mission to the laws distinguished Pisistratus from most other usurpers; and the mildness of his government was such, as might make many a lawful sovereign blush. For which reason, the character of Pisistratus was thought worthy of being set in opposition to that of other tyrants. Cicero, doubting what use Cæsar would make of his victory at Pharsalia, wrote to his dear friend Atticus, "We do not yet know, whether the destiny of Rome will have us groan "under a Phalaris, or live under a Pisistratus.” This tyrant indeed, if we are to call him so, always showed himself very popular and moderate; and had such a command of his temper, as to bear reproaches and insults with patience, when he had it in his power to revenge them with a word. His gardens and orchards were open to all the citizens; in which he was afterwards imitated by Cimon. It is said he was the first who opened a public library in Athens, which after his time was much augmented, and at last carried into Persia by Xerxes, when he took the city. But Seleucus Nicanor, a long time afterwards, caused it to be brought back to Athens. e Cicero thinks also, it was Pisistratus who first made the Athenians acquainted with the poems of Homer; who arranged the books in the order we now find them, whereas before they were confused, and not digested; and who first caused them to be publicly read at their feats, called Panathenaa. Plato ascribes this honour to his son Hipparchus. Pisistratus died in tranquillity, and transmitted to his sons the sovereign power, which he had usurped 30 years before: 17 of which he had reigned in peace. His sons were Hippias and Hipparchus. Thucydides adds a third, whom he calls Thessalus. They seem to have inherited from their father an affection for learning and learned men. Plato, who attributes to Hipparchus what we have said concerning the poems of Homer, adds that he invited to Athens the famous poet Anacreon, who was of Teos, a city of Ionia; and that he sent a vessel of 50 oars on purpose for him. He likewise entertained at his house Simonides, another famous poet, of the isle of Ceos, one of the Cyclades, in the Ægean sea, to whom he gave a large pension, and made very rich presents. The design of these princes in inviting men of letters to Athens, was, says Plato, to soften and cultivate the minds of the citizens, and to infuse into them a relish and love for virtue, by giving them a taste for learna Incertum est Phalarimne, an Pisistratum, sit imitaturus. Ad Attic. I. vii Ep. xix. b Val. Max. 1. v c. 1. d Aul Gel. I. vi. c. 17. In Hipparch. p. 228. A. M 3478. Ant J. C, 526. c Athen. I. xii p. 532 ing and the sciences. Their care extended even to the instructing of the peasants and country people, by erecting not only in the streets of the city, but in all the roads and highways, statues of stone, called Mercuries, with grave sentences and moral maxims carved upon them; in which manner those silent monitors gave instructive lessons to all passengers. Plato seems to suppose, that Hipparchus had the authority, or that the two brothers reigned together. But Thucydides " shows, that Hippias, as the eldest of the sons, succeeded his father in the government. a However it were, their reign in the whole, after the death of Pisistratus, was only of 18 years duration. It ended in the following manner. Harmodius and Aristogiton, both citizens of Athens, had contracted a very strict friendship. Hipparchus, angry with the former for a personal affront he pretended to have received from him, endeavoured to revenge himself upon his sister, by putting a public affront upon her, obliging her shamefully to retire from a solemn procession, in which she was to carry one of the sacred baskets, alleging, that she was not in a fit condition to assist at such a ceremony. Her brother, and still more his friend, being stung to the quick by so gross and outrageous an affront, took, from that moment, a resolution to attack the tyrants; and to do it the more effectually, they waited for the opportunity of a festival, which they judged would be very favourable for their purpose. This was the feast of the Panathenæ, in which the ceremony required that all the tradesmen and artificers should be under arms. For the greater security, they admitted only a very small number of the citizens into their secret ; conceiving, that, upon the first motion, all the rest would join them. The day being come, they went betimes into the marketplace armed with daggers. Hippias came out of the palace, and went to the Ceramicus, which was a place without the city, where the company of guards then were, to give the necessary orders for the ceremony. The two friends followed him thither, and coming near him, they saw one of the conspirators talking very familiarly with him, which made them apprehend they were betrayed. They could have executed their design that moment upon Hippias, but were willing to begin their vengeance upon the author of the affront they had received. They therefore returned into the city, where meeting with Hipparchus, they killed him; but beng immediately apprehended, themselves were slain, and Hippias found means to dispel the storm. After this affair, he no longer observed any measures, and reigned like a true tyrant, putting to death a vast number Thucyd. 1. vi. p. 446–450. a Lib. vi. p. 445. VOL. II, Bb of citizens. To guard himself for the future against a like enterprise, and to secure a safe retreat for himself, in case of any accident, he endeavoured to strengthen himself by a foreign support, and to that end gave his daughter in marriage to the son of the tyrant of Lampsacus. In the mean time, the Alcmeonida, who from the beginning of the revolution, had been banished from Athens by Pisistratus, and who saw their hopes frustrated by the bad success of the last conspiracy, did not however lose courage, but turned their views another way. As they were very rich and powerful, they got themselves appointed by the Amphictyons, that is, the heads of the grand or general council of Greece, superintendants for rebuilding the temple of Delphos, for the sum of 300 talents, or 300,000 crowns". As they were naturally generous, and, besides, had their reasons for being so on this occasion, they added to this sum a great deal of their own money, and made the whole front of the temple all of Parian marble, at their particular expense; whereas, by the contract made with the Amphictyons, it was only to have been made of common stone. The liberality of the Alcmeonida was not altogether a free bounty; neither was their magnificence towards the god of Delphos, a pure effect of religion. Policy was the chief motive. They