some suppose, by Tantalus, or, according to others, by the Æolians.
It has been subject to many revolutions, and been severally in
the possession of the Æolians, Ionians, Lydians, and Macedonians.
Alexander, or according to Strabo, Lysimachus, rebuilt it 400 years
after it had been destroyed by the Lydians. It was one of the richest
and most powerful cities of Asia, and became one of the 12 cities
of the Ionian confederacy. The inhabitants were given much to luxury
and indolence, but they were universally esteemed for their valour
and intrepidity when called to action. Marcus Aurelius repaired it
after it had been destroyed by an earthquake, about the 180th year
of the christian era. Smyrna still continues to be a very commercial
town. The river Meles flows near its walls. The inhabitants of Smyrna
believed that Homer was born among them, and to confirm this opinion
they not only paid him divine honours, but showed a place which
bore the poet’s name, and also had a brass coin in circulation which
was called _Homerium_. Some suppose that it was called Smyrna from
an Amazon of the same name who took possession of it. _Herodotus_,
bk. 1, ch. 16, &c.――_Strabo_, bks. 12 & 14.――_Silius Italicus_, bk. 8,
li. 565.――_Pausanias_, bk. 5, ch. 8.――_Mela_, bk. 1, ch. 17.――――A
daughter of Thias, mother of Adonis.――――An Amazon.――――The name of a
poem which Cinna, a Latin poet, composed in nine years, and which was
worthy of admiration, according to _Catullus_, poem 94.
=Smyrnæus=, a Greek poet of the third century, called also Calaber.
_See:_ Calaber.
=Soana=, a river of Albania. _Ptolemy._
=Soanda=, a town of Armenia.
=Soanes=, a people of Colchis, near Caucasus, in whose territories
the rivers abound with golden sands, which the inhabitants gather
in wool skins, whence, perhaps, arose the fable of the golden fleece.
_Strabo_, bk. 11.――_Pliny_, bk. 33, ch. 3.
=Sōcrătes=, the most celebrated philosopher of all antiquity, was
a native of Athens. His father Sophroniscus was a statuary, and
his mother Phænarete was by profession a midwife. For some time he
followed the occupation of his father, and some have mentioned the
statues of the graces, admired for their simplicity and elegance,
as the work of his own hands. He was called away from this meaner
employment, of which, however, he never blushed, by Crito, who
admired his genius and courted his friendship. Philosophy soon became
the study of Socrates, and under Archelaus and Anaxagoras he laid the
foundation of that exemplary virtue which succeeding ages have ever
loved and venerated. He appeared like the rest of his countrymen in
the field of battle; he fought with boldness and intrepidity, and to
his courage two of his friends and disciples, Xenophon and Alcibiades,
owed the preservation of their lives. But the character of Socrates
appears more conspicuous and dignified as a philosopher and moralist
than as a warrior. He was fond of labour, he inured himself to suffer
hardships, and he acquired that serenity of mind and firmness of
countenance, which the most alarming dangers could never destroy, or
the most sudden calamities alter. If he was poor, it was from choice,
and not the effects of vanity, or the wish of appearing singular. He
bore injuries with patience, and the insults of malice or resentment
he not only treated with contempt, but even received with a mind
that expressed some concern, and felt compassion for the depravity
of human nature. So singular and so venerable a character was admired
by the most enlightened of the Athenians. Socrates was attended by
a number of illustrious pupils, whom he instructed by his exemplary
life, as well as by his doctrines. He had no particular place where
to deliver his lectures, but as the good of his countrymen, and the
reformation of their corrupted morals, and not the aggregation of
riches, was the object of his study, he was present everywhere, and
drew the attention of his auditors either in the groves of Academus,
the Lyceum, or on the banks of the Ilyssus. He spoke with freedom
on every subject, religious as well as civil; and had the courage to
condemn the violence of his countrymen, and to withstand the torrent
of resentment, by which the Athenian generals were capitally punished
for not burying the dead at the battle of Arginusæ. This independence
of spirit, and that visible superiority of mind and genius over the
rest of his countrymen, created many enemies to Socrates; but as his
character was irreproachable, and his doctrines pure, and void of all
obscurity, the voice of malevolence was silent. Yet Aristophanes soon
undertook, at the instigation of Melitus, in his comedy of the Clouds,
to ridicule the venerable character of Socrates on the stage; and
when once the way was open to calumny and defamation, the fickle and
licentious populace paid no reverence to the philosopher whom they
had before regarded as a being of a superior order. When this had
succeeded, Melitus stood forth to criminate him, together with Anytus
and Lycon, and the philosopher was summoned before the tribunal of
the 500. He was accused of corrupting the Athenian youth, of making
innovations in the religion of the Greeks, and of ridiculing the many
gods whom the Athenians worshipped; yet, false as this might appear,
the accusers relied for the success of their cause upon the perjury
of false witnesses, and the envy of the judges, whose ignorance
would readily yield to misrepresentation, and be influenced and
guided by eloquence and artifice. In this their expectations were not
frustrated, and while the judges expected submission from Socrates,
and that meanness of behaviour and servility of defence which
distinguished criminals, the philosopher, perhaps, accelerated his
own fall by the firmness of his mind, and his uncomplying integrity.
