vent any projects of invasion of Asia. Hence, as in modern times two Turkish pashas may have different foreign policies, so of the two satraps of Lesser Asia the one would support the Lacedæmonians, the other their enemies. By these means the influence of the Persian monarch was become so great in Greece, that he dictated the terms of a peace among the contending states; in which he declares the cities of Lesser Asia, and the islands of Clazomenæ and Cyprus, to belong to himself, and pronounces the independence of all other cities, great and small, with the exception of Lemnos, Imbrus, and Scyrus, which should belong as of old to B. c. Athens, and menaces with war such as refuse to ac- 387 cept it. This peace, called that of Antalcidas, from the name of the Spartan who was the chief agent in bringing it to bear, was viewed with indignation by every man of noble mind, who compared it with the terms which Greece, when at unity with herself, had imposed on the Persians, and saw in it loss of honour and independence by the permission of foreign interference.

Theban Dominion.

Sparta had humbled Athens; her own turn was to come from a quarter whence it was least expected. A Spartan general, Phœbidas, had, in the midst of peace, made himself, by treachery, master of the citadel of Thebes; his government punished him, but retained the fortress, and established an oligarchy in that city. Sparta seemed at this period in the height of her power. Her king, Agesilaus, was victorious in Asia, she had dissolved the Olynthian confederacy, and reduced Olynthus to that state of subjection, from which Athens alone was exempt, and never less dreaded decline, when a conspiracy was formed by some of the democratic party in Thebes; the principal oligarchs were murdered, the citadel besieged, and the garrison forced to surrender.

Two great men now appeared to guide the Theban

affairs, Pelopidas and Epaminondas; the Athenians joined them; the Thebans recovered their supremacy over the other Boeotian towns. The Lacedæmonians were now forced to recall Agesilaus from his conquests in Asia to oppose the Theban and Athenian generals. The power of Thebes continually increasing, the Athenians grew jealous, and sent ambassadors to the Great King, who directed the Greeks to make peace among themselves on the basis of that of Antalcidas. Athens and Sparta obeyed it was for the advantage of both and Sparta, who had lost all influence out of Peloponnesus, willingly withdrew her harmosts. Cleombrotus was marching his troops out of Phocis, when he received orders to make the Thebans restore the other Boeotian cities to independence. The Thebans, who were dissatisfied at the peace by which they were the only losers, refused compliance; the armies met on the B. C. plain of Leuctra, and the Spartans were for the first 371. time defeated in a pitched battle. The charm was now dissolved. It was proved that the Lacedæmonian arms were not invincible.

Epaminondas and Pelopidas now invaded the Peloponnesus at the head of 40,000 men; the Argives, Elians, and the democratic party in Arcadia joined the Thebans, who entered and ravaged the Lacedæmonian territory. Epaminondas advanced into Messenia, called the oppressed inhabitants to liberty, recalled the exiles, and raised a town named Messene, in which he placed a Theban garrison. Athens joined Sparta. Ambassadors from all the parties hastened to the Persian court. Pelopidas headed the Theban embassy, peace was dictated on the Theban terms, and the stream of gold that previously flowed to Sparta was directed to Thebes. The Arcadians had now become powerful in Peloponnesus. Lycomedes, one of their leading men, sought to detach them from the Thebans: the latter, fearing to lose their influence in Peloponnesus, sent an army thither under Epaminondas. A second battle for the supremacy in Greece was fought at Mantinea between

the Thebans and Lacedæmonians, and Epaminondas B. c. died in the arms of victory.

Philip of Macedon.

The republican spirit was now extinct in Greece: no state was in a condition to take the lead; no man of any eminence was to be found except in Athens. The republican virtues had fled from those who had sunk to be the pensioners of Persia. A monarchical was the only form of supremacy suited to the present state of Greece, and Providence had provided such in a constitutional monarchy- that of Macedon.

