talents he had joined an unquestionable integrity, his fame would have been purer. 23. After the banishment of Themistocles, the affairs of Athens were, for a short time, directed by Aristi'des; and, upon his death, the whole power came into the hands of Ci'mon, the son of Milti'ades, one of the most illustrious statesmen and warriors that Greece ever produced. 24. Cimon maintained the political influence and military power of Athens, conducted the war with great success, and gained two great victories over the Persians on the same day, one by sea, and the other by land, near the mouth of the Eurym'edon, in Asia Minor. 25. A powerful party at length arose against Cimon, and procured his banishment by the ostracism, and Per'icles, a young man of noble birth, great talents, and extraordinary eloquence, succeeded him in authority. 26. But, after a banishment of five years, Cimon was recalled, restored to the command of the army, gained further important victories over the Persians, and finally died of a wound which he received at the siege of Citium, in Cyprus. 27. The Persian war, which had lasted, with little inter mission, about fifty years, was now brought to a termination Artaxerxes, finding his strength, both by sea and land, broken sued for peace, which was granted on condition that he should give freedom to all the Grecian colonies in Asia Minor, and that the Persian fleets should be excluded from the Grecian seas. 28. After the death of Cimon, his brother-in-law, Thucydides, became the competitor of Per'icles for popular favor and authority. A war of eloquence ensued, and Thucydides, being worsted, was banished by the ostracism, and the lead of Pericles was, from this time till his death, a period of about twenty years, but little disputed. 29. He governed Athens with almost arbitrary sway, adorned the city with master-pieces of architecture, sculpture, and painting, patronized the arts and sciences, celebrated splendid games and festivals, and his administration formed an era of great internal splendor and magnificence; but he exhausted the public revenue, and corrupted the manners of the people. 30. The time of the Persian war was the period of the highest military glory of the Greeks, and they owed their prosperity to their union. But, after this war had ceased, this union was dissolved, and the jealousies and ambitious views of the rival states were again revived. Athens had been rebuilt, and surrounded with a strong wall. But to this Sparta had meanly objected, and Athens saw with pleasure the depopulation of Sparta by an earthquake, in which about 20,000 lives were lost. Sparta also suffered greatly about this time by the insurrection of the Helots, or slaves. 31. Although the Athenians were apparently the greatest sufferers by the invasion, their city being burnt, and their country laid waste, yet they derived the greatest benefits from its effects. In consequence of their naval superiority, and the unrivalled talents of their commanders, Miltiades, Themis'tocles, Aristides, and Ci'mon, they reached the summit of political influence and military power, and attained that supremacy in Greece which the Lacedæmonians had hitherto enjoyed. 32. The politics of Greece, for a considerable time after the Persian war, turned upon the rivalry between the two leading republics, Athens and Lacedæmon. The former was powerful by sea, the latter by land. Athens was the patroness of democracy, Lacedæmon of aristocracy. It was customary for the weaker states, for their security, to ally themselves with one of the two leading ones; and, in most of them, there were two parties in continual contest, the democrats and the aristocrats: the former naturally adhered to Athens; the latter to Sparta. 33. From this period the martial and patriotic spirit began to decline. An acquaintance with Asia, and an importation of her wealth, introduced a relish for Asiatic manners and luxuries. With the Athenians, however, this luxurious spirit was under the guidance of taste and genius, and it led to the cultivation of the fine arts, which, during the age of Per'icles, were in the most flourishing state. SECTION VIII. PELOPONNESIAN WAR: Pericles: Alcibiades: Battle of Egos-Potamos: Lysander: Thirty Tyrants: Socrates: Retreat of the 10,000: Peace of Antalcidas: Thebes : Epaminondas: Battles of Leuctra and Mantinea: Agesilaus.-From E. C. 431 to 360. 1. In the latter part of the administration of Per'icles, commenced the Peloponnesian War, which grew out of the long continued rivalship between Athens and Sparta, and was the most important and celebrated war ever carried on by the Grecian states with each other. 2. This contest partook, in a great degree, of the nature of a civil war; and though the time of its continuance, the age of Soc'rates himself, was an era characterized by the high perfection to which the arts, philosophy, and refinement had been brought, yet it was carried on in a spirit of savage ferocity, rarely exemplified among civilized nations; a boundless scope was given to ambition and party rage; all the ties of nature were trampled upon, and Greece exhibited, during this period, a perpetual scene of conflict and calamity. 3. The Athenians, having assisted the inhabitants of Corcy'ra against the Corinthians, were accused by the latter of having thereby violated the treaty of the confederated states of Peloponne'sus, and an appeal to arms was immediately resolved on. The 4. Sparta took the lead against Athens, and was joined by all the Peloponnesian states, except Argos, which remained neutral; and in Northern Greece, by the Megarians, Boeotians, Locrians, Phocians, &c. Athens had few allies; the principal were the Thessalians, Acarnanians, and several islands. Peloponnesian forces, commanded by the Spartan king, Archid'amus, amounted to 60,000; while the army of the Athenians did not exceed 32,000; but the navy of the latter was much the superior. 