Lysias, one of the most celebrated orators of the age, composed
an oration in a laboured and pathetic style, which he offered to
his friend to be pronounced as his defence in the presence of his
judges. Socrates read it, but after he had praised the eloquence
and the animation of the whole, he rejected it, as neither manly
nor expressive of fortitude, and comparing it to Sicyonian shoes,
which, though fitting, were proofs of effeminacy, he observed, that a
philosopher ought to be conspicuous for magnanimity and for firmness
of soul. In his apology he spoke with great animation, and confessed
that while others boasted that they were acquainted with everything,
he himself knew nothing. The whole discourse was full of simplicity
and noble grandeur, the energetic language of offended innocence. He
modestly said, that what he possessed was applied for the service of
the Athenians; it was his wish to make his fellow-citizens happy, and
it was a duty which he performed by the special command of the gods,
“whose authority,” said he, emphatically to his judges, “I regard
more than yours.” Such language from a man who was accused of a
capital crime, astonished and irritated the judges. Socrates was
condemned, but only by a majority of three voices; and when he was
demanded, according to the spirit of the Athenian laws, to pass
sentence on himself, and to mention the death he preferred, the
philosopher said, “For my attempts to teach the Athenian youth
justice and moderation, and render the rest of my countrymen more
happy, let me be maintained at the public expense the remaining
years of my life in the Prytaneum, an honour, O Athenians, which
I deserve more than the victors of the Olympic games. They make
their countrymen more happy in appearance, but I have made you so
in reality.” This exasperated the judges in the highest degree, and
he was condemned to drink hemlock. Upon this he addressed the court,
and more particularly the judges who had decided in his favour, in
a pathetic speech. He told them that to die was a pleasure, since
he was going to hold converse with the greatest heroes of antiquity;
he recommended to their paternal care his defenceless children,
and as he returned to prison, he exclaimed: “I go to die, you to
live; but which is the best the Divinity alone can know.” The solemn
celebration of the Delian festivals [_See:_ Delia] prevented his
execution for 30 days, and during that time he was confined in the
prison and loaded with irons. His friends, and particularly his
disciples, were his constant attendants; he discoursed with them upon
different subjects with all his usual cheerfulness and serenity. He
reproved them for their sorrow, and when one of them was uncommonly
grieved because he was to suffer, though innocent, the philosopher
replied, “Would you then have me die guilty?” With this composure he
spent his last days. He continued to be a preceptor till the moment
of his death, and instructed his pupils on questions of the greatest
importance; he told them his opinions in support of the immortality
of the soul, and reprobated with acrimony the prevalent custom of
suicide. He disregarded the intercession of his friends, and when
it was in his power to make his escape out of prison he refused it,
and asked, with his usual pleasantry, where he could escape death.
“Where,” says he to Crito, who had bribed the gaoler, and made
his escape certain, “where shall I fly, to avoid this irrevocable
doom passed on all mankind?” When the hour to drink the poison
was come, the executioner presented him the cup with tears in his
eyes. Socrates received it with composure, and after he had made a
libation to the gods, he drank it with an unaltered countenance, and
a few moments after he expired. Such was the end of a man whom the
uninfluenced answer of the oracle of Delphi had pronounced the wisest
of mankind. Socrates died 400 years before Christ, in the 70th year
of his age. He was no sooner buried than the Athenians repented of
their cruelty; his accusers were universally despised and shunned.
