Now that we have compassed the so great deeds of a life so short, it
is inevitable that the sum total of the man’s varied activity should
be reckoned up into a brief statement of the value of his career to
civilisation. The sums arrived at in Alexander’s case have been as
various as the minds that have made them up. A brief collection of them
is full of contrast and illumination.[a]
HIS VICES AND VIRTUES (ARRIAN)
His body was beautiful, and well proportion’d; his Mind brisk and Active;
his Courage wonderful. He was strong enough to undergo Hardships, and
willing to meet Dangers; ever ambitious of Glory, and a strict observer
of Religious Duties. As to those Pleasures which regarded the Body, he
shewed himself indifferent; as to the Desires of the Mind, insatiable.
In his Counsels he was sharp-sighted, and cunning; and pierc’d deep into
doubtful Matters, by the Force of his natural Sagacity. In marshalling,
arming, and governing an Army, he was thoroughly skill’d; and famous for
exciting his Soldiers with Courage, and animating them with Hopes of
Success, as also in dispelling their private Fears, by his own Example of
Magnanimity. He always enter’d upon desperate Attempts with the utmost
Resolution and Vigour, and was ever diligent in taking any Advantage of
his Enemies’ Delay, and falling upon him unawares. He was a most strict
observer of his Treaties; notwithstanding which he was never taken at a
Disadvantage, by any Craft or Perfidy of his Enemies. He was sparing in
his Expenses, for his own Private Pleasures, but in the distribution of
his Bounty to his Friends, Liberal and Magnificent.
If anything can be laid to Alexander’s Charge, as committed in the
heat and violence of Wrath, or if he may be said to have imitated the
Barbarian Pride a little too much, and bore himself too haughtily, I
cannot think them such vast Crimes; and especially when one calmly
considers his green Years, and uninterrupted Series of Success, it will
appear no great Wonder if Court Sycophants, who always flatter Princes
to their Detriment, sometimes led him away. But this must be said, in his
behalf, that all Antiquity has not produced an Example of such sincere
Repentance, in a King, as he has shewed us. I cannot condemn Alexander
for endeavouring to draw his Subjects into the Belief of his Divine
Original, because ’tis reasonable to imagine he intended no more by it,
than to procure the greater Authority among his Soldiers. Neither was
he less famous than Minos, or Æacus, or Rhadamanthus, who, all of them
challeng’d Kindred with Jove; and none of the ancients condemn’d them for
it; nor were his glorious Actions any way inferior to those of Theseus,
or Ion, tho’ the former claim’d Neptune, and the latter Apollo, for
his Father. His assuming and wearing the Persian Habit, seems to have
been done with a political View, that he might appear not altogether to
despise the Barbarians, and that he might also have some Curb to the
Arrogance and Insolence of his Macedonians. And for this Cause, I am of
Opinion, he plac’d the Persian Melophori among his Macedonian Troops,
and Squadrons of Horse, and allow’d them the same share of Honour. Long
Banquets, and deep Drinking, Aristobulus assures us, were none of his
Delights; neither did he prepare Entertainments for the sake of the Wine
(which he did not greatly love, and seldom drank much of) but to Rub up a
mutual Amity among his Friends.
Whoever therefore attempts to condemn, or calumniate Alexander, does
not so much ground his Accusation upon those Acts of his, which really
deserve Reproof, but gathers all his Actions as into one huge Mass, and
forms his Judgment thereupon: But let any Man consider seriously who he
was, what Success he always had, and to what a pitch of Glory he arrived;
who, without Controversy, reigned King of both Continents, and whose Name
has spread through all Parts of the habitable World; and he will easily
conclude, that in comparison of his great and laudable Acts, his Vices
and Failings are few and trifling, and which, in so prodigious a Run of
Prosperity, if they could be avoided, (considering his Repentance and
Abhorrence of them afterwards) may easily be overlooked, and are not of
Weight sufficient to cast a Shade upon his Reign.
I am persuaded there was no Nation, City, nor People then in being
whither his Name did not reach, for which Reason, whatever Origin he
might boast of or claim to himself, there seems to me to have been some
Divine Hand presiding both over his Birth and Actions, insomuch, that no
mortal upon Earth either excel’d or equal’d him.[b]
HIS FAVOUR WITH FORTUNE (ÆLIANUS)
Commendable and renowned be the actes of Alexander which he dyd at
Granicus and Issus. His foughten field at Arbeles, the taking of Darius,
the subduing of the Persians to the Macedonians, the conquering of al
Asia, the bringyng of the Indians under his owne dominion, etc. Lawdible
be his feats of armes donne at Tyrus, and Oxydacris: But what meane we
to comprehend in a skantlyng of lynes the puisaunce of so incomparable
a Prince? let it be as some envyous varlets and backbiting tonges
woulde have it, that the prosperous successe of his adventures is to be
attributed to Fortune, what of that? yet is he notable and praiseworthy
notwithstanding, insomuch as his fortune never fainted nor fayled, and
in that hee was lulled in the lappe of so loving a Lady that she never
withdrew her favour from him.[c]
IF ALEXANDER HAD ATTEMPTED ROME (LIVY)
[When the historian of Rome, old Livy, was writing of the
comparatively obscure general, Papirius Cursor, the fact that
he was contemporary with Alexander and would have had to meet
him had he come against Italy, led Livy to breathe so Roman a
defiance to the world-conqueror that we must needs quote it here,
preferably in the old-fashioned garb of the anonymous translation
of 1686.]
Without doubt in that Age, which yielded as great plenty of gallant
Captains as any, there was not a Person on whom the State of Rome did
more rely and depend, insomuch, as some Writers have concluded, that he
[Papirius Cursor] would have been an equal match to the Great Alexander,
if after the Conquest of Asia, he had bent his Arms against Europe.
