted and trim'd especially against a day of Battel pursuant to a saying of their Law-giver that a large head of Hair set off a good Face to more advantage and those that were ugly it made more ugly and dreadfull When they were in the Field their Exercises were generally more moderate their Fare not so hard nor so strict a hand held over them by their Officers so that they were the onely people in the world to whom War gave repose When their Army was drawn up in Battel array and the Enemy near the King sacrific'd a Goat commanded the Souldiers to set their Garlands upon their heads and the Pipers to play the Tune of the Hymn to Castor and himself advancing forwards began the Paean which serv'd for a signal to fall on It was at once a delightfull and terrible sight to see them march on to the Tune of their Flutes without ever troubling their Order or confounding their Ranks no disorder in their minds or change in their countenance but on they went to the hazard of their lives as unconcernedly and cheerfully as if it had been to lead up a Dance or to hear a consort of Musick Men in this temper were not likely to be possessed with fear or transported with fury but they proceeded with a deliberate Valour full of hope and good assurance as if some Divinity had sensibly assisted them The King had always about his person some one who had been crown'd in the Olympick Games and upon this account a Lacedemonian refus'd a considerable present which was offered to him upon condition that he would not come into the Lists and having with much to doe thrown his Antagonist some of the Spectatours said to him And now Sir Lacedemonian what are you the better for your Victory he answered smiling O a great deal Sir for I shall have the honour to fight by the side of my Prince After they had routed an Enemy they pursu'd him till they were well assured of the Victory and then they sounded a retreat thinking it base and unworthy of a Graecian people to cut men in pieces who durst not look them in the face or lift up their hands against them This manner of dealing with their Enemies did not onely shew their magnanimity but had a politick end in it too for knowing that they kill'd onely those who made resistance and gave quarter to the rest they generally thought it their best way to consult their safety by flight Hippias the Sophister says that Lycurgus himself was a very valiant and experienced Commander Philostephanus attributes to him the first division of the Cavalry into Troops of fifties in a square Body but Demetrius the Phalerian says quite the contrary and that he made all his Laws in a continued Peace And indeed the cessation of Arms procured by his means and management inclines me to think him a good-natur'd man and one that lov'd quietness and peace Notwithstanding all this Hermippus tells us that he had no hand in the Ordinance that Iphitus made it and
To these reasons and perswasions several other auspicious Omens as is reported did concurr and when his own Citizens understood what message the Roman Ambassadours had brought him they all addressed themselves to him instantly intreating him to accept the offer being assured that it was the onely means to appease all civil dissentions and incorporate both people into one Body Numa yielding to these perswasions and reasons having first performed Divine Service proceeded to Rome being met in his way by the Senate and People who with an impatient desire came forth to receive him the Women also welcomed him with joyfull acclamations and Sacrifices were offered for him in all the Temples and so universal was the joy that they seem'd not to receive a King but the addition of a new Kingdom In this manner he descended into the Forum where Spurius Vetius whose turn it was to be Governour at that hour putting it to the Vote Whether Numa should be King they all with one voice and consent cried out a Numa a Numa Then were the Regalities and Robes of Authority brought to him but he refused to be invested with them untill he had first consulted and been confirmed by the Gods so being accompanied by the Priests and Augurs he ascended the Capitol which at that time the Romans called the Tarpeian Rock Then the chief of the Augurs covered his head and turned his face towards the South and standing behind him laid his right hand on the head of Numa and prayed casting his eyes every way in expectation of some auspicious signal from the Gods It is wonderfull to consider with what silence and devotion the multitude which was assembled in the Market-place expected a happy event which was soon determined by the appearance and flight of such Birds as were accounted fortunate Then Numa apparelling himself in his Royal Robes descended from the Hill unto the people by whom he was received and congratulated with shouts and acclamations and esteemed by all for a holy and a devout Prince The first thing he did at his entrance into Government was to dismiss the Band of three hundred men which had been Romulus's Life-guard called by them Celeres for that the maintenance of such a force would argue a diffidence of them that chose him saying that he would not rule over that people of whom he conceived the least distrust The next thing he did was to add to the two Priests of Jupiter and Mars a third in honour of Romulus who was called Quirinalis The Romans ancienâ—â—y called their Priests Flamines by corruption of the word Pilamines from a certain Cap which they wore called Pileus for in those times Greek words were more mixed with the Latin than in this age so also that Royal Robe which is called Laenas Juba will have it from the Greek Chlaenas and that the name of Camillus which is given to the Boy that serves in the Temple of Jupiter was taken from the same which is given to Mercury denoting his service and attendance on the Gods When Numa had by these actions insinuated himself into the favour and affection of the people he began to dispose the humour of the City which as yet was obdurate and rendred hard as iron by War to become more gentle and pliable by the applications of humanity and justice It was then if ever the critical motion of the City and as Plato properly styles it the time when it was in its highest fermentation For this City in its original was the receptacle of all bold and daring spirits where men of desperate Fortunes joyning their hopes and force together made frequent sallies and incursions on their neighbours the which being prosperous gave nourishment and increase to the City and was then grown wresty and settled in its fierceness as piles droven into the ground become more fixed and stable by the impulse and blows which the Rammer layes upon them Wherefore Numa judging that it was the master-piece of his Art to mollifie and bend the stubborn and inflexible spirits of this people began to operate and practice upon them with the principles of Religion He sacrificed often and used supplications and religious Dances in which most commonly he officiated in person being ever attended with a grave and religious company and then at other times he divertised their minds with pleasures and delightfull exercises which he ever intermixed with their devotions so as to cool their fiery martial spirits and then to affect their fancies with a fear and reverence of God he made them believe that strange Apparitions and Visions were seen and prophetick Voices heard and all to season and possess their minds with a sense of Religion This method which Numa used made it believed that he was much conversant with Pythagoras and that he drew and copied his learning and wisedom from him for that in his institutions of a Commonwealth he lays down Religion for the first Foundation and ground of it It is said also that he affected the exteriour garb and gestures of Pythagoras and to personate him in all his motions For as it is said of Pythagoras that he had taught an Eagle to come at his lure and stoop at his call and that as he passed over the heads of the people assembled at the Olympick Games he made him shew his golden Thigh with many other rare arts and feats which appeared miraculous on which Timon Philasius wrote this distick Pythagoras that he might common fame acquire Did with his golden Verse mens minds inspire In like manner Numa affected the story of a mountain Nymph to be in love with him and that he entertained familiar conversation with the Muses from whom he received the greatest part of his Revelations and having amongst them a particular devotion for the Lady which he named Tacita he recommended the veneration of her to the Romans which he did perhaps in imitation of the Pythagorean Silence His opinion also of Images is very agreeable to the Doctrine of Pythagoras who taught that the First Principle of Being which is not capable to be affected with sensual passions is invisible and incorrupt and onely to be comprehended by abstracted speculations of the mind And for this reason he forbad the Romans to represent God in the form of Man or Beast nor was there any painted or graven Image of a Deity admitted amongst them for the space of the first hundred and sixty years all which time their Temples and Chapels were free and pure from Idols and Images which seem'd too mean and beggarly representations of God to whom no access was allowable but by the mind raised and elated by divine contemplation His Sacrifices also had great similitude with the Victims of Pythagoras which were not celebrated with effusion of Bloud but consisted of the flour of Wheat or Wine and such sort of blended Offerings And to make appear the inclination that Numa had to Pythagoras by other