One suffered death, some were banished, and others, with their own
hands, put an end to the life which their severity to the best of
the Athenians had rendered insupportable. The actions, sayings, and
opinions of Socrates have been faithfully recorded by two of the most
celebrated of his pupils, Xenophon and Plato, and everything which
relates to the life and circumstances of this great philosopher is
now minutely known. To his poverty, his innocence, and his example,
the Greeks were particularly indebted for their greatness and
splendour; and the learning which was universally disseminated by his
pupils, gave the whole nation a consciousness of their superiority
over the rest of the world, not only in the polite arts, but in
the more laborious exercises, which their writings celebrated. The
philosophy of Socrates forms an interesting epoch in the history of
the human mind. The son of Sophroniscus derided the more abstruse
inquiries and metaphysical researches of his predecessors, and by
first introducing moral philosophy, he induced mankind to consider
themselves, their passions, their opinions, their duties, actions,
and faculties. From this it was said that the founder of the Socratic
school drew philosophy down from heaven upon the earth. In his
attendance upon religious worship, Socrates was himself an example;
he believed the divine origin of dreams and omens, and publicly
declared that he was accompanied by a dæmon or invisible conductor
[_See:_ Dæmon], whose frequent interposition stopped him from the
commission of evil, and the guilt of misconduct. This familiar spirit,
however, according to some, was nothing more than a sound judgment
assisted by prudence and long experience, which warned him at the
approach of danger, and from a general speculation of mankind could
foresee what success would attend an enterprise, or what calamities
would follow an ill-managed administration. As a supporter of the
immortality of the soul, he allowed the perfection of a supreme
knowledge, from which he deduced the government of the universe. From
the resources of experience as well as nature and observation, he
perceived the indiscriminate dispensation of good and evil to mankind
by the hand of Heaven, and he was convinced that none but the most
inconsiderate would incur the displeasure of their Creator to avoid
poverty or sickness, or gratify a sensual appetite, which must at the
end harass their soul with remorse and the consciousness of guilt.
From this natural view of things, he perceived the relation of one
nation with another, and how much the tranquillity of civil society
depended upon the proper discharge of these respective duties.
The actions of men furnished materials also for his discourse; to
instruct them was his aim, and to render them happy was the ultimate
object of his daily lessons. From principles like these, which were
enforced by the unparalleled example of an affectionate husband, a
tender parent, a warlike soldier, and a patriotic citizen in Socrates,
soon after the celebrated sects of the Platonists, the Peripatetics,
the Academics, Cyrenaics, Stoics, &c., arose. Socrates never wrote
for the public eye, yet many support that the tragedies of his
pupil Euripides were partly composed by him. He was naturally of a
licentious disposition, and a physiognomist observed, in looking in
the face of the philosopher, that his heart was the most depraved,
immodest, and corrupted that ever was in the human breast. This
nearly cost the satirist his life, but Socrates upbraided his
disciples, who wished to punish the physiognomist, and declared
that his assertions were true, but that all his vicious propensities
had been duly corrected and curbed by means of reason. Socrates
made a poetical version of Æsop’s fables, while in prison. _Diogenes
Laërtius._――_Xenophon._――_Pluto._――_Pausanias_, bk. 1, ch. 22.
――_Plutarch_, _On the Opinions of the Philosophers_, &c.――_Cicero_,
_On Oratory_, bk. 1, ch. 54; _Tusculanæ Disputationes_, bk. 1, ch. 41,
&c.――_Valerius Maximus_, bk. 3, ch. 4.――――A leader of the Achæans,
at the battle of Cunaxa. He was seized and put to death by order of
Artaxerxes.――――A governor of Cilicia under Alexander the Great.――――A
painter.――――A Rhodian in the age of Augustus. He wrote an account of
the civil wars.――――A scholiast born A.D. 380, at Constantinople. He
wrote an ecclesiastical history from the year 309, where Eusebius
ended, down to 450, with great exactness and judgment, of which the
best edition is that of Reading, folio, Cambridge. 1720.――――An island
on the coast of Arabia.
=Sœmias Julia=, mother of the emperor Heliogabalus, was made president
of a senate of women, which she had elected to decide the quarrels
and the affairs of the Roman matrons. She at last provoked the people
by her debaucheries, extravagance, and cruelties, and was murdered
with her son and family. She was a native of Apamea; her father’s
name was Julius Avitus, and her mother’s Masa. Her sister Julia
Mammæa married the emperor Septimus Severus.
=Sogdiāna=, a country of Asia, bounded on the north by Scythia, east by
the Sacæ, south by Bactriana, and west by Margiana, and now known by
the name of _Zagatay_, or _Usbec_. The people were called _Sogdiani_.
The capital was called Marcanda. _Herodotus_, bk. 3, ch. 93.
――_Curtius_, bk. 7, ch. 10.
=Sogdiānus=, a son of Artaxerxes Longimanus, who murdered his elder
brother, king Xerxes, to make himself master of the Persian throne.
