[1] The O.E. _ieg_, _ig_, still appearing in local names, e.g.
Anglesey, Battersea, is cognate with Norw. _oy_, Icel. _ey_, and the
first part of Ger. _Eiland_, &c.; it is referred to the original
Teut. _ahwia_, a place in water, _ahwa_, water, cf. Lat. _aqua_; the
same word is seen in English "eyot," "ait," an islet in a river. The
spelling "island," accepted before 1700, is due to a false connexion
with "isle," Fr. _ile_, Lat. _insula_.
ISLAY, the southernmost island of the Inner Hebrides, Argyllshire,
Scotland, 16 m. W. of Kintyre and 3/4 m. S.W. of Jura, from which it is
separated by the Sound of Islay. Pop. (1901) 6857; area, 150,400 acres;
maximum breadth 19 m. and maximum length 25 m. The sea-lochs Gruinart
and Indaal cut into it so deeply as almost to convert the western
portion into a separate island. It is rich and productive, and has been
called the "Queen of the Hebrides." The surface generally is regular,
the highest summits being Ben Bheigeir (1609 ft.) and Sgorr nam
Faoileann (1407 ft.). There are several freshwater lakes and streams,
which provide good fishing. Islay was the ancient seat of the "lord of
the Isles," the first to adopt that title being John Macdonald of Isle
of Islay, who died about 1386; but the Macdonalds were ultimately ousted
by their rivals, the Campbells, about 1616. Islay House, the ancient
seat of the Campbells of Islay, stands at the head of Loch Indaal. The
island was formerly occupied by small crofters and tacksmen, but since
1831 it has been gradually developed into large sheep and arable farms
and considerable business is done in stock-raising. Dairy-farming is
largely followed, and oats, barley and various green crops are raised.
The chief difficulty in the way of reclamation is the great area of peat
(60 sq. m.), which, at its present rate of consumption, is calculated to
last 1500 years. The island contains several whisky distilleries,
producing about 400,000 gallons annually. Slate and marble are quarried,
and there is a little mining of iron, lead and silver. At Bowmore, the
chief town, there is a considerable shipping trade. Port Ellen, the
principal village, has a quay with lighthouse, a fishery and a
golf-course. Port Askaig is the ferry station for Faolin on Jura.
Regular communication with the Clyde is maintained by steamers, and a
cable was laid between Lagavulin and Kintyre in 1871.
ISLES OF THE BLEST, or FORTUNATE ISLANDS (Gr. [Greek: ai ton makaron
nesoi]: Lat., Fortunatae Insulae), in Greek mythology a group of islands
near the edge of the Western Ocean, peopled not by the dead, but by
mortals upon whom the gods had conferred immortality. Like the islands
of the Phaeacians in Homer (_Od._ viii.) or the Celtic Avalon and St
Brendan's island, the Isles of the Blest are represented as a land of
perpetual summer and abundance of all good things. No reference is made
to them by Homer, who speaks instead of the Elysian Plain (_Od._ iv. and
ix.), but they are mentioned by Hesiod (_Works and Days_, 168) and
Pindar (_Ol._ ii.). A very old tradition suggests that the idea of such
an earthly paradise was a reminiscence of some unrecorded voyage to
Madeira and the Canaries, which are sometimes named Fortunatae Insulae
by medieval map-makers. (See ATLANTIS.)
ISLINGTON (in Domesday and later documents _Iseldon_, _Isendon_ and in
the 16th century _Hisselton_), a northern metropolitan borough of
London, England, bounded E. by Stoke Newington and Hackney, S. by
Shoreditch and Finsbury, and W. by St Pancras, and extending N. to the
boundary of the county of London. Pop. (1901) 334,991. The name is
commonly applied to the southern part of the borough, which, however,
includes the districts of Holloway in the north, Highbury in the east,
part of Kingsland in the south-east, and Barnsbury and Canonbury in the
south-central portion. The districts included preserve the names of
ancient manors, and in Canonbury, which belonged as early as the 13th
century to the priory of St Bartholomew, Smithfield, traces of the old
manor house remain. The fields and places of entertainment in Islington
were favourite places of resort for the citizens of London in the 17th
century and later; the modern Ball's Pond Road recalls the sport of
duck-hunting practised here and on other ponds in the parish, and the
popularity of the place was increased by the discovery of chalybeate
wells. At Copenhagen Fields, now covered by the great cattle market
(1855) adjoining Caledonian Road, a great meeting of labourers was held
in 1834. They were suspected of intending to impose their views on
parliament by violence, but a display of military force held them in
check. The most noteworthy modern institutions in Islington are the
Agricultural Hall, Liverpool Road, erected in 1862, and used for cattle
and horse shows and other exhibitions; Pentonville Prison, Caledonian
Road (1842), a vast pile of buildings radiating from a centre, and
Holloway Prison. The borough has only some 40 acres of public grounds,
the principal of which is Highbury Fields. Among its institutions are
the Great Northern Central Hospital, Holloway, the London Fever
Hospital, the Northern Polytechnic, and the London School of Divinity,
St John's Hall Highbury. Islington is a suffragan bishopric in the
diocese of London. The parliamentary borough of Islington has north,
south, east and west divisions, each returning one member. The borough
council consists of a mayor, 10 aldermen and 60 councillors. Area,
3091.5 acres.
