But he is ever
awake; he misses no occasion; he makes move for move and counters every
stroke.
awake; he misses no occasion; he makes move for move and counters every
stroke.
Lucian
Here are my tablets, which I have brought with designs upon any
idle friend I might light upon; and you, I rejoice to see, are idle. '
'Ah, you lucky man! ' I exclaimed; 'you are like the winner of the three
miles, who had washed off the dust, and could amuse himself for the
rest of the day. He was minded to crack a story with the wrestler, when
the wrestling was next on the programme; but the wrestler asked him
whether he had felt like cracking stories when he toed the line just
now. You have won your poetic three miles, and want me to minister to
your amusement just as I am shivering at the thought of my hundred
yards. ' He laughed: 'Why, how will it make things worse for you? '
'Ah, you probably consider Demosthenes of much less account than Homer.
_You_ are very proud of your eulogy on Homer; and is Demosthenes a
light matter to _me_? ' 'A trumped up charge,' he exclaimed; 'I am not
going to sow dissension between these two mighty ones, though it is
true my own allegiance is rather to Homer. '
'Good,' I said, 'and you must allow me to give mine to Demosthenes.
But, though you do not disqualify my subject, I am sure you think
poetry the only real treatment; you feel about mere rhetoric what the
cavalryman feels as he gallops past the infantry. ' 'I hope I am not
so mad as that,' he said, 'though a considerable touch of madness is
required of him who would pass the gates of poetry. ' 'If you come to
that, prose cannot do without some divine inspiration either, if it
is not to be flat and common. ' He admitted that at once: 'I often
delight myself with comparing passages from Demosthenes and other prose
writers with Homer in point of vehemence, pungency, fire. "Flown with
wine" I pair off against the revellings and dancings and debauchery of
Philip; "One presage that ne'er fails[18]" finds its counterpart in
"It is for brave men, founding themselves upon brave hopes--"; "How
would old Peleus, lord of steeds, repine--" is matched by "What a cry
of lamentation would go up from the men of those days who laid down
their lives for glory and freedom--"; "fluent Python" reminds me of
Odysseus's "snow-flake speech"; "If 'twere our lot neither to age nor
die," I illustrate by "For every man's life must end in death, though
he shut himself up in a narrow chamber for safer keeping. " In fact the
instances are numberless in which they attack their meaning by the same
road.
'I love too to study his feelings and moods and transitions, the
variety with which he combats weariness, his resumptions after
digression, the charm of his opportune illustrations, and the
never-failing native purity of his style.
'It has often struck me about Demosthenes--for I will tell the whole
truth out--that that looser of the bonds of speech rebukes Athenian
slackness with a dignity that is lacking in the "Greekesses" used by
Homer of the Greeks; and again he maintains the tragic intensity proper
to the great Hellenic drama more consistently than the poet who inserts
speeches at the very crisis of battle and allows energy to evaporate in
words.
'As often as I read Demosthenes, the balanced clauses, the rhythmic
movement and cadence, make me forget that this is not my beloved
poetry; for Homer too abounds in contrast and parallel, in figures
startling or simple. It is a provision of nature, I suppose, that each
faculty should have its proper equipment attached to it. How should I
scorn your Muse? I know her powers too well.
'None the less, I consider my task of a Homeric encomium twice as
difficult as your praise of Demosthenes; not because it must be in
verse, but from the nature of the material; _I_ cannot lay down a
foundation of fact to build the edifice of praise upon; there is
nothing but the poems themselves. Everything else is uncertain--his
country, his family, his time. If there had been any uncertainty about
them,
Debate and strife had not divided men;
but as it is, they give him for a country Ios or Colophon or Cumae,
Chios, Smyrna, or Egyptian Thebes, or half a hundred other places; his
father may be Maeon the Lydian, or he may be a river; his mother is now
Melanope, and now in default of satisfactory human descent a dryad; his
time is the Heroic Age, or else perhaps it is the Ionic. There is no
knowing for certain whether he was before or after Hesiod, even; and no
wonder, considering that some object to his very name, and will have
him Melesigenes instead. So too with his poverty, and his blindness.
However, all these questions are best left alone. So you see the arena
open to my panegyric is extremely limited; my theme is a poet and not a
man of action; I can infer and collect his wisdom only from his verses.
'_Your_ work, now, can be reeled smoothly off out of hand; you have
your definite known facts; the butcher's meat is there, only needing to
be garnished with the sauce of your words. History supplies you with
the greatness and distinction of Demosthenes; it is all known; his
country was Athens, the splendid, the famous, the bulwark of Hellas.
Now if _I_ could have laid hands on Athens, I might have used the
poet's right to introduce the loves and judgements and sojourns there
of the Gods, the gifts they lavished on it, the tale of Eleusis. As
for its laws and courts and festivals, its Piraeus and its colonies,
the memorials set up in it of victory by land and sea, Demosthenes
himself is the authority for saying that no words could do justice to
them. My material would have been inexhaustible; and I could not have
been accused of hanging up my true theme; the formula of panegyric
includes the arraying of the man in the splendours of his country. So
too Isocrates ekes out his _Helen_ by introducing Theseus. It is true
that poets have their privileges; and perhaps _you_ have to be more
careful about your proportions; there must not be _too_ much sack to
the proverbial halfpennyworth of bread.
'Well then, let Athens go; but your discourse at once finds another
support in his father's wealth--that "golden base" which Pindar
likes--; for to be responsible for providing a war-ship was to be
among the richest Athenians in those days. And though he died while
Demosthenes was quite a child, we are not to count his orphan state a
disaster; it led to the distinction that brought his splendid gifts
into notice.
'Tradition gives us no hint of how Homer was educated or developed his
powers; the panegyrist must plunge straight into his works, and can
find nothing to talk about in his breeding and training and pupilage;
he has not even the resource of that Hesiodic sprig of bay which could
make a facile poet out of a shepherd. But think of _your_ abundance
in this branch of the subject. There is Callistratus and all the
mighty roll of orators, Alcidamas, Isocrates, Isaeus, Eubulides. Then
again, at Athens even those who were subject to paternal control had
countless temptations to indulgence, youth is the susceptible time, a
neglected ward could have lived as irregular a life as he chose, and
yet the objects that Demosthenes set up for himself were philosophy and
patriotism, and the doors they took him to not Phryne's, but those of
Aristotle and Theophrastus, Xenocrates and Plato.
'And so, my dear sir, your way is open to a disquisition upon the two
kinds of human love, the one sprung of a desire that is like the sea,
outrageous, fierce, stormily rocking the soul; it is a true sea wave,
which the earthly Aphrodite sets rolling with the tempestuous passions
of youth; but the other is the steady drawing of a golden cord from
heaven; it does not scorch and pierce and leave festering wounds; it
impels towards the pure and unsullied ideal of absolute beauty, and is
a sane madness in those souls which "yet hold of Zeus and nurse the
spark divine. "
'Love will find out the way, though that way involve a shaven head,
a cavern dwelling, a discouraging mirror and punitive sword, a
disciplining of the tongue, a belated apprenticeship to the actor's
art, a straining of the memory, a conquest over clamour, and a
borrowing of night hours to lengthen toilsome days. [19] All this your
Demosthenes endured, and who knows not what an orator it made of
him? his speech packed with thought and terse of language, himself
convincing in his knowledge of human nature, as splendid in the
elevation as mighty in the force of his sentiments, the master and not
the slave of his words and his ideas, ever fresh with the graces of
his art. He is the one orator whose speech has, in the bold phrase of
Leosthenes, at once the breath of life and the strength of wrought iron.
'Callisthenes remarked of Aeschylus that he wrote his tragedies in
wine, which lent vigour and warmth to his work. With Demosthenes it was
otherwise; he composed not on wine but on water; whence the witticism
of Demades, that most men's tongues are regulated by water,[20] but
Demosthenes's pen was subject to the same influence. And Pytheas
detected the smell of the midnight oil in the very perfection of the
speeches. Well, there is much in common between your subject and mine,
so far as this branch of them is concerned; on Homer's _poems_ I was no
worse off than you are.
'But when you come to your hero's acts of humanity, his pecuniary
sacrifices, his grand political achievements' (and he was going on
in full swing to the rest of the catalogue, when I interrupted, with
a laugh: 'Must I be dowsed with the remainder of your canful, good
bath-man? ' 'Most certainly,' he retorted, and went straight on),
'the public entertainments he gave, the public burdens he assumed,
the ships, the wall, the trench he contributed to, the prisoners he
ransomed, the girls he portioned, his admirable policy, the embassies
he served on, the laws he got passed, the mighty issues he was
concerned in--why, then I cannot but laugh to see your contracted
brows; as if a recital of the exploits of Demosthenes _could_ lack
matter! '
'I believe you think, my good man,' I protested, 'that I have never had
the deeds of Demosthenes drummed into me; I should be singular among
rhetoricians, then. ' 'It was on the assumption,' he said, 'implied by
you, that we want assistance. But perhaps your case is a very different
one; is the light so bright that you cannot manage to fix your eyes on
the dazzling glory of Demosthenes? Well, I was rather like that about
Homer at first. Indeed, I came very near turning mine away, thinking I
could not possibly face my subject. However, I got over it somehow or
other; became gradually inured, as it were, superior to the weakness of
vision that would have condemned me for a bastard eagle and no true son
of Homer.
'But now here is another great advantage that I consider you have over
me. The poetic faculty has a single aim; from which it follows that
Homer's glory must be laid hold of at once and as a whole. You on the
other hand, if you were to attempt dealing with the whole Demosthenes
all at once, would never know what to say; you would waver and not be
able to set your thoughts to work. You would be like the _gourmand_
at a Sicilian banquet, or the aesthete who has a thousand delightful
sights and sounds presented to him at once; they do not know which
way to turn for their conflicting desires. I suspect that you too are
distracted and find concentration impossible; all round you are the
varied attractions--his magnanimity, his fire, his orderly life, his
oratorical force and practical courage, the endless opportunities of
gain that he scorned, his justice, humanity, honour, spirit, sagacity,
and each of all his great services to his country. It may well be that,
when you behold on this side decrees, ambassadors, speeches, laws, on
the other, fleets, Euboea, Boeotia, Chios, Rhodes, the Hellespont,
Byzantium, you are pulled to and fro among these too numerous
invitations, and cannot tell which to accept.