He was but seven months in possession of the crown. His brother Ochus,
who reigned under the name of Darius Nothus, conspired against him,
and suffocated him in a tower full of warm ashes.
=Sol= (_the sun_), was an object of veneration among the ancients.
It was particularly worshipped by the Persians, under the name of
Mithras; and was the Baal or Bel of the Chaldeans, the Belphegor
of the Moabites, the Moloch of the Canaanites, the Osiris of the
Egyptians, and the Adonis of the Syrians. The Massagetæ sacrificed
horses to the sun on account of their swiftness. According to some of
the ancient poets, Sol and Apollo were two different persons. Apollo,
however, and Phœbus and Sol, are universally supposed to be the same
deity.
=Solicinium=, a town of Germany, now _Sultz_, on the Neckar.
=Solīnus Caius Julius=, a grammarian at the end of the first century,
who wrote a book called _Polyhistor_, which is a collection
of historical remarks and geographical annotations on the most
celebrated places of every country. He has been called Pliny’s ape,
because he imitated that well-known naturalist. The last edition of
the Polyhistor is that of Nuremberg, _ex editione Salamasii_. 1777.
=Solis Fons=, a celebrated fountain in Libya. _See:_ Ammon.
=Soloe=, or =Soli=, a town of Cyprus, built on the borders of the
Clarius by an Athenian colony. It was originally called _Æpeia_,
till Solon visited Cyprus, and advised Philocyprus, one of the
princes of the island, to change the situation of his capital. His
advice was followed; a new town was raised in a beautiful plain, and
called after the name of the Athenian philosopher. _Strabo_, bk. 14.
――_Plutarch_, _Solon_.――――A town of Cilicia on the sea-coast, built
by the Greeks and Rhodians. It was afterwards called _Pompeiopolis_,
from Pompey, who settled a colony of pirates there. _Pliny_, bk. 5,
ch. 27.――_Dionysius of Halicarnassus._ Some suppose that the Greeks,
who settled in either of these two towns, forgot the purity of their
native language, and thence arose the term _Solecismus_, applied to
an inelegant or improper expression.
=Solœis=, or =Soloentia=, a promontory of Libya at the extremity
of mount Atlas, now cape _Cantin_.――――A town of Sicily, between
Panormus and Himera, now _Solanto_. _Cicero_, _Against Verres_,
bk. 3, ch. 43.――_Thucydides_, bk. 6.
=Solon=, one of the seven wise men of Greece, was born at Salamis, and
educated at Athens. His father’s name was Euphorion, or Exechestides,
one of the descendants of king Codrus, and by his mother’s side he
reckoned among his relations the celebrated Pisistratus. After he
had devoted part of his time to philosophical and political studies,
Solon travelled over the greatest part of Greece, but at his return
home he was distressed with the dissensions which were kindled among
his countrymen. All fixed their eyes upon Solon as a deliverer, and
he was unanimously elected archon and sovereign legislator. He might
have become absolute, but he refused the dangerous office of king of
Athens, and, in the capacity of lawgiver, he began to make a reform
in every department. The complaints of the poorer citizens found
redress, all debts were remitted, and no one was permitted to seize
the person of his debtor if unable to make a restoration of his
money. After he had made the most salutary regulations in the state,
and bound the Athenians by a solemn oath that they would faithfully
observe his laws for the space of 100 years, Solon resigned the
office of legislator and removed himself from Athens. He visited
Egypt, and in the court of Crœsus king of Lydia he convinced the
monarch of the instability of fortune, and told him, when he wished
to know whether he was not the happiest of mortals, that Tellus, an
Athenian, who had always seen his country in a flourishing state,
who had seen his children lead a virtuous life, and who had himself
fallen in defence of his country, was more entitled to happiness than
the possessor of riches and the master of empires. After 10 years’
absence Solon returned to Athens, but he had the mortification to
find the greatest part of his regulations disregarded by the factious
spirit of his countrymen, and the usurpation of Pisistratus. Not to
be longer a spectator of the divisions that reigned in his country,
he retired to Cyprus, where he died at the court of king Philocyprus,
in the 80th year of his age, 558 years before the christian era.
The salutary consequences of the laws of Solon can be discovered
in the length of time they were in force in the republic of Athens.