ISLIP, a township of Suffolk county, New York, U.S.A., in the central
part of the S. side of Long Island. Pop. (1905, state census) 13,721;
(1910) 18,346. The township is 16 m. long from E. to W., and 8 m. wide
in its widest part. It is bounded on the S. by the Atlantic Ocean;
between the ocean and the Great South Bay, here 5-7 m. wide, is a long
narrow strip of beach, called Fire Island, at the W. end of which is
Fire Island Inlet. The "Island" beach and the Inlet, both very dangerous
for shipping, are protected by the Fire Island Lighthouse, the Fire
Island Lightship, and a Life Saving Station near the Lighthouse and
another at Point o' Woods. Near the Lighthouse there are a United States
Wireless Telegraph Station and a station of the Western Union Telegraph
Company, which announces to New York incoming steamships; and a little
farther E., on the site formerly occupied by the Surf House, a
well-known resort for hay-fever patients, is a state park. Along the
"Island" beach there is excellent surf-bathing. The township is served
by two parallel branches of the Long Island railroad about 4 m. apart.
On the main (northern) division are the villages of Brentwood (first
settled as Modern Times, a quasi free-love community), which now has the
Convent and School of St Joseph and a large private sanitarium; Central
Islip, the seat of the Central Islip State Hospital for the Insane; and
Ronkonkoma, on the edge of a lake of the same name (with no visible
outlet or inlet and suffering remarkable changes in area). On the S.
division of the Long Island railroad are the villages of Bay Shore (to
the W. of which is West Islip); Oakdale; West Sayville, originally a
Dutch settlement; Sayville and Bayport. The "South Country Road" of
crushed clam or oyster shells runs through these villages, which are
famous for oyster and clam fisheries. About one-half of the present
township was patented in 1684, 1686, 1688 and 1697 by William Nicolls
(1657-1723), the son of Matthias Nicolls, who came from Islip in
Oxfordshire, England; this large estate (on either side of the
Connetquot or Great river) was kept intact until 1786; the W. part of
Islip was mostly included in the Moubray patent of 1708; and the
township was incorporated in 1710.
ISLY, the name of a small river on the Moroccan-Algerian frontier, a
sub-tributary of the Tafna, famous as the scene of the greatest victory
of the French army in the Algerian wars. The intervention of Morocco on
the side of Abd-el-Kader led at once to the bombardment of Tangier by
the French fleet under the prince de Joinville, and the advance of the
French army of General Bugeaud (1844). The enemy, 45,000 strong, was
found to be encamped on the Isly river near Kudiat-el-Khodra. Bugeaud
disposed of some 6500 infantry and 1500 cavalry, with a few pieces of
artillery. In his own words, the formation adopted was "a boar's head."
With the army were Lamoriciere, Pelissier and other officers destined to
achieve distinction. On the 14th of August the "boar's head" crossed the
river about 9 m. to the N.W. of Kudiat and advanced upon the Moorish
camp; it was immediately attacked on all sides by great masses of
cavalry; but the volleys of the steady French infantry broke the force
of every charge, and at the right moment the French cavalry in two
bodies, each of the strength of a brigade, broke out and charged. One
brigade stormed the Moorish camp (near Kudiat) in the face of artillery
fire, the other sustained a desperate conflict on the right wing with a
large body of Moorish horse which had not charged; and only the arrival
of infantry put an end to the resistance in this quarter. A general
rally of the Moorish forces was followed by another action in which
they endeavoured to retake the camp. Bugeaud's forces, which had
originally faced S. when crossing the river, had now changed direction
until they faced almost W. Near Kudiat-el-Khodra the Moors had rallied
in considerable force, and prepared to retake their camp. The French,
however, continued to attack in perfect combination, and after a
stubborn resistance the Moors once more gave way. For this great
victory, which was quickly followed by proposals of peace, Bugeaud was
made duc d'Isly.
