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were included, and sent troops to Pylus to lay waste Laconia. In this manner they again involved themselves in the war which they were so lately desirous of avoiding.

* Plutarch, after relating the intrigue of Alcibiades, adds, "No one can 66 approve the methods he employed to succeed in his design; however it 66 was a master-stroke to disunite and shake almost every part of Pelopon66 nesus in this manner, and raise up in one day so many enemies against "the Lacedæmonians." In my opinion this is too soft a censure of so knavish and perfidious an action, which, how successful soever it might have been, was notwithstanding horrid in itself, and of a nature never to be sufficiently detested.

†There was in Athens, a citizen, Hyperbolus by name, a very wicked man, whom the comic poets generally made the object of their raillery and invectives. He was hardened in evil, and become insensible to infamy, by renouncing all sentiments of honour, which could only be the effect of a soul abandoned entirely to vice. Hyperbolus was not agreeable to any one; and yet the people made use of him to humble those in high stations, and involve them in difficulties. Two citizens, Nicias and Alcibiades, engrossed at that time all the authority in Athens. The dissolute life of the latter shocked the Athenians, who besides dreaded his audacity and haughtiness. On the other side, Nicias, by always opposing, without the least reserve, their unjust desires, and by obliging them to take the most useful measures, was become very odious to them. One would have imagined, that as the people were thus alienated from both, they would not have failed to put the ostracism in force against one of them. Of the two parties which prevailed at that time in the city, one consisted of the young men, who were eager for war, the other of the old men, who were desirous for peace; the former endeavoured to procure the banishment of Nicias, and the latter of Alcibiades. Hyperbolus, whose only merit was his impudence, in hopes of succeeding whichsoever of them should be removed, declared openly against them, and was eternally exasperating the people against both. However, the two factions being afterwards reconciled, he himself was banished by, and put an end to the ostracism, which seemed to have been demeaned in being employed against a man of so base a character; for hitherto there was a kind of honour and dignity annexed to this punishment. Hyperbolus was therefore the last who was sentenced by the ostracism; as Hipparchus, a near relation of Pisistratus the tyrant, had been the first.

SECTION V.

ALCIBIADES ENGAGES THE ATHENIANS IN THE WAR OF SICILY.

SIXTEENTH AND SEVENTEENTH YEARS OF THE WAR.

I PASS over several inconsiderable events, to hasten to the relation of that of the greatest importance, the expedition of the Athenians into Sicily, to which they were especially excited by Alcibiades. This is the 16th year of the Peloponnesian war.

Alcibiades had gained a surprising ascendant over the minds of the people, though they were perfectly well acquainted with his character.

*In Alcib. p. 198.

Plut. in Alcib. p. 196, 197. In Nic. p. 530, 531. A. M. 3588. Ant. J. C. 416. Thucyd. 1. viii. p. 350-409. Plut. in Alcib. 198-200. In Nic. p. 531.

For his great qualities were united with still greater vices, which he did not take the least pains to conceal. He passed his life in such an excess of luxury and voluptuousness, as was a scandal to that city. Nothing was seen in his house but festivals, rejoicings, and parties of pleasure and debauchery. He showed very little regard to the customs of his country, and less to religion and the gods. All persons of sense and judgment, besides the strong aversion they had for his irregularities, dreaded exceeddingly the consequences of his audacity, profusion and utter contempt of the laws, which they considered as so many steps by which Alcibiades would rise to tyrannical power.

Aristophanes, in one of his comedies,* shows admirably well, in a single verse, the disposition of the people with regard to him: "They hate "Alcibiades," says he, "and yet cannot do without him." And indeedthe prodigious sums he squandered on the people; the pompous games and shows he exhibited to please them; the magnificent and almost incredible presents which he made the city; the grace and beauty of his whole person; his eloquence; his bodily strength, joined to his courage and experience; in a word, this assemblage of great qualities made the Athenians wink at his faults, and bear them patiently, always endeavouring to lessen and screen them under soft and favourable names; for they called them sports, polite pastimes, and indications of his humanity and good nature.

Timon, the man-hater, morose and savage as he was, formed a better judgment of this conduct of Alcibiades. Meeting him one day as he was coming out of the assembly, vastly pleased at his having been gratified in all his demands, and to see the greatest honours paid him by the people in general, who were attending him in crowds to his house; so far from shunning him as he did all other men, on the contrary he ran to meet him, and stretching out his hand to him in a friendly way; Courage my son," says he, "thou dost right in pushing thy fortune, for thy advance"ment will be the ruin of all these people." The war of Sicily will show that Timon was not mistaken.