'Pindar once found himself in a similar difficulty with an
over-abundant theme:
Ismenus? Melia's distaff golden-bright?
Cadmus? the race from dragon's teeth that came?
Thebe's dark circlet? the all-daring might
Of Heracles? great Bacchus' merry fame?
White-armed Harmonia's bridal? --Ay, but which?
My Muse, we're poor in that we are too rich.
You, I dare say, are in the same quandary. Logic and life, rhetoric and
philosophy, popularity and death--ay, but which?
'The maze is quite easy to escape from, though; you have only to take
hold of one single clue, no matter which--his oratory, if you will, so
that it is taken by itself--, and stick to that one throughout your
present discourse. You will have ample material; his oratory is not of
the Periclean type. Pericles could lighten and thunder, and he could
hit the right nail on the head; so much tradition tells us; but we
have nothing to judge for ourselves by, no doubt because, beyond the
momentary impression produced, there was in his performances no element
of permanence, nothing that could stand the searching test of time. But
with Demosthenes's work--well, that it will be your province to deal
with, if your choice goes that way.
'Or if you prefer his character, or his policy, it will be well to
isolate some particular detail--if you are greedy you may pick out two
or three--which will give you quite enough to go upon; so great was he
at every point. And for such specializing we have Homer's example; the
compliments he pays his heroes are attached to parts of them, their
feet, their heads, their hair, even their shields or something they
have on; and the Gods seem to have had no objection to poets' basing
their praises merely on a distaff, a bow, or the aegis; a limb or a
quality must pass still more easily; and as for good actions, it is
impossible to give an exhaustive list of them. Demosthenes accordingly
will not blame you for confining your eulogy to _one_ of his merits,
especially as to celebrate the whole of them worthily would be beyond
even _his_ powers. '
When Thersagoras had finished this harangue, I remarked: 'Your
intention is plain; I am to be convinced that you are more than a good
poet; so you have constructed your prose Demosthenes as a pendant to
your verse Homer. ' 'No, no,' he said; 'what made me run on so long was
the idea that, if I could ease your mind by showing how light your
task was, I should have secured my listener. ' 'Then let me tell you
that _your_ object has not been furthered, and _my_ case has only been
aggravated. ' 'A fine doctor I seem to be! ' he said. 'Not knowing where
the difficulty lies,' I continued, 'you are a doctor who mistakes his
patient's ailment and treats him for another. ' 'How so? '
'You have been prescribing for the troubles that would attend a first
attempt; unfortunately it is years and years since I got through that
stage, and your remedies are quite out of date. ' 'Why, then,' he
exclaimed, 'the cure is complete; nobody is nervous about a road of
which he knows every inch. '
'Ah, but then I have set my heart upon reversing the feat that
Anniceris of Cyrene exhibited to Plato and his friends. To show what
a fine driver he was, he drove round the Academy time after time
exactly in his own track, which looked after it as if it had only been
traversed once. Now my endeavour is just the opposite, to _avoid_ my
old tracks; and it is by no means so easy to keep out of the ruts. '
'Pauson's is the trick for you,' he said. 'What is that? I never heard
of it. '
'Pauson the painter was commissioned to do a horse rolling. He painted
one galloping in a cloud of dust. As he was at work upon it, his
patron came in, and complained that this was not what he had ordered.
Pauson just turned the picture upside down and told his man to hold
it so for inspection; there was the horse rolling on its back. ' 'You
dear innocent! ' I said; 'do you suppose I have kept my picture turned
the same way all these years? It has been shifted and tilted at every
conceivable angle, till I begin to have apprehensions of ending like
Proteus. ' 'And how was that? ' 'Oh, I mean the issue of his attempts to
evade human observation; when he had exhausted all shapes of animals
and plants and elements, finding no metamorphosis left him, he had to
be Proteus again. '
'You have more shifts than ever Proteus had,' he said, 'to get off
hearing my poem. '
'Oh, do not say that,' said I; 'off goes my burden of care, and I am
at your service. Perhaps when you have got over your own pains of
child-birth you will show more feeling for my delicate state. '
He liked the offer, we settled down on a convenient stone step, and
I listened to some excellent poetry. In the middle of reading he was
seized with an idea, did up his tablets, and said: 'You shall have your
hearer's fee, as well deserved as an Athenian's after a day in court or
assembly. Thank me, please. ' 'I do, before I know what for. But what
may it be? ' 'It was in the Macedonian royal archives that I came across
the book; I was delighted with it at the time, and took considerable
trouble to secure it; it has just come into my head that I have it
at home. It contains, among details of Antipater's management of the
household, facts about Demosthenes that I think you will find worth
your best attention. ' 'You shall have payment on the spot,' I said,
'in the shape of an audience for the rest of your verses; and moreover
I shall not part with you till your promise is fulfilled. You have
given me a luscious Homer birthday dinner; and it seems you are to be
at the charges of the Demosthenes one too. '
He read to the end, we stayed long enough for me to give the poem its
meed of praise, and then adjourned to his house, where after some
search the book was found. I took it away with me, and on further
acquaintance was so much impressed by it that I shall do no editing,
but read it you _totidem verbis_. Asclepius is not less honoured if his
worshippers, in default of original compositions, have the hymns of
Isodemus or Sophocles performed before him; there is a failure nowadays
in the supply of new plays for Dionysus; but those who produce the
works of old masters at the proper season have the credit all the same
of honouring the God.
This book, then (the part of the state records that concerns us is the
conversation I shall give you)--the book informs us that Archias's
name was announced to Antipater. In case any of my younger hearers
should not know the fact already, this Archias had been charged with
the arrest of all exiles. In particular, he was to get Demosthenes from
Calauria into Antipater's presence, but rather by persuasion than by
force. Antipater was excited about it, hoping that Demosthenes might
arrive any day. So, hearing that Archias was come from Calauria, he
gave orders for his instant admittance.
When he entered--but you shall have the conversation as it stands.
_Archias. Antipater_
_Ar. _ Is it well with you, Antipater?
_Ant. _ It is well, if you have brought Demosthenes.
_Ar. _ I have brought him as I might. I have the urn that holds his
remains.
_Ant. _ Ha? my hopes are dashed. What avail ashes and urns, if I have
not Demosthenes?
_Ar. _ The soul, O King, may not be prisoned in a man's own despite.
_Ant. _ Why took you him not alive?
_Ar. _ We took him.
_Ant. _ And he has died on the way?
_Ar. _ He died where he was, in Calauria.
_Ant. _ Your neglect is to blame; you took not due care of him.
_Ar. _ Nay, it lies not at our door.
_Ant. _ What mean you? These are riddles, Archias; you took him alive,
and you have him not?
_Ar. _ Was it not your charge that we should use no force at first? Yet
indeed we should have fared no better if we had; we did intend it.
_Ant. _ You did not well, even in the intention; it may be your violence
killed him.
_Ar. _ No, we killed him not; but if we could not persuade him, there
was nothing for it but force. But, O King, how had you been the better
off, if he had come alive? you could have done no more than kill him.
_Ant. _ Peace, Archias! methinks you comprehend neither the nature of
Demosthenes, nor my mind. You think there is no more in the finding of
Demosthenes than in the hunting down such scoundrels as Himeraeus or
Aristonicus or Eucrates; these are like swollen torrents--mean fellows
in themselves, to whom a passing storm gives brief importance; they
make a brave show while the disturbance lasts; but they are as sure to
vanish soon as the wind to fall at evening. The recreant Hyperides is
another--a selfish demagogue, who took no shame to curry favour with
the mob by libelling Demosthenes, and make himself its instrument for
ends that his dupes soon wished they had never attained; for the libels
had not long borne their fruit before the libelled was reinstated
with more honour than Alcibiades himself. But what recked Hyperides?
he scrupled not to use against what had once been dearest to him the
tongue that he deserved, even by that iniquity, to lose.
_Ar. _ How? was Demosthenes not our enemy of enemies?
_Ant. _ Not in the eyes of one who cares for an honourable nature, and
loves a sincere consistent character. The noble is noble, though it be
in an enemy; and virtue has no country. Am I meaner than Xerxes? he
could admire Bulis and Sperchis the Spartans, and release them when
they were in his power. No man that ever lived do I admire more than
Demosthenes; twice I was in his company at Athens (in hurried times, it
is true), and I have heard much from others, and there is his work to
judge by. And what moves me is not his skill in speech. You might well
suppose so; Python was nothing, matched with him, and the Attic orators
but babes in comparison with his finish and intensity, the music of
his words, the clearness of his thoughts, his chains of proof, his
cumulative blows. We found our mistake when we listened to Python and
his promises; we had gathered the Greeks to Athens to see the Athenians
confuted; it was Demosthenes who confuted _us. _ But no words of mine
can describe the power of his eloquence.
Yet to that I give but a secondary place, as a tool the man used. It
was the man himself I marvelled at, his spirit and his wisdom, and
the steadiness of soul that steered a straight course through all the
tempests of fortune with never a craven impulse. And Philip was of
my mind about him; when a speech of his before the Athenian assembly
against Philip was reported, Parmenio was angry, and made some bitter
jest upon him. But Philip said: _Ah, Parmenio, he has a right to say
what he pleases; he is the only popular orator in all Greece whose name
is missing in my secret service accounts, though I would far rather
have put myself in his hands than in those of clerks and third-rate
actors. All the tribe of them are down for gold, timber, rents, cattle,
land, in Boeotia if not in Macedonia[21]; but the walls of Byzantium
are not more proof against the battering-ram than Demosthenes against
gold_.