others they were to present themselves before the Gods to obtain their blessings and success on that which was to follow And this form of Ceremony did very well sute with the preceding Doctrine which taught that men ought not to approach the Gods in a transitory way and with distracted minds but laying aside all worldly cares and wandring fancies should then onely pray when their thoughts are possessed with Divine Meditation By such Discipline as this recommended by the constant practice and example of the Legislatour the City did so insensibly pass into a religious temper and frame of devotion and stood in that awe and reverence of the vertue of Numa that they received and believed with an undoubted assurance whatsoever he delivered though never so fabulous his authority being sufficient to make the greatest absurdities and impossibilities to pass for matters and points of Faith There goes a story That he once invited a great number of Citizens to an entertainment at which the Dishes in which the Meat was served were very homely and plain and the Commons short and the Meat ill dressed the Guests being sate he began to tell them that the Goddess which was his familiar Spirit and always conversant with him was then at that time present when on a sudden the Room was furnished with all sorts of pretious Pots and Dishes and the mean Fare converted into a most magnificent Feast adorned with all sorts of the most delicious Viands But the Dialogue which is reported to have passed between him and Jupiter surpasses all the fabulous Legends that were ever invented They say that before Mount Aventine was inhabited or inclosed within the Walls of the City that two Demi-gods which were Picus and Faunus did usually frequent the Fountains and close shades of that place which some will have to be two Satyrs of the Titanian race who being expert in the faculty of Physick and dexterous in legerdemain and magical spells like the Dactyli of Mount Ida made a Journey through all the parts of Italy Numa contriving one day to surprise these Demi-gods mingled the Waters of the Fountain of which they did usually drink with Wine and Honey which so pleased these liquorish Deities that he easily ensnared and took them but then they changed themselves into many various forms and shapes intending under horrid and unknown transmutations to make their escape but finding themselves entrapped in inextricable toils and in no possibility to get free revealed unto him many secrets and future events and particularly a charm against Thunder and Lightning which they composed of Onions and Hair and the Bones of a Fish but some deny and say that these Demi-gods did not discover the secret of this charm to Numa but that they by the force of their Magick Art and Spells had constrained Jove himself to descend from Heaven to satisfie the demands of Numa and that he then in an angry manner answering his enquiries told him that if he would charm the Thunder and Lightning he must doe it with Heads How said Numa with the Heads of Onions No reply'd Jupiter of Men. But Numa willing to divert the cruelty of this Receipt turned it another way saying Your meaning is the Hairs of Mens Heads No reply'd Jupiter of living Men then Numa being instructed by the Goddess Egeria seemed to mistake and say How with the Bones of the Fish Maena which being the three ingredients that compose the charm so operated on Jupiter that he returned again to Heaven pacified and well-pleased This place was ever afterwards called Elicium or Ilicium from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies propitious or mercifull and in this manner this Magick Spell was effected Such was the superstitious humour of that Age which the example of the Prince had wrought in the Minds of the Vulgar that nothing was so absurd and ridiculous in Religion which gain'd not belief and Numa himself was said to have been possessed with such a confidence and fiducial trust in the Gods that when it was told him that the Enemy was near at hand he smilingly answered That he feared them not let them come at their peril for he was then sacrificing to the Gods It was he also that built the Temples of Faith and Terminus and taught the Romans such respect to Faith that it was the greatest Oath and the most obligatory that they could swear and to the God Terminus they offer unto this day the bloud of Beasts both in publick and private Sacrifices upon the borders and stone marks of their Land though anciently those Sacrifices were solemnized without bloud it being the Precept and Doctrine of Numa to offer nothing to the God Terminus but what was pure and free of bloudy cruelty for that he whose incumbence it was to fix boundaries was thereby constituted an Arbiter of Peace and Justice punishing those who removed their neighbours Land-mark or invaded his right It is very clear that it was this King who first prescribed bounds to the jurisdiction of Rome for Romulus would have betrayed his own cause and plainly discovered how much he had encroached on his neighbours Lands had he ever set limits to his own which as they are fences and curbs against arbitrary invasions to those who observe them so they serve for evidences to arise in judgment against those who break over and violate the borders with which they are circumscribed The truth is the portion of Lands which the Romans possessed at the beginning was very narrow untill Romulus by War enlarged them and which Numa afterwards divided amongst the indigent Commonalty that he might ward them against violent necessity which always puts men upon injurious designs and shifts and that by placing them in Farms he might accustom them to a desire of property and a regular way of living for as there is nothing that so reconciles the minds of men to Peace as Husbandry and a Country lise so it makes them abhorr all violence and gives them courage and resolution to defend their sowed Lands and Pastures from the encroachment of their neighbours Wherefore Numa that he might take and amuse the hearts of his Citizens with Agriculture or Husbandry which is an employment that rather begets civility and a peaceable temper than great opulency and riches he divided all the Lands into several parcels to which he gave the name of Pagus or Borough and over every one of them he ordained a Chief or Arbitrator in judicial causes and taking a delight sometimes to survey his Colonies in person he made judgment of every man's inclinations and manners by his industry and the improvements he had made of which being witness himself he preferred those to honours and authority who had merited most and on the contrary reproached the sluggishness of such who had given themselves over to a careless and a negligent life But above all which was a principal point of his Politicks he divided the
as Solon did but augmented the old with almost a double number He erected the Office of Questors lest the Consul if good should not have leisure otherwise to attend greater matters or if bad should have any temptation to unjustice having the Government and Treasury in his hands The aversion to tyranny was greater in Poplicola for whosoever endeavour'd an usurpation his punishment by Solon's Law commenc'd onely upon conviction but Poplicola made it death before a trial And though Solon justly gloried that when things without the least aversion of the Citizens were presented to his Sovereignty he refus'd the offer yet Poplicola merited not less who finding a tyrannical Government made it more popular by not using the Authority he might But we must allow that Solon knew it before Poplicola for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An even hand will an even state maintain Holding not too loose nor yet too strait a rein But the remission of debts was more peculiar to Solon which much strengthened the Citizens liberty for the Law intending a level little avail'd if the debts of the poor prevented that equality and where they seem'd chiefly to exercise their liberty as in debates elections and administrations of their Offices they were overrul'd by the rich yielding themselves to their disposal But 't is more extraordinary that rebellion attending usually this remission of debts yet he apply'd this as a desperate remedy and seasonably allay'd their heats by his vertue and esteem which was above the infamy or detraction that could arise from this act The beginning of his Government was more glorious for he was himself an original and followed no example and without the aid of an Allie did great things by his own conduct yet the death of Poplicola was more happy and admired for Solon saw the dissolution of his own Commonwealth but Poplicola preserv'd his inviolable till the Civil Wars Solon leaving his Laws engraven in Wood but destitute of a defender departed Athens whilst Poplicola remaining in his magistracy establish'd the Government and though Solon was sensible of Pisistratus's ambition yet was not able to suppress it but sunk under the new establish'd Tyranny whereas Poplicola utterly subverted and dissolved a potent Monarchy strongly settled by long continuance being nothing inferiour to Solon in vertue and disposition and withall favourably assisted with power and fortune to accomplish his vertuous designs and as for martial exploits Daimachus Plataeensis does not so much as attribute the Wars against the Megarenses to Solon as is before intimated But Poplicola in great encounters both as a private Souldier and Commander obtain'd the victory As to the managery of publick affairs Solon in a mimical way and by a counterfeit shew of madness solicited the enterprise of Salamis whereas Poplicola in the very beginning nothing daunted at the greatest enterprises oppos'd Tarquin detected the Conspiracy and being principally concern'd both in preventing the escape and afterwards punishing the Traitours he not onely excluded the Tyrants from the City but frustrated likewise all their expectations from thence who as in matters of conflict tumult or opposition he behaved himself with courage and resolution so in peaceable debates where perswasion and condescension were requisite he was more to be commended Porsenna a terrible and invincible Enemy by his means being reconciled and made a Friend Some may perhaps object that Solon recovered Salamis for the Athenians which they had lost whereas Poplicola receded from part of what the Romans were presently possess'd of but judgment is to be made of actions according to the times in which they were perform'd The conduct of a wise Politician is ever suted to the present posture of affairs who often by forgoing a part saves the whole and by yielding in a small matter secures a greater as Poplicola who by restoring what the Romans had lately usurped saved their undoubted patrimony and moreover procured the Stores of the enemy for them who were very much straitned to secure their City For permitting the decision of the Controversie to his Adversary he not onely got the victory but what likewise he would willingly have given to have overcome Porsenna putting an end to the War and leaving them all the provision of his Camp through a perswasion of the vertue and gallant disposition of the Romans which the Consul had impress'd upon him THEMISTOCLES THE LIFE OF THEMIS TOCLES THE ATHENIAN Translated out of the Greek By Edward Brown M. D. THE obscure Family of Themistocles gave some beginning to his honour and made his glory shine the brighter His Father Neocles was none of the most splendid of Athens but of the Division of Phrear and of the Line of Leontes and by his Mother's side as it is reported he was illegitimate I am not of the noble Grecian race I 'm poor Abrotanon and born in Thrace Yet 'mong the Greeks my fame shall never cease For them I brought forth great Themistocles Yet Phanias writes that the Mother of Themistocles was not of Thracia but of Caria and that her name was not Abrotanon but Euterpe and Neanthes adds further that she was of the City of Halicarnassus in Caria upon which consideration when the Strangers and those that were but of the half bloud or had but one Parent an Athenian were to perform their exercise at Cynosarges a wrastling place without the Gates dedicated to Hercules who was also under some illegitimacy and was not one of the great immortal Gods but had a mortal Woman for his Mother Themistocles persuaded divers of the young Noblemen to accompany him to anoint and exercise themselves together at Cynosarges in doing which he seemed with some ingenuity to take away the distinction between the truly Noble and the Stranger and between those of the whole and those of the half bloud of Athens However it is certain that he was related to the House of Licomedes for Simonides reports that he rebuilt the Chapel of Phlyes belonging to that Family and beautified it with Pictures and other Ornaments after it had been burnt by the Persians It is confess'd by all that from his youth he was of an impetuous nature full of spirit apprehensive and of a good understanding ever resolving to undertaking great actions and manage publick affairs The vacations and times of recreations from his studies he spent not in play or in idleness as other youths but would be always inventing or putting in order some Oration or Declamation the subject of which was generally the excusing or accusing his companions so that his Master would often say to him Boy thou canst never be any thing mean or indifferent but must at some time or other prove either a most heroick glorious blessing or a most destructive plague and ruine to thy Country He received very slowly and negligently such instructions as were given him to improve his manners and behaviour or to make him skilfull in any pleasure
