Chapter XXXVI: Close of the Peloponnesian War (1)

In the populous and extensive kingdoms of modern Europe, the revolutions of public affairs seldom disturb the humble obscurity of private life; but the national transactions of Greece involved the interest of every family, and deeply affected the fortune and happiness of every individual. Had the arms of the Athenians proved successful in Sicily, each citizen would have derived from that event an immediate accession of wealth, as well as of power, and have felt a proportional increase of honour and security. But their proud hopes perished forever in the harbour of Syracuse. The succeeding disasters shook to the foundation the fabric of their empire.

In one rash enterprise they lost their army, their fleet, the prudence of their experienced generals, and the flourishing vigour of their manly youth--irreparable disasters which totally disabled them to resist the confederacy of Peloponnesus, reinforced by the resentment of a new and powerful enemy. While a Lacedæmonian army invested their city, they had reason to dread that a Syracusan fleet should assault the Piræus; that Athens must finally yield to these combined attacks, and her once prosperous citizens destroyed by the sword, or dragged into captivity, atone by their death or disgrace for the cruelties which they had recently inflicted on the wretched republics of Melos and Scione.

ATHENS AFTER THE SICILIAN DÉBACLE

The dreadful alternative of victory and defeat, renders it little surprising that the Athenians should have rejected intelligence, which they must have received with horror. The first messengers of such sad news were treated with contempt; but it was impossible long to withhold belief from the miserable fugitives, whose squalid and dejected countenances too faithfully attested the public calamity. Such evidence could not be refused; the arrogance of incredulity was abashed, and the whole republic thrown into consternation, or seized with despair. The venerable members of the Areopagus expressed the majesty of silent sorrow; but the piercing cries of woe extended many a mile along the lofty walls which joined the Piræus to the city; and the licentious populace raged with unbridled fury against the diviners and orators, whose blind predictions, and ambitious harangues, had promoted an expedition eternally fatal to their country.

The Athenian allies, or rather subjects, scattered over so many coasts and islands, prepared to assert their independence; the confederates of Sparta, among whom the Syracusans justly assumed the first rank, were unsatisfied with victory, and longed for revenge: even those communities which had hitherto declined the danger of a doubtful contest, meanly solicited to become parties in a war, which they expected must finally terminate in the destruction of Athens. Should all the efforts of such a powerful confederacy still prove insufficient to the ruin of the devoted city, there was yet another enemy behind, from whose strength and animosity the Athenians had everything to fear.

[Sidenote: [425-413 B.C.]]

The long and peaceful reign of Artaxerxes expired four hundred and twenty-five years before the Christian era. There followed a rapid succession of kings, Xerxes, Sogdianus, Ochus; the last of whom assumed the name of Darius, to which historians have added the epithet of Nothus, the bastard, to distinguish this effeminate prince from his illustrious predecessor. But in the ninth year of his reign Darius was roused from his lethargy by the revolt of Egypt and Lydia. The defection of the latter threatened to tear from his dominion the valuable provinces of Asia Minor; a consequence which he determined to prevent by employing the bravery of Pharnabazus, and the policy of the crafty Tissaphernes, to govern respectively the northern and southern districts of that rich and fertile peninsula. The abilities of these generals not only quelled the rebellion in Lydia, but extended the arms of their master towards the shores of the Ægean, as well as of the Hellespont and Propontis; in direct opposition to the treaty which forty years before had been ratified between the Athenians, then in the height of their prosperity, and the unwarlike Artaxerxes. But the recent misfortunes of that ambitious people flattered the Persian commanders with the hope of restoring the whole Asiatic coast to the Great King, as well as of inflicting exemplary punishment on the proud city, which had resisted the power, dismembered the empire, and tarnished the glory of Persia.

The terror of such a formidable combination might have reduced the Athenians to despair. Their disasters and disgrace in Sicily destroyed at once the real and the ideal supports of their power; the loss of one-third of their citizens made it impossible to supply, with fresh recruits, the exhausted strength of their garrisons in foreign parts; the terror of their fleet was no more; and their multiplied defeats, before the walls of Syracuse, had converted into contempt that admiration in which Athens had been long held by Greeks and barbarians.

But in free governments there are many latent resources which public calamities alone can bring to light; and adversity, which to individuals endowed with inborn vigour of mind is the great school of virtue and of heroism, furnishes also to the enthusiasm of popular assemblies the noblest field for the display of national honour and magnanimity. Had the measures of the Athenians depended on one man, or even on a few, it is probable that the selfish timidity of a prince, and the cautious prudence of a council, would have sunk under the weight of misfortunes, too heavy for the unsupported strength of ordinary minds. But the first spark of generous ardour, which the love of virtue, of glory, and the republic, or even the meaner motives of ambition and vanity, excited in the assembled multitude, was diffused and increased by the natural contagion of sympathy; the patriotic flame was communicated simultaneously to every breast. With one mind and resolution the Athenians determined to brave the severity of fortune, and to withstand the assaults of the enemy.

[Sidenote: [412 B.C.]]