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The Athenians, from the time of Pericles, had meditated the conquest of Sicily. However, that wise guide had always endeavoured to check this ambitious and wild project. He used frequently to inculcate to them that by living in peace, by supporting their fleet, by contenting themselves with the conquests they had already gained, and by not engaging in hazardous enterprises, they would raise their city to a flourishing condition, and be always superior to their enemies. The authority he had at that time over the people, though it kept them from invading Sicily, could not sup press the desire they had to conquer it, and their eyes were continually upon that island. † Some time after Pericles' death, the Leontines being invaded by the Syracusans, had sent a deputation to Athens to demand aid. They were originally of Chalcis, an Athenian colony. The chief of the deputies was Gorgias, a famous rhetorician, who was reputed the most eloquent man of his time. His elegant and florid diction, heightened by shining figures which he first employed, charmed the Athenians, who were prodigiously affected with the beauties and graces of eloquence. Accordingly the alliance was concluded, and they sent ships to Rhegium to the aid of the Leontines. The year following they sent a greater number. Two years after they sent a new fleet, something stronger than the former; but the Sicilians having put an end to all their divisions, by the advice of

*The Frogs, act 5. scene 4.

+ Diod. 1. xii. p. 99.

Hermocrates, the fleet was sent back; and the Athenians not being able to prevail with themselves to pardon their generals for not conquering Sicily, sent two of them, Pythodorus and Sophocles, into banishment; and sentenced the third, Eurymedon, to pay a heavy fine; their prosperity having blinded them to so prodigious a degree, that they were persuaded no power was able to resist them. They made several attempts afterwards; and upon pretence of sending from time to time arms and soldiers to such cities as were unjustly treated or oppressed by the Syracusans, they by that means were preparing to invade them with a greater force.

But the person who most inflamed this ardour, was Alcibiades, by his feeding the people with splendid hopes, with which he himself was ever filled, or rather intoxicated. He was every night in his dreams taking Carthage, subduing Africa, crossing from thence into Italy, and possessing himself of all Peloponnesus; looking upon Sicily not as the scope and end of this war, but as the beginning and the first step of the exploits he revolved in his mind. All the citizens favoured his views, and, without enquiring seriously into matters, were enchanted with the mighty hopes he gave them. This expedition was the only topic of all conversations. The young men, in the places where the public exercises were performed, and the old men in their shops and elsewhere, were employed in nothing but in drawing the plan of Sicily; in discoursing on the nature and quality of the sea with which it is surrounded; on its good harbours, and flat shores towards Africa: for these people, infatuated by the speeches of Alcibiades, were like him, persuaded that they should make Sicily only their place of arms and their arsenal, from whence they should set out for the conquest of Carthage, and make themselves masters of all Africa and the sea, as far as the pillars of Hercules.

* It is related, that neither Socrates nor Methon the astronomer, believed this enterprise would be successful; the former being inspired, as he insinuated, by his familiar spirit, who always warned him of the evils with which he was threatened; and the other, directed by his reason and good sense, which, pointing out what he had to apprehend in respect to the future, induced him to act the madman on this occasion, and to demand, in consideration of the unhappy condition to which he was reduced, that the Athenians would not force away his son, and would dispense with his carrying arms.

SECTION VI.

ACCOUNT OF THE SEVERAL PEOPLE WHO INHABITED SICILY.

BEFORE I enter on the relation of the war of Sicily, it will not be improper to give a plan of the country, and of the nations who inhabited it. Thucydides begins in the same manner.

It was first inhabited by the Lestrygones and the Cyclops, of whom we do not know any particulars, except what we are told by the poets. The most ancient, after these, were the Sicani, who called themselves the original inhabitants of this country, though they are thought to have come into it from the neighbourhood of a river in Spain, called Sicanus, whose name they gave to the island, which before was called Trinacria: these people were afterwards confined to the western part of the island.

*Plut. in Alcib. p. 199. In Nic. p. 532.

Thucyd. 1. vi. p. 410-413.

Some Trojans, after the burning of their city, came and settled near them, and built Erik, and Egesta, who all assumed the name of Elymai, and were afterwards joined by some inhabitants of Phocis, at their return from the siege of Troy. Those who are properly called Sicilians, came from Italy in very great numbers, and having gained a considerable victory over the Sicani, confined them to a corner of their island, about 300 years before the arrival of the Greeks; and in Thucydides' time they still inhabited the middle part of the island, and the northern coast. From them the island was called Sicily. The Phoenicians also spread themselves along the coast, and in the little islands which border upon it, for the convenience of trade; but after the Greeks began to settle there, they retired into the country of the Elymai, in order to be nearer Carthage, and abandoned the rest. It was in this manner the barbarians first settled in Sicily.