For above 400 years they flourished in full vigour, and Cicero, who
was himself a witness of their benign influence, passes the highest
encomiums upon the legislator, whose superior wisdom framed such a
code of regulations. It was the intention of Solon to protect the
poorer citizens, and by dividing the whole body of the Athenians into
four classes, three of which were permitted to discharge the most
important offices and magistracies of the state, and the last to
give their opinion in the assemblies, but not have a share in the
distinctions and honours of their superiors, the legislator gave the
populace a privilege which, though at first small and inconsiderable,
soon rendered them masters of the republic, and of all the affairs
of government. He made a reformation in the Areopagus, he increased
the authority of the members, and permitted them yearly to inquire
how every citizen maintained himself, and to punish such as lived
in idleness, and were not employed in some honourable and lucrative
profession. He also regulated the Prytaneum, and fixed the number of
its judges at 400. The sanguinary laws of Draco were all cancelled,
except that against murder, and the punishment denounced against
every offender was proportioned to his crime; but Solon made no
law against parricide or sacrilege. The former of these crimes, he
said, was too horrible to human nature for a man to be guilty of
it, and the latter could never be committed, because the history
of Athens had never furnished a single instance. Such as had died
in the service of their country were buried with great pomp, and
their family was maintained at the public expense; but such as
had squandered away their estates, such as refused to bear arms in
defence of their country, or paid no attention to the infirmities
and distress of their parents, were branded with infamy. The laws
of marriage were newly regulated; it became a union of affection and
tenderness, and no longer a mercenary contract. To speak with ill
language against the dead as well as the living, was made a crime,
and the legislator wished that the character of his fellow-citizens
should be freed from the aspersions of malevolence and envy. A person
that had no children was permitted to dispose of his estates as he
pleased, and the females were not allowed to be extravagant in their
dress or expenses. To be guilty of adultery was a capital crime,
and the friend and associate of lewdness and debauchery was never
permitted to speak in public, for, as the philosopher observed, a man
who has no shame, is not capable of being intrusted with the people.
These celebrated laws were engraven on several tables, and that they
might be better known and more familiar to the Athenians, they were
written in verse. The indignation which Solon expressed on seeing the
tragical representations of Thespis, is well known, and he sternly
observed, that if falsehood and fiction were tolerated on the stage,
they would soon find their way among the common occupations of men.
According to Plutarch, Solon was reconciled to Pisistratus; but this
seems to be false, as the legislator refused to live in a country
where the privileges of his fellow-citizens were trampled upon by
the usurpation of a tyrant. _See:_ Lycurgus. _Plutarch_, _Solon_.
――_Herodotus_, bk. 1, ch. 29.――_Diogenes Laërtius_, bk. 1.
――_Pausanias_, bk. 1, ch. 40.――_Cicero._
=Solona=, a town of Gaul Cispadana on the Utens.
=Solonium=, a town of Latium on the borders of Etruria. _Plutarch_,
_Caius Marius_.――_Cicero_, _de Divinatione_, bk. 1.
=Solva=, a town of Noricum.
=Solus= (untis), a maritime town of Sicily. _See:_ Solœis. _Strabo_,
bk. 14.
=Soly̆ma= and =Soly̆mæ=, a town of Lycia. The inhabitants, called
_Solymi_, were anciently called _Milyades_, and afterwards _Termili_
and _Lycians_. Sarpedon settled among them. _Strabo_, bk. 14.
――_Homer_, _Iliad_, bk. 6.――_Pliny_, bk. 5, chs. 27 & 29.――――An
ancient name of Jerusalem. _See:_ Hierosolyma. _Juvenal_, satire 6,
li. 543.
=Somnus=, son of Erebus and Nox, was one of the infernal deities, and
presided over sleep. His palace, according to some mythologists,
is a dark cave where the sun never penetrates. At the entrance
are a number of poppies and somniferous herbs. The god himself is
represented as asleep on a bed of feathers with black curtains. The
dreams stand by him, and Morpheus, as his principal minister, watches
to prevent the noise from awaking him. The Lacedæmonians always
placed the image of Somnus near that of death. _Hesiod_, _Theogony_.
――_Homer_, _Iliad_, bk. 14.――_Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 6, li. 893.
――_Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 11.
=Sonchis=, an Egyptian priest, in the age of Solon. It was he who told
that celebrated philosopher a number of traditions, particularly
about the Atlantic isles, which he represented as more extensive than
the continent of Africa and Asia united. This island disappeared, it
is said, in one day and one night. _Plutarch_, _de Iside et Osiride_,
&c.
=Sontiătes=, a people in Gaul.
=Sopăter=, a philosopher of Apamea, in the age of the emperor
Constantine. He was one of the disciples of Iamblicus, and after his
death he was at the head of the Platonic philosophers.