In the year following the unfortunate expedition into Sicily, the Spartans prepared a fleet of a hundred sail, of which twenty-five galleys were furnished by their own seaports. This armament was destined to encourage and support the revolt of the Asiatic subjects of the Athenians. The islands of Chios and Lesbos, as well as the city Erythræ on the continent, solicited the Spartans to join them with their naval force. Their request was enforced by Tissaphernes, who promised to pay the sailors, and to victual the ships. At the same time, an ambassador from Cyzicus, a populous town situate on an island of the Propontis, entreated the Lacedæmonian armament to sail to the safe and capacious harbours which had long formed the wealth and the ornament of that city, and to expel the Athenian garrisons, to which the Cyzicenes and their neighbours reluctantly submitted. The Persian Pharnabazus seconded their proposal; offered the same conditions with Tissaphernes; and so little harmony subsisted between the lieutenants of the Great King, that each urged his particular demand with a total unconcern about the important interests of their common master. The Lacedæmonians held many consultations amongst themselves, and with their allies; hesitated, deliberated, resolved, and changed their resolution; and at length were persuaded by Alcibiades to prefer the overture of Tissaphernes and the Ionians to that of the Hellespontines and Pharnabazus.

The delay occasioned by this deliberation was the principal, but not the only cause which hindered the allies from acting expeditiously, at a time when expedition was of the utmost importance. A variety of private views diverted them from the general aim of the confederacy; and the season was far advanced before the Corinthians, who had been distinguished by excess of antipathy to Athens, were prepared to sail. The Athenians anticipated the designs of the rebels of Chios, and carried off seven ships as pledges of their fidelity. The squadron which returned from this useful enterprise, intercepted the Corinthians as they sailed through the Saronic Gulf; and having attacked and conquered them, pursued and blocked them up in their harbours. Meanwhile the Spartans sent to the Ionian coast such squadrons as were successively ready for sea, under the conduct of Alcibiades, Chalcideus, and Astyochus. The first of these commanders sailed to the isle of Chios, which was distracted by contending factions. The Athenian partisans were surprised and compelled to submit; and the city, which possessed forty galleys, and yielded in wealth and populousness to none of the neighbouring colonies, became an accession to the Peloponnesian confederacy. The strong and rich town of Miletus followed the example: Erythræ and Clazomenæ surrendered to Chalcideus; several places of less note were conquered by Astyochus.

When the Athenians received the unwelcome intelligence of these events, they voted the expenditure of a thousand talents, which in more prosperous times, they had deposited in the citadel, under the sanction of a decree of the senate and people, to reserve it for an occasion of the utmost danger. This seasonable supply enabled them to increase the fleet, which sailed under Phrynichus and other leaders, to the isle of Lesbos. Having secured the fidelity of the Lesbians, who were ripe for rebellion, they endeavoured to recover their authority in Miletus, anciently regarded as the capital of the Ionic coast. A bloody battle was fought before the walls of that place, between the Athenians and Argives on one side, and the Peloponnesians, assisted by the troops of Tissaphernes and the revolted Milesians, on the other. The Athenian bravery defeated, on this occasion, the superior number of Greeks and barbarians to whom they were opposed; but their Argive auxiliaries were repulsed by the gallant citizens of Miletus so that in both parts of the engagement, the Ionic race, commonly reckoned the less war-like, prevailed over their Dorian rivals and enemies. Elevated with the joy of victory, the Athenians prepared to assault the town, when they were alarmed by the approach of a fleet of fifty-five sail which advanced in two divisions, the one commanded by the celebrated Hermocrates, the other by Theramenes the Spartan. Phrynichus prudently considered, that his own strength only amounted to forty-eight galleys, and refused to commit the last hope of the republic to the danger of an unequal combat. His firmness despised the clamours of the Athenian sailors, who insulted, under the name of cowardice, the caution of their admiral; and he calmly retired with his whole force to the isle of Samos, where the popular faction having lately treated the nobles with shocking injustice and cruelty, too frequent in Grecian democracies, were ready to receive with open arms the patrons of that form of government.

The retreat of the Athenian fleet acknowledged the naval superiority of the enemy; a superiority which was alone sufficient either to acquire or to maintain the submission of the neighbouring coasts and islands. In other respects too, the Peloponnesians enjoyed the most decisive advantages. Their galleys were victualled, their soldiers were paid by Tissaphernes, and they daily expected a reinforcement of a hundred and fifty Phœnician ships. But, in this dangerous crisis, fortune seemed to respect the declining age of Athens, and, by a train of accidents, singular and almost incredible, enabled Alcibiades, so long the misfortune and the scourge, to become the defence and the saviour of his country.

ALCIBIADES AGAIN TO THE FORE

[Sidenote: [415-412 B.C.]]

During his long residence in Sparta, Alcibiades assumed the outward gravity of deportment, and conformed himself to the spare diet, and laborious exercises, which prevailed in that austere republic; but his character and his principles remained as licentious as ever. His intrigue with Timæa, the spouse of king Agis, was discovered by an excess of female levity. The queen, vain of the attachment of so celebrated a character, familiarly gave the name of Alcibiades to her son Leotychides; a name which, first confined to the privacy of her female companions, was soon spread abroad in the world. Alcibiades punished her folly by a most mortifying but well-merited declaration, boasting that he had solicited her favours from no other motive but that he might indulge the ambitious desire of giving a king to Sparta. The offence itself, and the shameless avowal, still more provoking than the offence, excited the keenest resentment in the breast of the injured husband. The magistrates and generals of Sparta, jealous of the fame, and envious of the merit of a stranger, readily sympathised with the misfortune, and encouraged the revenge of Agis; and, as the horrid practice of assassination was still disgracing the manners of Greece, orders were sent to Astyochus, who commanded in chief the Peloponnesian forces in Asia, secretly to destroy Alcibiades, whose power defied those laws which in every Grecian republic condemned adulterers to death. But the active and subtile Athenian had secured too faithful domestic intelligence in the principal families of Sparta to become the victim of this execrable design. With his usual address he eluded all the snares of Astyochus: his safety, however, required perpetual vigilance and caution, and he determined to escape from the situation, which subjected him to such irksome restraint.

