manner Philip, with very little trouble, engrossed all the honour of a long and bloody war, which had exhausted the forces of both parties. This victory gained him incredible honour throughout all Greece, and his glorious expedition was the sole topic of conversation in that country. He was considered as the avenger of sacrilege, and the protector of religion; and they almost ranked in the number of the gods the man who had defended their majesty with so much courage and success. Philip, that he might not seem to do any thing by his own private authority, in an affair which concerned all Greece, assembles the council of the Amphictyons, and appoints them, for form's sake, supreme judges of the pains and penalties to which the Phocæans had rendered themselves obnoxious. Under the name of these judges, who were entirely at his devotion, he decrees that the cities of Phocis shall be destroyed, that they should all be reduced to small towns of sixty houses each, and that those towns shall be at a certain distance one from the other; that those wretches who had committed the sacrilege shall be irrevocably proscribed; and that the rest shall not enjoy their possessions, but upon condition of paying an annual tribute, which shall continue to be levied till such a time as the whole sums taken out of the temple of Delphi shall be repaid. Philip did not forget himself on this occasion. After he had subjected the rebellious Phocæans, he demanded that their right of session in the council of the Amphictyons, which they had been declared to have forfeited, should be transferred to him. The Amphictyons, of whose vengeance he had now been the instrument, were afraid of refusing hin, and accordingly admitted him a member of their body; a circumstance of the highest importance to him, as we shall see in the sequel, and of very dangerous consequence to all the rest of Greece. They also gave him the superintendence of the Pythian games, in conjunction with the Baotians and Thessalians; because the Corinthians, who possessed this privilege hitherto, had rendered themselves unworthy of it, by sharing in the sacrilege of the Phocæans. When news was brought to Athens of the treatment which the Phocæans had met with, the former perceived, but too late, the wrong step they had taken in refusing to comply with the counsels of Demosthenes; and in abandoning themselves blindly to the vain and idle promises of a traitor, who had sold his country. Besides the shame and grief with which they were siezed, for having failed in the obligations by which they were bound to the Phocæans by their confederacy with them, they found that they had betrayed their own interests in abandoning their allies. For Philip, by possessing himself of Phocis, was become master of Thermopyle, which opened nim the gates, and put into his hands the keys, of Greece. The * Incredibile quantum ca res apud omnes nationes Philippo gloriæ dedit. Illum vindi cem sacrilegii, llum ultorem religionum. Itaque Diis proximus habetur, per quem Deoum majestas vindicata sit. Justin. 1. viii. c. 2. Athenians, therefore, being justly alarmed upon their own account gave orders that the women and children should be brought out of the country into the city; that the walls should be repaired, and the Piraeus fortified, in order to put themselves into a state of defence in case of an invasion. The Athenians had no share in the decree by which Philip had been admitted among the Amphictyons. They perhaps had absented themselves purposely, that they might not authorize it by their presence; or, which was more probable, Philip, in order to remove the obstacles and avoid the impediments he might meet with in the execution of his design, assembled, in an irregular manner, such of the Amphictyons alone as were entirely at his devotion. In short, he conducted his intrigue so very artfully, that he obtained his ends. This election might be disputed as clandestine and irregular; and therefore he required a confirmation of it from the states, who, as members of that body, had a right either to reject or ratify the new choice. Athens received the circular invitation; but in an assembly of the people, which was called in order to deliberate on Philip's demand, several were of opinion that no notice should be taken of it. Demosthenes, however, was of a contrary opinion; and though he did not approve in any manner of the peace which had been concluded with Philip, he did not think it would be for their interest to infringe it in the present juncture; since that could not be done without stirring up against the Athenians both the new Amphictyon and those who had elected him. His advice therefore was, that they should not expose themselves unseasonably to the dangerous consequences which might ensue, in. case of their determinate refusal to consent to the almost unanimous decree of the Amphictyons; and protested, that it was their interest prudently to submit, for fear of worse, to the present condition of the times; that