ISMAIL (1830-1895), khedive of Egypt, was born at Cairo on the 31st of
December 1830, being the second of the three sons of Ibrahim and
grandson of Mehemet Ali. After receiving a European education at Paris,
where he attended the Ecole d'Etat-Major, he returned home, and on the
death of his elder brother became heir to his uncle, Said Mohammed, the
Vali of Egypt. Said, who apparently conceived his own safety to lie in
ridding himself as much as possible of the presence of his nephew,
employed him in the next few years on missions abroad, notably to the
pope, the emperor Napoleon III. and the sultan of Turkey. In 1861 he was
despatched at the head of an army of 14,000 to quell an insurrection in
the Sudan, and this he successfully accomplished. On the death of Said,
on 18th January 1863, Ismail was proclaimed viceroy without opposition.
Being of an Orientally extravagant disposition, he found with
considerable gratification that the Egyptian revenue was vastly
increased by the rise in the value of cotton which resulted from the
American Civil War, the Egyptian crop being worth about L25,000,000
instead of L5,000,000. Besides acquiring luxurious tastes in his
sojourns abroad, Ismail had discovered that the civilized nations of
Europe made a free use of their credit for raising loans. He proceeded
at once to apply this idea to his own country by transferring his
private debts to the state and launching out on a grand scale of
expenditure. Egypt was in his eyes the ruler's estate which was to be
exploited for his benefit and his renown. His own position had to be
strengthened, and the country provided with institutions after European
models. To these objects Ismail applied himself with energy and
cleverness, but without any stint of expense. During the 'sixties and
'seventies Egypt became the happy hunting-ground of self-seeking
financiers, to whose schemes Ismail fell an easy and a willing prey. In
1866-1867 he obtained from the sultan of Turkey, in exchange for an
increase in the tribute, firmans giving him the title of khedive, and
changing the law of succession to direct descent from father to son; and
in 1873 he obtained a new firman making him to a large extent
independent. He projected vast schemes of internal reform, remodelling
the customs system and the post office, stimulating commercial progress,
creating a sugar industry, introducing European improvements into Cairo
and Alexandria, building palaces, entertaining lavishly and maintaining
an opera and a theatre. It has been calculated that, of the total amount
of debt incurred by Ismail for his projects, about 10% may have been
sunk in works of permanent utility--always excluding the Suez Canal.
Meanwhile the opening of the Canal had given him opportunities for
asserting himself in foreign courts. On his accession he refused to
ratify the concessions to the Canal company made by Said, and the
question was referred in 1864 to the arbitration of Napoleon III., who
awarded L3,800,000 to the company as compensation for the losses they
would incur by the changes which Ismail insisted upon in the original
grant. Ismail then used every available means, by his own undoubted
powers of fascination and by judicious expenditure, to bring his
personality before the foreign sovereigns and public, and he had no
little success. He was made G.C.B. in 1867, and in the same year visited
Paris and London, where he was received by Queen Victoria and welcomed
by the lord mayor; and in 1869 he again paid a visit to England. The
result was that the opening of the Canal in November 1869 enabled him to
claim to rank among European sovereigns, and to give and receive royal
honours: this excited the jealousy of the sultan, but Ismail was clever
enough to pacify his overlord. In 1876 the old system of consular
jurisdiction for foreigners was modified, and the system of mixed courts
introduced, by which European and native judges sat together to try all
civil cases without respect of nationality. In all these years Ismail
had governed with _eclat_ and profusion, spending, borrowing, raising
the taxes on the fellahin and combining his policy of independence with
dazzling visions of Egyptian aggrandizement. In 1874 he annexed Darfur,
and was only prevented from extending his dominion into Abyssinia by the
superior fighting power of the Abyssinians. But at length the inevitable
financial crisis came. A national debt of over one hundred millions
sterling (as opposed to three millions when he became viceroy) had been
incurred by the khedive, whose fundamental idea of liquidating his
borrowings was to borrow at increased interest. The bond-holders became
restive. Judgments were given against the khedive in the international
tribunals. When he could raise no more loans he sold his Suez Canal
shares (in 1875) to Great Britain for L3,976,582; and this was
immediately followed by the beginning of foreign intervention. In
December 1875 Mr Stephen Cave was sent out by the British government to
inquire into the finances of Egypt, and in April 1876 his report was
published, advising that in view of the waste and extravagance it was
necessary for foreign Powers to interfere in order to restore credit.