Publicly banished from Athens, secretly persecuted by Sparta, he had recourse to the friendship of Tissaphernes, who admired his accomplishments, and respected his abilities, which, though far superior in degree, were similar in kind to his own. Tissaphernes was of a temper the more readily to serve a friend, in proportion as he less needed his services. Alcibiades, therefore, carefully concealed from him the dangerous resentment of the Spartans. In the selfish breast of the Persian no attachment could be durable unless founded on interest; and Alcibiades, who had deeply studied his character, began to flatter his avarice, that he might insure his protection. He informed him, that by allowing the Peloponnesian sailors a drachma, or sevenpence sterling, of daily pay, he treated them with a useless and even dangerous liberality: that the pay given by the Athenians, even in the most flourishing times, amounted only to three oboli. Should the sailors prove dissatisfied with this equitable reduction, the Grecian character afforded an easy expedient for silencing their licentious clamours. It would be sufficient to bribe the naval commanders and a few mercenary orators, and the careless and improvident seamen would submit, without suspicion, the rate of their pay, as well as every other concern, to the influence and the authority of those who were accustomed to govern them.

Tissaphernes heard this advice with all the attention of an avaricious man to every proposal for saving his money; and so true a judgment had Alcibiades formed of the Greeks, that Hermocrates the Syracusan was the only officer who disdained, meanly and perfidiously, to betray the interest of the men under his command: yet through the influence of his colleagues, the plan of economy was universally adopted.

The intrigues of Alcibiades sowed jealousy and distrust in the Peloponnesian fleet: they alienated the minds of the troops both from Tissaphernes and from their commanders: the Persian was ready to forsake those whom he had learned to despise; and Alcibiades profited by this disposition to insinuate that the alliance of the Lacedæmonians was equally expensive and inconvenient for the Great King and his lieutenants.

These artful representations produced almost an open breach between Tissaphernes and his confederates. The advantage which Athens would derive from this rupture might have paved the way for Alcibiades to return to his country: but he dreaded to encounter that popular fury, whose effects he had fatally experienced, and whose mad resentment no degree of merit could appease; he therefore applied secretly to Pisander, Theramenes, and other persons of distinction in the Athenian camp. To them he deplored the desperate state of public affairs, expatiated on his own credit with Tissaphernes, and insinuated that it might be yet possible to prevent the Phœnician fleet from sailing to assist the enemy. Assuming gradually more boldness, he finally declared that the Athenians might obtain not merely the neutrality, but perhaps the assistance of Tissaphernes, should they consent to abolish their turbulent democracy, so odious to the Persians, and to entrust the administration of government to men worthy to negotiate with so mighty a monarch.

When the illustrious exile proposed this measure, it is uncertain whether he was acquainted with the secret cabals which had been already formed, both in the city and in the camp, for executing the design which he suggested. One man, the personal enemy of Alcibiades, alone opposed the general current. But this man was Phrynichus. The courage with which he invited dangers many have equalled, but none ever surpassed the boldness with which he extricated himself from difficulties. When he perceived that his colleagues were deaf to every objection against recalling the friend of Tissaphernes, he secretly informed the Spartan admiral Astyochus, of the intrigues which were carrying on to the disadvantage of his country. Daring as this treachery was, Phrynichus addressed a traitor not less perfidious than himself. Astyochus was become the pensioner and creature of Tissaphernes, to whom he communicated the intelligence. The Persian again communicated it to his favourite Alcibiades, who complained in strong terms to the Athenians of the baseness and villainy of Phrynichus.

The latter exculpated himself with address; but as the return of Alcibiades might prove fatal to his safety, he ventured, a second time, to write to Astyochus, gently reproaching him with his breach of confidence, and explaining by what means he might surprise the whole Athenian fleet at Samos; an exploit that must forever establish his fame and fortune. Astyochus again betrayed the secret to Tissaphernes and Alcibiades; but before their letters could be conveyed to the Athenian camp, Phrynichus, who, by some unknown channel, was informed of this second treachery, anticipated the dangerous discovery, by apprising the Athenians of their enemy’s design to surprise their fleet. They had scarcely employed the proper means to counteract that purpose when messengers came from Alcibiades to announce the horrid perfidy of a wretch who had basely sacrificed to private resentment the last hope of his country. But the messengers arrived too late; the prior information of Phrynichus, as well as the bold and singular wickedness of his design, which no common degree of evidence was thought sufficient to prove, were sustained as arguments for his exculpation; and it was believed that Alcibiades had made use of a stratagem most infamous in itself, but not unexampled among the Greeks, for destroying a man whom he detested.

The opposition of Phrynichus, though it retarded the designs of Alcibiades, prevented not the measures of Pisander and his associates for abolishing the democracy. The soldiers at Samos were induced, by reasons above mentioned, to acquiesce in the resolution of their generals. But a more difficult task remained; to deprive the people of Athens of their liberty which, since the expulsion of the family of Pisistratus, they had enjoyed a hundred years. Pisander headed the deputation which was sent from the camp to the city to effect this important revolution. He acquainted the extraordinary assembly, summoned on that occasion in the theatre of Bacchus, of the measures which had been adopted by their soldiers and fellow-citizens at Samos. The compact band of conspirators warmly approved the example; but loud murmurs of discontent resounded in different quarters of that spacious theatre. Pisander asked the reason of this disapprobation. “Had his opponents anything better to propose? If they had, let them come forward and explain the grounds of their dissent: but, above all, let them explain how they could save themselves, their families, and their country, unless they complied with the demand of Tissaphernes. The imperious voice of necessity was superior to law; and when the actual danger had ceased, they might re-establish their ancient constitution.” The opponents of Pisander were unable or afraid to reply: and the assembly passed a decree, investing ten ambassadors with full powers to treat with the Persian satrap.