Jason, the tyrant of Pheræ in Thessaly, had conceived this design. The Thessalians were a strict aristocracy, with a numerous body of vassals called Penestæ, resembling the barons of the middle ages. Occasionally there rose a prince in some town among them who gradually united several towns under him. At this period, Jason was such in Pheræ, and Polydamas in Pharsalus. Both were men of virtue, only that of Jason was not proof against ambition. They united in the project of turning the quarrels of Thebes and Sparta to the advantage of Thessaly, and by the influence of Polydamas, Jason was chosen Tagus or commander-in-chief of Thessaly. He took the same road to power afterwards so successfully trodden by Philip; but he was unfortunate in three circumstances: his troops were chiefly mercenaries, and therefore not to be depended upon; he was not an hereditary prince, and his nobility were jealous of him; he appeared at a time when the great Theban generals were in the height of their glory, and when Athens had generals far superior to those she opposed to Philip. Fate seemed, resolved to deprive Thessaly of the glory of becoming a great power. Jason perished by the daggers of conspirators: his brothers and his nephew Alexander were tyrants, in the modern sense. The last was

362.

murdered by his own relations, and Thessaly fell into confusion and disorder.

At this period the celebrated Holy War broke out, and greatly contributed to the farther demoralization of Greece, when all reverence for the gods and every thing sacred was lost, and the holy offerings collected for so many years in the temple at Delphi, were scattered through Greece, the precious metals melted and coined, the crowns and other votive offerings profanely worn by women and boys of loose life.

The Boeotians and Thessalians formed the great majority in the Amphictyonic Council. They caused a decree to be passed, inflicting a heavy fine on the Lacedæmonians for their ravages in Boeotia; and when these refused payment, they, from private motives, did the same to the Phocians for having occupied the land that once belonged to the Cirrhæans, and had been consecrated to the god. Relying on the aid of Athens and Sparta, the Phocians refused obedience, and by the advice of Philomelus, one of their chief men, seized on the temple and its treasures. Greece at that time abounded in soldiers of fortune, men who made war a trade, who served any one who was able to pay them. Masters of the immense wealth of the temple, the Phocians, therefore, easily collected an army, and they carried on the contest for a space of ten years.

In this war the Thessalians, being hard pressed by the Phocians, called Philip king of Macedon to their aid. This talented prince, who had been brought up at Thebes in the time of Epaminondas, had, from the day he ascended the Macedonian throne, all his thoughts occupied on the means of strengthening and extending his hereditary kingdom. He aided the Thessalians, and, after a variety of changes of fortune, the Phocians were at length destroyed. Philip made himself master of Olynthus and all the cities on the coast of Thrace, and in spite of all the efforts of Demosthenes, who did all that was in man to rouse the Athenians to energy while it was yet time, continually advanced in his plans of power

and aggrandisement, and at length, on the field of Chæ- B. c. ronea, saw the independence of Greece prostrate at his 338. feet.

Philip was now at the height of his power: the Spartans had been excluded from the Amphictyonic Council, and the votes of the Phocians transferred to him: he had the right of priority in consulting the Delphian oracle, and was president of the Pythian games. He called a general assembly of the Greeks to Corinth; and was there appointed commander-in-chief of the Grecian forces in the war now to be undertaken against Persia, under pretext of avenging her former violations of the Grecian temples. The Macedonian monarch thus occupied the station for which he was fitted, and which the present state of Greece required, -that of head of the Grecian confederacy; from which the ill-judging patriotism of Demosthenes so long sought to exclude him. The idea of reducing Greece to a province of his kingdom he was too wise to entertain. In the midst of his projects for the conquest of Asia he fell by the hand of an assassin.

CHAP. V.

ALEXANDER AND HIS SUCCESSORS.

Alexander.

ALEXANDER was in his twentieth year when his father 337. was slain he had been educated by Aristotle, and his naturally great talents sedulously cultured. Difficulties environed him on his accession: the Athenians and Thebans, on the intelligence of the death of Philip, were flying to arms, when Alexander appeared in Boeotia at the head of an army. They were terrified and desisted. The Illyrians and Triballi had made inroads into Macedon: the young prince marched against them, and conquered to the Danube. A report was spread in Greece of his death: Thebes rose in arms; but Alexander sud

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