Now although from the beginning of this Work it may sufficiently appear,
that I have sought nothing less than Digressions from the just order
and series of the Story; nor have at all endeavored, by extravagant
Varieties, to garnish it, or with pleasant Sallies to divert the Reader
and refresh myself; yet happening upon the mention of so great a King,
and so renowned a Captain, I could not but be moved to disclose and set
down those thoughts which have oft occur’d to my mind, and inquire a
little, What event would probably have succeeded to the Roman Affairs,
had they happened to have been engaged with this Illustrious Conqueror.
As the Roman State bore up against other Kings and Nations, so it
might have prov’d to him also Invincible. To begin with ballancing the
Commanders one against another, I do not deny but Alexander was an
excellent Leader, but that which enhanc’d his Fame, was, That he was a
sole and Soveraign Commander; a young Man, his Sails always full blown
with prosperous Gales, and one who dyed before ever he had labored under
any of the frowns of Fortune. For to omit other glorious Princes and
renowned Captains, illustrious Examples of the uncertainty of Humane
Grandeur: What was it that exposed Cyrus (whom the Greeks so highly
magnifie) or our great Pompey of late, to the turning Wheel of Fortune,
but only this, That they lived long? On the other side, Let us take a
review of the Roman Commanders, I mean not through all Ages, but such as
being Consuls or Dictators about those times, Alexander must have engaged
with, if he had spread his Ensigns this way; there were M. Valerius
Corvinus, C. Marcius Rutilus, C. Sulpicius, T. Manlius Torquatus, Q.
Publilius Philo, L. Papirius Cursor, Q. Fabius Maximus, the two Decii, L.
Volumnius, Manlius Curius, besides abundance of prodigious Warriors that
succeeded afterwards; if he had first set upon the Carthaginians, (as he
was resolv’d to have done, if he had not been prevented by Death) and so
had arriv’d in Italy when well stricken in years. Each one of these was
master of as good Parts and natural Abilities, as Alexander, and had the
advantage of being train’d up in an incomparable Military Discipline,
which having been delivered from hand to hand ever since the foundation
of their City, was now by continual Precepts arriv’d to the perfection of
an Art. And whereas, Alexander often hazarded his Person, and underwent
all Military toils and dangers (which was one thing that not a little
added to his Glory:) can it be thought, that if Manlius Torquatus, or
Valerius Corvinus, had chanc’d to meet him at the head of his Troops,
either of them would not have prov’d a Match for him, who were both of
them famous for stout Soldiers before ever they had Commands? Would the
Decii, that rush’d with devoted Bodies into the midst of the Enemy, have
been afraid of him? Would Papirius Cursor, that mighty Man both for
strength of Body and gallantry of Mind, have declined to cope with him?
Was it likely that a single young Gentleman should out-wit or manage his
Affairs with greater prudence than that Senate which he only, whoever he
was, had a right Idea of, that said, “It consisted altogether of Kings”?
Here, forsooth, was the danger, lest he should more advantagiously
choose his Ground to Encamp on, provide Victuals more carefully, prevent
Surprizes and Stratagems more warily, know better when to venture a
Battel, range his Army more Soldier-like, or strengthen it with Reserves
and Recruits, better than any of those whom I have named knew how to do:
Alas! in all these matters, he would have confess’d he had not to deal
with a Darius, over whom, being attended with a vast Train of Women and
Eunuchs, softened with wearing gold and Purple, and clogg’d with the
superfluous Furniture of his luxurious Fortune, he did indeed obtain an
unbloody Victory, meeting rather with a Booty than an Enemy, and had only
this to boast of, That he durst handsomely contemn such an abundance of
Vanity.
He would have had another kind of prospect in Italy than in India,
through which he march’d at his ease with a drunken Army, Feasting and
Revelling all the way: But here he must have met with the thick woody
Forrest, and almost unpassable Streights of Apulia; the lofty Mountains
of Lucania, and fresh Tokens of a late Defeat that happen’d to his own
Name and Family, where his Uncle Alexander, King of the Epirotes, was
hewn to pieces.
We speak hitherto of Alexander, not yet debauch’d with excess of good
Fortune, wherein never any Man had less command of himself than he: But
if we consider him in his new Habit, and that new Nature, (if I may
call it so) which he took up after he had a while been flush’d with
Victories, we may avow he would have come into Italy, more like a Darius
than an Alexander, and brought with him a bastard Army, altogether
degenerated from the Macedonian courage and manners, into the debauches
and effeminacies of the Persians. I am asham’d, in so great a Monarch
as he was, to relate his proud humors of changing so oft his Garb; his
excessive vain-glory, in expecting that Men should adore him by casting
themselves prostrate at his feet, when-ever they approached him; his
barbarous Cruelties and Butcheries of his nearest Friends amongst his
Cups and Banquets, and that ridiculous Vanity of forging a Divine
Pedigree, and boasting himself the Son of Jupiter. Nay more, since his
Drunkenness and Greediness of wine, his savage Passions and cholerick
Phrensies did every day increase (I report nothing but what all Authors
agree in), shall we not think that his Abilities, as a General, must
quickly have decayed and been wonderfully impaired?
But here perhaps was the danger (which some little trifling Greeks who
would cry up the glory even of the Parthians, to depress the Roman
name, are often wont to alledge) That the People of Rome would never
have been able to endure the very Majesty and dread of Alexanders Name
(whom indeed I am apt to think they then scarce ever heard of:) Let us
conceit as magnificently as may be of this Prince, yet still it will be
but the Grandeur of one Man, acquir’d in little more than twelve Years
continued Felicity; and whereas some extol it highly on his Account, That
the Romans, though never worsted in any War, have yet been defeated in
divers Battels, whereas Fortune was never wanting to Alexander in any one
encounter, they do not consider that they are comparing the Exploits of
one particular Man, and he too but a Youth, with the atchievements of a
People that have now been involv’d in Wars eight hundred years.