great addition of strength and firmness Rewards and honours shall be bestowed on every man according as he shall acquit himself in the action When the King had thus spoken the Gauls chearfully undertook to perform it and in the dead of night a good party of them together with great silence began to climb the Rock catching hold of the craggy Stones and drawing their Bodies into the broken places which though hard and untoward in it self yet upon trial prov'd not half so difficult as they had expected it So that the foremost of them having gained the top of all and put themselves into order they were not far from surprizing the Out-works and mastering the Watch who were fast asleep for neither Man nor Dog perceived their coming But there were sacred Geese kept near the Temple of Juno which at other times were plentifully fed but at this time by reason that Corn and all other provisions were grown strait their allowance was shortned and they themselves in a poor and lean condition This Creature is by nature of quick sense and apprehensive of the least noise so that being besides watchfull through hunger and restless they immediately discovered the coming of the Gauls so that running up and down with their noise and cackling they raised the whole Camp The Barbarians on the other side perceiving themselves discovered no longer endeavoured to conceal their attempt but with great shouting and violence set themselves to the assault The Romans every one in haste snatching up the next Weapon that came to hand did what they could on this sudden occasion Manlius a man of consular dignity of strong body and stout heart was the first that made head against them and engaging with two of the Enemy at once with his Sword cut off the right Arme of one just as he was lifting up his Poleaxe to strike and running his Target full in the face of the other tumbled him headlong down the steep Rock then mounting the Rampier and there standing with others that came running to his assistence he drove down the rest of them there having not many got up and those that had doing nothing brave or gallant The Romans having thus escaped this danger early in the morning took the Capt. of the Watch and flung him down the Rock upon the head of their Enemies and to Manlius for his victory they voted a reward which carried more honour than advantage with it which was that they contributed to him as much as every man had for his daily allowance which was half a pound of Bread and about half a pint of Wine Henceforward the affairs of the Gauls were daily in a worse and worse condition they wanted Provisions being kept in from forraging through fear of Camillus besides that sickness came upon them occasioned by the number of Carcasses that lay unburied in heaps Moreover being lodged among the Ruines the Ashes which were very deep blown about with the wind and mingled with the soultry heat caused a dry and pestilent Air which drawn in infected their Bodies But the chief cause was the change of their natural Climate coming out of shady and hilly Countrys which afforded pleasant retirements and shelter from the heat to lodge in low and champion Grounds naturally unhealthfull in the Autumn Season Another thing which broke their Spirits was the length and tediousness of the Siege for they had now sate seven months before the Capitol insomuch that there was vast desolation among them and the number of the dead grown so great that the living scarce sufficed to bury them Neither were things any thing better with the Besieged for famine encreased upon them and not knowing what Camillus did they remained in a languishing and desponding condition for it was impossible to send any to him the City was so narrowly guarded by the Barbarians Things being in this sad condition on both sides it came to pass that a motion of treaty was made by some of the Fore-guards as they happened to discourse with one another which being embraced by the better sort Sulpicius Tribune of the Romans came to parle with Brennus where it was agreed that the Romans laying down a thousand weight of Gold the Gauls upon the receipt of it should immediately quit the City and Territories The agreement being confirmed by oath on both sides and the Gold brought forth the Gauls used false dealing in the weights first privily afterwards openly pulling back the balance and violently turning it at which the Romans being moved and complaining Brennus in a scoffing and insulting manner pull'd off his Sword and Belt and threw them both into the Scales and when Sulpicius asked what that meant What should it mean says he but woe to the conquered which afterwards became a proverbial Saying As for the Romans some were so incensed that they were for taking their Gold back again and returning and with resolution to endure the uttermost extremities of the Siege Others were for passing by and dissembling a petty injury and not to account that the indignity of the thing lay in paying more than was due but the paying any thing at all which stood not with their honour to have done had not the necessity of the times made them yield unto it Whilst this difference was amongst themselves and with the Gauls Camillus was at the Gates and having learned what had passed he commanded the body of his Forces to follow slowly after him in good order and himself with the choicest of his men hastning on went presently to the Romans Where all giving way to him and receiving him as their sole Magistrate with profound silence and order he took the Gold out of the Scales and delivered it to his Officers and commanded the Gauls to take their Weights and Scales and depart Saying that it was customary with the Romans to deliver their Country with Iron not with Gold And when Brennus began to rage and say that he had injury done him in breaking the Contract Camillus answered that it was never legally made and the agreements of no force or obligation at all for that himself being declared Dictatour and there being no other Magistrate by Law that he had contracted with those who had no power to doe it But now they might use their own discretions for he was come as absolute Lord by law to grant pardon to such as should ask it or inflict punishment on those who had been authours of these disturbances if they did not repent At this Brennus flew out into rage and it came to a present quarrel both sides drawing their Swords and vigorously assaulting each other being mixed in confusion together as could not otherwise be amongst the ruines of Houses and narrow Lanes and such places where it was impossible to draw up in any order But Brennus presently recollecting himself called off his Men and with the loss of a few onely brought them to their Camp and rising in
th' Feasts And Teleclides another of those Poets saith in mockery of him that one while Puzzled with nice affairs of State and Town His grout-Head being overset hangs down And that another while Onely from that long over-growing Pate There doth arise much trouble to the State And Eupolis a third Poet in a Comedy of his called Demi that is The People of the Borroughs making inquiry concerning every one of the Demagogues or Leading-men whom he makes in the Play to come up from Hell as Pericles comes to be named last he replies Why in the Devil's name ' mongst all the Dead That lie below hast brought us up the Head The Master that taught him Musick most Authours are agreed was one Damon whose name they say ought to be pronounced with the first syllable short Though Aristotle tells us that he was thoroughly practised to Musick with one Pythoclides And as to Damon it is not unlikely that he being a shrewd cunning Sophister as he was did out of policy shelter himself under the name and profession of a Musick-master on purpose to conceal from the vulgar his subtilty and skill in State-affairs So that under this pretence he attended Pericles to instruct him in Politicks and to teach him the mysteries of Government in the same manner as the Anointer or Master in a Fencing School useth to wait upon a young Scholar that learns to Wrestle Yet for all that Damon did not so escape publick notice how he made use of his Lyre or Harp for a covert and blind of another design but that he was banished the Country by Ostracism for ten years as a bigotted intermeddler in the Government and one that favoured arbitrary Power and by this means gave the Stage occasion to play upon him As for instance Plato one of those Play-wrights brought in a person putting the question to him under the name of Chiron who had been Achilles his Tutour likewise in Musick in this manner First I beseech thee tell me if thou can For Chiron thou they say bredst up the Man meaning Pericles Moreover Pericles did by snatches and by the by hear several Lectures of Zeno Eleates who discoursed and treated of natural Philosophy much at the same rate as Parmenides did onely that he had by exercise and practice gotten a kind of habit or knack of confuting any opinion right or wrong and of baffling people by thwarting and opposing whatsoever they said and so running them aground that they did not know which way to turn themselves And accordingly Timon the Phliasian hath given the account of him in this pair of Verses Zeno's great force who spoke to either part Confuted all and never fail'd in 's Art But he that was most conversant with Pericles and furnished him most especially with a weight and grandeur of Sense and a more grave and solid research of those Arts by which the Populace is to be managed and in the main heightned his Spirit and advanced the majesty and grace of his address and deportment was Anaxagoras the Clazomenian whom the men of those times called by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nous that is Mind or Vnderstanding whether in admiration of his great and extraordinary skill and knowledge as it clearly appeared to be in the affairs of Nature or whether it were because that he was the first of the Philosophers who did not commit the Government of the World to Fortune or Chance nor to Fatal Necessity as the principle of that order we find things in but preferr'd to the rule and manage of all other things that are jumbled and huddled together a pure and clear Vnderstanding which sifts and culls out the parts alike from amidst those confusions This man