The result was the establishment of the Caisse de la Dette. In October
Mr (afterwards Lord) Goschen and M. Joubert made a further
investigation, which resulted in the establishment of Anglo-French
control. A further commission of inquiry by Major Baring (afterwards
Lord Cromer) and others in 1878 culminated in Ismail making over his
estates to the nation and accepting the position of a constitutional
sovereign, with Nubar as premier, Mr (afterwards Sir Charles) Rivers
Wilson as finance minister, and M. de Blignieres as minister of public
works. Ismail professed to be quite pleased. "Egypt," he said, "is no
longer in Africa; it is part of Europe." The new regime, however, only
lasted six months, and then Ismail dismissed his ministers, an occasion
being deliberately prepared by his getting Arabi (q.v.) to foment a
military _pronunciamiento_. England and France took the matter
seriously, and insisted (May 1879) on the reinstatement of the British
and French ministers; but the situation was no longer a possible one;
the tribunals were still giving judgments for debt against the
government, and when Germany and Austria showed signs of intending to
enforce execution, the governments of Great Britain and France perceived
that the only chance of setting matters straight was to get rid of
Ismail altogether. He was first advised to abdicate, and a few days
afterwards (26th June), as he did not take the hint, he received a
telegram from the sultan (who had not forgotten the earlier history of
Mehemet Ali's dynasty), addressed to him as ex-khedive, and informing
him that his son Tewfik was his successor. He at once left Egypt for
Naples, but eventually was permitted by the sultan to retire to his
palace of Emirghian on the Bosporus. There he remained, more or less a
state prisoner, till his death on the 2nd of March 1895. Ismail was a
man of undoubted ability and remarkable powers. But beneath a veneer of
French manners and education he remained throughout a thorough Oriental,
though without any of the moral earnestness which characterizes the
better side of Mahommedanism. Some of his ambitions were not unworthy,
and though his attitude towards western civilization was essentially
cynical, he undoubtedly helped to make the Egyptian upper classes
realize the value of European education. Moreover, spendthrift as he
was, it needed--as is pointed out in Milner's _England in Egypt_--a
series of unfortunate conditions to render his personality as pernicious
to his country as it actually became. "It needed a nation of submissive
slaves, not only bereft of any vestige of liberal institutions, but
devoid of the slightest spark of the spirit of liberty. It needed a
bureaucracy which it would have been hard to equal for its combination
of cowardice and corruption. It needed the whole gang of
swindlers--mostly European--by whom Ismail was surrounded." It was his
early encouragement of Arabi, and his introduction of swarms of foreign
concession-hunters, which precipitated the "national movement" that led
to British occupation. His greatest title to remembrance in history must
be that he made European intervention in Egypt compulsory. (H. Ch.)
ISMAIL HADJI MAULVI-MOHAMMED (1781-1831), Mussulman reformer, was born
at Pholah near Delhi. In co-operation with Syed Ahmed he attempted to
free Indian Mahommedanism from the influence of the native early Indian
faiths. The two men travelled extensively for many years and visited
Mecca. In the Wahhabite movement they found much that was akin to their
own views, and on returning to India preached the new doctrine of a pure
Islam, and gathered many adherents. The official Mahommedan leaders,
however, regarded their propaganda with disfavour, and the dispute led
to the reformers being interdicted by the British government in 1827.
The little company then moved to Punjab where, aided by an Afghan chief,
they declared war on the Sikhs and made Peshawar the capital of the
theocratic community which they wished to establish (1829). Deserted by
the Afghans they had to leave Peshawar, and Ismail Hadji fell in battle
against the Sikhs amid the Pakhli mountains (1831). The movement
survived him, and some adherents are still found in the mountains of the
north-west frontier.
Ismail's book _Taqouaiyat el Iman_ was published in Hindustani and
translated in the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, xiii. 1852.