[Illustration: GRECIAN COSTUME
(After Hope)]
You ought rather to compare Man with Man, Captain with Captain, than
the Fortune of one with the other. How many Roman Generals may I name,
that never suffer’d a Repulse in their days? We can run over whole Pages
in the Annals of our Magistrates, full of Consuls and Dictators, whose
Success as well as Virtue, was such, as they never gave the Common-wealth
so much as one days grief or discontentment. And that which makes them
yet to be more admired than Alexander, or any other King in the World;
some of them held their Office of Dictator not above ten or twenty
days, and none the Consulship beyond a year: Their Levies were often
obstructed by the Tribunes of the Commons, so that they set forth too
late; and sometimes for holding the Court for Elections, they were
sent for home too soon: In the hurry of Affairs the Year was apt to be
wheel’d about, and then they must leave all to new Instruments; now
the rashness, another time the dishonesty of a Colleague, was either
a great hindrance to their Success, or perhaps occasion’d a mischief.
Many times they succeeded after the defeat of their Predecessors, or
receiv’d a raw and undisciplin’d Army: From all which inconveniences
Kings are not only free, but absolute Masters both of their Enterprizes,
and the times and means they will take to accomplish them, leading all
things by their Councils, and not following them. Had therefore this
unconquered Alexander been engaged against these unconquered Captains,
he would have hazarded all those past pleasures of Fortunes favor; nay,
in this the danger would have been greater, that the Macedonians had
but one Alexander, and he not only obnoxious to many Casualties, but
voluntarily exposing himself to frequent Dangers. But the Romans had many
that were Alexanders equals, both for Glory and the grandeur of their
Atchievements, each of whom, might according to his peculiar Fate, either
live or dye, without at all endangering the Publick.
It remains now to ballance the Forces on each side, and that neither in
respect of numbers, quality of the Soldiers, or the multitude of their
Allies and Auxiliaries. There were numbered of Romans in the Surveys
taken by the Censors of that Age, two hundred and fifty thousand Polls;
and therefore in all the revolts of the Latines, they were able to levy
Ten Legions, and that too almost wholly in the City; and frequently
in those times, four or five distinct Armies were kept on foot at
once, which maintained Wars in Etruria, in Umbria, with the Gauls
(Confederates with the Enemy) in Samnium and in Lucania: On the other
side, he must have cross’d the Sea, having of old Macedonian Bands not
above Thirty thousand Foot, and four thousand Horse, and those most of
them Thessalians; for this was the total of his Force when he appeared
most formidable. If he should have added to these, Persians, Indians, or
others out of his new Conquests, they would but more encumber rather
than assist him. Then the Romans had Supplies at hand to reinforce them
presently from home upon any accident; whereas Alexander (as it happened
afterwards to Annibal), Warring in a remote foreign Country, his Army
would have mouldered away apace, and could not readily have Recruits.
The Macedonians had for their Arms, a Shield and a Spear like a Pike;
the Romans, a large Target that skreen’d almost the whole Body, and a
Javelin, a Weapon not a little more serviceable than the Spear, both to
strike and push with, near hand, and also to be lanced at a distance. The
Soldiers of each side were wont to stand firm, and keep their Ranks; the
Macedonian Phalanx was immovable and uniform; but the Roman Battalions
more distinct, and consisting of several Divisions, more ready to
separate and close again upon any occasion.
_A Patriotic Estimate of Rome’s Greatness_
To speak now of labour and travel, What Soldier is comparable to the
Roman? Who better able to hold out and endure all the fatigues of War?
Alexander, worsted in one Battel, had been utterly undone: But what Power
could have broken the Roman courage, whom neither the shameful disgrace
at Caudium nor the fatal defeat at Cannæ, could in the least daunt or
dispirit? Undoubtedly Alexander, although his first attempt should have
prov’d prosperous, would often here have missed his Persians and his
Indians; he would have wish’d to have been dealing again with the soft
and cowardly Nations of Asia and confest, That before he only fought with
Women, as King Alexander of Epirus is reported to have said, when he had
here received his Death wound, reflecting upon those easie Occurents of
War, which this young Prince (his Nephew) met with in Asia, in respect to
those difficulties he himself had to struggle with in Italy.
And truly, when I consider that the Engagements at Sea between the Romans
and Carthaginians in the first Punick War, took up no less than four
and twenty years’ space, I am inclinable to conjecture, that the whole
age of Alexander would not have been enough to have finish’d a War with
either a one of those States. And since by antient Leagues they were
then at Amity and in Alliance with each other, ’tis probable an equal
apprehension of danger might have united them against the common Enemy:
And what less could he then expect but to have been utterly overwhelm’d
and crush’d by the joint Arms of two the most potent Republicks in the
World? The Romans, though not indeed in the days of Alexander, or when
the Macedonian Power was at heighth, have yet since try’d the courage of
the Macedonians, under the conduct of Antiochus, Philip, and Perses, and
came off not only without loss, but even without any danger or hazard.
It may seem a proud word, but without arrogance it is spoken, Let there
be no Civil Wars amongst us; never can we be distressed by any Enemy,
Horse or Foot; never in set Battel, never in plain equal ground, or
places disadvantagious, outdone in Courage or Resolution. The Soldier I
confess in heavy Armour, may be apprehensive of the Enemies Cavalry in
a Champion Country, or be incommoded with Arrows shot from a distance,
or embarrass’d in unpassable Woods, or Quarters, where provisions cannot
be brought to them; but still let there be a thousand Armies greater and
stronger than that of Alexander and his Macedonians, so long as we hold
together, and continue that love of Peace, and prudent care of civil
Concord, wherein we live at this day, we are able, and ever shall be, to
rout and put them all to flight.[d]
HIS INVINCIBILITY (GROTE)
[Against Livy’s confidence in the Roman bulwark must be placed
Grote’s trust in Alexander’s genius.]