[Sidenote: [412 B.C.]]

Soon after the arrival of the Peloponnesian fleet on the coast of Asia, the Spartan commanders had concluded, in the name of their republic, a treaty with Tissaphernes; in which it was stipulated, that the subsidies should be regularly paid by the king of Persia, and that the Peloponnesian forces should employ their utmost endeavours to recover, for that monarch, all the dominions of his ancestors, which had been long unjustly usurped, and cruelly insulted, by the Athenians. This treaty seemed so honourable to the Great King, that his lieutenant could not venture openly to infringe it. Alarmed at the decay of his influence with the Persians, on which he had built the flattering hopes of returning to his country, Alcibiades employed all the resources of his genius to conceal his disgrace. By solicitations, entreaties, and the meanest compliances, he obtained an audience for his fellow-citizens. As the agent of Tissaphernes, he then proposed the conditions on which they might obtain the friendship of the Great King. Several demands were made, demands most disgraceful to the name of Athens: to all of which the ambassadors submitted. They even agreed to surrender the whole coast of Ionia to its ancient sovereign. But when the artful Athenian (fearful lest they should, on any terms, admit the treaty which Tissaphernes was resolved on no terms to grant) demanded that the Persian fleets should be allowed to sail, undisturbed, in the Grecian seas, the ambassadors, well knowing that should this condition be complied with, no treaty could hinder Greece from becoming a province of Persia, expressed their indignation in very unguarded language, and left the assembly in disgust.

This imprudence enabled Alcibiades to affirm, with some appearance of truth, that their own anger and obstinacy, not the reluctance of Tissaphernes, had obstructed the negotiation, which was precisely the issue of the affair most favourable to his views. His artifices succeeded, but were not attended with the consequences expected from them. The Athenians, both in the camp and city, perceived, by this transaction, that his credit with the Persians was less than he represented it; and the aristocratical faction were glad to get rid of a man, whose restless ambition rendered him a dangerous associate. They persisted, however, with great activity, in executing their purpose; of which Phrynichus, who had opposed them only from hatred of Alcibiades, became an active abettor. When persuasion was ineffectual, they had recourse to violence. Androcles, Hyperbolus, and other licentious demagogues, were assassinated. The people of Athens, ignorant of the strength of the conspirators, and surprised to find in the number many whom they least suspected, were restrained by inactive timidity, or fluctuated in doubtful suspense. The cabal alone acted with union and with vigour; and difficult as it seemed to subvert the Athenian democracy, which had subsisted a hundred years with unexampled glory, yet this design was undertaken and accomplished by the enterprising activity of Pisander, the artful eloquence of Theramenes, the firm intrepidity of Phrynichus, and the superintending wisdom of Antiphon.

He it was who formed the plan, and regulated the mode of attack, which was carried on by his associates. Pisander and his party boldly declared, that neither the spirit nor the forms of the established constitution (which had recently subjected them to such a weight of misfortunes) suited the present dangerous and alarming crisis. That it was necessary to new-model the whole fabric of government; for which purpose five persons (whose names he read) ought to be appointed by the people, to choose a hundred others; each of whom should select three associates; and the four hundred thus chosen, men of dignity and opulence, who would serve their country without fee or reward, ought immediately to be invested with the majesty of the republic. They alone should conduct the administration uncontrolled, and assemble, as often as seemed proper, five thousand citizens, whom they judged most worthy of being consulted in the management of public affairs. This extraordinary proposal was accepted without opposition: the partisans of democracy dreaded the strength of the cabal; and the undiscerning multitude, dazzled by the imposing name of five thousand, a number far exceeding the ordinary assemblies of Athens, perceived not that they surrendered their liberties to the artifice of an ambitious faction.[b]

THE OVERTHROW OF THE DEMOCRACY: THE FOUR HUNDRED

[Sidenote: [411 B.C.]]

Full liberty being thus granted to make any motion, however anti-constitutional, and to dispense with all the established formalities, such as preliminary authorisation by the senate, Pisander now came forward with his substantive propositions to the following effect:

(1) All the existing democratical magistracies were suppressed at once, and made to cease for the future. (2) No civil functions whatever were hereafter to be salaried. (3) To constitute a new government, a committee of five persons were named forthwith, who were to choose a larger body of one hundred; that is, one hundred including the five choosers themselves. Each individual out of this body of one hundred, was to choose three persons. (4) A body of Four Hundred was thus constituted, who were to take their seat in the senate house, and to carry on the government with unlimited powers, according to their own discretion. (5) They were to convene the Five Thousand, whenever they might think fit. All was passed without a dissentient voice.