ISMAILIA, a town of Lower Egypt, the central station on the Suez Canal,
on the N.W. shore of Lake Timsa, about 50 m. from the Mediterranean and
the Red Sea, and 93 m. N.E. of Cairo by rail. Pop. (1907) 10,373. It was
laid out in 1863, in connexion with the construction of the canal, and
is named after the khedive Ismail. It is divided into two quarters by
the road leading from the landing-place to the railway station, and has
numerous public offices, warehouses and other buildings, including a
palace of the khedive, used as a hospital during the British military
operations in 1882, but subsequently allowed to fall into a dilapidated
condition. The broad macadamized streets and regular squares bordered
with trees give the town an attractive appearance; and it has the
advantage, a rare one in Egypt, of being surrounded on three sides by
flourishing gardens. The Quai Mehemet Ali, which lies along the canal
for upwards of a mile, contains the chalet occupied by Ferdinand de
Lesseps during the building of the canal. At the end of the quay are the
works for supplying Port Said with water. On the other side of the lake
are the so-called Quarries of the Hyenas, from which the building
material for the town was obtained.
ISMAY, THOMAS HENRY (1837-1899), British shipowner, was born at
Maryport, Cumberland, on the 7th of January 1837. He received his
education at Croft House School, Carlisle, and at the age of sixteen was
apprenticed to Messrs Imrie & Tomlinson, shipowners and brokers, of
Liverpool. He then travelled for a time, visiting the ports of South
America, and on returning to Liverpool started in business for himself.
In 1867 he took over the White Star line of Australian clippers, and in
1868, perceiving the great future which was open to steam navigation,
established, in conjunction with William Imrie, the Oceanic Steam
Navigation Company, which has since become famous as the White Star
Line. While continuing the Australian service, the firm determined to
engage in the American trade, and to that end ordered from Messrs
Harland & Wolff, of Belfast, the first _Oceanic_ (3807 tons), which was
launched in 1870. This vessel may fairly be said to have marked an era
in North Atlantic travel. The same is true of the successive types of
steamer which Ismay, with the co-operation of the Belfast shipbuilding
firm, subsequently provided for the American trade. To Ismay is mainly
due the credit of the arrangement by which some of the fastest ships of
the British mercantile marine are held at the disposal of the government
in case of war. The origin of this plan dates from the Russo-Turkish
war, when there seemed a likelihood of England being involved in
hostilities with Russia, and when, therefore, Ismay offered the
admiralty the use of the White Star fleet. In 1892 he retired from
partnership in the firm of Ismay, Imrie and Co., though he retained the
chairmanship of the White Star Company. He served on several important
committees and was a member of the royal commission in 1888 on army and
navy administration. He was always most generous in his contributions
to charities for the relief of sailors, and in 1887 he contributed
L20,000 towards a pension fund for Liverpool sailors. He died at
Birkenhead on the 23rd of November 1899.
ISMID, or ISNIKMID (anc. _Nicomedia_), the chief town of the Khoja Ili
sanjak of Constantinople, in Asia Minor, situated on rising ground near
the head of the gulf of Ismid. The sanjak has an area of 4650 sq. m. and
a population of 225,000 (Moslems 131,000). It is an agricultural
district, producing cocoons and tobacco, and there are large forests of
oak, beech and fir. Near Yalova there are hot mineral springs, much
frequented in summer. The town is connected by the lines of the
Anatolian railway company with Haidar Pasha, the western terminus, and
with Angora, Konia and Smyrna. It contains a fine 16th-century mosque,
built by the celebrated architect Sinan. Pop. 20,000 (Moslems 9500,
Christians 8000, Jews, 2500). As the seat of a mutessarif, a Greek
metropolitan and an Armenian archbishop, Ismid retains somewhat of its
ancient dignity, but the material condition of the town is little in
keeping with its rank. The head of the gulf of Ismid is gradually
silting up. The dockyard was closed in 1879, and the port of Ismid is
now at Darinje, 3(3/4) m. distant, where the Anatolian Railway Company
have established their workshops and have built docks and a quay.
ISNARD, MAXIMIN (1758-1825), French revolutionist, was a dealer in
perfumery at Draguignan when he was elected deputy for the department of
the Var to the Legislative Assembly, where he joined the Girondists.