Pericles did extraordinarily esteem and admire and being fill'd up to the brim with that they call lofty way of speaking and discoursing as it were on tiptoe he not onely was as we may judge master of brave and bold resentments and of such a strain of harangue as was high in it self and free from the taint of plebeian prate and lewd knavish buffoonry but also beside that the very air of his Face and composure of his Countenance grave and not any way moved to laughter and the gentleness and slowness of his pace and gate and the decent ordering of his Apparel so that no accident could discompose him in the delivery of himself and the even undisturbed fashioning and tuning of his voice and whatever other the like advantages he had did make wonderfull impressions even to astonishment in all persons that either saw or heard him See but his patience and greatness of mind One time being reviled and ill spoken of all day long in his own hearing by a villainous and ill-tongu'd Rascal that cared not what he said he bore it patiently all along without returning him one word all this in the open Court or the Assembly of the people where he was at the same time ingaged in the prosecution and dispatch of some weighty urgent affair In the evening he went home in very good order as one unconcerned this Fellow dogging him at the heels and pelting him all the way he went with all the hard words and Billinsgate language he could rake up As he was ready to go into his House it being by this time dark he ordered one of his Servants to take a light and to go along with the man and see him safe home which was all the notice he took of him Now Ion the Poet saith that Pericles his converse and carriage in company was haughty and surly superb and full of huff and that he had a great deal of slightingness and scorn of others intermixt with his state and high thoughts of himself and on the other hand he commends Cimon's exact civility and easy compliance and gentile well-fashioned behaviour at every turn in all his conversations Well! but let us leave Ion to himself who seems to take it for granted that Vertue hath by all means somewhat of the Satyrical part in it as Tragedy hath but as for those who miscalled Pericles his gravity by the name of an affected ostentation and grandeur of state Zeno advised such persons that they also would try to affect the like garb of greatness inasmuch as the very counterfeiting and aping of good qualities doth in time by stealth procure and beget a kind of emulation for those things and a familiarity with them Nor were these the onely advantages which Pericles had of Anaxagoras his acquaintance and keeping him company but he seemed also to be advanced by his instructions far above all that superstition whatever it is which as to Meteors and the like strange Appearances doth with frightfull apprehensions possess the minds of people who are ignorant of the true causes by which such effects are naturally produced and are mad as if the Devil were in them and in great agony and
his Cronies And of this number we are told Ephialtes made one he who broke up the power of the Areopagites the Council that sate on Mars his Hill and by that means according to Plato's expression gave the Citizens a large and racy draught of liberty which set the people so a-gog as the Play-wrights inform us that like a wild unruly Horse that had flung his Rider they would be ruled no longer but champed and bit Euboea and flounced and curvetted upon the other Isles Now Pericles designing to fuit the gravity of his life and the greatness of his spirit and sense with a befitting character of speech he to put that as it were a musical Instrument in tune put his Tutour Anaxagoras often upon the stretch and by a kind of Bow-dy gloss set off those accounts he gave of Nature with artificial Rhetorick For having beside his great natural parts by the study of nature attained this height of understanding and ability of turning and winding every thing to his own purpose to use the words of divine Plato and drawing whatever might be of advantage into the Art of speaking he got the start of all others by much Upon which account they say he had the sirname or nickname of Olympius given him the same title that Jupiter himself was called by though some are of opinion he was so named for those famous works and publick buildings wherewith he adorn'd the City others would have him so called from the great power he had in publick affairs whether of war or peace Nor is it unlikely or absurd to imagine that from the confluence of those many good qualities which belonged to the man himself the glory of such a Title might be conferred upon him However the Comedies of the then Masters of the Stage who both in good earnest and out of merriment too let fly many shrewd words at him do plainly shew that he got that appellation especially upon the account of his being an able Speaker by saying that he thunder'd and lightned when he harangued the people and that he carried a dreadfull Thunderbolt in his Tongue There is a saying also of Thucydides the Milesian stands on record spoken by him pleasantly enough upon Pericles his shrewdness of speech For Thucydides was a person one of them of great credit and repute and one who had for a very long time bandied against Pericles in the Government Now when Archidamus the King of the Lacedaemonians asked him whether he or Pericles were the better Wrestler he made this answer When I saith he have thrown him and given him a fair fall he by standing out in the denial saying that he had no fall gets the better of me and persuades people into a belief of what he says whether they will or no though they saw the quite contrary Howbeit the truth of it is that Pericles himself was very wary and carefull what and how he was to speak insomuch that always whenever he went up to the Tribunal or into the Pulpit to deliver himself he prayed to the Gods that no one word might unawares against his will slip from him which should be misbecoming or unsuitable to the matter in hand and the occasion he was to speak to Indeed he hath left nothing in writing behind him save onely some popular Decrees or Ordinances And there are but few in all of his notable Sayings which are recorded recorded as this for one that he gave order that they would take away the City and Isle of Aegina then possest by the Enemy as an Eye-sore from the Piraeum a port of Athens and this for another that he fancied he saw a War coming along towards them out of Peloponnesus now called the Morea Again when on a time Sophocles who was his Fellow-commissioner in the Generalship was going on board with him and praised the beauty of a Boy they met with in the way to the Ship Sophocles saith he a General ought not onely to have clean hands but eyes too meaning that a person in such an office and charge should not give way even to the temptations of sight And moreover Stesimbrotus hath this passage of him that as he was in an encomiastick Oration speaking of those who fell in the battel at Samos he said they were grown immortal as the Gods were For said he we do not see them themselves but onely by those honours we pay them and by those good things which they do injoy we guess and judge them to be immortal And the very same case it is went he on with those that dye in the service and defence of their Country Now whereas Thucydides makes such a description of Pericles his Aristocratical government that it went by the name of a Democracy but was indeed a government by a single person to wit under the conduct and at the pleasure of one man who was chief and many others say that by him the common people was first brought on and led along to the sharing of Lands by lot taken from the Enemy and to the dividing of publick moneys formerly reserved for the uses of war to be allowed them for seeing of Plays and Shows and to distributions of Salaries by which means being ill accustomed of a sober modest thrifty people that maintained themselves by their own labours they became riotous and debauched through the methods of policy then used let us consider the cause of this change in the things themselves as to matter of fact For indeed at the first as hath been said when he set himself against Cimon's great authority he did caress the people what he could and under hand curry favour with them But finding himself come short of his Competitour in wealth and moneys by which advantages the other was inabled to take care of the poor inviting every day some one or other of the Citizens that was in want to supper and bestowing cloaths on the aged people and breaking down the hedges and inclosures of Grounds to the intent that all that would might freely gather what fruit they pleased Pericles being snubb'd and kept under by these popular arts did by the advice of one Demonides Iensis turn himself to the distribution of the publick moneys as Aristotle hath told the story and in a short time having decoy'd and won the people what with those moneys allowed for Shows and for Courts of Justice and what with other bribes and largesses and supplies he made use of these methods against the Council of Areopagus of which he himself was no member as having not been chosen by lot either Annual Magistrate or Guardian of the Laws or King that is Governour of the sacred Rites nor Chieftain of the Wars For of old these Offices were conferr'd on persons by lot and they who had acquitted themselves well in the discharge of these trusts were advanced and taken into the Court of Areopagus Whereupon Pericles having gotten so