_This is the way I look at it, Parmenio. An Athenian who speaking in
Athens prefers me to his country shall have of my money, but not of
my friendship; as for one who hates me for his country's sake, I will
assault him as I would a citadel, a wall, a dock, a trench, but I have
only admiration for his virtue, and congratulations for the State that
possesses him. The other kind I should like to crush as soon as they
have served my purpose; but him I would sooner have here with us than
the Illyrian and Triballian horse and all my mercenaries; arguments
that carry conviction, weight of intellect, I do not put below force of
arms. _
That was to Parmenio; and he said much the same to me. At the time of
the Athenian expedition under Diopithes, I was very anxious, but Philip
laughed at me heartily, and said: _Are you afraid of these town-bred
generals and their men? Their fleet, their Piraeus, their docks, I snap
my fingers at them. What is to be looked for from people whose worship
is of Dionysus, whose life is in feasting and dancing? If Demosthenes,
and not a man besides, had been subtracted from Athens, we should have
had it with less trouble than Thebes or Thessaly; deceit and force,
energy and corruption, would soon have done the thing.
But he is ever
awake; he misses no occasion; he makes move for move and counters every
stroke. Not a trick of ours, not an attempt begun or only thought of,
but he has intelligence of it; in a word he is the obstacle that stands
between us and the swift attainment of our ends. It was little fault of
his that we took Amphipolis, that we won Olynthus, Phocis, Thermopylae,
that we are masters of the Hellespont. _
_He rouses his reluctant countrymen out of their opiate sleep, applies
to their indolence the knife and cautery of frank statement, and little
he cares whether they like it or not. He transfers the revenues from
state theatre to state armament, re-creates with his navy bill a fleet
disorganized to the verge of extinction, restores patriotism to the
place from which it had long been ousted by the passion for legal fees,
uplifts the eyes of a degenerate race to the deeds of their fathers and
emulation of Marathon and Salamis, and fits them for Hellenic leagues
and combinations. You cannot escape his vigilance, he is not to be
wheedled, you can no more buy him than the Persian King could buy the
great Aristides. _
_This is the direction your fears should take, Antipater; never mind
all the war-ships and all the fleets. What Themistocles and Pericles
were to the Athens of old, that is Demosthenes to Athens to-day, as
shrewd as Themistocles, as high of soul as Pericles. He it was that
gained them the control of Euboea and Megara, the Hellespont and
Boeotia. It is well indeed that they give the command to such as Chares
or Diopithes or Proxenus, and keep Demosthenes to the platform at home.
If they had given into his hands their arms and ships and troops, their
strategy and their money, I doubt he would have put me on my mettle to
keep Macedonia; even now that he has no weapon but his decrees, he is
with us at every turn, his hand is upon us; the ways and means are of
his finding, the force of his gathering; it is he that sends armadas
afar, he that joins power to power, he that meets our every change of
plan. _
This was his tone about Demosthenes on many other occasions too; he
put it down as one of his debts to fortune that armies were never led
by the man whose mere words were so many battering-rams and catapults
worked from Athens to the shattering and confounding of his plans. As
to Chaeronea, even the victory made no difference; he continued to
impress upon us how precarious a position this one man had contrived
for us. _Things went unexpectedly well; their generals were cowards
and their troops undisciplined, and the caprice of fortune, which has
so often served us well, brought us out victorious; but he had reduced
me to hazarding my kingdom and my life on that single throw; he had
brought the most powerful cities into line, he had united Greece,
he had forced Athens and Thebes and all Boeotia, Corinth, Euboea,
Megara--the might of Greece, in short--to play the game out to its end,
and had arrested me before I reached Attic soil. _
He never ceased to speak thus about Demosthenes. If any one told him
the Athenian democracy was a formidable rival, 'Demosthenes,' he would
say, 'is my only rival; Athens without him is no better than Aenianes
or Thessalians. ' Whenever Philip sent embassies to the various states,
if Athens had sent any one else to argue against his men, he always
gained his point with ease; but when it was Demosthenes, he would tell
us the embassy had come to naught: there was not much setting up of
trophies over speeches of Demosthenes.
Such was Philip's opinion. Now I am no Philip at the best, and do you
suppose, Archias, that if I could have got a man like Demosthenes, I
should have found nothing better to do with him than sending him like
an ox to the slaughter? or should I have made him my right-hand man
in the management of Greece and of the empire? I was instinctively
attracted long ago by his public record--an attraction heightened
by the witness of Aristotle. He constantly assured both Alexander
and myself that among all the vast number of his pupils he had found
none comparable to Demosthenes in natural genius and persevering
self-development, none whose intellect was at once so weighty and so
agile, none who spoke his opinions so freely or maintained them so
courageously.
_But you_ (said Aristotle) _confuse him with an Eubulus, a Phrynon_, _a
Philocrates, and think to convert with gifts a man who has actually
lavished his inheritance half on needy Athenians and half on Athens;
you vainly imagine that you can intimidate one who has long ago
resolved to set his life upon his country's doubtful fortunes; if
he arraigns your proceedings, you try denunciation; why, the nearer
terrors of the Assembly find him unmoved. You do not realize that the
mainspring of his policy is patriotism, and that the only personal
advantage he expects from it is the improvement of his own nature. _
All this it was, Archias, that made me long to have him with me, to
hear from his own lips what he thought about the state of things, and
be able at any time of need, abandoning the flatterers who infest us,
to hear the plain words of an independent mind and profit by sincere
advice. And I might fairly have drawn _his_ attention to the ungrateful
nature of those Athenians for whom he had risked all when he might have
had firmer and less unconscionable friends.
_Ar. _ O King, your other ends you might have gained, but that you would
have told him to no purpose; his love of Athens was a madness beyond
cure.
_Ant. _ It was so indeed; 'twere vain to deny it. But how died he?
_Ar. _ O King, there is further wonder in store for you. We who have
had the scene before our eyes are as startled and as unbelieving
yet as when we saw it. He must long ago have determined how to die;
his preparation shows it. He was seated within the temple, and our
arguments of the days before had been spent on him in vain.
_Ant. _ Ay? and what were they?
_Ar. _ Long and kindly I urged him, with promises on your part, not that
I looked to see them kept (for I knew not then, and took you to be
wroth with him), but in hopes they might prevail.
_Ant. _ And what hearing did he give them? Keep nothing back; I would I
were there now, hearing him with my own ears; failing which, do you
hide nothing from me. 'Tis worth much to learn the bearing of a true
man in the last moments of his life, whether he gave way and played the
coward, or kept his course unfaltering even to the end.
_Ar. _ Ah, in him was no bending to the storm; how far from it! With a
smiling allusion to my former life, he told me I was not actor enough
to make your lies convincing.
_Ant. _ Ha? he left life for want of belief in my promises?
_Ar. _ Not so; hear to the end, and you will see his distrust was not
all for you. Since you bid me speak, O King, he told me there was no
oath that could bind a Macedonian; it was nothing strange that they
should use against Demosthenes the weapon that had won them Amphipolis,
and Olynthus, and Oropus. And much more of the like; I had writers
there, that his words might be preserved for you. _Archias_ (he said),
_the prospect of death or torture would be enough to keep me out of
Antipater's presence. And if you tell me true, I must be on my guard
against the worse danger of receiving life itself as a present at his
hands, and deserting, to serve Macedonia, that post which I have sworn
to hold for Greece. _
_Life were a thing to be desired, Archias, were it purchased for me by
the power of Piraeus (a war-ship, my gift, has floated there), by the
wall and trench of which I bore the cost, by the tribe Pandionis whose
festival charges I took upon me, by the spirit of Solon and Draco, by
unmuzzled statesmen and a free people, by martial levies and naval
organization, by the virtues and the victories of our fathers, by the
affection of fellow citizens who have crowned me many a time, and by
the might of a Greece whose guardian I have never ceased to be. Or
again, if life is to be owed to compassion, though it be mean enough,
yet compassion I might endure among the kindred of the captives I have
ransomed, the fathers whose daughters I have helped to portion, and the
men whose debts I have joined in paying. _
_But if the island empire and the sea may not save me, I ask my safety
from the Posidon at whose altar and under whose sanctuary I stand.
And if Posidon's power avails not to keep his temple inviolate, if he
scorns not to surrender Demosthenes to Archias, then welcome death; I
will not transfer my worship to Antipater. I might have had Macedonia
more at my devotion than Athens, might be now a partaker in your
fortunes, if I would have ranged myself with Callimedon, and Pytheas,
and Demades. When things were far gone, I might yet have made a shift,
if I had not had respect to the daughters of Erechtheus and to Codrus.
Fortune might desert, I would not follow her; for death is a haven of
safety, which he who reaches will do no baseness more. Archias, I will
not be at this late day a stain upon the name of Athens; I will not
make choice of slavery; be my winding-sheet the white one of liberty. _
_Sir actor, let me recall to you a fine passage from one of your
tragedies_[22]:
_But even at the point of death
She forethought took to fall in seemly wise_.
_She was but a girl; and shall Demosthenes choose an unseemly life
before a seemly death, and forget what Xenocrates and Plato have said
of immortality? _ And then he was stirred to some bitter speech upon men
puffed up by fortune. What remains to tell? At last, as I now besought
and now threatened, mingling the stern and mild, 'Had I been Archias,'
he said, 'I had yielded; but seeing that I am Demosthenes, your pardon,
good sir, if my nature recoils from baseness. '
Then I was minded to hale him off by force. Which when he observed,
I saw him smile and glance at the God. _Archias_ (he said) _believes
that there is no might, no refuge for the human soul, but arms and
war-ships, walls and camps. He scorns that equipment of mine which
is proof against Illyrians and Triballi and Macedonians, surer than
that wooden wall_[23] _of old, which the God averred none should
prevail against. Secure in this I ever took a fearless course; fearless
I braved the might of Macedonia; little I cared for Euctemon or
Aristogiton, for Pytheas and Callimedon, for Philip in the old days,
for Archias to-day. _
And then, _Lay no hand upon me. Be it not mine to bring outrage upon
the temple; I will but greet the God, and follow of my free will. _ And
for me, I put reliance upon this, and when he lifted his hand to his
mouth, I thought it was but to do obeisance.