Attacking the court, and the "Austrian committee" in the Tuileries, he
demanded the disbandment of the king's bodyguard, and reproached Louis
XVI. for infidelity to the constitution. But on the 20th of June 1792,
when the crowd invaded the palace, he was one of the deputies who went
to place themselves beside the king to protect him. After the 10th of
August 1792 he was sent to the army of the North to justify the
insurrection. Re-elected to the Convention, he voted the death of Louis
XVI. and was a member of the Committee of General Defence when it was
organized on the 4th of January 1793. The committee, consisting of 25
members, proved unwieldy, and on the 4th of April Isnard presented, on
behalf of the Girondist majority, the report recommending a smaller
committee of nine, which two days later was established as the Committee
of Public Safety. On the 25th of May, Isnard was presiding at the
Convention when a deputation of the commune of Paris came to demand that
J. R. Hebert should be set at liberty, and he made the famous reply: "If
by these insurrections, continually renewed, it should happen that the
principle of national representation should suffer, I declare to you in
the name of France that soon people will search the banks of the Seine
to see if Paris has ever existed." On the 2nd of June 1793 he offered
his resignation as representative of the people, but was not comprised
in the decree by which the Convention determined upon the arrest of
twenty-nine Girondists. On the 3rd of October, however, his arrest was
decreed along with that of several other Girondist deputies who had left
the Convention and were fomenting civil war in the departments. He
escaped, and on the 8th of March 1795 was recalled to the Convention,
where he supported all the measures of reaction. He was elected deputy
for the Var to the Council of Five Hundred, where he played a very
insignificant role. In 1797 he retired to Draguignan. In 1800 he
published a pamphlet _De l'immortalite de l'ame_, in which he praised
Catholicism; in 1804 _Reflexions relatives au senatus-consulte du 28
floreal an XII._, which is an enthusiastic apology for the Empire. Upon
the restoration he professed such royalist sentiments that he was not
disturbed, in spite of the law of 1816 proscribing regicide ex-members
of the Convention.
See F. A. Aulard, _Les Orateurs de la Legislative et de la Convention_
(Paris, 2nd ed., 1906).
ISOBAR (from Gr. [Greek: isos], equal, and [Greek: baros], weight), a
line upon a meteorological map or pressure chart connecting points where
the atmospheric pressure is the same at sea-level, or upon the earth's
surface. A general pressure map will indicate, by these lines, the
average pressure for any month or season over large areas. The daily
weather charts for more confined regions indicate the presence of a
cyclonic or anticyclonic system by means of lines, which connect all
places having the same barometric pressure at the same time. It is to be
noted that isobaric lines are the intersections of inclined isobaric
surfaces with the surface of the earth.
ISOCLINIC LINES (Gr. [Greek: isos], equal, and [Greek: klinein], to
bend), lines connecting those parts of the earth's surface where the
magnetic inclination is the same in amount. (See MAGNETISM,
TERRESTRIAL.)
ISOCRATES (436-338 B.C.), Attic orator, was the son of Theodorus, an
Athenian citizen of the deme of Erchia--the same in which, about 431
B.C., Xenophon was born--who was sufficiently wealthy to have served the
state as choregus. The fact that he possessed slaves skilled in the
trade of flute-making perhaps lends point to a passage in which his son
is mentioned by the comic poet Strattis.[1] Several popular "sophists"
are named as teachers of the young Isocrates. Like other sons of
prosperous parents, he may have been trained in such grammatical
subtleties as were taught by Protagoras or Prodicus, and initiated by
Theramenes into the florid rhetoric of Gorgias, with whom at a later
time (about 390 B.C.) he was in personal intercourse. He tells us that
his father had been careful to provide for him the best education which
Athens could afford. A fact of greater interest is disclosed by Plato's
_Phaedrus_ (278 E). "Isocrates is still young, Phaedrus," says the
Socrates of that dialogue, "but I do not mind telling you what I
prophesy of him.... It would not surprise me if, as years go on, he
should make all his predecessors seem like children in the kind of
oratory to which he is now addressing himself, or if--supposing this
should not content him--some divine impulse should lead him to greater
things. My dear Phaedrus, a certain philosophy is inborn in him." This
conversation is dramatically supposed to take place about 410 B.C. It is
unnecessary to discuss here the date at which the _Phaedrus_ was
actually composed. From the passage just cited it is at least clear that
there had been a time--while Isocrates could still be called "young"--at
which Plato had formed a high estimate of his powers.