The invention and employment of this imaginary aggregate of Five Thousand was not the least dexterous among the combinations of Antiphon. No one knew who these Five Thousand were: yet the resolution just adopted purported--not that such a number of citizens should be singled out and constituted, either by choice, or by lot, or in some determinate manner which should exhibit them to the view and knowledge of others--but that the Four Hundred should convene the Five Thousand, whenever they thought proper: thus assuming the latter to be a list already made up and notorious, at least to the Four Hundred themselves. The real fact was that the Five Thousand existed nowhere except in the talk and proclamations of the conspirators, as a supplement of fictitious auxiliaries. They did not even exist as individual names on paper, but simply as an imposturous nominal aggregate. The Four Hundred, now installed, formed the entire and exclusive rulers of the state. But the mere name of the Five Thousand, though it was nothing more than a name, served two important purposes for Antiphon and his conspiracy. First, it admitted of being falsely produced, especially to the armament at Samos, as proof of a tolerably numerous and popular body of equal, qualified, concurrent citizens, all intended to take their turn by rotation in exercising the powers of government; thus lightening the odium of extreme usurpation to the Four Hundred, and passing them off merely as the earliest section of the Five Thousand, put into office for a few months, and destined at the end of that period to give place to another equal section. Next, it immensely augmented the means of intimidation possessed by the Four Hundred at home, by exaggerating the impression of their supposed strength. For the citizens generally were made to believe that there were five thousand real and living partners in the conspiracy; while the fact that these partners were not known and could not be individually identified, rather aggravated the reigning terror and mistrust; since every man, suspecting that his neighbour might possibly be among them, was afraid to communicate his discontent or propose means for joint resistance. In both these two ways, the name and assumed existence of the Five Thousand lent strength to the real Four Hundred conspirators. It masked their usurpation, while it increased their hold on the respect and fears of the citizens.

As soon as the public assembly at Colonus had, with such seeming unanimity, accepted all the propositions of Pisander, they were dismissed; and the new regiment of Four Hundred were chosen and constituted in the form prescribed. It now only remained to install them in the senate house. But this could not be done without force, since the senators were already within it; having doubtless gone thither immediately from the assembly, where their presence, at least the presence of the prytanes, or senators of the presiding tribe, was essential as legal presidents. They had to deliberate what they would do under the decree just passed, which divested them of all authority. Nor was it impossible that they might organise armed resistance; for which there seemed more than usual facility at the present moment, since the occupation of Decelea by the Lacedæmonians kept Athens in a condition like that of a permanent camp, with a large proportion of the citizens day and night under arms. Against this chance the Four Hundred made provision. They selected that hour of the day when the greater number of citizens habitually went home, probably to their morning meal, leaving the military station, with the arms piled and ready, under comparatively thin watch. While the general body of hoplites left the station at this hour, according to the usual practice, the hoplites--Andrian, Tenian, and others--in the immediate confidence of the Four Hundred, were directed, by private order, to hold themselves prepared and in arms, at a little distance off; so that if any symptoms should appear of resistance being contemplated, they might at once interfere and forestall it.

The Four Hundred then marched to the senate house, each man with a dagger concealed under his garment, and followed by their special bodyguard of 120 young men from various Grecian cities, the instruments of the assassinations ordered by Antiphon and his colleagues. In this array they marched into the senate house, where the senators were assembled, and commanded them to depart; at the same time tendering to them their pay for all the remainder of the year--seemingly about three months or more down to the beginning of _Hecatombæon_, the month of new nominations--during which their functions ought to have continued. The senators were no way prepared to resist the decree just passed under the forms of legality, with an armed body now arrived to enforce its execution. They obeyed and departed, each man as he passed the door receiving the salary tendered to him. That they should yield obedience to superior force, under the circumstances, can excite neither censure nor surprise; but that they should accept, from the hands of the conspirators, this anticipation of an unearned salary, was a meanness which almost branded them as accomplices, and dishonoured the expiring hour of the last democratical authority. The Four Hundred now at last found themselves triumphantly installed in the senate house, without the least resistance, either from within its walls or even from without, by any portion of the citizens.

Thus perished, or seemed to perish, the democracy of Athens, after an uninterrupted existence of nearly one hundred years since the revolution of Clisthenes. So incredible did it appear that the numerous, intelligent, and constitutional citizens of Athens should suffer their liberties to be overthrown by a band of four hundred conspirators, while the great mass of them not only loved their democracy, but had arms in their hands to defend it, that even their enemy and neighbour Agis, at Decelea, could hardly imagine the revolution to be a fact accomplished.

The ulterior success of the conspiracy--when all prospect of Persian gold, or improved foreign position, was at an end--is due to the combinations, alike nefarious and skillful, of Antiphon, wielding and organising the united strength of the aristocratical classes at Athens; strength always exceedingly great, but under ordinary circumstances working in fractions disunited and even reciprocally hostile to each other--restrained by the ascendent democratical institutions--and reduced to corrupt what it could not overthrow. Antiphon, about to employ this anti-popular force in one systematic scheme, and for the accomplishment of a predetermined purpose, keeps still within the same ostensible constitutional limits. He raises no open mutiny: he maintains inviolate the cardinal point of Athenian political morality--respect to the decision of the senate and political assembly, as well as to constitutional maxims.

He knows, however, that the value of these meetings, depends upon freedom of speech; and that, if that freedom be suppressed, the assembly itself becomes a nullity, or rather an instrument of positive imposture and mischief. Accordingly, he causes all the popular orators to be successively assassinated, so that no man dares to open his mouth on that side; while on the other hand, the anti-popular speakers are all loud and confident, cheering one another on, and seeming to represent all the feeling of the persons present. By thus silencing each individual leader, and intimidating every opponent from standing forward as spokesman, he extorts the formal sanction of the assembly and the senate to measures which the large majority of the citizens detest. That majority, however, are bound by their own constitutional forms; and when the decision of these, by whatever means obtained, is against them, they have neither the inclination nor the courage to resist. In no part of the world has this sentiment of constitutional duty, and submission to the vote of a legal majority, been more keenly and universally felt, than it was among the citizens of democratical Athens.[57] Antiphon thus finds means to employ the constitutional sentiment of Athens as a means of killing the constitution: the mere empty form, after its vital and protective efficacy has been abstracted, remains simply as a cheat to paralyse individual patriotism.