is, to comply with what was not in their power to prevent. This is the subject of Demosthenes's discourse, entitled, Oration on the Peace. We may reasonably believe that his advice was followed. SECTION V. Philip, being returned to Macedonia, extends his conquests into Illyria and Thracc. He projects a league with the Thebans, the Messenians, and the Argives, to invade Peloponnesus in concert with them. Athens having declared in favour of the Lacedaemonians, this league is dissolved. He again makes an attempt upon Eubea, but Phocion drives him out of it. Character of that celelated Athenian. Philip besieges Perinthus and Byzantium. The Athenians animated by the orations of Demosthenes, send succours to those two cities, under the command of Phocion who forces Philip to raise the siege of those places A. M. 3660. After Philip had settled every thing relating to the Ant. J. C. 344. Worship of the god, and the security of the temple of Delphi, he returned into Macedonia crowned with glory, and carrying with him the reputation of a religious prince and an intrepid conqueror. Diodorus observes,† that all those who had shared in Diod. I. xvI. p. 456. Demusili. de fals. Legat. p. 312. profaning and plundering the temple, perished miserably, and came to a tragical end. * Philip, satisfied with having opened to himself a passage into Greece by his seizure of Thermopyla; having subjected Phocis, established himself one of the judges of Greece, by his new dignity of Amphyction; and gained the esteem and applause of all nations, by his zeal to avenge the honour of the deity: judged very prudently, that it would be proper for him to check his career, in order to prevent all the states of Greece from taking arms against him, by discovering too soon his ambitious views with regard to that country. In order, therefore, to remove all suspicion, and to soothe the disquietudes which arose on that occasion, he turned his arms against Illyria, purposely to extend his frontiers on that side, and to keep his troops always in exercise by some new expedition. The same motive prompted him afterwards to go into Thrace. In the very beginning of his reign he had dispossessed the Athenians of several strong places in that country. Philip still carried on his conquests there. Suidas observes, that before he took Olynthus, he had made himself master of thirty-two cities in Chalcis, which is part of Thrace. The Chersonesus also was situated very ccamodiously for him. This was a very rich peninsula, which there were a great number of powerful cities and fine pasture lands It had formerly belonged to the Athenians. The inhabitants put themselves under the protection of Lacedæmonia, when Lysander had captured Athens; but submitted again to their first masters, after Conon, the son of Timotheus, had reinstated his country. Cotys, king of Thrace, afterwards dispossessed the Athenians of the Chersonesus; but it was restored to them by Chersobleptus,‡ son of Cotys, who finding himself unable to defend it against Philip, gave it up to them the fourth year of the 106th Olympiad; reserv ing, however, to himself Cardia, which was the most considerable city of the peninsula, and formed, as it were, the gate and entrance to it. After Philip had dep.ived Chersobleptus of his kingdom, which happened the second year of the 109th Olympiad, the inhabitants of Cardia being afraid of falling into the hands of the AtheA. M. 3661. nians, who claimed their city as having formerly beAnt. J. C. 343. longed to them, submitted themselves to Philip, who did not fail to take them under his protection.|| A. M. 3662. Diopithes, the head of the colony which the AtheAut. J. C. 342. nians had sent into Chersonesus, looking upon this step in Philip as an act of hostility against the commonwealth, without waiting for an order, and fully persuaded that it would not be disavowed, marches suddenly into the dominions of that prince in the maritime part of Thrace; whilst he was carrying on an inportant war in Upper Thrace; plunders them before he had time * Diod. l. xvi. թ. 463 † In Kagav. + Diod. l. xvi. թ. 434. Liban. in. Demost. p. 75. Ibid. p. 464. to return and make head against him, and carries off a rich booty, all which he lodged safe in Chersonesus. Philip, not being able to avenge himself in the manner he could have wished, contented himself with making grievous complaints to the Athenians, by letters on that subject. Such as received pensions from him in Athens, served him but too effectually. These venal wretches loudly exclaimed against a conduct, which, if not prudent, was at least excusable. They declaim against Diopithes; impeach him of involving the state in war; accuse him of extortion and piracy; insist upon his being recalled, and prosecute his condemnation with the utmost heat and violence. Demosthenes seeing at this juncture that the public welfare was inseparably connected with that of Diopithes, undertook his defence, which is the subject of his oration on the Chersonesus. This