5. In the first year of the war, the Lacedæmonians ravaged Attica, and laid siege to Athens; in the second year, the city was visited by a dreadful plague, which swept away multitudes; and among its victims was Pericles, who died the third year of the war, and at a time when his services were most wanted. The war, however, was not arrested by this awful calamity, but continued to rage for several years in a similar manner, and with nearly equal losses on both sides. 6. After the death of Per'icles, Cleon, who raised himself into power by flattering the worst passions of his countrymen, had, for a time, the direction of the Athenian councils; but he was slain at Amphip'olis, in a battle with Bras'idas the Spartan general, who was also mortally wounded. After the death of Cleon, by means of the influence of Ni' cias, the leader of the aristocratic and pacific party, a treaty of peace was concluded between Athens and Sparta. 7. But the war was again soon renewed through the influence of Alcibiades, who now took the lead in the government of Athens, and who was one of the most accomplished orators and generals of his age; but whose total want of principle rendered his talents ruinous both to himself and his country. 8. An expedition was sent against the island of Sicily, under the command of Alcibiades and Ni'cias; but the former was accused of misconduct and recalled, and the latter totally defeated and slain. Alcibiades afterward again took the command of the army of Athens, and gained important advantages; but he at length fell into disgrace, and was banished; and the chief command of the Athenian army was given to Conon. 9. But Lysan'der, the ablest of the Lacedæmonian generals, having succeeded to the command, utterly defeated the Athenian fleet at Æ'gos-Pot'amos on the Hellespont which reduced Athens to the last extremity. The Lacedæmonians blockaded the city by land and sea, and its reduction was left to the sure operation of famine. 10. The Athenians, anxious to avoid utter extermination, were ready to accept almost any terms of peace. They were spared or condition that they should demolish their port, with all their fortifications, limit their fleet to 12 ships, and in future undertake no military enterprise, except under the command of the Lacedæmonians. Thus the Peloponnesian war terminated by the humiliating submission of Athens, and by rendering Lacedæ'mon the leading power in Greece. 11. Lysan'der, after the reduction of Athens, abolished the popular government, and substituted in its place an oligarchy consisting of 30 magistrates, whose power was absolute, and who, from their atrocious acts of cruelty, where styled the Thirty Tyrants. In the space of eight months, 1,500 citizens were sacrificed to their avarice or vengeance. At length Thrasybulus, at the head of a band of patriots, drove the tyrants from the seat of their abused power, and restored the democratical form of government. 12. But pure democracy was far from being any security, at Athens, against acts of tyranny and oppression, even in the most enlightened age of the republic. The Athenians were characterized as fickle and capricious; and in some of their proceedings, they were as unjust and cruel as the most lawless despots. 13. The name of Socrates is at once the glory and the reproach of Athens. This illustrious philosopher, who, on account of his high moral views, is the boast of the pagan world, and who attempted to introduce among his countrymen worthier sentiments of religion, and a better understand ing of the duties of life, was accused of corrupting the youth, and condemned by the assembly of Athens to die by poison. 14. During his imprisonment, which lasted thirty days, he conducted himself with the greatest dignity; refused to escape when opportunity offered; conversed with his friends on topics of moral philosophy, particularly the immortality of the soul, and, when the appointed time arrived, drank the fatal cup of hemlock, and died with the greatest composure. 15. The philosophy of Soc'rates, which forms an important epoch in the history of the human mind, was wholly promulgated in conversation, not in writing; but his doctrines and character have been handed down to us by two of his most gifted pupils, Plato and Xenophon. He turned all the powers of his mind against the atheists, materialists, and skeptics. He attended but little to physical science; he ridiculed the metaphysical speculations of his predecessors; and introduced moral philosophy, by teaching mankind to govern their pas sions, and to consider their actions and their duties. From this it was said of him, that he drew down philosophy from heaven to earth. 16. About the end of the Peloponnesian war, the death of Darius left the throne of Persia to his son Artaxerxes II; but his brother Cyrus attempted to dethrone him, and for this purpose he employed upwards of 10,000 Grecian mercenaries; and after the battle of Cunaxa, near Babylon, Cyrus, and also the Grecian commander, were slain. The remainder of the Grecian army, under the command of Xen'ophon, made a retreat, in which they encountered incredible difficulties and dangers, in traversing an enemy's country of 1,600 miles in extent, from Babylon to the shores of the Euxine. 17. This celebrated return of the Greeks, usually called the Retreat of the Ten Thousand, is beautifully described by Xen'ophon, and is considered one of the most extraordinary exploits in military history; but it is to be regretted that the pupil and biographer of Socrates should have gathered his laurels in so vile a trade as that of a mere hireling military adventurer 18. The Greek cities of Asia having taken part with Cyrus, the Spartans, under their king Agesila'us, engaged in the defence, and thus became involved in the war with the Persians. But the king of Persia, by means of bribes, induced Athens, Thebes, Corinth, and other Grecian states, jealous of the Lacedæmonians, to join in a league against them. Agesila'us vas obliged to return from Asia Minor to protect his |