Exalted to this prodigious grandeur, Alexander was at the time of his
death little more than thirty-two years old--the age at which a citizen
of Athens was growing into important commands; ten years less than
the age for a consul at Rome; two years younger than the age at which
Timur first acquired the crown, and began his foreign conquests. His
extraordinary bodily powers were unabated; he had acquired a large stock
of military experience; and what was still more important, his appetite
for further conquest was as voracious, and his readiness to purchase
it at the largest cost of toil or danger, as complete, as it had been
when he first crossed the Hellespont. Great as his past career had been,
his future achievements, with such increased means and experience,
were likely to be yet greater. His ambition would have been satisfied
with nothing less than the conquest of the whole habitable world as
then known; and if his life had been prolonged, he would probably have
accomplished it. Nowhere (so far as our knowledge reaches) did there
reside any military power capable of making head against him; nor were
his soldiers, when he commanded them, daunted or baffled by any extremity
of cold, heat, or fatigue.
The patriotic feelings of Livy dispose him to maintain that Alexander,
had he invaded Italy would have failed and perished like his relative,
Alexander of Epirus. But this conclusion cannot be accepted. If we grant
the courage and discipline of the Roman infantry to have been equal to
the best infantry of Alexander’s army, the same cannot be said of the
Roman cavalry as compared with the Macedonian companions. Still less is
it likely that a Roman consul, annually changed, would have been found
a match for Alexander in military genius and combinations; nor, even if
personally equal, would he have possessed the same variety of troops
and arms, each effective in its separate way, and all conspiring to one
common purpose; nor the same unbounded influence over their minds in
stimulating them to full effort. I do not think that even the Romans
could have successfully resisted Alexander the Great; though it is
certain that he never throughout all his long marches encountered such
enemies as they, nor even such as Samnites and Lucanians--combining
courage, patriotism, discipline, with effective arms both for defence and
for close combat.
Among all the qualities which go to constitute the highest military
excellence, either as a general or as a soldier, none was wanting
in the character of Alexander. Together with his own chivalrous
courage--sometimes indeed both excessive and unseasonable, so as to form
the only military defect which can be fairly imputed to him--we trace
in all his operations the most careful dispositions taken beforehand,
vigilant precaution in guarding against possible reverse, and abundant
resource in adapting himself to new contingencies. Amidst constant
success, these precautionary combinations were never discontinued. His
achievements are the earliest recorded evidence of scientific military
organisation on a large scale, and of its overwhelming effects. Alexander
overawes the imagination more than any other personage of antiquity, by
the matchless development of all that constitutes effective force--as
an individual warrior, and as organiser and leader of armed masses;
not merely the blind impetuosity ascribed by Homer to Ares, but also
the intelligent, methodised, and all-subduing compression which he
personifies in Athene. But all his great qualities were fit for use only
against enemies; in which category indeed were numbered all mankind,
known and unknown, except those who chose to submit to him. In his
Indian campaigns, amidst tribes of utter strangers, we perceive that not
only those who stand on their defence, but also those who abandon their
property and flee to the mountains, are alike pursued and slaughtered.
Apart from the transcendent merits of Alexander as a soldier and a
general, some authors give him credit for grand and beneficent views on
the subject of imperial government, and for intentions highly favourable
to the improvement of mankind. I see no ground for adopting this opinion.
As far as we can venture to anticipate what would have been Alexander’s
future, we see nothing in prospect except years of ever-repeated
aggression and conquest, not to be concluded until he had traversed
and subjugated all the inhabited globe. The acquisition of universal
dominion--conceived not metaphorically, but literally, and conceived with
greater facility in consequence of the imperfect geographical knowledge
of the time--was the master passion of his soul.
The Persian empire was a miscellaneous aggregate, with no strong feeling
of nationality. The Macedonian conqueror who seized its throne was still
more indifferent to national sentiment. He was neither Macedonian nor
Greek. Though the absence of this prejudice has sometimes been counted
to him as a virtue, it only made room, in my opinion, for prejudices
yet worse. The substitute for it was an exorbitant personality and
self-estimation, manifested even in his earliest years, and inflamed by
extraordinary success into the belief in divine parentage; which, while
setting him above the idea of communion with any special nationality,
made him conceive all mankind as subjects under one common sceptre to be
wielded by himself. To this universal empire the Persian king made the
nearest approach, according to the opinions then prevalent. Accordingly
Alexander, when victorious, accepted the position and pretensions of the
overthrown Persian court as approaching most nearly to his full due.
He became more Persian than either Macedonian or Greek. While himself
adopting, as far as he could safely venture, the personal habits of the
Persian court, he took studied pains to transform his Macedonian officers
into Persian grandees, encouraging and even forcing intermarriages with
Persian women according to Persian rites. At the time of Alexander’s
death, there was comprised, in his written orders given to Craterus,
a plan for the wholesale transportation of inhabitants both out of
Europe into Asia, and out of Asia into Europe, in order to fuse these
populations into one by multiplying intermarriages and intercourse. Such
reciprocal translation of peoples would have been felt as eminently
odious, and could not have been accomplished without coercive authority.
It is rash to speculate upon unexecuted purposes; but, as far as we can
judge, such compulsory mingling of the different races promises nothing
favourable to the happiness of any of them, though it might serve as an
imposing novelty and memento of imperial omnipotence.
In respect of intelligence and combining genius, Alexander was Hellenic
to the full; in respect of disposition and purpose, no one could be
less Hellenic. Instead of hellenizing Asia, he was tending to asiatise
Macedonia and Hellas. His temper and character, as modified by a few
years of conquest, rendered him quite unfit to follow the course
recommended by Aristotle towards the Greeks--quite as unfit as any of
the Persian kings, or as the French Emperor Napoleon, to endure that
partial frustration, compromise, and smart from free criticism, which is
inseparable from the position of a limited chief.[e]
Cox[f] in his _General History of Greece_ sees a degeneration already set
in foreshadowing his future, had he lived, and agrees with Grote[e] as to
his asiatising tendency. “It may almost be said that the results which he
had achieved were precisely those which would have followed if Xerxes had
been the conqueror at Salamis, Platæa, and Mycale.”
HIS MEANNESS (MÉNARD AND ROLLIN)
“So ended he,” says Ménard, “whom they call Alexander the Great.