did distribute and scatter the plentifull advantage and benefit of them among the people of the Town through all ages and conditions of whatsoever Trade and Occupation they might be As the Works then grew up being as stately and extraordinary for bulk and greatness so inimitable for beauty and gracefulness the Work-men striving to out-vy the matter and grandeur of the Work with the neat contrivance and artificial beauty of it the thing that was most to be admired was the haste and speed they made For of those things which every one of them singly they did imagin could hardly be finished and brought to an end in several successions of Governours and ages of Men all of them had their complement and perfection in the height and prime of one man's Government Although they say too that about the same time Zeuxis having heard Agatharchus the Picture-drawer boast himself for dispatching his Work with speed and ease replied But I am a long time about mine For the easiness and hastiness in doing of a thing doth not put upon the Work a lasting solidity or exactness of beauty but time being allow'd to a man's pains aforehand for the production of a thing doth by way of interest return a vital force for the preservation of the thing after it is once produced For which reason Pericles his Works are the more admired having been done so well in a little time as to hold good for a long time For every several Piece of his Work was immediately even at that time for its beauty and elegance Antique as if it had been performed by some ancient Master and yet for its vigour and freshness it looks to this day as if it were spick and span and newly wrought There is such a kind of flourishing gloss upon those Works of his which continually preserves the sight of them from being sullied by time as if they had an ay-green spirit and a never-fading soul mingled in the composition of them Now Phidias was he who had the oversight of all the Works and was his Surveyour-general though in the several Designs and Pieces there were great Masters and rare Artists imployed For Callicrates and Ictinus built the Parthenon that is the Temple of the Virgin Pallas which was in measure an hundred Foot every way and the Chapel at Eleusin where the sacred Rites of the Goddess Ceres were celebrated was begun by Coroebus who also placed the Pillars that stand upon the Floor or Pavement and join'd them with Architraves but after his death Metagenes the Xypetian rais'd the Girth or Waste of it and set up the Pillars that are above and Xenocles the Cholargian roofed or arched the Lanthorn or Loover on the top of the Temple of Castor and Pollux As for the Long Wall which join'd the Port or Harbour with the Town concerning which Socrates saith he himself heard Pericles deliver his opinion and give order about it Callicrates took that a-great This brave piece of Work Cratinus like a Poet as he was sneeringly flouts at by reason it was so long a finishing saith he 'T is long since Pericles if words would do 't Talk'd up the Wall but yet sets no hands to 't The Choir or Musick-room which for the contrivance of it on the inside was full of Seats and ranges of Pillars and on the outside in the Roof or covering of it was made from one point at top with a great many bendings all shelving downward they say that it was so made after the Copy and in imitation of the King of Persia's Pavilion and this by Pericles his order likewise Upon which occasion Cratinus again in his Comedy called The Thracian Women plays upon him with rallery thus Here comes along our goodly Jove God bless Who 's that I pray' Iobbernoll Pericles The Shells being scap'd he now has got the Moddle O' th' Musick-room help Goddess in his Noddle Then Pericles out of an ambition to doe something to be talk'd of did first enact or make a Decree that a Prize should be plaid in the Science of Musick every year at the solemn Feasts of Minerva which lasted five days together called Panathenaea whither all the people of City and Country were used to resort and he himself being chosen Judge of the Prizes and Bestower of the Rewards gave order after what manner those who were to play the Prizes were either to sing with the Voice or to play upon the Flute or upon the Cittern or Guitarr And both at that time to wit at the Feast and at other times also they were wont to sit in this Musick-room and see and hear those Prizes and trials of Skill Further the Foregate and entrance of the Cittadel or Castle were finished in five years time Mnesicles being the chief undertaker of that Work Now there was a strange accident happened in building of the Cittadel which shewed that the Goddess was so far from disliking the Work or being averse to it that she help'd to carry it on and to bring it to perfection For one of the Artificers who was the quickest and the handiest Work-man among them all with a slip of his Foot fell down from a great height and lay ill of it in so miserable a condition that the Physicians and Chirurgeons gave him over having no hopes of his recovery Pericles being at a loss and not knowing what to doe Minerva appeared to him at night in a Dream and order'd a Medicine which Pericles applying to the Man did in a short time and with great ease cure him And upon this occasion it was that he set up a brass Statue of Minerva called hence the Statue of Health in the Cittadel near an Altar which as they say was there before But it was Phidias who wrought the Goddesses Image in Gold and hath his name inscribed on the Pedestal as the Workman thereof And indeed the whole Work in a manner was under his charge and he had as we have said already the oversight over all the Artists and Workmen because Pericles had a kindness for him And this made the poor man to be much envied and his Patron to be very ill spoken of and horribly abused with stories as if Phidias had been his Pimp and took up Ladies and Gentlewomen that came to see the Works for Pericles his use The Comick Wits of the Town when they had got this story by the end made much of it and bedash'd him with all the ribaldry they could invent as if he had been the arrantest Whoremaster that ever liv'd charging him falsely with the Wife of Menippus one who was his Friend and had been a Lieutenant General under him in the Wars and with the Volaries or Bird-cages of Pyrilampes who being an acquaintance of Pericles they pretended and made as if he were wont to present Peacocks and such fine Birds to Pericles his Misses the Women whom he gallanted and kept company
that the Athenians had betray'd and surrender'd up to him both the Customs and Imposts of their subject Cities and the Cities themselves so as to bind up some and to let loose others and Stone Walls to build up what he pleas'd and again to throw them down Leagues of Alliance the interest and strength of the Nation their peace and their wealth and good fortune Nor was all this the business of a lucky hit by some emergent occasion nor was it the vigorous height and propitious favour of a State-management that flourish'd for a season but having for forty years together bore the bell away among such brave Statesmen as Ephialtes and Leocrates and Myronides and Cimon and Tolmides and Thucydides were he after the overthrow and banishment of Thucydides kept up his head still for no less than fifteen years longer and having gotten a place of command and power which was but one among the annual Magistracies or Offices and places of Trust to which there was a new Election every year he preserv'd himself free and unprevail'd upon as to money or bribes Though otherwise he was not altogether idle or careless in looking after his own advantage but as to his paternal and personal Estate which of right belonged to him he so order'd it that it might neither through negligence be wasted or lessen'd nor yet he being so full of business as he was give him any great trouble or cost him much time with taking care of it and put it into such a way of management as he thought to be the most easie for himself and the most exact for thrift For all his yearly products and profits he sold together in a lump and afterward buying every thing that he or his Family had or might have need of out of the Market he by this means supplied the concerns of his House as to sustenance and provision Upon which account it was that his Children when they grew to age were not well pleased with his menage and the Women that liv'd with him were treated with little cost insomuch that they complain'd of this way of expence in his House-keeping which was ordered and set down from day to day and contracted to the greatest exactness of thrift since there was not there as is usual in a great Family and a plentifull Estate any thing to spare or over and above but all that went out or came in all his disbursements and receipts were book'd and carried on as it were by number and measure Now there was but one Menial Servant of his Euangelus by name who kept up all this strictness of his Accounts one naturally fitted as no body else could be for such an imploy or at least bred up by Pericles himself to this Stewardship All this in sooth was but the effect of his Tutour Anaxagoras his wise instructions though he for his part by a kind of Divine impulse and greatness of Spirit which made him contemn the World voluntarily quit his House and left his Land to lie fallow and to be grazed by Sheep like a Common But I must rationally suppose that the Life of a contemplative Philosopher and that of an active Statesman is not to be one and the same thing for the one onely imploys his Mind and understanding about great and good things which Mind of his wants not the help of instruments nor needs the supply of any materials from without for what it hath to doe whereas the other who attempers and applies his Vertue to humane uses may have occasion sometimes for plenty and abundance of outward things not onely those which are necessary for his subsistence but those which are handsome also and sutable to his quality which was Pericles his case who relieved abundance of their poor And yet for all that there goes a story that his Tutour himself poor Anaxagoras while Pericles was taken up with publick affairs lay neglected and that now being grown old he muffled up himself with a resolution to die for want of Food which thing being by chance brought to Pericles his ear he was struck and instantly ran to the man and used all the arguments and intreaties he could to him lamenting not so much his condition as his own should he loose such a Counsellour of State as he had found him to be And that upon this as the story goes on Anaxagoras should unmuffle and shewing himself make answer Ah Pericles said he even those people who have occasion for a Lamp use to supply it with Oil meaning that if he would have him to live he must allow him a maintenance The Lacedemonians beginning to shew themselves troubled at the greatness of the Athenians and to be jealous of the increase of their power Pericles on the other hand to advance the peoples spirit and buoy it up yet more and to put them upon great actions and exploits proposeth an Edict or Decree in writing to summon all the Grecians in what part soever they dwelt whether of Europe or Asia and that every City little as well as great should send their Deputies to Athens to a general Assembly or Convention of Estates there to consult and advise concerning the Grecian Temples which the Barbarians had set fire to and burnt down and the Sacrifices which they were indebted upon vows they made to their Gods for the safety of Greece when they fought against those Barbarians and the Sea-affair that they might henceforward all of them pass to and fro and trade securely and be at a constant peace among themselves Upon this errand there were twenty men of such as were each of them above fifty years of age sent by Commission five whereof were to summon the Ionians and Dorians that were in Asia and the Islanders as far as Lesbos and Rhodes and five were to go over all the places in Hellespont and Thrace up to Byzantium now Constantinople and other five beside these to go to Boeotia and Phocis and Peloponnesus now called the Morea and from hence to pass through the Locrians Country over to the neighbouring Continent as far as Acarnania and Ambracia and the rest of the Commissioners were to take their course through Euboea to the Oetaeans and the Gulf of Malea and to those of Phthia and Achaia and Thessaly all of them to treat with the people as they past and to perswade them to come in and bear their share in the debates and concerts which would be for settling the peace and regulating anew the affairs of Greece When all came to all there was nothing done in this business nor did the Cities meet by their Deputies as was desired the Lacedemonians as it is said under-hand crossing the design the trial whereof was disappointed and baffled first in Peloponnesus However I thought fit to bring in this passage to shew the spirit of the Man and the greatness of his mind for State-projects In his military Imploy
