panied him to Numantia, at the siege of which he was present. When Scipio was dead, he returned into Greece; and having enjoyed there the esteem,* gratitude, and affection, of his beloved citizens, he died at the age of fourscore and two years, of a hurt he received by a fall from his horse.

Metellus, upon his return to Rome, was honoured with a triumph, as conqueror of Macedonia and Achaia, and surnamed Macedonicus. The false king, Andriscus, was led before his chariot. Amongst the spoils, he caused what was called the troop of Alexander the Great to be carried in the procession. That prince at the battle of the Granicus, having lost five-and-twenty of his friends, ordered Lysippus, the most excellent artist in that way, to make, in honour of each of them, an equestrian statue, to which he added his own. These statues were set up in Dium, a city of Macedonia. Metellus caused them to be transported to Rome, and adorned his triumph with them.

Mummius obtained also the honour of a triumph; and, in consequence of having conquered Achaia, was surnamed Achaicus. He exhibited a great number of statues and paintings in this triumph, which were afterwards the ornaments of the public buildings at Rome, and of several other cities of Italy; but not one of them entered the conqueror's own house.

SECT. V.

Reflections upon the causes of the grandeur, declension, and ruin of Greece.

After having seen the final ruin of Greece, which has supplied us through a series of so many ages with such fine examples of heroic virtues and memorable events, we may be permitted to retrace our steps, and to consider succinctly, and at one view, its rise, progress, and declension. The whole time of its duration

may be divided into four ages.

The first and second ages of Greece.

I shall not dwell upon the ancient origin of the Greeks, nor the fabulous times before the Trojan war; which make the first age, and constitute, if I may so say, the infancy of Greece.

The second age, which extends from the taking of Troy to the reign of Darius I. king of Persia, was in a manner its youth, in which it formed, fortified, and prepared itself, for those great things which it was afterwards to perform; and laid the foundations of that power and glory, which at length rose so high, and became the admiration of all future ages.

The Greeks, as Monsieur Bossuet observes,† whose mental faculties were naturally vigorous, had been cultivated by kings and † Universal History.

* Lucian. in Macrob. p. 142.

colonies which came from Egypt, who, settling in several parts of the country, spread, wherever they came, the excellent polity of the Egyptians. It was from them they learned the exercises of the body; wrestling, the horse, foot, and chariot races, and the other combats, which they carried to their highest perfection, by means of the glorious crowns given to the victors in the Olympic games. But the best thing taught them by the Egyptians, was to be docile and obedient, and to suffer themselves to be guided by laws for the good of the public. They were not private persons, who regard nothing but their own interests and concerns, and have no sense of the calamities of the state, but as they suffer themselves, or as the repose of their own family is involved in them: the Greeks were taught to consider themselves and their families as part of a greater body, which was that of the state. The fathers brought up their children in this opinion; and the children were taught from their cradle to look upon their country as their com mon mother, to whom they more strictly appertained than to their parents.

The Greeks, disciplined thus by degrees, believed they were capable of governing for themselves; and most of the cities formed themselves into republics, under different forms of government, which had all of them liberty for their vital principle: but that liberty was wise, reasonable, and subservient to the laws. The advantage of this government was, that the citizens loved their country the better from transacting their affairs in common, and from being all equally capable of attaining to its honours and dignities. Besides this, the condition of private persons, to which all returned when they quitted their office, prevented them from abusing an authority, of which they might soon be deprived; whereas, power often becomes haughty, unjust and oppressive, when under no restraints, and when it is to have a long or continual duration.

The love of labour removed the vices and passions which generally occasion the ruin of states. They led a laborious and busy life, intent upon the cultivation of their lands and of the arts, and not excluding the husbandman nor the artificer from the first dignities of the state; preserving between all the citizens and members of the state a great equality, void of pomp, luxury, or ostentation. He who had commanded the army for one year, fought the next in the rank of a private officer, and was not ashamed of the most common functions in the armies either by land or sea.

The reigning characteristic in all the cities of Greece, was a particular affection for poverty, a mediocrity of fortune, simplicity in buildings, furniture, dress, equipage, domestics, and table. It is surprising to consider the small recompense with which they were satisfied for their application in public employments, and for the services which they had rendered the state.

What might not be expected from a people formed in this manner, educated and nurtured in these principles, and imbued from

their earliest infancy with maxims so proper to exalt the soul, and to inspire it with great and noble sentiments? The effects exceeded every idea and every hope that could possibly have been conceived of them.

The third age of Greece.

We now come to the glorious times of Greece, which have been and will for ever be, the admiration of all ages. The merit and virtue of the Greeks, shut up within the compass of their cities, had hitherto but faintly dawned, and shone with but a feeble ray. To produce and place them in their full light, some great and important occasion was necessary, wherein Greece, attacked by a formidable enemy, and exposed to extreme dangers, was compelled in some measure to quit her home, and to show herself abroad in her true character in open day. And this was supplied by the Persians in their invasions of Greece, first under Darius, and afterwards under Xerxes. All Asia, armed with the whole force of the East, overflowed on a sudden, like an impetuous torrent, and came pouring with innumerable troops, both by sea and land, against a little spot of Greece, which seemed under the necessity of being entirely swallowed up and overwhelmed at the first shock. Two small cities, however, Sparta and Athens, not only resist those formidable armies, but attack, defeat, pursue, and destroy, the greatest part of them. Let the reader call to mind (for the recollection of them is all I have here in view) the prodigies of valour and fortitude which shone forth at that time, and continued to do so long after on like occasions.