Let the name stand; but he owed his greatness not to his personal
qualities, to his own efforts, or to his genius, but, as Plutarch
admitted, to Fortune. Never was there an example of a prosperity
so infallible and so little deserved. But Fame is feminine;
she measures merit by success. Alexander created a school; his
personality encumbers history and usurps an enormous space. The
decadence of Greece and the Roman decadence are filled up with
pastiches and caricatures of him; even in modern times he has
remained the type and the ideal of all warrior tyrants down to
Louis XIV and Napoleon.
“The literature that makes his fame is for the most part of
poor stuff. The Greeks of the imperial epoch, in order to
console themselves for the grandeur of Rome, did their best
to inflate the glory of Alexander. This theatrical hero is
worth more to the rhetorician than a legislator like Solon or
a statesman like Pericles. Men of letters of all countries and
times have been overwhelmed by him and found in him the god of
monarchic idolatry. Thanks are due to Rollin for having made
some reservations. He who lived in the sunlight of royalty was
not afraid to say that it was a poor compliment for a king to be
compared to Alexander, ‘the least estimable of Plutarch’s great
men.’ We hardly read Rollin nowadays and his judgments have
little authority; they say that he lacked the power of historic
criticism. Perhaps he did, but he had a right conscience,
which is worth still more. He made history a school of moral
instruction, and it is thus that later generations are formed
strong and sane. Our grandfathers, who learned their history from
Rollin, achieved the French Revolution.”[g]
It is interesting to refer directly to the pages of Rollin
alluded to by Ménard. Rollin divides Alexander’s life into two
distinct halves, the former all beautiful and brilliant; the
latter in hideous contrast. We quote from his resumé of the
latter and uglier half.[a]
His uninterrupted felicity, that never experienced adverse fortune,
intoxicated and changed him to such a degree, that he no longer appeared
the same man; and I do not remember that ever the poison of prosperity
had a more sudden or more forcible effect than upon him.
Was ever enterprise more wild and extravagant, than that of crossing the
sandy deserts of Libya; of exposing his army to the danger of perishing
with thirst and fatigue; of interrupting the course of his victories,
and giving his enemy time to raise a new army, merely for the sake of
marching so far, in order to get himself named the son of Jupiter Ammon;
and purchase, at so dear a rate, a title which could only render him
contemptible?
It appears to me that to the battle of Issus and the siege of Tyre
inclusive, it cannot be denied, but that Alexander was a great warrior
and an illustrious general. But I much doubt, whether, during these his
first exploits, he ought to be set above his father; whose actions,
though not so dazzling, are however as much applauded by good judges,
and those of the military profession. Philip, at his accession to the
throne, found all things unsettled. He himself was obliged to lay the
foundations of his own fortune, and was not supported by the least
foreign assistance. He alone raised himself to the power and grandeur
to which he afterwards attained. He was obliged to train up, not only
his soldiers, but his officers; to instruct them in all the military
exercises; to inure them to the fatigues of war; and to his care and
abilities alone, Macedonia owed the rise of the celebrated phalanx,
that is, of the best troops the world had then ever seen, and to which
Alexander owed all his conquests. How many obstacles stood in Philip’s
way before he could possess himself of the power which Athens, Sparta,
and Thebes had successively exercised over Greece! The Greeks, who were
the bravest people in the universe, would not acknowledge him for their
chief, till he acquired that title by wading through seas of blood, and
by gaining numberless conquests over them. Thus we see, that the way was
prepared for Alexander’s executing his great design; the plan whereof,
and most excellent instructions relative to it, had been laid down for
him by his father. Now, will it not appear a much easier task to subdue
Asia with Grecian armies, than to subject the Greeks who had so often
triumphed over Asia?
[Illustration: MERCURY
(From a vase)]
It must be confessed, that the actions of this prince diffuse a splendour
that dazzles and astonishes the imagination, which is ever fond of the
great and marvellous. His enthusiastic courage raises and transports all
who read his history, as it transported himself. But ought we to give the
name of bravery and valour to a boldness that is equally blind, rash, and
impetuous; a boldness void of all rule, that will never listen to the
voice of reason, and has no other guide than a senseless ardour for false
glory, and a wild desire of distinguishing itself at any price? This
character suits only a military robber, who has no attendants; whose own
life is alone exposed; and who, for that reason, may be employed in some
desperate action; but the case is far otherwise with regard to a king,
who owes his life to all his army and his whole kingdom. True valour
is not desirous of displaying itself, is no ways anxious about its own
reputation, but is solely intent on preserving the army.
Do any of these characteristics suit Alexander? When we peruse his
history and follow him to sieges and battles, we are perpetually alarmed
for his safety, and that of his army; and conclude every moment that
they are upon the point of being destroyed. Here we see a rapid flood,
which is going to draw in and swallow up this conqueror: there we behold
a craggy rock, which he climbs, and perceives round him soldiers, either
transfixed by the enemy’s darts, or thrown headlong by huge stones from
precipices. We tremble when we perceive in a battle the axe just ready to
cleave his head; and much more when we behold him alone in a fortress,
whither his rashness had drawn him, exposed to all the javelins of the
enemy. Alexander was ever persuaded, that miracles would be wrought in
his favour, than which nothing could be more unreasonable, as Plutarch
observes; miracles do not always happen; and the gods at last are weary
of guiding and preserving rash mortals, who abuse the assistance they
afford them.
Alexander seems possessed of such qualities only as are of the second
rank, I mean those of war, and these are all extravagant; are carried to
the rashest and most odious excess, and to the extremes of folly and
fury; whilst his kingdom is left a prey to the rapine and exactions of
Antipater; and all the conquered provinces abandoned to the insatiable
avarice of the governors, who carried their oppressions so far, that
Alexander was forced to put them to death.
Nor do his soldiers appear to be better regulated; for these, having
plundered the wealth of the East, after the prince had given them the
highest marks of his beneficence, grew so licentious, so disorderly, so
debauched and abandoned to vices of every kind, that he was forced to pay
their debts by a largess of £1,500,000.