hoped by this means to acquire great credit and influence in the temple, which happened according to their expectation. The money which they had plentifully poured into the hands of the priestess, rendered them absoÎute masters of the oracle, and of the pretended god who presided over it, and who, for the future, becoming their echo, faithfully repeated the words they dictated to him, and gratefully lent them the assistance of his voice and authority. As often, therefore, as any Spartan came to consult the priestess, whether upon his own affairs, or upon those of the state, no promise was ever made him of the god's assistance, but upon condition that the Lacedæmonians should deliver Athens from the yoke of tyranny. This order was so often repeated to them by the oracle, that they resolved at last to make war against the Pisistratida, though they were under the strongest engagements of friendship and hospitality with them; herein preferring the will of God, says Herodotus, to all human considerations. The first attempt of this kind miscarried; and the troops they sent against the tyrant were repulsed with loss. Notwithstanding, a little time after, they made a second, which seemed to promise no better success than the first; because a Herod. 1. v c. 62-96. b About 40,000/. sterling. Τὶ γὰρ τῇ Θεό πρεσβύτερα ἐποιεῦντο, ἢ τὰ τῶν ἀνδρῶν. most of the Lacedæmonians, seeing the siege they had laid before Athens likely to continue a great while, retired, and left only a small number of troops to carry it on. But the tyrant's children, who had been clandestinely conveyed out of the city, in order to be put in a safe place, being taken by the enemy, the father, to redeem them, was obliged to come to an accommodation with the Athenians, by which it was stipulated, that he should depart out of Attica, in five days time. • Accordingly he actually retired within the time limited, and settled at Sigæum, a town in Phrygia, seated at the mouth of the river Scamander. Pliny observes, that the tyrants were driven out of Athens, the same year the kings were expelled Rome. Extraordinary honours were paid to the memory of Harmodius and Aristogiton. Their names were infinitely respected at Athens in all succeeding ages, and almost held in equal reverence with those of the gods. Statues were forthwith erected to them in the market-place, which was an honour that had never been conferred on any man before. The very sight of these statues, exposed to the view of all the citizens, kept up their hatred and detestation of tyranny, and daily renewed their sentiments of gratitude to those generous defenders of their liberty, who had not scrupled to purchase it with their lives, and to seal it with their blood. c Alexander the Great, who knew how dear the memory of these men was to the Athenians, and how far they carried their zeal in this respect, thought he did them a sensible pleasure in sending back to them the statues of those two great men, which he found in Persia after the defeat of Darius, and which Xerxes before had carried thither from Athens. This city, at the time of her deliverance from tyranny, did not confine her gratitude solely to the authors of her liberty; but extended it even to a woman who had signalized her courage on that occasion. This woman was a courtezan, named Leana, who, by the charms of her beauty, and skill in playing on the harp, had particularly captivat ed Harmodius and Aristogiton. After their death, the tyrant, who knew they had concealed nothing from this woman, caused her to be put to the torture, in order to make her declare the names of the other conspirators. But she bore all the cruelty of their torments with an invincible constancy, and expired in the midst of them; gloriously showing the world, that her sex is more courageous and more capable of keeping a secret than some men imagine. The Athenians would not suffer the memory of so heroic an action to be lost : a A. M. 3496. Ant. J. C. 508. c Ibid. c. & b Plin. 1 xxxiv. c. 4. d Plin. 1. vii. c. 23. et l. xxxiv. e, 8, and, to prevent the lustre of it from being sullied by the consideration of her character as a courtezan, they endeavoured to conceal that circumstance, by representing her in the statue which they erected to her honour under the figure of a lioness without a tongue. a Plutarch, in the life of Aristides, relates a thing, which does great honour to the Athenians, and which shows to what a pitch they carried their gratitude to their deliverer, and their respect for his memory. They had learned, that the grand-daughter of Aristogiton lived at Lemnos, in very mean and poor circumstances, nobody being willing to marry her upon account of her extreme indigence and poverty. The people of Athens sent for her, and marrying her to one of the most rich and considerable men of their city, gave her an estate in land in the town of Potamos for her portion. Athens seemed, in recovering her liberty, to have also recovered her pristine courage. During the reigns of her tyrants, she had acted with indolence and inactivity, as knowing what she did was not for herself, but for them: but after her deliverance from their yoke, the vigour and activity she exerted was of a quite different kind, because then her labours were her own. Athens, however, did not immediately enjoy a perfect tranquillity. Two of her citizens, Clisthenes, one of the Alcmæonidæ, and Isagoras, who were men of the greatest credit and power in the city, by contending with each other for superiority, created two considerable factions. The former, who had gained the people on his side, made an alteration in the form of their establishment, and, instead of four tribes, whereof they consisted before, divided that body into ten tribes, to which he gave the names of the ten sons of Ion, whom the Greek historians make the father and first founder of the nation. Isagoras seeing himself inferior in credit to his rival, had recourse to the Lacedæmonians. Cleomenes, one of the two kings of Sparta, obliged Clisthenes to depart from Athens with 700 families of his adherents. But they soon returned with their leader, and were restored to all their estates and fortunes. The Lacedæmonians, stung with spite and jealousy against Athens, because she took upon her to act independent of their authority, and repenting also, that they had delivered her from her tyrants upon the credit of an oracle, of which they since discovered the imposture, began to think of reinstating Hippias, one of the sons of Pisistratus; and to that end sent for him from Sigæum, whither he had retired. They then communicated their design in the assembly of the deputies of a Page 335. |