_Ant. _ And it was indeed--?
_Ar. _ We put his servant to the question later, and learned from her
that he had long had poison by him, to give him liberty by parting soul
from body. He had not yet passed the holy threshold, when he fixed his
eye on me and said: 'Take _this_ to Antipater; Demosthenes you shall
not take, no, by ----' And methought he would have added, by the men
that fell at Marathon.
And with that farewell he parted. So ends, O King, the siege of
Demosthenes.
_Ant. _ Archias, that was Demosthenes. Hail to that unconquerable soul!
how lofty the spirit, how republican the care, that would never be
parted from their warrant of freedom! Enough; the man has gone his way,
to live the life they tell of in the Isles of the heroic Blest, or to
walk the paths that, if tales be true, the heaven-bound spirits tread;
he shall attend, surely, on none but that Zeus who is named of Freedom.
For his body, we will send it to Athens, a nobler offering to that land
than the men that died at Marathon.
H.
FOOTNOTES:
[18] Homer, _Il. _ xii. 243. 'One omen is best--to fight for our own
country. '
[19] See _Demosthenes_ in Notes.
[20] Speeches in the law courts had a time limit appointed, which was
measured by the water-clock or clepsydra, generally called simply 'the
water', 'my water,' 'his water,' &c.
[21] To get a meaning, I translate as though the Greek, instead of #ou
Boiôtias oud' entha ti mê# were #ho men Boiôtias, ho d' entha#.
[22] Euripides, _Hecuba_. See _Polyxena_ in Notes.
[23] Oracle in Herodotus vii. 141: 'A bulwark of wood at the last Zeus
grants to the Trito-born goddess | Sole to remain unwasted. ' _G. C.
Macaulay. _ Variously interpreted of the thorn hedge of the Acropolis,
and of the Athenian fleet.
THE GODS IN COUNCIL
_Zeus. Hermes. Momus_
_Zeus. _ Now, gentlemen, enough of that muttering and whispering in
corners. You complain that our banquets are thrown open to a number
of undesirable persons. Very well: the Assembly has been convened
for the purpose of dealing with this very point, and every one is at
liberty to declare his sentiments openly, and bring what allegations he
will. --Hermes, make formal proclamation to that effect.
_Her. _ All duly qualified divinities are hereby invited to address the
Assembly on the subject of foreigners and immigrants.
_Mo. _ Have I your permission to speak, sir?
_Zeus. _ It is not needed; you have heard the proclamation.
_Mo. _ I desire, then, to protest against the insufferable vanity of
some among us who, not content with their own promotion to godhead,
would introduce their dependants and underlings here as our equals.
Sir, I shall express myself on this subject with that blunt sincerity
which is inseparable from my character. I am known to the world as one
whose unfettered tongue cannot refrain from speech in the presence of
wrong-doing; as one who probes matters to the bottom, and says what
he thinks, without concealment, without fear, and without scruple. My
frankness is burdensome to the generality of Gods, who mistake it for
censoriousness; I have been termed by such the Accuser General. But I
shall none the less avail myself of the freedom accorded to me by the
proclamation--and by your permission, sir--to speak my mind without
reserve. --There are, I repeat it, many persons who, despite their mixed
origin, have been admitted to our feasts and councils upon terms of
equality; and who, not satisfied with this, have brought hither their
servants and satellites, and enrolled them among the Gods; and these
menials now share in our rations and sacrifices without ever so much as
paying the customary tax.
_Zeus. _ These are riddles. Say what you mean in so many words, and let
us have the names. Generalities of this kind can only give ground for
random conjecture; they might apply to any one. You are a friend to
sincerity: speak on, then, without hesitation.
_Mo. _ This is really most gratifying. Such encouragement is precisely
what I should have expected of a king of your exalted spirit; I will
mention the name. I refer, in fact, to Dionysus. Although the mother of
this truly estimable demi-god was not only a mortal, but a barbarian,
and his maternal grandfather a tradesman in Phoenicia, one Cadmus, it
was thought necessary to confer immortality upon him. With his own
conduct since that time, I am not concerned; I shall have nothing
to say on the subject of his snood, his inebriety, or his manner of
walking. You may all see him for yourselves: an effeminate, half-witted
creature, reeking of strong liquor from the early hours of the day.
But we are indebted to him for the presence of a whole tribe of his
followers, whom he has introduced into our midst under the title
of Gods. Such are Pan, Silenus, and the Satyrs; coarse persons, of
frisky tendencies and eccentric appearance, drawn chiefly from the
goat-herd class. The first-mentioned of these, besides being horned,
has the hind-quarters of a goat, and his enormous beard is not unlike
that of the same animal. Silenus is an old man with a bald head and
a snub nose, who is generally to be seen riding on a donkey; he is
of Lydian extraction. The Satyrs are Phrygians; they too are bald,
and have pointed ears, and sprouting horns, like those of young kids.
When I add that every one of these persons is provided with a tail,
you will realize the extent of our obligation to Dionysus. And with
these theological curiosities before their eyes, we wonder why it is
that men think lightly of the Gods! I might have added that Dionysus
has also brought us a couple of ladies: Ariadne is one, his mistress,
whose crown is now set among the host of stars; the other is farmer
Icarius's daughter. And the cream of the jest is still to come: the
dog, Erigone's dog, must be translated too; the poor child would never
be happy in Heaven without the sweet little pet! What can we call this
but a drunken freak?
So much for Dionysus. I now proceed--
_Zeus. _ Now, Momus, I see what you are coming to: but you will kindly
leave Asclepius and Heracles alone. Asclepius is a physician, and
restores the sick; he is
More worth than many men.
And Heracles is my own son, and purchased his immortality with many
toils. So not one word against either of them.
_Mo. _ Very well, sir; as you wish, though I had something to say on
that subject, too. You will excuse my remarking, at any rate, that
they have something of a scorched appearance still. With reference to
yourself, sir, a good deal might be said, if I could feel at liberty----
_Zeus. _ Oh, as regards myself, you are,--perfectly at liberty. What,
then, I am an interloper too, am I?
_Mo. _ Worse than that, according to what they say in Crete: your
tomb is there on view. Not that _I_ believe them, any more than I
believe that Aegium story, about your being a changeling. But there
is one thing that I think ought to be made clear. You yourself,
sir, have set us the example in loose conduct of this kind; it is
you we have to thank--you and your terrestrial gallantries and your
transformations--for the present mixed state of society. We are quite
uneasy about it. You will be caught, some day, and sacrificed as a
bull; or some goldsmith will try his hand upon our gold-transmuted
sire, and we shall have nothing to show for it but a bracelet, a
necklace or a pair of earrings. The long and short of it is, that
Heaven is simply _swarming_ with these demi-gods of yours; there is
no other word for it. It tickles a man considerably when he suddenly
finds Heracles promoted to deity, and Eurystheus, his taskmaster,
dead and buried, his tomb within easy distance of his slave's temple;
or again when he observes in Thebes that Dionysus is a God, but that
God's cousins, Pentheus, Actaeon, and Learchus, only mortals, and poor
devils at that. You see, sir, ever since you gave the entrée to people
of this sort, and turned your attention to the daughters of Earth, all
the rest have followed suit; and the scandalous part of it is, that
the Goddesses are just as bad as the Gods. Of the cases of Anchises,
Tithonus, Endymion, Iasion, and others, I need say nothing; they are
familiar to every one, and it would be tedious to expatiate further.
_Zeus. _ Now I will have no reflections on Ganymede's antecedents; I
shall be very angry with you, if you hurt the boy's feelings.
_Mo. _ Ah; and out of consideration for him I suppose I must also
abstain from any reference to the eagle, which is now a God like the
rest of us, perches upon the royal sceptre, and may be expected at
any moment to build his nest upon the head of Majesty? --Well, you
must allow me Attis, Corybas, and Sabazius: by what contrivance, now,
did _they_ get here? and that Mede there, Mithras, with the candys
and tiara? why, the fellow cannot speak Greek; if you pledge him,
he does not know what you mean. The consequence is, that Scythians
and Goths, observing their success, snap their fingers at us, and
distribute divinity and immortality right and left; that was how
the slave Zamolxis's name slipped into our register. However, let
that pass. But I should just like to ask that Egyptian there--the
dog-faced gentleman in the linen suit[24]--who _he_ is, and whether he
proposes to establish his divinity by barking? And will the piebald
bull yonder[25], from Memphis, explain what use _he_ has for a temple,
an oracle, or a priest? As for the ibises and monkeys and goats and
worse absurdities that are bundled in upon us, goodness knows how, from
Egypt, I am ashamed to speak of them; nor do I understand how you,
gentlemen, can endure to see such creatures enjoying a prestige equal
to or greater than your own. --And you yourself, sir, must surely find
ram's horns a great inconvenience?
_Zeus. _ Certainly, it is disgraceful the way these Egyptians go on.
At the same time, Momus, there is an occult significance in most of
these things; and it ill becomes you, who are not of the initiated, to
ridicule them.
_Mo. _ Oh, come now: a God is one thing, and a person with a dog's head
is another; I need no initiation to tell me that.
_Zeus. _ Well, that will do for the Egyptians; time must be taken for
the consideration of their case. Proceed to others.
_Mo. _ Trophonius and Amphilochus come next. The thought of the latter,
in particular, causes my blood to boil: the father[26] is a matricide
and an outcast, and the son, if you please, sets up for a prophet in
Cilicia, and retails information--usually incorrect--to a believing
public at the rate of twopence an oracle. That is how Apollo here has
fallen into disrepute: it needs but a quack (and quacks are plentiful),
a sprinkling of oil, and a garland or two, and an oracle may be had in
these days wherever there is an altar or a stone pillar. Fever patients
may now be cured either at Olympia by the statue of Polydamas the
athlete, or in Thasos by that of Theagenes. Hector receives sacrifice
at Troy: Protesilaus just across the water on Chersonese. Ever since
the number of Gods has thus multiplied, perjury and temple-robbery have
been on the increase. In short, men do not care two straws about us;
nor can I blame them.
idle friend I might light upon; and you, I rejoice to see, are idle. '
'Ah, you lucky man! ' I exclaimed; 'you are like the winner of the three
miles, who had washed off the dust, and could amuse himself for the
rest of the day. He was minded to crack a story with the wrestler, when
the wrestling was next on the programme; but the wrestler asked him
whether he had felt like cracking stories when he toed the line just
now. You have won your poetic three miles, and want me to minister to
your amusement just as I am shivering at the thought of my hundred
yards. ' He laughed: 'Why, how will it make things worse for you? '
'Ah, you probably consider Demosthenes of much less account than Homer.