What strange men were these! how depraved their school! how pernicious
the fruit of their victories![h]
HIS EVIL INFLUENCE (NIEBUHR)
Alexander is for the East, what Charlemagne is for the West; and, next to
Rustam, he is the chief hero of the Persian fairy tales and romances. To
us also he is a man of extraordinary importance, inasmuch as he gave a
new appearance to the whole world. He began what will now be completed,
in spite of all obstacles--the dominion of Europe over Asia; he was the
first that led the victorious Europeans to the East. Asia had played its
part in history, and was destined to become the slave of Europe. He has
also become the national hero of the Greeks, although he was as foreign
to them as Napoleon was to the French, notwithstanding that he traced his
family to the mythical heroes of Greece.
But his personal character will appear to us in a different light. Many
a rhetorician, even in antiquity, formed a correct judgment of him. Who
does not know the story of the pirate, who was condemned to death by
Alexander, and, on being brought before him, said, that there was no
difference between them! The Orientals still call him, “Alexander the
robber.” I will not judge of him from this point of view, for the whole
history of the world turns upon war and conquest; I speak only of his
personal character. But, without agreeing with the declamations which
have so often been made about him, I unhesitatingly declare, that I have
formed a very unfavourable opinion of him. When I behold a young man,
who, in his twentieth year, ascends the throne, after having conspired
against his father--who then displays in his policy a cruelty like that
of the house of the Medici in the sixteenth century, like Cosmo de Medici
and his two sons--who not only sacrifices his step-mother to Olympias,
but causes the innocent infant of the unhappy Cleopatra, as well as
several other near relatives, to be murdered (we do not know their names,
as Arrian skilfully evades mentioning them)--who despatched all that knew
anything of his complicity, as well as those who had previously offended
him--such a young man is condemned for all time to come.
Plutarch shows a foolish and unfounded partiality towards him, and
such was universally the case among the Greeks. His drunkenness cannot
be denied, and with it they excuse his murders, as, for example, that
of Clitus; and, in order poetically to complete the indescribable
folly committed by later Greeks, they compare him with Dionysus. But
his drunkenness does not account for all he did. He caused the most
innocent and most faithful servant, the best general of his father, to
be maliciously assassinated in a truly oriental manner; the man had been
frank and open, and knew that Alexander was what he was through him. The
murder of his friend Clitus, who told him the truth, was a fearful act.
I do not comprehend how persons can excuse Alexander by saying, that he
was an unusually great man; if he was so, was he not then responsible
for his unusually great powers? All his actions, which are praised as
generous, are of a theatrical nature and mere ostentation. His friendship
for Aristotle did not save Callisthenes. His attachment to Hephæstion
was not friendship, but a disgrace. His generosity towards the captive
Persian princesses is nothing extraordinary; if it be not ostentation, it
is something quite natural, and of everyday occurrence; but it is mere
ostentation.
[Illustration: WRAPPING THE DEAD IN INFLAMMABLE SHEETS]
It must, indeed, be acknowledged that Alexander is a most remarkable
phenomenon; but the praise bestowed on him can apply only to his great
intelligence and his talents. He was altogether an extraordinary
man, with the vision of a prophet, a power for which Napoleon also
was greatly distinguished; when he came to a place, he immediately
perceived its capability and its destination; he had the eye which
makes the practical man. If we had no other example of the keenness of
his judgment, the fact that he built Alexandria would alone furnish
sufficient evidence; he discovered the point which was destined, for
fifteen hundred years, to form the link between Egypt, Europe, and Asia.
It is impossible not to concede to him the praise of a great general.
Nay, a most competent judge, Hannibal, declared him to be the greatest
general. It must not, however, be forgotten, that he had most excellent
instruments--distinguished generals, and a splendid army. If he had
had to create his army, his undertaking would not have succeeded so
well. Parmenion, Philotas, Ptolemy, Seleucus, and Antigonus were all
distinguished captains, all proceeded from the school of his father,
and had acquired great reputation even under him; and, if we except the
single Eumenes, we may assert, that no great commander was trained under
Alexander. In like manner, King Frederick II inherited an army already
trained by his father; and most of his generals had served in the army
before his time.
Alexander undertook the Asiatic expedition as a true adventurer. He
himself adopted the most contemptible pomp of eastern despotism, and took
pleasure in the vanities and follies of the Persians; the Orientals, who
were accustomed to prostrate themselves before him, were his darlings.
He forgot the respect due to his old soldiers, and demanded of them, who
were free men, the prostration of the Persians.
His worthless friend Hephæstion died; and Alexander celebrated his
burial in a manner which showed utter senselessness and absurdity, in
his prodigality and in his perpetration of oriental horrors. In order
to offer to the deceased a worthy sacrifice, he undertook an expedition
against a free people of mountaineers, and extirpated the whole nation;
and according to a truly eastern fashion, he slaughtered all the
prisoners in honour of his deceased friend. All that is related of this
period is disgraceful; insensible to all that is good, and dissatisfied
with himself, he abandoned himself more and more to frightful
drunkenness. He offered prizes for the best drinkers, and an ἀγὼν
πολυποσίας ended with some thirty persons drinking themselves to death: a
proceeding which we can contemplate only with the most complete disgust.
Perhaps no man has personally exercised a greater historical influence
than Alexander; this cannot be questioned. But what influence he
exercised, and whether it was beneficial, is a question on which
opinions are divided. In regard to Greece, his conquests were altogether
injurious. Through him the Greek nation was, as it were, seized with
consumption, for he reduced its numbers immensely. A vast number of
recruits must have gone from Greece and Macedonia to India and Upper
Asia, whom he forever withdrew from their country by assigning to them
settlements in those countries. It lay in the nature of things, that
Greece should be lost, and should fall into a state of complete weakness,
when a new wealthy and military state arose by the side of it. Even the
good which arose from the establishment of this Macedonio-Asiatic empire,
was injurious to Greece. Commerce was transferred to Alexandria; and
Athens ceased to be spoken of as a commercial city. Alexander’s influence
upon the nearer and remoter parts of conquered Asia was different in
different countries. Upon Egypt it was beneficial, for that country
was evidently better off under the Ptolemies than it had been under
the Persians. The first three Macedonian kings of Egypt were excellent
princes, and raised the country to a degree of prosperity, which it never
enjoyed either before or after: and that period was sufficient for such a
country to heal its ancient wounds.