at a time Wherefore he sent to a Friend one day and borrow'd some money of him in his Father Pericles name pretending it was by his order But the man coming afterward to demand the debt Pericles was so far from yielding to pay it that he arrested the man and entred an action against him Upon which the young man Xanthippus thought himself so heinously used and highly disobliged that he openly reviled his Father And first by way of droll and raillery he ridicul'd him by telling stories what his carriages and conversations were at home and what kind of discourses he had with the Sophisters and Scholars that came to his House As for instance how Epitimius the Pharsalian one who was a practiser of all the five Games of Skill having with a Dart or Javelin unawares against his will struck and kill'd a Horse that stood in the way his Father spent a whole day with Protagoras in a serious and learned dispute whether the Javelin or the Man that threw it or the Masters of the Game who appointed these Sports were according to the strictest and best reason to be accounted the cause of this mischance or Horse-slaughter whereas and make the worst of it it was but chance-medley Further beside this Stesimbrotus tells us that it was Xanthippus self who spread abroad among the people that infamous story concerning his own Wife how his Father should make him Cuckold and that this untoward grudge of the young man 's against his Father and unnatural breach betwixt them which was never to be healed or made up continued with him till his very dying day For Xanthippus died in the Plague-time of the Sickness At which time Pericles also lost his Sister and the greatest part of his Kinsfolks and Friends and those who had been most usefull and serviceable to him in managing the affairs of State However he did not shrink or give out upon these occasions nor did he betray or lower his high spirit and the greatness of his mind under all his misfortunes and those calamities which befell him Nay so unconcern'd and so great a master of his passions he was or at least seemed to be that he was never known to weep or to mourn and pay the Funeral Rites to any of his dead Friends nor was so much as seen at the Burial of any of his Relations till at last he lost the onely Son which was left of those who were lawfully begotten his Son Paralus This touch'd him home and made him bow and relent and yet he striv'd what he could to maintain his principle of gravity and to preserve and keep up the greatness of his Soul but all would not doe for when he came to perform the ceremony of putting a Garland or Chaplet of Flowers upon the Head of the Corps he was vanquished by his passion at the sight so that he burst out a crying and pour'd forth abundance of tears having never done any such thing in all the rest of his life before After all the City having made trial of other Generals for the conduct of War and Oratours for business of State when they found there was no one who was of weight enough to counterballance such a charge or of authority sufficient to be trusted with so great a Command then they hankerd after their old Friend and Servant Pericles and solemnly invited him to the Tribunal or pleading place and desired him to accept of the Office of General or Commander in chief again He was then in a very pensive condition and kept in at home as a close Mourner but was perswaded by Alcibiades and others of his Friends to come abroad and shew himself to the people who having upon his appearance made their acknowledgments and apologized for their ingratitude and untowardly usage of him he undertook the publick affairs once more and being chosen Praetor or chief Governour he brought in a Bill that the Statute concerning Bastard-issue which he himself had formerly caused to be made might be repealed that so the name and race or off-spring of his Family might not for want of a lawfull Heir to succeed be wholly and utterly lost and extinguished Now the business of that Statute or Law stood thus Pericles when long ago he flourished in the State and had as hath been said Children lawfully begotten proposed a Law that those onely should be reputed true Citizens of Athens who were born of such Parents as were both Athenians After this the King of Egypt having sent to the Commons by way of present forty thousand Bushels of Wheat which were to be distributed and shared out among the Citizens there sprung up a great many Actions and Suits against Bastards by vertue of that Edict which till that time had not been known nor taken notice of and several persons besides were trepann'd and insnar'd by false accusations There were little less than five thousand who were caught in this State-trap and having lost the freedom of the City were sold for Slaves and those who induring the test remained in the Government and past muster for right Athenians were found upon the Poll to be fourteen thousand and forty persons in number Now though it look'd somewhat odd and strange that a Law which had been carried on so far against so many people should be broken and cancell'd again by the same man that made it yet the present calamity and distress which Pericles labour'd under as to his Family broke through all objections and prevail'd with the Athenians to pity him as one who by those losses and misfortunes had sufficiently been punished for his former arrogance and haughtiness And therefore being of opinion that he had been shrewdly handled by divine vengeance of which he had run so severe a Gantlop and that his request was such as became a man to ask and men to grant they yielded that he should inroll his Bastard-son in the register of his own Ward by his paternal name This very Son of his afterward when he had defeated the Peloponnesians in a Sea-fight near the Islands called Arginusae was put to death by the people together with his fellow-Captains his Colleagues in that Commission About that time when his Son was inroll'd it should seem the Plague seis'd Pericles not with sharp and violent fits as it did others that had it but with a dull and lingring Distemper through various changes and alterations leisurely by little and little wasting the strength of his Body and undermining the noble faculties of his Soul So that Theophrastus in his Morals having made a moot-point Whether mens Manners change with their Fortunes and their Souls being jogg'd and disturb'd by the ailings of their Bodies do start aside from the rules of Vertue hath left it upon record that Pericles when he was sick shew'd one of his Friends that came to visit him an Amulet or Charm that the Women had
Command that each Consul should have his day and when his turn came he posted his Army close to Hannibal at a Village called Cannas by the River Aufidius It was no sooner day but he set up the red Flagg over his Tent which was the signal of Battel This boldness of the Consul and the numerousness of his Army double to theirs startled the Carthaginians but Hannibal commanded them to their Arms and with a small train he went forth to take a full prospect of the Enemy upon a rising ground not far distant One of his followers called Gisco a Nobleman of Carthage told him that the number of the Enemy was very astonishing to whom Hannibal reply'd with a serious countenance There is something yet more astonishing which you take no notice of that in all that Army there is not one man whose name is Gisco This jest of their General made all the company laugh and as they return'd to the Camp they told it to those whom they met which caused a general laughter amongst them all The Army seeing Hannibal's attendants come back from viewing the Enemy in such a laughing condition did verily believe that from the good posture of their affairs and from the contempt of the Enemy this laughter had proceeded which did not a little serve to raise the drooping spirits of the Souldiers According to his usual manner Hannibal fail'd not by his Stratagemes to advantage himself In the first place he so drew up his men that the wind was on their backs which was at that time very violent and by reason of the great plains of sand carried before it a great cloud of dust which striking upon the faces of the Romans did very much disable them in the fight In the next place all his best men he put into his Wings and in the Body which was somewhat more advanced than the Wings he placed the worst and the weakest of his Army Then he commanded those in the Wings that when the Enemy had made a thorough charge upon that middle advanc'd Body which he knew would recoile as not being able to stand their shock and that when the Romans in their pursuit should be far enough ingaged within the two Wings they should both on the right and the left charge them in the Flank and endeavour to incompass them This design had all the success imaginable for the Romans pressing upon Hannibal's Front which gave ground reduced the form of his Army into a perfect half Moon and blinded with the dust they followed on so far that they gave room for the Enemies Wings to join behind them and so to inclose and charge them both Flanks and Rere which they did with an incredible flaughter of the Romans To whose Calamity it is also said that a casual mistake did very much contribute For the Horse of Aemilius receiving a hurt and throwing his Master those about him immediately alighted to aid the Consul the Roman Troops seeing their Commanders thus quitting their Horses took it for a sign that they should all dismount and charge the Enemy on foot At the sight of this Hannibal was heard to say This pleaseth me better than if they had been deliver'd to me bound hand and foot For the particulars of this Ingagement we refer our Reader to those Authours who have writ at large upon the Subject The Consul Varro with a thin company fled to Venutia and Paulus Aemilius unable any longer to oppose the flight of his men or the pursuit of the Enemy his Body all covered with wounds and his Soul no less wounded with grief sate himself down upon a Stone expecting the kindness of a dispatching blow His Face was so disfigured and all his Armour so stained with Bloud that his very Friends and Domesticks passing by knew him not At last Cornelius Lentulus of a Patrician Race perceiving who he was alighted from his Horse and tendring it to him desired him to get up and save a life so necessary to the safety of the Commonwealth which at this time would dearly want so great a Captain But nothing could prevail upon him to accept of the offer with tears in his eyes he obliged young Lentulus to remount his Horse then standing up he gave him his hand and commanded him to tell Fabius Maximus that Paulus Aemilius had followed his directions to his very last and had not in the least deviated from those measures which were agreed between them but that it was his hard fate to be overpower'd by Varro in the first place and secondly by Hannibal Having dispatch'd Lentulus with this Commission he mark'd where the slaughter was greatest and there threw himself upon the Swords of the Enemy In this