With regard to the Greeks, the first of them who crossed into Sicily, were the Chalcidians of Euboea, under Theocles, who founded Naxos. The year after, which, according to Dionysius Halicarnassus, was the third of the 17th Olympiad, Archias the Corinthian, laid the foundation of Syracuse. Seven years after, the Chalcidians founded Leontium and Cataną, after having drove out the inhabitants of the country, who were Sicilians. Other Greeks, who came from Megara, a city of Achaia, about the same time, founded Megara, called Hyblæa, or barely Hybla, from Hyblon a Sicilian king, by whose permission they settled in his dominions. It is well known that the Hyblæan honey was very famous among the ancients. An hundred years after, the inhabitants of that city built Selinunta. Zancle, called afterwards Messana or Messene, by Anaxilas, tyrant of Rheghium, who was of Messene, a city of Peloponnesus, had several founders, and at different periods. The Zanclians built the city of Hymera; the Syracusans built Acre, Cesmene, and Camarina. These are most of the nations, whether Greeks or barbarians, who settled in Sicily.

SECTION VII.

THE PEOPLE OF EGESTA IMPLORE AID OF THE ATHENIANS.

ATHENS was in the disposition above related, when ambassadors were sent from the people of Egesta, who, in quality of their allies, came to implore their aid against the inhabitants of Selinunta, who were assisted by the Syracusans. It was the sixteenth year of the Peloponnesian war. They represented, among other things, that should they be abandoned, the Syracusans, after seizing their city, as they had done that of Leontium, would possess themselves of all Sicily, and not fail to aid the Peloponnesians, who were their founders; and that they might put them to as little charge as possible, they offered to pay the troops that should be sent to succour them. The Athenians, who had long waited for an opportunity to declare themselves, sent deputies to Egesta to inquire into the state of affairs, and to see whether there was money enough in the treasury to defray the expence of so great a war. The inhabitants of that city had been so artful as to borrow from the neighbouring nations a great number of gold and silver vases, worth an immense sum of money; and of these

* It is called Segesta by the Romans. † A. M. 3291. Ant. J. C. 710. ↑ A. M. 3588. Ant. J. C. 416. 129, 150. Plut. in Alcib. p. 200.

Thmeyd. 1. vi. p. 413-419. Diod. 1. xii. p.
In Nic. p. 531.

they made a show when the Athenians arrived. *The deputies returned with those of Egesta, who carried 60 talents in ingots, as a month's pay for the galleys which they demanded, and a promise of larger sums, which they said were ready both in the public treasury and in the temples. The people, struck with these fair appearances, the truth of which they did not give themselves the leisure to examine, and seduced by the advantageous reports which their deputies made, in the view of pleasing them, immediately granted the Egestans their demand, and appointed Alcibiades, Nicias, and Lamachus, to command the fleet, with full power not only to succour Egesta, and restore the inhabitants of Leontium to their city, but also to regulate the affairs of Sicily in such a manner as might best suit the interests of the republic.

Nicias was appointed one of the generals, to his very great regret; for; besides other motives which made him dread that command, he shunned it, because Alcibiades was to be his colleague. But the Athenians promised themselves greater success from this war, should they not resign the whole conduct of it to Alcibiades, but temper his ardour and audacity with the coolness and wisdom of Nicias.

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Five days after, to hasten the execution of the decree, and make the necessary preparations, a second assembly was held. Nicias, who had had time enough to reflect diliberately on the affair proposed, and was still better convinced of the difficulties and dangers which would ensue from it, thought himself obliged to speak with some vehemence against a project, the consequences of which he foresaw might be very fatal to the republic. He said, "That it was surprising so important an affair should have been "determined the moment almost it was taken into deliberation: that with"out once inquiring into matters, they had given credit to whatever was "told them by foreigners, who were very lavish of their promises, and "whose interest it was to offer mighty things, in order to extricate themselves from their imminent danger. After all, what advantage," says he,. * can accrue from thence to the republic? Have we so few enemies at our doors, that we need go in search of others at a distance from us? Will you act wisely to hazard your present possessions, on the vain hopes of an uncertain advantage? To meditate new conquests, before you have "secured your ancient ones? To study nothing but the aggrandizing of your state, and quite neglect your own safety? Can you depend in any manner on a truce, which you yourselves know is very precarious, which you are sensible has been infringed more than once, and which the least defeat on our side may suddenly change into an open war? You are not ignorant how the Lacedæmonians have always been, and still continue disposed with regard to us. They detest our government as different from "theirs; it is with grief and disdain they see us possessed of the empire of "Greece; they consider our glory as their shame and confusion; and there is nothing they would not attempt to humble a power which excites "their jealousy, and keeps them perpetually in fear. These are our real "enemies, and it is they we ought to guard against. Will it be a proper time "to make these reflections, when (after having divided our troops, and our arms will be employed elsewhere, and unable to resist them) we shall be "attacked at once by all the forces of Peloponnesus? We do but just be gin to breathe, after the calamities in which war and the plague had plun"ged us; and we are now going to plunge ourselves into greater danger.

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* A. M. 3589. Ant. J. C. 415. 22

VOL. II.

+ Thucyd. 1. vi. p. 405–428.

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