Alexander’s contemporaries among the Greeks were not mistaken as to the
influence which he exercised. He died detested and cursed by Greece and
Macedonia. If he had lived longer, he would perhaps himself have seen the
downfall of the structure he had reared. He could not be otherwise than
active and stirring, and he could not have gone on without bringing ruin
upon himself. His intention was not to hellenise Asia, but to make Greece
Persian; hence if he had longer remained in Asia, we should have seen
the formation of a Græco-Persico-Macedonian empire. As he wanted to arm
the Greeks and Macedonians in the Persian fashion, those nations would
afterwards probably have revolted and put him to death. The only means by
which Greece might have been saved, and have recovered its liberty, would
have been, if Alexander had passed through the natural course of his
life, and had fallen with the glory of his exploits.[i]
HIS MOTIVES (DROYSEN)
[Bishop Thirlwall[k] sees great benefits from Alexander’s
conquests, but doubts if they were all intentional with him, or
largely the accidents of his success. Droysen feels no doubt as
to the presence of sharply definite motives and large policies in
Alexander’s mind.]
“That the soul of this king was built on a scale that surpassed human
measure,” Polybius says, “is an opinion in which all agree.” His strength
of will, his wide vision, his intellectual pre-eminence are proved by
his deeds and the strict, the rigid, logic of their consistency. What
his desire was, and what his conception of his work (a fair judge will
wish no other measure), this is something one can approximately learn
only from such parts of his work as he was allowed to realise. Alexander
was versed in the highest culture and knowledge of his time; he would
have cherished no meaner opinion of a king’s calling than the “master of
those who know.” But for him, unlike his great teacher, the thought of
what monarchy was and the “monarch’s duty as watchman” did not logically
lead to the necessity of treating barbarians like animals and plants.
Nor would it have been his opinion that his Macedonians had been trained
to arms from his father’s time in order that they might be, in the
philosopher’s language, “masters over those who were fitly slaves”; still
less that first his father, and then he himself, had forced the Greeks
into the Corinthian federation, that they might plunder defenceless Asia,
squeeze it dry with their exquisite selfishness and their shameless
intrigues.
[Illustration: ARISTOTLE TEACHING THE YOUTHFUL ALEXANDER
(See p. 262)]
He had dealt Asia a terrible blow. He would remember the spear of
his ancestor Achilles. He would recognise that the grace of the true
spear of royalty lay in its power to heal the wounds it made. With the
annihilation of the old kingdom, with the death of Darius, he became heir
to the empire over unnumbered peoples who had been governed till then as
slaves. A labour it was, worthy of a king indeed, to free them so far as
they could understand or learn of freedom, to preserve and further them
in whatever they enjoyed of laudable and sound, to respect and spare them
in whatever was sacred in their eyes and whatever was their very own. He
must know how to propitiate, how to win them, that they too may be made
to share the burden of the empire which is gradually to unite them with
the Greek world. Such a monarchy could permit no mention of conquerors
and conquered when once the victory was won; it must wipe out from men’s
memory the distinction between Greek and barbarian.
There lay on this road difficulties immeasurable--much that was
arbitrary, much that was violent, unnatural--they seemed to make the
undertaking impossible. But him they did not stop nor perplex; they
only heightened the vehemence of his will, and stiffened the rigid and
conscious assurance of his dealings. The work which he had undertaken in
the exaltation of youth possessed him; gathering like an avalanche it
swept him on; ruin, devastation, fields of dead, marked his progress;
with the world that he conquered, there came a change over his army, over
his surroundings, over the man himself. He passed on like a tempest, he
saw only his aim, and in that his justification.
The majority misunderstood and disapproved of what the king did or left
undone. While Alexander tried all means to win the conquered and make
them forget their conquerors in the Macedonians, many of his followers
in their insolence and their selfishness calmly claimed the conquerors’
ruthless right of violence. While Alexander received with the same
graciousness the genuflexions of Persian magnates and the congratulatory
missions with which Greece honoured him, accepting alike the worship
which the orientals considered they owed him, and the military
acclamations of his phalanxes, they would have liked to see themselves as
the equal of their king, and everything else far below them in the dust
of humility. And while they themselves yielded to all the luxuriousness
and licentiousness of Asiatic life, so far as the camp and the vicinity
of their openly disapproving king permitted--yielded with no other object
besides the gratification of appetites run mad--they took it ill of
their king that he wore the Median dress and affected the Persian court
functions, wherein the millions of Asia recognised and worshipped him as
their god and king.[l]
HIS EFFECT ON FEDERALISATION (PÖHLMANN)
[Every one admits that the lack of unity among the Greek towns
was the cause of evils innumerable, and that some form of
federation was vitally needed. Many have felt that Alexander
furnished the needed unifaction by his centralised empire; but
Pöhlmann is of contrary mind.]
Droysen’s peculiar way of seeing history has led him greatly to overrate
the blessings of the new federal régime. It is true that in Hellas, under
the old party names of aristocrat and democrat, the hostile interests
of rich and poor were engaged in a pitiless and passionate struggle,
and, if we consider the decomposition that was killing the life of
communities, a monarchy would appear to be exactly what was needed to
exercise a levelling and reconciliatory influence. But a kingdom of this
national character, whose first aim would be to satisfy the most vital
interests of the nation and create a true internal peace--such a kingdom
was not at all the ideal of the Macedonian monarchy. So far from standing
superior to party warfare, the monarchy supported itself by favouring
the particular interests of that party which came over to the Macedonian
camp. The immense emigration produced by the consequent oppression of
those who belonged to the opposition, is proof enough that the new order
did not produce a citizenship of inner peace, but, on the contrary,
gave new food to the differences from which the communities suffered.