Battel it is reported that fifty thousand Romans were slain four thousand Prisoners taken in the Field and ten thousand in the Camp of both Consuls The Friends of Hannibal earnestly perswaded him to follow his Victory and pursue the flying Romans into the very Gates of Rome assuring him that in five days march he might sup in the Capitol Nor is it easie to imagine what hindred him from it I am apt to believe that the excess of his good fortune or some Tutelary God of the Romans blinded his reason and made him loiter away his time which made Barcas a Carthaginian tell him with indignation You know Hannibal how to get a Victory but not how to use it Yet though he failed in making the best advantage of so mighty a Victory however it produced a strange turn and improvement in his affairs For he who hitherto had not one Town nor a Sea-port in his possession who had nothing for the subsistence of his men but what he pillaged from day to day who had no place of Retreat nor any reasonable hopes to make the War continue nor his Army to hold together now became Master of the best Provinces and Towns of Italy and of Capua it self next to Rome the most flourishing and opulent City all which came over to him and submitted to his Authority It is the saying of Euripides that a man is in no good condition when he is obliged to try a Friend nor a State when it stands in need of an able General And so it was with the Romans who before the Battel branded the counsels and actions of Fabius with the infamous note of cowardise and fear but now in the other extreme they admire and adore his prudence as something divine that could see so far and foretell what would happen so contrary to and so much above the judgment of all others In him therefore they place their onely hope his wisedom is the sacred Anchor which fix'd them in so great a fluctuation and his Counsels alone preserve them from dispersing and deserting their City as in the time when the Gauls took possession of Rome He whom they esteemed fearfull and pusillanimous when they were as they thought in a prosperous condition is
Nobility and were true lovers of their Country Indeed the authority of Pericles in Athens was much greater than that of Fabius in Rome for which reason it was more easie for him to prevent miscarriages commonly arising from weakness and insufficiency of Officers since he had got the sole nomination and management of them onely Tolmides broke loose from him and contrary to his orders unadvisedly fought with the Boeotians and was slain whereas Fabius for want of that general power and influence upon the Officers had not the means to obviate their miscarriages but it had been happy for the Romans if his Authority had been greater for so we may presume their disasters had been fewer As to their liberality and publick spirit Pericles was eminent in never taking any gifts and Fabius for giving his own money to ransome his Souldiers though the sum did not exceed six Talents This right we must doe Pericles that no man had ever greater opportunities to enrich himself as having had presents offer'd him from so many Kings and Princes and States of his Alliance yet no man was ever more free from corruption And for the beauty and magnificence of Temples and publick Edifices with which he adorn'd his Country it must be confest that all the Ornaments and Structures of Rome to the time of the Caesars had nothing to compare either in greatness of design or of expence with the lustre of those which Pericles onely erected at Athens The End of the First Volume The comparison between Theseus and Romulus Homer The Family of Theseus * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies a putting any thing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies to adopt or acknowledge one for his Son The Education of Theseus Theseus reputed the Son of Neptune His relation to Hercules He slew Periphetes He kills Sinnis * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He begets Menalippus of Perigune the Daughter of Sinnis Slays the Cromyonian Sow Phaea Kills Sciron Kills Cercyon and Procrustes Arrives at Athens Aegeus perswaded to poison him not knowing him to be his Son He is discovered to his Father The Pallantidae rebell They are overcome and dispers'd by Theseus He takes the Bull of Marathon alive The murther of Androgeus The Cretans Offering to Apollo Theseus offers himself voluntarily to be sent to Crete 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ilicis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His Offering at the Delphinian Temple * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying a Goat His Arrival at Crete and Adventures there Taurus envied by the Cretans Ariadne in love with Theseus Deucalion 's Message to Athens Theseus 's Answer He fits out a Navy The Surprisal of Cnossus Ariadne left in Cypros Her death A Ceremony instituted in memory of Her Theseus his return from Crete His and his Pilots forgetfulness fatal to Aegeus Theseus his Ship Perswades the Inhabitants of Attica to reside together in one City * Metaecaea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Transmigration Lays down his Regal Power His Voyage into the Euxine Sea He builds Pythopolis Gives Battel to the Amazons Peace concluded His Marriages In most of the printed Copies it is read This is another Hercules but some Manuscripts read it better as it is here translated The occasion of the Friendship between Theseus and Peirithous The Rape of Helen Accompanies Peirithous to Epirus Peirithous 's Death Theseus in Prison Menestheus stirs up the Athenians against Theseus Castor and Pollux invade Athens for the recovery of Helen They take Aphidnae * In Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hercules procures the release of Theseus He returns to Athens Slighted by the Athenians He sails to Scyrus His Death * Whence Rome was so call'd * Divers Opinions of the Name of Rome * Of Romulus 's Birth * His Mother Faustulus * Cermanum * Ruminor signifies to chew the Cud. * Rumilia * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Velabrum Romulus his Education * Ruma signifying a Dug The occasion of Romulus and Remus being known Remus 's Speech Amulius is slain * The first design of building Rome Romulus and Remus differ about the Place Remus is slain Romulus begins to build The day when He divides the People * From lego to choose * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His Stratagem upon the Sabine Virgins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 congrego to gather together The reason of the word Talasius at Weddings * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Ceninenfian 's War against Romulus Are conquered The Sabines besiege Rome Tarpeia betrays it And is kill'd in recompence * Tarpeia Rupes The Sabines and Romans fight Are parted by the Women A Peace made The City settled * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The rise of several Customs and Feasts * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The occasion of the death of Tatius Romulus takâ—s Fidenae A Plague at Rome Cameria is taken The Veientes subdued Romulus grows insolent * Celer swift Offends the Senate Dies Several Opinions of his Death * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Julius Proculus decides the Matter Why Romulus was call'd Quirinus * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How old he was when he died * Lib. de Laced Rep. †This was the first Life that Plutarch publish'd and he seems to have a particular respect to this people by writing a Book of their wise Sayings * A subtile promise †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stab'd with a Cooks Knife * They call'd them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lycurgus envied Lycurgus his Travels Homer 's Works brought to light by Lycurgus This Story of the Aegyptians is confirm'd by some Greek Historians His return and the alterations he made This Oracle is extant at length in Herodotus The Rhetra or Oracle * Plato no great friend to a Monarchy * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The same story is told of Dionysius the Tyrant Cic. Tusc Pol. lib. 7. * The Romans allow'd them to marry at twelve years of age he covertly blames them for it †A Remedy almost as bad as the Disease blam'd and derided by the other Graecians * They kept their Court at a place called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 †These places they call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Store-houses an unnatural custom †in Alcib priore Their Exercises Their Habit. Their Diet. Their Thievery Barbarous Superstition Their Lovers Their short Sayings * The form of crying quarter among the Ancients †He seems to allude to the Questions which us'd to be put to the young Lads as Who is the best man in Sparta * a lover of the Lacedemonians †a lover of his own Country-men Their Poetry * To the young men †To the old men Their going to Battel * He alludes to the Olympick Games * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 12 in a side the Captain and Lieutenant excepted How they spent their time †These
when the Oxen went but slow they put themselves into the Waggon and drew their Mother to Juno's Temple who was extremely pleas'd with their action and call'd happy by her neighbours and then sacrificing and feasting they never rose again but died without pains or convulsions immediately after they had gotten so great credit and reputation What says Croesus angry and dost not thou reckon us amongst the happy men and Solon unwilling either to flatter or exasperate him more reply'd The Gods O King in other things have given the Greeks nothing great and excellent so our wisedom is bold and mean and low not noble and Kingly and this observing the numerous misfortunes that attend all conditions forbids us to grow insolent upon our present enjoyments or to admire any man's happiness that may change for what variety will happen is unknown but to whom God hath continued happiness unto the end that Man we call happy but his happiness that is yet alive is like the glory and crown of a Wrestler that is still within the ring unsteady and uncertain after this he was dismiss'd having griev'd but not instructed Croesus But Aesop he that writ the Fables being then at Sardis upon Croesus his invitation and very much esteem'd was concern'd that Solon was so meanly treated and gave him this advice Solon let your visits to Kings be as seldom or as pleasant as you can and Solon reply'd No faith but let them be as seldom or as profitable as you can Then indeed Croesus despis'd Solon but when he was overcome by Cyrus had lost his City was taken alive condemn'd to be burnt and laid bound upon the Pile before all the Persians and Cyrus himself he cry'd out as loud as possibly he could three times O Solon and Cyrus surpris'd and sending some to enquire what Man or God this Solon was that he onely invok'd in this unavoidable misfortune Croesus told him the whole story saying he was one of the wise men of Greece whom I sent for not to be instructed or to learn any thing that I wanted but that he should see and be a witness of my happiness the loss of which is now a greater evil than the