As Grecian history has been usually written, we are instructed to believe that the misfortunes, and the corruption, and the degradation of the democratical states are brought upon them by the class of demagogues, of whom Cleon, Hyperbolus, Androcles, etc., stand forth as specimens. These men are represented as mischief makers and revilers, accusing without just cause, and converting innocence into treason. Now the history of this conspiracy of the Four Hundred presents to us the other side of the picture. It shows that the political enemies, against whom the Athenian people were protected by their democratical institutions, and by the demagogues as living organs of those institutions, were not fictitious but dangerously real. It reveals the continued existence of powerful anti-popular combinations, ready to come together for treasonable purposes when the moment appeared safe and tempting. It manifests the character and morality of the leaders, to whom the direction of the anti-popular force naturally fell. It proves that these leaders, men of uncommon ability, required nothing more than the extinction or silence of the demagogues, to be enabled to subvert the popular securities and get possession of the government. We need no better proof to teach us what was the real function and intrinsic necessity of these demagogues in the Athenian system, taking them as a class, and apart from the manner in which individuals among them may have performed their duty. They formed the vital movement of all that was tutelary and public spirited in democracy. Aggressive in respect to official delinquents, they were defensive in respect to the public and the constitution.

If that force, which Antiphon found ready made, had not been efficient, at an earlier period in stifling the democracy, it was because there were demagogues to cry aloud, as well as assemblies to hear and sustain them. If Antiphon’s conspiracy was successful, it was because he knew where to aim his blows, so as to strike down the real enemies of the oligarchy and the real defenders of the people. We here employ the term demagogue because it is that commonly used by those who denounce the class of men here under review: the proper neutral phrase, laying aside odious associations, would be to call them popular speakers, or opposition speakers. But, by whatever name they may be called, it is impossible rightly to conceive their position in Athens, without looking at them in contrast and antithesis with those anti-popular forces against which they formed the indispensable barrier, and which come forth into such manifest and melancholy working under the organising hands of Antiphon and Phrynichus.[c]

THE REVOLT FROM THE FOUR HUNDRED

The conduct of the Four Hundred tyrants (for historians have justly adopted the language of Athenian resentment) soon opened the eyes and understanding of the most thoughtless. They abolished every vestige of ancient freedom; employed mercenary troops levied from the small islands of the Ægean, to overawe the multitude, and to intimidate, in some instances to destroy, their real or suspected enemies. Instead of seizing the opportunity of annoying the Peloponnesians, enraged at the treachery of Tissaphernes, and mutinous for want of pay and subsistence, they sent ambassadors to solicit peace from the Spartans on the most dishonourable terms. Their tyranny rendered them odious in the city, and their cowardice made them contemptible in the camp at Samos. Their cruelty and injustice were described and exaggerated by the fugitives who continually arrived in that island. Thrasybulus and Thrasyllus, two officers of high merit and distinction, though not actually entrusted with a share in the principal command, gave activity and boldness to the insurgents. The abettors of the new government were attacked by surprise: thirty of the most criminal were put to death, several others were banished, democracy was re-established in the camp, and the soldiers were bound by oath to maintain their hereditary government against the conspiracy of domestic foes, and to act with vigour against the public enemy.

Thrasybulus, who headed this successful and meritorious sedition, had a mind to conceive, a tongue to persuade, and a hand to execute the most daring designs. He exhorted the soldiers not to despair of effecting in the capital the same revolution which they had produced in the camp. Their most immediate concern was to recall Alcibiades, who had been deceived and disgraced by the tyrants, and who not only felt with peculiar sensibility, but could resent with becoming dignity, the wrongs of his country and his own. The advice of Thrasybulus was approved; soon after he sailed to Magnesia, and returned in company with Alcibiades.

Though the army immediately saluted him general, Alcibiades left the care of the troops to his colleagues Thrasybulus and Thrasyllus, and withdrew himself from the applauses of his admiring countrymen, on pretence of concerting with Tissaphernes the system of their future operations. But his principal motive was to show himself to the Persian, in the new and illustrious character with which he was invested; for having raised his authority among the Athenians by his influence with the satrap, he expected to strengthen this influence by the support of that authority. Before he returned to the camp, ambassadors had been sent by the tyrants, to attempt a negotiation with the partisans of democracy, who, inflamed by continual reports of the indignities and cruelties committed in Athens, prepared to sail thither to protect their friends and take vengeance on their enemies. Alcibiades judiciously opposed this rash resolution which must have left the Hellespont, Ionia, and the islands, at the mercy of the hostile fleet. But he commanded the ambassadors to deliver to their masters a short but pithy message: “That they must divest themselves of their illegal power, and restore the ancient constitution. If they delayed obedience, he would sail to the Piræus, and deprive them of their authority and their lives.”

When this message was reported at Athens, it added to the disorder and confusion in which that unhappy city was involved. The Four Hundred who had acted with unanimity in usurping the government, soon disagreed about the administration, and split into factions, which persecuted each other as furiously as both had persecuted the people. Theramenes and Aristocrates condemned and opposed the tyrannical measures of their colleagues. The perfidious Phrynichus was slain: both parties prepared for taking arms; and the horrors of a Corcyrean sedition were ready to be renewed in Athens, when the old men, the children, the women, and strangers, interposed for the safety of a city which had long been the ornament of Greece, the terror of Persia, and the admiration of the world.