So far as the policy of Philip was concerned, the object of the bond
was attained when it brought the power of the Greek people into its own
service; and even if the war against Persia had its national and Hellenic
side, yet so early an authority as Polybius rightly and soberly judged
that the Macedonian king was chiefly acting in the matter to satisfy
a personal end. It is an illusion of Droysen’s to imagine that this
subjection of Greece to a policy which was, by its nature, bound to serve
dynastic and personal interests, at the same time secured to the Greeks a
common national policy.
The consolidation of the new world power was a consequence of Alexander’s
irresistible and victorious progress through the heart of the Persian
kingdom. His policy was to bring about a new “Hellenistic” régime which
should lead to a peaceful blending of Greek and barbarian, and the
object was to be gained by putting the oriental and the Græco-Macedonian
elements on an equality in army and administration--setting Asiatics,
for example, as satraps beside European military governors and treasury
officers. He triumphed over opposition, which he encountered chiefly in
the army.
This policy was certainly an inevitable consequence of his undertaking
and of the conditions which were necessary to its success; but need he
have so exaggerated it as to make a complete return to the traditions of
oriental despotism? This is a question we do not find so easy to answer
in the affirmative, as Droysen does, for he sees nothing but “prejudice”
in the resistance which Alexander’s claims to apotheosis and genuflexion
encountered in the old Macedonian spirit and the Greek love of freedom.
As Ranke rightly declared, it meant a complete break with their entire
national history that the Greeks as well should be subjected to the
sway of an authority which was no other than that against which they
had warred for centuries. Certainly the “city” had outlived its time as
the final political unit. The needs of the day called for “an ascent
from the city constitution to state constitutions,” in which the cities
themselves would enjoy only a communal independence. But then they must,
to use Droysen’s own words, “find in the universal bond their right and
their safeguard.” And this safeguard could be offered by no orientalising
despotism.[n]
HIS HERITAGE (HEGEL)
Alexander had the good fortune to die at the proper time--_i.e._, it
may be called good fortune, but it is rather a necessity. That he may
stand before the eyes of posterity as a youth, an early death must hurry
him away. Achilles begins the Greek world, and his antitype Alexander
concludes it: and these youths not only supply a picture of the fairest
kind in their own persons, but at the same time afford a complete and
perfect type of Hellenic existence. Alexander finished his work and
completed his ideal; and thus bequeathed to the world one of the noblest
and most brilliant of visions, which our poor reflections only serve to
obscure. For the great world-historical form of Alexander, the modern
standard applied by recent historical “Philistines”--that of virtue or
morality--will by no means suffice. And if it be alleged in depreciation
of his merit, that he had no successor, and left behind no dynasty, we
may remark that the Greek kingdoms that arose in Asia after him are his
dynasty. The Græco-Bactrian kingdom lasted for two centuries. Thence the
Greeks came into connection with India, and even with China. The Greek
dominion spread itself over northern India. Other Greek kingdoms arose in
Asia Minor, in Armenia, in Syria, and Babylonia. But Egypt especially,
among the kingdoms of the successors of Alexander, became a great centre
of science and art; for a great number of its architectural works belong
to the time of the Ptolemies, as has been made out from the deciphered
inscriptions. Alexandria became the chief centre of commerce--the point
of union for Eastern manners and tradition with Western civilisation.
Besides these, the Macedonian kingdom, that of Thrace, stretching beyond
the Danube, that of Illyria, and that of Epirus, flourished under the
sway of Greek princes.[m]
ALEXANDER’S TRUE GLORY (WHEELER)
If a man’s life-work is to be judged only by what he erects into formal
organisation, then we must pronounce the career of Alexander a failure,
and more than a failure. He had dismantled what he found, and built
nothing sure in its place. His dream of fusing the East and the West
had been fulfilled and embodied in no visible institution, no form of
government or law, of state or church. Greece, Egypt, and the Orient were
still in government asunder.
No wonder that historians have written the story of Greece--among them
great names like Niebuhr and Grote--and seen nothing more in the career
of Alexander than a brilliant disturbance of the world’s order, an
enthronement of militarism, an annihilation of Greek liberty, and an
undoing of Greece in all that makes her life of interest to the world. It
is another thing that their blindness could see in Alexander himself only
a mad opportunist and greedy conqueror, whose life, had it been spared,
could have wrought no more than further conquest; for Alexander was of
all things an idealist, and they who have not read that in the story of
his life, may as well not have read it at all. Grote and Demosthenes
are, each in his way, types of historians and statesmen who have spent
their strength in deploring the waste of goodly seed-corn scattered on
the fields, their eyes turned towards the former harvest, not the next.
The old maxims, the old creeds, and the good old times are reasserted,
defended, and bewailed long after they have passed to their larger
fruitage in the unfolding of a larger life.
When Alexander’s career began, the culture of the world, fixed in
two main types, the feminine and the masculine, if we may broadly
characterise them so, was still centralised and located, on the one hand
in the wealth and settled industrial life of the Mesopotamian and the
Egyptian river valleys, on the other in the free energy of the old Greek
city communities. When his career ended, the barrier separating these
domains had been broken down, never to be raised again.
Man as a base line for measuring the universe, man as a source of
governing power, arose in Greece; it was Greece that shaped the law of
beauty from which came the arts of form, the law of speculative truth
from which by ordered observations came the sciences, and the law of
liberty from which came the democratic state. This was what the old
Greece held in keeping for the world. Alexander was the strong wind that
scattered the seed; again, he was the willing hand of the sower.
The story of Alexander has become a story of death. He died, himself,
before his time. With his life he brought the old Greece to its end;
with his death, the state he had founded. But they all three, Alexander,
Greece, the Grand Empire, each after its sort, set forth, as history
judges men and things, the inner value of the saying, “Except a grain of
wheat fall into the earth and die, it abideth alone.”[o]
[Illustration]