_You_ are very proud of your eulogy on Homer; and is Demosthenes a
light matter to _me_? ' 'A trumped up charge,' he exclaimed; 'I am not
going to sow dissension between these two mighty ones, though it is
true my own allegiance is rather to Homer. '
'Good,' I said, 'and you must allow me to give mine to Demosthenes.
But, though you do not disqualify my subject, I am sure you think
poetry the only real treatment; you feel about mere rhetoric what the
cavalryman feels as he gallops past the infantry. ' 'I hope I am not
so mad as that,' he said, 'though a considerable touch of madness is
required of him who would pass the gates of poetry. ' 'If you come to
that, prose cannot do without some divine inspiration either, if it
is not to be flat and common. ' He admitted that at once: 'I often
delight myself with comparing passages from Demosthenes and other prose
writers with Homer in point of vehemence, pungency, fire. "Flown with
wine" I pair off against the revellings and dancings and debauchery of
Philip; "One presage that ne'er fails[18]" finds its counterpart in
"It is for brave men, founding themselves upon brave hopes--"; "How
would old Peleus, lord of steeds, repine--" is matched by "What a cry
of lamentation would go up from the men of those days who laid down
their lives for glory and freedom--"; "fluent Python" reminds me of
Odysseus's "snow-flake speech"; "If 'twere our lot neither to age nor
die," I illustrate by "For every man's life must end in death, though
he shut himself up in a narrow chamber for safer keeping. " In fact the
instances are numberless in which they attack their meaning by the same
road.
'I love too to study his feelings and moods and transitions, the
variety with which he combats weariness, his resumptions after
digression, the charm of his opportune illustrations, and the
never-failing native purity of his style.
'It has often struck me about Demosthenes--for I will tell the whole
truth out--that that looser of the bonds of speech rebukes Athenian
slackness with a dignity that is lacking in the "Greekesses" used by
Homer of the Greeks; and again he maintains the tragic intensity proper
to the great Hellenic drama more consistently than the poet who inserts
speeches at the very crisis of battle and allows energy to evaporate in
words.
'As often as I read Demosthenes, the balanced clauses, the rhythmic
movement and cadence, make me forget that this is not my beloved
poetry; for Homer too abounds in contrast and parallel, in figures
startling or simple. It is a provision of nature, I suppose, that each
faculty should have its proper equipment attached to it. How should I
scorn your Muse? I know her powers too well.
'None the less, I consider my task of a Homeric encomium twice as
difficult as your praise of Demosthenes; not because it must be in
verse, but from the nature of the material; _I_ cannot lay down a
foundation of fact to build the edifice of praise upon; there is
nothing but the poems themselves. Everything else is uncertain--his
country, his family, his time. If there had been any uncertainty about
them,
Debate and strife had not divided men;
but as it is, they give him for a country Ios or Colophon or Cumae,
Chios, Smyrna, or Egyptian Thebes, or half a hundred other places; his
father may be Maeon the Lydian, or he may be a river; his mother is now
Melanope, and now in default of satisfactory human descent a dryad; his
time is the Heroic Age, or else perhaps it is the Ionic. There is no
knowing for certain whether he was before or after Hesiod, even; and no
wonder, considering that some object to his very name, and will have
him Melesigenes instead. So too with his poverty, and his blindness.
However, all these questions are best left alone. So you see the arena
open to my panegyric is extremely limited; my theme is a poet and not a
man of action; I can infer and collect his wisdom only from his verses.
'_Your_ work, now, can be reeled smoothly off out of hand; you have
your definite known facts; the butcher's meat is there, only needing to
be garnished with the sauce of your words. History supplies you with
the greatness and distinction of Demosthenes; it is all known; his
country was Athens, the splendid, the famous, the bulwark of Hellas.
Now if _I_ could have laid hands on Athens, I might have used the
poet's right to introduce the loves and judgements and sojourns there
of the Gods, the gifts they lavished on it, the tale of Eleusis. As
for its laws and courts and festivals, its Piraeus and its colonies,
the memorials set up in it of victory by land and sea, Demosthenes
himself is the authority for saying that no words could do justice to
them. My material would have been inexhaustible; and I could not have
been accused of hanging up my true theme; the formula of panegyric
includes the arraying of the man in the splendours of his country. So
too Isocrates ekes out his _Helen_ by introducing Theseus. It is true
that poets have their privileges; and perhaps _you_ have to be more
careful about your proportions; there must not be _too_ much sack to
the proverbial halfpennyworth of bread.
'Well then, let Athens go; but your discourse at once finds another
support in his father's wealth--that "golden base" which Pindar
likes--; for to be responsible for providing a war-ship was to be
among the richest Athenians in those days. And though he died while
Demosthenes was quite a child, we are not to count his orphan state a
disaster; it led to the distinction that brought his splendid gifts
into notice.
'Tradition gives us no hint of how Homer was educated or developed his
powers; the panegyrist must plunge straight into his works, and can
find nothing to talk about in his breeding and training and pupilage;
he has not even the resource of that Hesiodic sprig of bay which could
make a facile poet out of a shepherd. But think of _your_ abundance
in this branch of the subject. There is Callistratus and all the
mighty roll of orators, Alcidamas, Isocrates, Isaeus, Eubulides. Then
again, at Athens even those who were subject to paternal control had
countless temptations to indulgence, youth is the susceptible time, a
neglected ward could have lived as irregular a life as he chose, and
yet the objects that Demosthenes set up for himself were philosophy and
patriotism, and the doors they took him to not Phryne's, but those of
Aristotle and Theophrastus, Xenocrates and Plato.
'And so, my dear sir, your way is open to a disquisition upon the two
kinds of human love, the one sprung of a desire that is like the sea,
outrageous, fierce, stormily rocking the soul; it is a true sea wave,
which the earthly Aphrodite sets rolling with the tempestuous passions
of youth; but the other is the steady drawing of a golden cord from
heaven; it does not scorch and pierce and leave festering wounds; it
impels towards the pure and unsullied ideal of absolute beauty, and is
a sane madness in those souls which "yet hold of Zeus and nurse the
spark divine. "
'Love will find out the way, though that way involve a shaven head,
a cavern dwelling, a discouraging mirror and punitive sword, a
disciplining of the tongue, a belated apprenticeship to the actor's
art, a straining of the memory, a conquest over clamour, and a
borrowing of night hours to lengthen toilsome days. [19] All this your
Demosthenes endured, and who knows not what an orator it made of
him? his speech packed with thought and terse of language, himself
convincing in his knowledge of human nature, as splendid in the
elevation as mighty in the force of his sentiments, the master and not
the slave of his words and his ideas, ever fresh with the graces of
his art. He is the one orator whose speech has, in the bold phrase of
Leosthenes, at once the breath of life and the strength of wrought iron.
'Callisthenes remarked of Aeschylus that he wrote his tragedies in
wine, which lent vigour and warmth to his work. With Demosthenes it was
otherwise; he composed not on wine but on water; whence the witticism
of Demades, that most men's tongues are regulated by water,[20] but
Demosthenes's pen was subject to the same influence. And Pytheas
detected the smell of the midnight oil in the very perfection of the
speeches. Well, there is much in common between your subject and mine,
so far as this branch of them is concerned; on Homer's _poems_ I was no
worse off than you are.
'But when you come to your hero's acts of humanity, his pecuniary
sacrifices, his grand political achievements' (and he was going on
in full swing to the rest of the catalogue, when I interrupted, with
a laugh: 'Must I be dowsed with the remainder of your canful, good
bath-man? ' 'Most certainly,' he retorted, and went straight on),
'the public entertainments he gave, the public burdens he assumed,
the ships, the wall, the trench he contributed to, the prisoners he
ransomed, the girls he portioned, his admirable policy, the embassies
he served on, the laws he got passed, the mighty issues he was
concerned in--why, then I cannot but laugh to see your contracted
brows; as if a recital of the exploits of Demosthenes _could_ lack
matter! '
'I believe you think, my good man,' I protested, 'that I have never had
the deeds of Demosthenes drummed into me; I should be singular among
rhetoricians, then. ' 'It was on the assumption,' he said, 'implied by
you, that we want assistance. But perhaps your case is a very different
one; is the light so bright that you cannot manage to fix your eyes on
the dazzling glory of Demosthenes? Well, I was rather like that about
Homer at first. Indeed, I came very near turning mine away, thinking I
could not possibly face my subject. However, I got over it somehow or
other; became gradually inured, as it were, superior to the weakness of
vision that would have condemned me for a bastard eagle and no true son
of Homer.
'But now here is another great advantage that I consider you have over
me. The poetic faculty has a single aim; from which it follows that
Homer's glory must be laid hold of at once and as a whole. You on the
other hand, if you were to attempt dealing with the whole Demosthenes
all at once, would never know what to say; you would waver and not be
able to set your thoughts to work. You would be like the _gourmand_
at a Sicilian banquet, or the aesthete who has a thousand delightful
sights and sounds presented to him at once; they do not know which
way to turn for their conflicting desires. I suspect that you too are
distracted and find concentration impossible; all round you are the
varied attractions--his magnanimity, his fire, his orderly life, his
oratorical force and practical courage, the endless opportunities of
gain that he scorned, his justice, humanity, honour, spirit, sagacity,
and each of all his great services to his country. It may well be that,
when you behold on this side decrees, ambassadors, speeches, laws, on
the other, fleets, Euboea, Boeotia, Chios, Rhodes, the Hellespont,
Byzantium, you are pulled to and fro among these too numerous
invitations, and cannot tell which to accept.