Diopithes was father to Menander, the comic poet, whom Terence has copied so faithfully. Diopithes was accused of oppressing the allies by his unjust exactions. However, Demosthenes lays the least stress on this, because it was personal; he nevertheless pleads his apology (transiently) from the example of all the generals, to whom the islands and cities of Asia Minor paid certain voluntary contributions, by which they purchased security to their merchants, and procured convoys for them to guard them against the pirates. It is true, indeed, that a man may exercise oppressions, and ransom allies very unseasonably. But in this case, a bare decree, an accusation in due form,* a galley appointed to bring home the recalled general; all this is sufficien. to put a stop to abuses. But it is otherwise with regard to Philip's enterprises. These cannot be checked either by decrees or menaces; and nothing will do this effectually, bit raising troops, and fitting out galleys. Your orators, says he, cry out eternally to you, that we must make choice either of peace or war; but Philip does not leave this at our option, he who is daily meditating some new enterprise against us. And can we doubt but it was he who broke the peace, unless it is pretended that we have no reason to complain of him, as long as he shall forbear making any attempts on Attica and the Piraeus? But it will then be too late for us to oppose him; and it is now that we must prepare strong barriers against his ambitious designs. You ought to lay it down as a certain maxim, O Athenwuns! that it is you he aims at; that he considers you as his most dangerous enemies ; that your ruin alone can establish his tranquillity, and secure his conquests; and that whatever he is now projecting, is merely with the view of falling upon you, and of reducing Athens to a state of subjection. And, indeed, can any of you be so vastly simple, as to imagine that Philip is so greedy of a few pallry towns,† (for what other name can we bestow on those which he now attacks?) as to submit to fatigues, the in clemency of the seasons, and dangers, merely for the sake of gaining them; but that as for the harbours, the arsenals, the galleys, the silver mines, and the immense revenues, of the Athenians, that he considers these with indifference, does not covet them in the least, but will suffer you to remain in quiet possession of them? What conclusion are we to draw from all that has been said? Why, that so far from cashiering the army we have in Thrace, it must be considerably reinforced and strengthened by new levies, in order that, as Philip has always one in readiness to oppress and enslave the Greeks, we, on our side, may always have one on foot to defend and preserve them. There is reason to believe Demosthenes's advice was followed. The same year that this oration was spoken,* Arymbas, king of the Molossi or Epirus died. He was son of lcetas, and had a brother called Neoptolemus, whose daughter Olympias was married to Philip. This Neoptolemus, by the influence and authority of his son-in-law, was raised so high as to share the regal power with his elder brother, to whom only it lawfully belonged. This first unjust action was followed by a greater. For after the death of Arymbas,† Philip played his part so well, either by his intrigues or his me naces, that the Molossians expelled acidas, son and lawful suc cessor to Arymbas, and established Alexander, son of Neoptolemus, sole king of Epirus. This prince, who was not only brother-in-law, but son-in-law, to Philip, whose daughter Cleopatra he had married, as will be observed in the sequel, carried his arms into Italy, and there died. After this, Æacidas reascended the throne of his ancestors, reigned alone in Epirus, and transmitted the crown to his son, the famous Pyrrhus (so celebrated in the Roman history,) and second cousin to Alexander the Great, Alcetas being grandfather to both those monarchs. Philip, after his expedition in Illyria and Thrace, turned his views towards Peloponnesus. Terrible commotions prevailed at that time in this part of Greece. Lacedæmonia assumed the sovereignty of it, with no other right than that of being the strongest. Argos and Messene being oppressed, had recourse to Philip. He had just before concluded a peace with the Athenians, who, on the faith of their orators that had been bribed by this prince, imagined he was going to break with the Thebars. However, so far from that, after having subdued Phocis, he divided the conquests with them. The Thebens embraced with joy the favourable opportunity which presented itself, of opening him a gate through which he might pass into Peloponnesus, in which country the inveterate hatred they bore to Sparta made them foment divisions perpetually, and continue the war. They therefore solicited Philip to join with them, the Fiod. l. xvi. p. 465. Justin, book viii. ch. 6, curtails the genealogy of this prince, and confounds this sue 1 Demosth. in Philipp. ii. Laban. in Demosth. |