Had the public enemy availed themselves of this opportunity to assault the Piræus, Athens could not have been saved from immediate destruction. But the Peloponnesian forces at Miletus, long clamorous and discontented, had broken out into open mutiny, when they heard of the recall of Alcibiades, and the hostile intentions of Tissaphernes. They destroyed the Persian fortifications in the neighbourhood of Miletus; they put the garrisons to the sword; their treacherous commander, Astyochus, saved his life by flying to an altar; nor was the tumult appeased until the guilty were removed from their sight, and Mindarus, an officer of approved valour and fidelity, arrived from Sparta to assume the principal command.

The dreadful consequences which must have resulted to the Athenians, if, during the fury of their sedition, the enemy had attacked them with a fleet of a hundred and fifty sail, may be conceived by the terror inspired by a much smaller Peloponnesian squadron of only forty-two vessels commanded by the Spartan Agesandridas. The friends of the constitution had assembled in the spacious theatre of Bacchus. The most important matters were in agitation, when the alarm was given that some Peloponnesian ships had been seen on the coast. All ranks of men hastened to the Piræus; and prepared thirty-six vessels for taking the sea. When Agesandridas perceived the ardent opposition which he must encounter in attempting to land, he doubled the promontory of Sunium, and sailed towards the fertile island of Eubœa, from which, since the fortification of Decelea, the Athenians had derived far more plentiful supplies than from the desolated territory of Attica. To defend a country which formed their principal resource, they sailed in pursuit of the enemy, and observed them next day near the shore of Eretria, the most considerable town in the island.

The Eubœans, who had long watched an opportunity to revolt, supplied the Peloponnesian squadron with all necessaries in abundance; but instead of furnishing a market to the Athenians, they retired from the coast on their approach. The commanders were obliged to weaken their strength by despatching several parties into the country to procure provisions; Agesandridas seized this opportunity to attack them: most of the ships were taken; the crews swam to land; many were cruelly murdered by the Eretrians, from whom they expected protection; and such only survived as took refuge in the Athenian garrisons scattered over the island.

The news of this misfortune were most alarming to the Athenians. Neither the invasion of Xerxes, nor even the defeat in Sicily, occasioned such terrible consternation. They dreaded the immediate defection of Eubœa; they had no more ships to launch; no means of resisting their multiplied enemies: the city was divided against the camp, and divided against itself. Yet the magnanimous firmness of Theramenes did not allow the friends of liberty to despair. He encouraged them to disburden the republic of its domestic foes, who had summoned, or who were at least believed to have summoned, the assistance of the Lacedæmonian fleet, that they might be enabled to enslave their fellow citizens. Antiphon, Pisander, and the most obnoxious, seasonably escaped; the rest submitted. A decree was passed, recalling Alcibiades, and approving the conduct of the troops at Samos. The sedition ceased. The democracy, which had been interrupted four months, was restored; and such are the resources of a free government, that even this violent fermentation was not unproductive of benefit to the state.

THE TRIUMPHS OF ALCIBIADES

[Sidenote: [411-409 B.C.]]

The Spartans, who formerly rejected the friendship, now courted the protection of Pharnabazus; to whose northern province they sailed with the principal strength of their armament, proceeded northwards in pursuit of the enemy; and the important straits, which join the Euxine and Ægean seas, became, and long continued, the scene of conflict. In the twenty-first winter of the war, a year already distinguished by the dissolution and revival of their democracy, the Athenians prevailed in three successive engagements, including Cynossema, the event of which became continually more decisive.

The Spartans yielded possession of the sea, which they hoped soon to recover, and retired to the friendly harbours of Cyzicus, to repair their shattered fleet; while the Athenians profited by the fame of their victory, and by the terror of their arms, to demand contributions from the numerous and wealthy towns in that neighbourhood. It was determined, chiefly by the advice of Alcibiades, to attack the enemy at Cyzicus; for which purpose they sailed, with eighty galleys, to the small island of Proconnesus, near the western extremity of the Propontis, and ten miles distant from the station of the Peloponnesian fleet. Alcibiades surprised sixty vessels on a dark and rainy morning, as they were manœuvring at a distance from the harbour, and skilfully intercepted their retreat. As the day cleared up, the rest sailed forth to their assistance; the action became general; the Athenians obtained a complete victory, and their valour was rewarded by the capture of the whole Peloponnesian fleet, except the Syracusan ships, which were burned, in the face of a victorious enemy, by the enterprising Hermocrates. The Peloponnesians were assisted by Pharnabazus in equipping a new fleet; but were deprived of the wise counsels of Hermocrates, whose abilities were well fitted both to prepare and to employ the resources of war. The success of the Asiatic expedition had not corresponded to the sanguine hopes of his countrymen; the insolent populace accused their commanders of incapacity; and a mandate was sent from Syracuse, depriving them of their office, and punishing them with banishment.

Meanwhile Thrasyllus obtained at Athens the supplies which he had gone to solicit; supplies far more powerful than he had reason to expect. With these forces, Thrasyllus sailed to Samos. He took Colophon, with several places of less note, in Ionia; penetrated into the heart of Lydia, burning the corn and villages; and returned to the shore, driving before him a numerous body of slaves, and other valuable booty. His courage was increased by the want of resistance on the part of Tissaphernes, whose province he had invaded; of the Peloponnesian forces at Miletus; and of the revolted colonies of Athens. He resolved, therefore, to attack the beautiful and flourishing city of Ephesus, which was then the principal ornament and defence of the Ionic coast. The Athenians were defeated, with the loss of three hundred men; and retiring from the field of battle, they sought refuge in their ships, and prepared to sail towards the Hellespont.