'Pindar once found himself in a similar difficulty with an
over-abundant theme:
Ismenus? Melia's distaff golden-bright?
Cadmus? the race from dragon's teeth that came?
Thebe's dark circlet? the all-daring might
Of Heracles? great Bacchus' merry fame?
White-armed Harmonia's bridal? --Ay, but which?
My Muse, we're poor in that we are too rich.
You, I dare say, are in the same quandary. Logic and life, rhetoric and
philosophy, popularity and death--ay, but which?
'The maze is quite easy to escape from, though; you have only to take
hold of one single clue, no matter which--his oratory, if you will, so
that it is taken by itself--, and stick to that one throughout your
present discourse. You will have ample material; his oratory is not of
the Periclean type. Pericles could lighten and thunder, and he could
hit the right nail on the head; so much tradition tells us; but we
have nothing to judge for ourselves by, no doubt because, beyond the
momentary impression produced, there was in his performances no element
of permanence, nothing that could stand the searching test of time. But
with Demosthenes's work--well, that it will be your province to deal
with, if your choice goes that way.
'Or if you prefer his character, or his policy, it will be well to
isolate some particular detail--if you are greedy you may pick out two
or three--which will give you quite enough to go upon; so great was he
at every point. And for such specializing we have Homer's example; the
compliments he pays his heroes are attached to parts of them, their
feet, their heads, their hair, even their shields or something they
have on; and the Gods seem to have had no objection to poets' basing
their praises merely on a distaff, a bow, or the aegis; a limb or a
quality must pass still more easily; and as for good actions, it is
impossible to give an exhaustive list of them. Demosthenes accordingly
will not blame you for confining your eulogy to _one_ of his merits,
especially as to celebrate the whole of them worthily would be beyond
even _his_ powers. '
When Thersagoras had finished this harangue, I remarked: 'Your
intention is plain; I am to be convinced that you are more than a good
poet; so you have constructed your prose Demosthenes as a pendant to
your verse Homer. ' 'No, no,' he said; 'what made me run on so long was
the idea that, if I could ease your mind by showing how light your
task was, I should have secured my listener. ' 'Then let me tell you
that _your_ object has not been furthered, and _my_ case has only been
aggravated. ' 'A fine doctor I seem to be! ' he said. 'Not knowing where
the difficulty lies,' I continued, 'you are a doctor who mistakes his
patient's ailment and treats him for another. ' 'How so? '
'You have been prescribing for the troubles that would attend a first
attempt; unfortunately it is years and years since I got through that
stage, and your remedies are quite out of date. ' 'Why, then,' he
exclaimed, 'the cure is complete; nobody is nervous about a road of
which he knows every inch. '
'Ah, but then I have set my heart upon reversing the feat that
Anniceris of Cyrene exhibited to Plato and his friends. To show what
a fine driver he was, he drove round the Academy time after time
exactly in his own track, which looked after it as if it had only been
traversed once. Now my endeavour is just the opposite, to _avoid_ my
old tracks; and it is by no means so easy to keep out of the ruts. '
'Pauson's is the trick for you,' he said. 'What is that? I never heard
of it. '
'Pauson the painter was commissioned to do a horse rolling. He painted
one galloping in a cloud of dust. As he was at work upon it, his
patron came in, and complained that this was not what he had ordered.
Pauson just turned the picture upside down and told his man to hold
it so for inspection; there was the horse rolling on its back. ' 'You
dear innocent! ' I said; 'do you suppose I have kept my picture turned
the same way all these years? It has been shifted and tilted at every
conceivable angle, till I begin to have apprehensions of ending like
Proteus. ' 'And how was that? ' 'Oh, I mean the issue of his attempts to
evade human observation; when he had exhausted all shapes of animals
and plants and elements, finding no metamorphosis left him, he had to
be Proteus again. '
'You have more shifts than ever Proteus had,' he said, 'to get off
hearing my poem. '
'Oh, do not say that,' said I; 'off goes my burden of care, and I am
at your service. Perhaps when you have got over your own pains of
child-birth you will show more feeling for my delicate state. '
He liked the offer, we settled down on a convenient stone step, and
I listened to some excellent poetry. In the middle of reading he was
seized with an idea, did up his tablets, and said: 'You shall have your
hearer's fee, as well deserved as an Athenian's after a day in court or
assembly. Thank me, please. ' 'I do, before I know what for. But what
may it be? ' 'It was in the Macedonian royal archives that I came across
the book; I was delighted with it at the time, and took considerable
trouble to secure it; it has just come into my head that I have it
at home. It contains, among details of Antipater's management of the
household, facts about Demosthenes that I think you will find worth
your best attention. ' 'You shall have payment on the spot,' I said,
'in the shape of an audience for the rest of your verses; and moreover
I shall not part with you till your promise is fulfilled. You have
given me a luscious Homer birthday dinner; and it seems you are to be
at the charges of the Demosthenes one too. '
He read to the end, we stayed long enough for me to give the poem its
meed of praise, and then adjourned to his house, where after some
search the book was found. I took it away with me, and on further
acquaintance was so much impressed by it that I shall do no editing,
but read it you _totidem verbis_. Asclepius is not less honoured if his
worshippers, in default of original compositions, have the hymns of
Isodemus or Sophocles performed before him; there is a failure nowadays
in the supply of new plays for Dionysus; but those who produce the
works of old masters at the proper season have the credit all the same
of honouring the God.
This book, then (the part of the state records that concerns us is the
conversation I shall give you)--the book informs us that Archias's
name was announced to Antipater. In case any of my younger hearers
should not know the fact already, this Archias had been charged with
the arrest of all exiles. In particular, he was to get Demosthenes from
Calauria into Antipater's presence, but rather by persuasion than by
force. Antipater was excited about it, hoping that Demosthenes might
arrive any day. So, hearing that Archias was come from Calauria, he
gave orders for his instant admittance.
When he entered--but you shall have the conversation as it stands.
_Archias. Antipater_
_Ar. _ Is it well with you, Antipater?
_Ant. _ It is well, if you have brought Demosthenes.
_Ar. _ I have brought him as I might. I have the urn that holds his
remains.
_Ant. _ Ha? my hopes are dashed. What avail ashes and urns, if I have
not Demosthenes?
_Ar. _ The soul, O King, may not be prisoned in a man's own despite.
_Ant. _ Why took you him not alive?
_Ar. _ We took him.
_Ant. _ And he has died on the way?
_Ar. _ He died where he was, in Calauria.
_Ant. _ Your neglect is to blame; you took not due care of him.
_Ar. _ Nay, it lies not at our door.
_Ant. _ What mean you? These are riddles, Archias; you took him alive,
and you have him not?
_Ar. _ Was it not your charge that we should use no force at first? Yet
indeed we should have fared no better if we had; we did intend it.
_Ant. _ You did not well, even in the intention; it may be your violence
killed him.
_Ar. _ No, we killed him not; but if we could not persuade him, there
was nothing for it but force. But, O King, how had you been the better
off, if he had come alive? you could have done no more than kill him.
_Ant. _ Peace, Archias! methinks you comprehend neither the nature of
Demosthenes, nor my mind. You think there is no more in the finding of
Demosthenes than in the hunting down such scoundrels as Himeraeus or
Aristonicus or Eucrates; these are like swollen torrents--mean fellows
in themselves, to whom a passing storm gives brief importance; they
make a brave show while the disturbance lasts; but they are as sure to
vanish soon as the wind to fall at evening. The recreant Hyperides is
another--a selfish demagogue, who took no shame to curry favour with
the mob by libelling Demosthenes, and make himself its instrument for
ends that his dupes soon wished they had never attained; for the libels
had not long borne their fruit before the libelled was reinstated
with more honour than Alcibiades himself. But what recked Hyperides?
he scrupled not to use against what had once been dearest to him the
tongue that he deserved, even by that iniquity, to lose.
_Ar. _ How? was Demosthenes not our enemy of enemies?
_Ant. _ Not in the eyes of one who cares for an honourable nature, and
loves a sincere consistent character. The noble is noble, though it be
in an enemy; and virtue has no country. Am I meaner than Xerxes? he
could admire Bulis and Sperchis the Spartans, and release them when
they were in his power. No man that ever lived do I admire more than
Demosthenes; twice I was in his company at Athens (in hurried times, it
is true), and I have heard much from others, and there is his work to
judge by. And what moves me is not his skill in speech. You might well
suppose so; Python was nothing, matched with him, and the Attic orators
but babes in comparison with his finish and intensity, the music of
his words, the clearness of his thoughts, his chains of proof, his
cumulative blows. We found our mistake when we listened to Python and
his promises; we had gathered the Greeks to Athens to see the Athenians
confuted; it was Demosthenes who confuted _us. _ But no words of mine
can describe the power of his eloquence.
Yet to that I give but a secondary place, as a tool the man used. It
was the man himself I marvelled at, his spirit and his wisdom, and
the steadiness of soul that steered a straight course through all the
tempests of fortune with never a craven impulse. And Philip was of
my mind about him; when a speech of his before the Athenian assembly
against Philip was reported, Parmenio was angry, and made some bitter
jest upon him. But Philip said: _Ah, Parmenio, he has a right to say
what he pleases; he is the only popular orator in all Greece whose name
is missing in my secret service accounts, though I would far rather
have put myself in his hands than in those of clerks and third-rate
actors. All the tribe of them are down for gold, timber, rents, cattle,
land, in Boeotia if not in Macedonia[21]; but the walls of Byzantium
are not more proof against the battering-ram than Demosthenes against
gold_.