To what were the Greeks indebted for such astonishing successes, so much above all probability, unless to the principles I have mentioned, which were profoundly engraven in their hearts by education, example, and practice; and were become by long habit a second nature in them?

Those principles, we cannot repeat too often, were the love of poverty, contempt of riches, disregard of self-interest, attachment to the public good, desire of glory, love of their country; but, above all, such a zeal for liberty, as no danger was capable of intimidating; and such an irreconcilable abhorrence for every one who in the slightest degree attempted to encroach upon it, as united their counsels, and put an end to all dissention and discord in a moment.

There was some difference between the republics as to authority and power, but none in regard to liberty; on that side they were perfectly equal. The states of ancient Greece were exempt from that ambition which occasions so many wars in monarchies; ard had no thoughts of aggrandizing themselves, or making conquests, at the expense of each other. They confined themselves to the cultivation, improvement, and defence, of their own territories, but did not endeavour to usurp any thing from their neighbours. The

weaker cities, in the peaceable possession of their domain, did not apprehend invasion from the more powerful. This occasioned such a multitude of cities, republics, and states of Greece, which subsisted to the latest times in a perfect independence, retaining their own forms of government, with the laws, customs, and usages, derived from their forefathers.

When we examine with some attention the conduct of these people, either at home or abroad, their assemblies, deliberations, and motives for the resolutions they take, we cannot sufficiently admire the wisdom of their government; and we are tempted to ask ourselves, from whence could arise this greatness of soul in the burghers of Sparta and Athens; whence these noble sentiments, this consummate wisdom in politics, this profound and universal knowledge in the art of war; whether as relating to the invention and construction of machines for the attack and defence of places, or to the drawing up of an army in battle, and disposing all its movements; and lastly, that supreme ability in maritime affairs, which always rendered their fleets victorious, which so gloriously acquired them the empire of the sea, and obliged the Persians to renounce it for ever by a solemn treaty?

We see here a remarkable difference between the Greeks and Romans. The latter, immediately after their conquests, suffered themselves to be corrupted by pride and luxury. After Antiochus had submitted to the Roman yoke, Asia, subdued by their victorious arms, conquered in turn its conquerors by its riches and voluptuousness; and that change of manners was very sudden and rapid, especially after Carthage, the haughty rival of Rome, was destroyed. It was not so with the Greeks. Nothing was more brilliant than the victories they had gained over the Persians; nothing more soothing than the glory they had acquired by their great and illustrious exploits. After that so glorious era, the Greeks still persevered for a long time in the same love of simplicity, frugality, and poverty; the same aversion to pomp and luxury; the same zeal and ardour for the defence of their liberty, and the preservation of their ancient manners. It is well known how much the islands and provinces of Asia Minor, over which the Greeks so often triumphed, were abandoned to effeminate pleasures and luxury: they, however, never suffered themselves to be affected by that contagious softness, and constantly preserved themselves from the vices of the conquered people. It is true, they did not make those countries provinces; but mere intercourse and example alone might have proved very dangerous to them.

The introduction of gold and silver into Sparta, from whence they had till that time been banished under severe penalties, did not happen till about fourscore years after the battle of Salamis, and the ancient simplicity of manners subsisted very long afterwards, notwithstanding that violation of the laws of Lycurgus. As much may be said of the rest of Greece; which did not grow weak and de

generate, but slowly and by degrees. This is what remains for us to show.

The fourth age of Greece.

The principal cause of the weakening and declension of the Greeks was the disunion which rose up amongst themselves. The Persians, who had found them invincible on the side of arms, as long as their union subsisted, applied their whole attention and policy in sowing the seeds of discord amongst them. For that purpose they employed their gold and silver, which succeeded much better than their steel and arms had done before. The Greeks, covertly attacked in this manner by bribes, secretly conveyed into the hands of those who had the greatest share in their government, were divided by domestic jealousies, and turned against themselves those victorious arms which had rendered them superior to their enemies.

The decline of power from these causes enabled Philip and Alexander to subject them. Those princes, to accustom them to servitude by gentle degrees, assumed as a pretext the design of avenging them upon their ancient enemies. The Greeks fell blindly into that gross snare, which gave the mortal blow to their liberty. Their avengers became more fatal to them than their enemies. The yoke imposed on them by the hands which had conquered the universe could never be removed; those little states were no longer in a condition to shake it off. Greece, from time to time, animated by the remembrance of its ancient glory, roused from its lethargy, and made some attempts to reinstate itself in its ancient condition: but those were the efforts of expiring liberty, ill concerted, and ill sustained, and tended only to augment its slavery; because the protectors, whom it called in to its aid, soon made themselves its masters. So that all it did was to change its fetters, and to make them the heavier.

The Romans at length totally subjected it; but it was by degrees, and with abundance of artifice. As they continually pushed on their conquests from province to province, they perceived that they should find a barrier to their ambitious projects in Macedonia, formidable by its neighbourhood, advantageous situation, reputation in arms, and very powerful in itself, and by its allies. The Romans artfully applied to the small states of Greece, from whom they had less to fear, and endeavoured to gain them by the attractive charms of liberty, which was their darling passion, and of which they knew how to awaken in them their ancient ideas. After having, with great address, made use of the Greeks to reduce and destroy the Macedonian power, they subjected all those states one after another, under various pretexts. Greece was thus swallowed up at last in the Roman empire, and became a province of it under the name of Achaia.