enjoyment was a good for when I had them they were goods onely in Opinion but now the loss of them hath brought upon me intolerable and real evils and that man conjecturing these present calamities would happen bad me look to the end of my life and not rely and grow proud upon uncertainties When this was told Cyrus who was a wiser man than Croesus and seeing in the present example that Solon's saying was confirm'd he not onely freed Croesus from punishment but honour'd him as long as he lived and Solon had the glory by the same saying to instruct one King and save another When Solon was gone the Citizens began to quarrel Lycurgus headed the lower quarter Megacles the Son of Alcmaeon those that liv'd towards the Sea and Pisistratus the upper quarter in which were the meanest people the Thetes and greatest enemies to the rich insomuch that though the City yet us'd their Laws yet all look'd for and desir'd a change of Government hoping the change would be better for them and put them above the contrary Faction Affairs standing thus Solon return'd and was reverenced by all and honoured but his old age would not permit him to be as active and speak in the publick as formerly but privately discoursing with the heads of the Factions he endeavoured to compose the differences Pisistratus still appearing the most tractable for he was a sweet and taking man in his discourse a friend to the poor and very little given to enmity or passion and what his nature had not given custom and imitation taught therefore he was trusted more than the others being accounted a prudent moderate Man one that lov'd equality and would be an enemy to him that strove against the present settlement rather than undermine it himself for which his fair carriage he deceiv'd the people But Solon presently discovered him and found out his design yet did not hate him upon this but endeavoured to humble him and bring him off from his ambition and often told him and others that if any one would take away his aspiring thoughts and desire of Empire none would make a more vertuous Man or a more excellent Citizen Thespis at this time beginning to act Tragedies and the thing because 't was new taking very much with the multitude for 't was not yet a matter of strife and contention Solon being by nature a lover of learning and now in his old age living idle sporting and cheering himself with Musick and a glass of Wine went to see Thespis himself as the ancient custom was act and after the Play was done he discours'd him and ask'd him if he was not asham'd to tell so many lies before such a company and Thespis replying 'T is no harm to say or doe so in jest and merriment Solon vehemently striking his staff against the ground Ay says he if we honour and commend such Merriment as this we shall find it will creep into our serious affairs Now when Pisistratus having wounded himself was brought into the Market-place in a Chariot and stirred up the People as if he had been thus dealt with for his affection to the Government and a great many were enraged and cry'd out Solon coming close to him said Pisistratus you do not imitate Vlysses well for you cut your self to bring your Citizens into a tumult but he to deceive his enemies Then presently the People would defend Pisistratus and gathered into an Assembly where one Ariston making a motion that they should allow Pisistratus fifty Club-men for a Guard to his person Solon oppos'd it and talk'd a great deal such as he hath left us in his Poems You doat upon his words and taking phrase And again True each Man single is a crafty Soul But all together ye make one giddy Fool But observing the poor men an-end to gratifie Pisistratus and tumultuous and the rich fearfull and getting out of harms way he departed saying he was wiser than some and stouter than others wiser than those that did not understand the design stouter than those that though they understood it were afraid to oppose the Tyranny Now the People having past the Law were not exact with Pisistratus about the number of his Club-men but took no notice of it though he listed and kept as many as he would till he seiz'd the Castle when that was done and the City in an uproar Megacles with all of his Family streight fled but Solon though he was now very old and had none to back him yet came into the Market-place and made a speech to his Citizens sometimes blaming their inadvertency and meanness of spirit sometimes passionately exhorting them not thus tamely to lose their Liberty and likewise then spoke that memorable saying that before 't was
and Conduct of his Souldiers he got himself a great reputation for his wariness in doing what he did securely and safely as one who would not by his good will ingage in any Fight which had much uncertainty in the Event and hazard in the Enterprize and one who envied not the glory of those Generals whose rash adventures fortune favour'd with good success beyond expectation however they were admired by others as brave men and excellent Commanders nor did he think them worthy his imitation and was always used to say to his Citizens that If he could help it what lay in his power they should continue immortal and live for ever meaning that he for his part would ever be tender of their lives and not needlesly expose them To this purpose seeing Tolmides the Son of Tolmaeus upon the confidence of his former good successes and flush'd with the great honour his warlike atchievements had procured him making preparation to attack the Boeotians in their own Country at an unseasonable time when there was no likely opportunity for carrying the design and that he had prevail'd with the bravest and highest mettled Blades among all the City-sparks to list themselves as Voluntiers in the service who besides his other force made up a thousand he endeavour'd to divert him and to advise him from it in the publick Assembly telling him in that memorable saying of his which still goes about That if he would not take Pericles his advice nor be ruled by him yet he should not doe amiss to await Times leisure who is the wisest Counsellour of all For his saying of this he was even at that time indifferently well approved and commended but within a few days after when the sad news was brought that Tolmides himself was slain having been defeated in the Battel near Coronea and that a great many brave fellows of the Citizens fell with him this that Pericles had said gain'd him a high respect together with a great love and kindness among the people looking upon him as a wise man and a lover of his Country-men But of all the Expeditions which have been made that of his about the Chersonese the people were most fond of and mightily taken with it having proved so instrumental to the safety of those poor Greeks who inhabited there For he did not onely by carrying along with him a thousand fresh Citizens of Athens fortifie and strengthen their Cities with a competent number of good stout men but also by bracing as it were the neck of Land which joins the Peninsula to the Continent with Bulwarks and Forts all the way from Sea to Sea he kept off and put a stop to the inroads of the Thracians who lay all about the Chersonese and shut out a continual and grievous War with which that Country had been all along pester'd and harassed as being mingled here and there with neighbourhoods of barbarous people and full of robberies what of Moss-troopers that were borderers what of Banditi that lived amongst them Nor was he less admired and talk'd of among strangers and foreigners for his sailing round the Peloponnesus having set out from a Port of Megara called Pegae or the Fountains with a hundred Gallies For he did not onely pillage and lay waste the Cities along the Sea-coast as Tolmides had formerly done but also advancing far from Sea up into main Land with his Souldiers he had on Board he made some people for fear of his coming shut themselves up and keep close within their Walls and at Nemea he with main force routed the Sicyonians who stood their ground and joined Battel with him and made them turn their backs whereupon he set up a Trophee in token of his Victory And having out of Achaia in League then with Athens taken on Board of him a supply of Souldiers into the Gallies he went off with the Fleet to the opposite Continent and having sailed along by the mouth of the River Achelous he overran Acarnania and shut up the Oeneadae or descendents of Oeneus the Governours of the Country within the City-wall and having ravaged and mischiev'd their Country he weigh'd Anchor for home with this double advantage that he appeared terrible and dreadfull to his Enemies and at the same time safe and wary yet stout and active too to his Fellow-citizens for there was not any the least miscarriage or disorder so much as by misfortune or chance that happened the whole Voyage to those who were under his charge Moreover when he sailed to Pontus with a great Fleet and bravely equipped he accommodated the Greek Cities with what things they wanted or stood in need of and treated them with great kindness and courtesie but to the barbarous Nations that dwelt round about them and to the Kings and Lords of those Nations he openly shew'd the greatness of the Athenians power and how void of fear and full of confidence they were sailing where ever they had a mind and bringing the whole Sea under their dominion Further he left the Sinopians thirteen men of War with Souldiers under Lamachus his command to assist them against Timesileos the Tyrant and he and his complices being thrown out he made a Decree or Order of State that six hundred of the Athenians that were willing to go should sail to Sinope and plant themselves there with the Sinopians sharing among them the Houses and Land which the Tyrant and his party had formerly held But in other things he did not comply with the giddy humours and eager passions of the Citizens nor quit his own resolutions to go along with them at their mad rate when being lifted up with the consideration of that vast strength they were masters of and of that great success fortune had favour'd them with they were on gog both to seise upon Egypt again as their own by a former Conquest and to disturb those parts of the King of Persia's Dominions that lay near the Sea-side Nay there were more than a good many who were possess'd with a confounded and as it would have proved then and hath done since unfortunate design for Sicily a heat which afterward the Oratours of Alcibiades his party blew up into a flame There were some also who dreamed of Tuscany and of Carthage and not without reason or hope they thought because of their large Dominion and of the prosperous course they had hitherto had of their affairs But Pericles curb'd this extravagant humour of making excursions abroad and chock'd their over-busie fancies which put them upon meddling with so much business at once and turned the most and greatest part of their force and power to the preserving and securing of what they had already gotten supposing it would be a considerable business if they could keep the Lacedemonians under or at least in good order he having all along a particular peek at them which as upon many other occasions so he particularly shew'd by