_This is the way I look at it, Parmenio. An Athenian who speaking in
Athens prefers me to his country shall have of my money, but not of
my friendship; as for one who hates me for his country's sake, I will
assault him as I would a citadel, a wall, a dock, a trench, but I have
only admiration for his virtue, and congratulations for the State that
possesses him. The other kind I should like to crush as soon as they
have served my purpose; but him I would sooner have here with us than
the Illyrian and Triballian horse and all my mercenaries; arguments
that carry conviction, weight of intellect, I do not put below force of
arms. _
That was to Parmenio; and he said much the same to me. At the time of
the Athenian expedition under Diopithes, I was very anxious, but Philip
laughed at me heartily, and said: _Are you afraid of these town-bred
generals and their men? Their fleet, their Piraeus, their docks, I snap
my fingers at them. What is to be looked for from people whose worship
is of Dionysus, whose life is in feasting and dancing? If Demosthenes,
and not a man besides, had been subtracted from Athens, we should have
had it with less trouble than Thebes or Thessaly; deceit and force,
energy and corruption, would soon have done the thing.
But he is ever
awake; he misses no occasion; he makes move for move and counters every
stroke. Not a trick of ours, not an attempt begun or only thought of,
but he has intelligence of it; in a word he is the obstacle that stands
between us and the swift attainment of our ends. It was little fault of
his that we took Amphipolis, that we won Olynthus, Phocis, Thermopylae,
that we are masters of the Hellespont. _
_He rouses his reluctant countrymen out of their opiate sleep, applies
to their indolence the knife and cautery of frank statement, and little
he cares whether they like it or not. He transfers the revenues from
state theatre to state armament, re-creates with his navy bill a fleet
disorganized to the verge of extinction, restores patriotism to the
place from which it had long been ousted by the passion for legal fees,
uplifts the eyes of a degenerate race to the deeds of their fathers and
emulation of Marathon and Salamis, and fits them for Hellenic leagues
and combinations. You cannot escape his vigilance, he is not to be
wheedled, you can no more buy him than the Persian King could buy the
great Aristides. _
_This is the direction your fears should take, Antipater; never mind
all the war-ships and all the fleets. What Themistocles and Pericles
were to the Athens of old, that is Demosthenes to Athens to-day, as
shrewd as Themistocles, as high of soul as Pericles. He it was that
gained them the control of Euboea and Megara, the Hellespont and
Boeotia. It is well indeed that they give the command to such as Chares
or Diopithes or Proxenus, and keep Demosthenes to the platform at home.
If they had given into his hands their arms and ships and troops, their
strategy and their money, I doubt he would have put me on my mettle to
keep Macedonia; even now that he has no weapon but his decrees, he is
with us at every turn, his hand is upon us; the ways and means are of
his finding, the force of his gathering; it is he that sends armadas
afar, he that joins power to power, he that meets our every change of
plan. _
This was his tone about Demosthenes on many other occasions too; he
put it down as one of his debts to fortune that armies were never led
by the man whose mere words were so many battering-rams and catapults
worked from Athens to the shattering and confounding of his plans. As
to Chaeronea, even the victory made no difference; he continued to
impress upon us how precarious a position this one man had contrived
for us. _Things went unexpectedly well; their generals were cowards
and their troops undisciplined, and the caprice of fortune, which has
so often served us well, brought us out victorious; but he had reduced
me to hazarding my kingdom and my life on that single throw; he had
brought the most powerful cities into line, he had united Greece,
he had forced Athens and Thebes and all Boeotia, Corinth, Euboea,
Megara--the might of Greece, in short--to play the game out to its end,
and had arrested me before I reached Attic soil. _
He never ceased to speak thus about Demosthenes. If any one told him
the Athenian democracy was a formidable rival, 'Demosthenes,' he would
say, 'is my only rival; Athens without him is no better than Aenianes
or Thessalians. ' Whenever Philip sent embassies to the various states,
if Athens had sent any one else to argue against his men, he always
gained his point with ease; but when it was Demosthenes, he would tell
us the embassy had come to naught: there was not much setting up of
trophies over speeches of Demosthenes.
Such was Philip's opinion. Now I am no Philip at the best, and do you
suppose, Archias, that if I could have got a man like Demosthenes, I
should have found nothing better to do with him than sending him like
an ox to the slaughter? or should I have made him my right-hand man
in the management of Greece and of the empire? I was instinctively
attracted long ago by his public record--an attraction heightened
by the witness of Aristotle. He constantly assured both Alexander
and myself that among all the vast number of his pupils he had found
none comparable to Demosthenes in natural genius and persevering
self-development, none whose intellect was at once so weighty and so
agile, none who spoke his opinions so freely or maintained them so
courageously.
_But you_ (said Aristotle) _confuse him with an Eubulus, a Phrynon_, _a
Philocrates, and think to convert with gifts a man who has actually
lavished his inheritance half on needy Athenians and half on Athens;
you vainly imagine that you can intimidate one who has long ago
resolved to set his life upon his country's doubtful fortunes; if
he arraigns your proceedings, you try denunciation; why, the nearer
terrors of the Assembly find him unmoved. You do not realize that the
mainspring of his policy is patriotism, and that the only personal
advantage he expects from it is the improvement of his own nature. _
All this it was, Archias, that made me long to have him with me, to
hear from his own lips what he thought about the state of things, and
be able at any time of need, abandoning the flatterers who infest us,
to hear the plain words of an independent mind and profit by sincere
advice. And I might fairly have drawn _his_ attention to the ungrateful
nature of those Athenians for whom he had risked all when he might have
had firmer and less unconscionable friends.
_Ar. _ O King, your other ends you might have gained, but that you would
have told him to no purpose; his love of Athens was a madness beyond
cure.
_Ant. _ It was so indeed; 'twere vain to deny it. But how died he?
_Ar. _ O King, there is further wonder in store for you. We who have
had the scene before our eyes are as startled and as unbelieving
yet as when we saw it. He must long ago have determined how to die;
his preparation shows it. He was seated within the temple, and our
arguments of the days before had been spent on him in vain.
_Ant. _ Ay? and what were they?
_Ar. _ Long and kindly I urged him, with promises on your part, not that
I looked to see them kept (for I knew not then, and took you to be
wroth with him), but in hopes they might prevail.
_Ant. _ And what hearing did he give them? Keep nothing back; I would I
were there now, hearing him with my own ears; failing which, do you
hide nothing from me. 'Tis worth much to learn the bearing of a true
man in the last moments of his life, whether he gave way and played the
coward, or kept his course unfaltering even to the end.
_Ar. _ Ah, in him was no bending to the storm; how far from it! With a
smiling allusion to my former life, he told me I was not actor enough
to make your lies convincing.
_Ant. _ Ha? he left life for want of belief in my promises?
_Ar. _ Not so; hear to the end, and you will see his distrust was not
all for you. Since you bid me speak, O King, he told me there was no
oath that could bind a Macedonian; it was nothing strange that they
should use against Demosthenes the weapon that had won them Amphipolis,
and Olynthus, and Oropus. And much more of the like; I had writers
there, that his words might be preserved for you. _Archias_ (he said),
_the prospect of death or torture would be enough to keep me out of
Antipater's presence. And if you tell me true, I must be on my guard
against the worse danger of receiving life itself as a present at his
hands, and deserting, to serve Macedonia, that post which I have sworn
to hold for Greece. _
_Life were a thing to be desired, Archias, were it purchased for me by
the power of Piraeus (a war-ship, my gift, has floated there), by the
wall and trench of which I bore the cost, by the tribe Pandionis whose
festival charges I took upon me, by the spirit of Solon and Draco, by
unmuzzled statesmen and a free people, by martial levies and naval
organization, by the virtues and the victories of our fathers, by the
affection of fellow citizens who have crowned me many a time, and by
the might of a Greece whose guardian I have never ceased to be. Or
again, if life is to be owed to compassion, though it be mean enough,
yet compassion I might endure among the kindred of the captives I have
ransomed, the fathers whose daughters I have helped to portion, and the
men whose debts I have joined in paying. _
_But if the island empire and the sea may not save me, I ask my safety
from the Posidon at whose altar and under whose sanctuary I stand.
And if Posidon's power avails not to keep his temple inviolate, if he
scorns not to surrender Demosthenes to Archias, then welcome death; I
will not transfer my worship to Antipater. I might have had Macedonia
more at my devotion than Athens, might be now a partaker in your
fortunes, if I would have ranged myself with Callimedon, and Pytheas,
and Demades. When things were far gone, I might yet have made a shift,
if I had not had respect to the daughters of Erechtheus and to Codrus.
Fortune might desert, I would not follow her; for death is a haven of
safety, which he who reaches will do no baseness more. Archias, I will
not be at this late day a stain upon the name of Athens; I will not
make choice of slavery; be my winding-sheet the white one of liberty. _
_Sir actor, let me recall to you a fine passage from one of your
tragedies_[22]:
_But even at the point of death
She forethought took to fall in seemly wise_.
_She was but a girl; and shall Demosthenes choose an unseemly life
before a seemly death, and forget what Xenocrates and Plato have said
of immortality? _ And then he was stirred to some bitter speech upon men
puffed up by fortune. What remains to tell? At last, as I now besought
and now threatened, mingling the stern and mild, 'Had I been Archias,'
he said, 'I had yielded; but seeing that I am Demosthenes, your pardon,
good sir, if my nature recoils from baseness. '
Then I was minded to hale him off by force. Which when he observed,
I saw him smile and glance at the God. _Archias_ (he said) _believes
that there is no might, no refuge for the human soul, but arms and
war-ships, walls and camps. He scorns that equipment of mine which
is proof against Illyrians and Triballi and Macedonians, surer than
that wooden wall_[23] _of old, which the God averred none should
prevail against. Secure in this I ever took a fearless course; fearless
I braved the might of Macedonia; little I cared for Euctemon or
Aristogiton, for Pytheas and Callimedon, for Philip in the old days,
for Archias to-day. _
And then, _Lay no hand upon me. Be it not mine to bring outrage upon
the temple; I will but greet the God, and follow of my free will. _ And
for me, I put reliance upon this, and when he lifted his hand to his
mouth, I thought it was but to do obeisance.
_Ant. _ And it was indeed--?