During the voyage thither, they fell in with twenty Sicilian galleys, of which they took four, and pursued the rest to Ephesus. Having soon afterwards reached the Hellespont, they found the Athenian armament at Lampsacus, where Alcibiades thought proper to muster the whole military and naval forces. They made a conjunct expedition against Abydos. Pharnabazus defended the place with a numerous body of Persian cavalry. The disgraced troops of Thrasyllus rejoiced in an opportunity to retrieve their honour. They attacked, repelled, and routed the enemy.

[Sidenote: [408-407 B.C.]]

For several years the measures of the Athenians had been almost uniformly successful; but the twenty-fourth campaign was distinguished by peculiar favours of fortune. The Athenians returned in triumph to attack the fortified cities, which still declined submission; an undertaking in which Alcibiades displayed the wonderful resources of his extraordinary genius. By gradual approaches, by sudden assaults, by surprise, by treason, or by stratagem, he in a few months became master of Chalcedon, Selymbria, and at last of Byzantium itself. His naval success was equally conspicuous. The Athenians again commanded the sea. The small squadrons fitted out by the enemy successively fell into their power. It was computed by the partisans of Alcibiades, that, since assuming the command, he had taken or destroyed two hundred Syracusan and Peloponnesian galleys; and his superiority of naval strength enabled him to raise such contributions, both in the Euxine and Mediterranean, as abundantly supplied his fleet and army with every necessary article of subsistence and accommodation.

While the Athenian arms were crowned with such glory abroad, the Attic territory was continually harassed by King Agis, and the Lacedæmonian troops posted at Decelea. Their bold and sudden incursions frequently threatened the safety of the city itself; the desolated lands afforded no advantage to the ruined proprietors; nor could the Athenians venture without their walls, to celebrate their accustomed festivals. Alcibiades, animated by his foreign victories, hoped to relieve the domestic sufferings of his country; and after an absence of many years, distinguished by such a variety of fortune, eagerly longed to revisit his native city, and enjoy the rewards and honours usually bestowed by the Greeks on successful valour. This celebrated voyage, which several ancient historians studiously decorated with every circumstance of naval triumph, was performed in the twenty-fifth summer of the war. Notwithstanding all his services, the cautious son of Clinias, instructed by adversity, declined to land in the Piræus, until he was informed that the assembly had repealed the decrees against him, formally revoked his banishment, and prolonged the term of his command. Even after this agreeable intelligence he was still unable to conquer his well-founded distrust of the variable and capricious humours of the people; nor would he approach the crowded shore, till he observed, in the midst of the multitude, his principal friends and relations inviting him by their voice and action. He then landed amidst the universal acclamations of the spectators, who, unattentive to the naval pomp, and regardless of the other commanders, fixed their eyes only on Alcibiades. Next day an extraordinary assembly was summoned, by order of the magistrates, that he might explain and justify his apparent misconduct, and receive the rewards due to his acknowledged merit.

Before judges so favourably disposed to hear him, Alcibiades found no difficulty to make his defence. He was appointed commander-in-chief by sea and land. A hundred galleys were equipped, and transports were prepared for fifteen hundred heavy-armed men, with a proportional body of cavalry.

Several months had passed in these preparations, when the Eleusinian festival approached; a time destined to commemorate and to diffuse the temporal and spiritual gifts of the goddess Ceres, originally bestowed on the Athenians, and by them communicated to the rest of Greece.

Besides the mysterious ceremonies of the temple, the worship of that bountiful goddess was celebrated by vocal and instrumental music, by public shows, and exhibitions, which continued during several days, and above all, by the pompous procession, which marched for ten miles along the sacred road leading from Athens to Eleusis. This important part of the solemnity had formerly been intermitted, because the Athenians, after the loss of Decelea, were no longer masters of the road, and were compelled, contrary to established custom, to proceed by sea to the temple of Ceres. Alcibiades determined to wipe off the stain of impiety which had long adhered to his character, by renewing, in all its lustre, this venerable procession. After sufficient garrisons had been left to defend the Athenian walls and fortresses, the whole body of heavy-armed troops were drawn out to protect the Eleusinian procession, which marched along the usual road to the temple, and afterwards returned to Athens, without suffering any molestation from the Lacedæmonians; having united, on this occasion alone, all the splendour of war with the pomp of superstition.

[Sidenote: [407 B.C.]]

Soon after this meritorious enterprise, Alcibiades prepared to sail for Lesser Asia, accompanied by the affectionate admiration of his fellow citizens, who flattered themselves that the abilities and fortune of their commander would speedily reduce Chios, Ephesus, Miletus, and the other revolted cities and islands. The general alacrity, however, was somewhat abated by the reflection, that the arrival of Alcibiades in Athens coincided with the anniversary of the _plynteria_, a day condemned to melancholy idleness, from a superstitious belief that nothing undertaken on that day could be brought to a prosperous conclusion.

While the superstitious multitude trembled at the imaginary anger of Minerva, men of reflection and experience dreaded the activity and valour of Lysander, who, during the residence of Alcibiades at Athens, had taken the command of the Peloponnesian forces in the East. Years had added experience to his valour, and enlarged the resources, without abating the ardour, of his ambitious mind. In his transactions with the world, he had learned to soften the harsh asperity of his national manners; to gain by fraud what could not be effected by force; and, in his own figurative language, to “eke out the lion’s with the fox’s skin.” This mixed character admirably suited the part which he was called to act.