_Ar. _ We put his servant to the question later, and learned from her
that he had long had poison by him, to give him liberty by parting soul
from body. He had not yet passed the holy threshold, when he fixed his
eye on me and said: 'Take _this_ to Antipater; Demosthenes you shall
not take, no, by ----' And methought he would have added, by the men
that fell at Marathon.
And with that farewell he parted. So ends, O King, the siege of
Demosthenes.
_Ant. _ Archias, that was Demosthenes. Hail to that unconquerable soul!
how lofty the spirit, how republican the care, that would never be
parted from their warrant of freedom! Enough; the man has gone his way,
to live the life they tell of in the Isles of the heroic Blest, or to
walk the paths that, if tales be true, the heaven-bound spirits tread;
he shall attend, surely, on none but that Zeus who is named of Freedom.
For his body, we will send it to Athens, a nobler offering to that land
than the men that died at Marathon.
H.
FOOTNOTES:
[18] Homer, _Il. _ xii. 243. 'One omen is best--to fight for our own
country. '
[19] See _Demosthenes_ in Notes.
[20] Speeches in the law courts had a time limit appointed, which was
measured by the water-clock or clepsydra, generally called simply 'the
water', 'my water,' 'his water,' &c.
[21] To get a meaning, I translate as though the Greek, instead of #ou
Boiôtias oud' entha ti mê# were #ho men Boiôtias, ho d' entha#.
[22] Euripides, _Hecuba_. See _Polyxena_ in Notes.
[23] Oracle in Herodotus vii. 141: 'A bulwark of wood at the last Zeus
grants to the Trito-born goddess | Sole to remain unwasted. ' _G. C.
Macaulay. _ Variously interpreted of the thorn hedge of the Acropolis,
and of the Athenian fleet.
THE GODS IN COUNCIL
_Zeus. Hermes. Momus_
_Zeus. _ Now, gentlemen, enough of that muttering and whispering in
corners. You complain that our banquets are thrown open to a number
of undesirable persons. Very well: the Assembly has been convened
for the purpose of dealing with this very point, and every one is at
liberty to declare his sentiments openly, and bring what allegations he
will. --Hermes, make formal proclamation to that effect.
_Her. _ All duly qualified divinities are hereby invited to address the
Assembly on the subject of foreigners and immigrants.
_Mo. _ Have I your permission to speak, sir?
_Zeus. _ It is not needed; you have heard the proclamation.
_Mo. _ I desire, then, to protest against the insufferable vanity of
some among us who, not content with their own promotion to godhead,
would introduce their dependants and underlings here as our equals.
Sir, I shall express myself on this subject with that blunt sincerity
which is inseparable from my character. I am known to the world as one
whose unfettered tongue cannot refrain from speech in the presence of
wrong-doing; as one who probes matters to the bottom, and says what
he thinks, without concealment, without fear, and without scruple. My
frankness is burdensome to the generality of Gods, who mistake it for
censoriousness; I have been termed by such the Accuser General. But I
shall none the less avail myself of the freedom accorded to me by the
proclamation--and by your permission, sir--to speak my mind without
reserve. --There are, I repeat it, many persons who, despite their mixed
origin, have been admitted to our feasts and councils upon terms of
equality; and who, not satisfied with this, have brought hither their
servants and satellites, and enrolled them among the Gods; and these
menials now share in our rations and sacrifices without ever so much as
paying the customary tax.
_Zeus. _ These are riddles. Say what you mean in so many words, and let
us have the names. Generalities of this kind can only give ground for
random conjecture; they might apply to any one. You are a friend to
sincerity: speak on, then, without hesitation.
_Mo. _ This is really most gratifying. Such encouragement is precisely
what I should have expected of a king of your exalted spirit; I will
mention the name. I refer, in fact, to Dionysus. Although the mother of
this truly estimable demi-god was not only a mortal, but a barbarian,
and his maternal grandfather a tradesman in Phoenicia, one Cadmus, it
was thought necessary to confer immortality upon him. With his own
conduct since that time, I am not concerned; I shall have nothing
to say on the subject of his snood, his inebriety, or his manner of
walking. You may all see him for yourselves: an effeminate, half-witted
creature, reeking of strong liquor from the early hours of the day.
But we are indebted to him for the presence of a whole tribe of his
followers, whom he has introduced into our midst under the title
of Gods. Such are Pan, Silenus, and the Satyrs; coarse persons, of
frisky tendencies and eccentric appearance, drawn chiefly from the
goat-herd class. The first-mentioned of these, besides being horned,
has the hind-quarters of a goat, and his enormous beard is not unlike
that of the same animal. Silenus is an old man with a bald head and
a snub nose, who is generally to be seen riding on a donkey; he is
of Lydian extraction. The Satyrs are Phrygians; they too are bald,
and have pointed ears, and sprouting horns, like those of young kids.
When I add that every one of these persons is provided with a tail,
you will realize the extent of our obligation to Dionysus. And with
these theological curiosities before their eyes, we wonder why it is
that men think lightly of the Gods! I might have added that Dionysus
has also brought us a couple of ladies: Ariadne is one, his mistress,
whose crown is now set among the host of stars; the other is farmer
Icarius's daughter. And the cream of the jest is still to come: the
dog, Erigone's dog, must be translated too; the poor child would never
be happy in Heaven without the sweet little pet! What can we call this
but a drunken freak?
So much for Dionysus. I now proceed--
_Zeus. _ Now, Momus, I see what you are coming to: but you will kindly
leave Asclepius and Heracles alone. Asclepius is a physician, and
restores the sick; he is
More worth than many men.
And Heracles is my own son, and purchased his immortality with many
toils. So not one word against either of them.
_Mo. _ Very well, sir; as you wish, though I had something to say on
that subject, too. You will excuse my remarking, at any rate, that
they have something of a scorched appearance still. With reference to
yourself, sir, a good deal might be said, if I could feel at liberty----
_Zeus. _ Oh, as regards myself, you are,--perfectly at liberty. What,
then, I am an interloper too, am I?
_Mo. _ Worse than that, according to what they say in Crete: your
tomb is there on view. Not that _I_ believe them, any more than I
believe that Aegium story, about your being a changeling. But there
is one thing that I think ought to be made clear. You yourself,
sir, have set us the example in loose conduct of this kind; it is
you we have to thank--you and your terrestrial gallantries and your
transformations--for the present mixed state of society. We are quite
uneasy about it. You will be caught, some day, and sacrificed as a
bull; or some goldsmith will try his hand upon our gold-transmuted
sire, and we shall have nothing to show for it but a bracelet, a
necklace or a pair of earrings. The long and short of it is, that
Heaven is simply _swarming_ with these demi-gods of yours; there is
no other word for it. It tickles a man considerably when he suddenly
finds Heracles promoted to deity, and Eurystheus, his taskmaster,
dead and buried, his tomb within easy distance of his slave's temple;
or again when he observes in Thebes that Dionysus is a God, but that
God's cousins, Pentheus, Actaeon, and Learchus, only mortals, and poor
devils at that. You see, sir, ever since you gave the entrée to people
of this sort, and turned your attention to the daughters of Earth, all
the rest have followed suit; and the scandalous part of it is, that
the Goddesses are just as bad as the Gods. Of the cases of Anchises,
Tithonus, Endymion, Iasion, and others, I need say nothing; they are
familiar to every one, and it would be tedious to expatiate further.
_Zeus. _ Now I will have no reflections on Ganymede's antecedents; I
shall be very angry with you, if you hurt the boy's feelings.
_Mo. _ Ah; and out of consideration for him I suppose I must also
abstain from any reference to the eagle, which is now a God like the
rest of us, perches upon the royal sceptre, and may be expected at
any moment to build his nest upon the head of Majesty? --Well, you
must allow me Attis, Corybas, and Sabazius: by what contrivance, now,
did _they_ get here? and that Mede there, Mithras, with the candys
and tiara? why, the fellow cannot speak Greek; if you pledge him,
he does not know what you mean. The consequence is, that Scythians
and Goths, observing their success, snap their fingers at us, and
distribute divinity and immortality right and left; that was how
the slave Zamolxis's name slipped into our register. However, let
that pass. But I should just like to ask that Egyptian there--the
dog-faced gentleman in the linen suit[24]--who _he_ is, and whether he
proposes to establish his divinity by barking? And will the piebald
bull yonder[25], from Memphis, explain what use _he_ has for a temple,
an oracle, or a priest? As for the ibises and monkeys and goats and
worse absurdities that are bundled in upon us, goodness knows how, from
Egypt, I am ashamed to speak of them; nor do I understand how you,
gentlemen, can endure to see such creatures enjoying a prestige equal
to or greater than your own. --And you yourself, sir, must surely find
ram's horns a great inconvenience?
_Zeus. _ Certainly, it is disgraceful the way these Egyptians go on.
At the same time, Momus, there is an occult significance in most of
these things; and it ill becomes you, who are not of the initiated, to
ridicule them.
_Mo. _ Oh, come now: a God is one thing, and a person with a dog's head
is another; I need no initiation to tell me that.
_Zeus. _ Well, that will do for the Egyptians; time must be taken for
the consideration of their case. Proceed to others.
_Mo. _ Trophonius and Amphilochus come next. The thought of the latter,
in particular, causes my blood to boil: the father[26] is a matricide
and an outcast, and the son, if you please, sets up for a prophet in
Cilicia, and retails information--usually incorrect--to a believing
public at the rate of twopence an oracle. That is how Apollo here has
fallen into disrepute: it needs but a quack (and quacks are plentiful),
a sprinkling of oil, and a garland or two, and an oracle may be had in
these days wherever there is an altar or a stone pillar. Fever patients
may now be cured either at Olympia by the statue of Polydamas the
athlete, or in Thasos by that of Theagenes. Hector receives sacrifice
at Troy: Protesilaus just across the water on Chersonese. Ever since
the number of Gods has thus multiplied, perjury and temple-robbery have
been on the increase. In short, men do not care two straws about us;
nor can I blame them.