Isocrates took no active part in the public life of Athens; he was not
fitted, as he tells us, for the contests of the popular assembly or of
the law-courts. He lacked strength of voice--a fatal defect in the
ecclesia, when an audience of many thousands was to be addressed in the
open air; he was also deficient in "boldness." He was, in short, the
physical opposite of the successful Athenian demagogue in the generation
after that of Pericles; by temperament as well as taste he was more in
sympathy with the sedate decorum of an older school. Two ancient
biographers have, however, preserved a story which, if true, would show
that this lack of voice and nerve did not involve any want of moral
courage. During the rule of the Thirty Tyrants, Critias denounced
Theramenes, who sprang for safety to the sacred hearth of the council
chamber. Isocrates alone, it is said, dared at that moment to plead for
the life of his friend.[2] Whatever may be the worth of the story, it
would scarcely have connected itself with the name of a man to whose
traditional character it was repugnant. While the Thirty were still in
power, Isocrates withdrew from Athens to Chios.[3] He has mentioned
that, in the course of the Peloponnesian War--doubtless in the troubles
which attended on its close--he lost the whole of that private fortune
which had enabled his father to serve the state, and that he then
adopted the profession of a teacher. The proscription of the "art of
words" by the Thirty would thus have given him a special motive for
withdrawing from Athens. He returned thither, apparently, either soon
before or soon after the restoration of the democracy in 403 B.C.
For ten years from this date he was occupied--at least occasionally--as
a writer of speeches for the Athenian law-courts. Six of these speeches
are extant. The earliest (_Or._ xxi.) may be referred to 403 B.C.; the
latest (_Or._ xix.) to 394-393 B.C. This was a department of his own
work which Isocrates afterwards preferred to ignore. Nowhere, indeed,
does he say that he had not written forensic speeches. But he frequently
uses a tone from which that inference might be drawn. He loves to
contrast such petty concerns as engage the forensic writer with those
larger and nobler themes which are treated by the politician. This helps
to explain how it could be asserted--by his adopted son, Aphareus--that
he had written nothing for the law-courts. Whether the assertion was due
to false shame or merely to ignorance, Dionysius of Halicarnassus
decisively disposes of it. Aristotle had, indeed, he says, exaggerated
the number of forensic speeches written by Isocrates; but some of those
which bore his name were unquestionably genuine, as was attested by one
of the orator's own pupils, Cephisodorus. The real vocation of Isocrates
was discovered from the moment that he devoted himself to the work of
teaching and writing. The instruction which Isocrates undertook to
impart was based on rhetorical composition, but it was by no means
merely rhetorical. That "inborn philosophy," of which Plato recognized
the germ, still shows itself. In many of his works--notably in the
_Panegyricus_--we see a really remarkable power of grasping a complex
subject, of articulating it distinctly, of treating it, not merely with
effect but luminously, at once in its widest bearings and in its most
intricate details. Young men could learn more from Isocrates than the
graces of style; nor would his success have been what it was if his
skill had been confined to the art of expression.
It was about 392 B.C.--when he was forty-four--that he opened his school
at Athens near the Lyceum. In 339 B.C. he describes himself as revising
the _Panathenaicus_ with some of his pupils; he was then ninety-seven.
The celebrity enjoyed by the school of Isocrates is strikingly attested
by ancient writers. Cicero describes it as that school in which the
eloquence of all Greece was trained and perfected: its disciples were
"brilliant in pageant or in battle,"[4] foremost among the accomplished
writers or powerful debaters of their time. The phrase of Cicero is
neither vague nor exaggerated. Among the literary pupils of Isocrates
might be named the historians Ephorus and Theopompus, the Attic
archaelogist Androtion, and Isocrates of Apollonia, who succeeded his
master in the school. Among the practical orators we have, in the
forensic kind, Isaeus; in the political, Leodamas of Acharnae, Lycurgus
and Hypereides. Hermippus of Smyrna (mentioned by Athenaeus) wrote a
monograph on the "Disciples of Isocrates." And scanty as are now the
sources for such a catalogue, a modern scholar[5] has still been able to
recover forty-one names. At the time when the school of Isocrates was in
the zenith of its fame it drew disciples, not only from the shores and
islands of the Aegean, but from the cities of Sicily and the distant
colonies of the Euxine. As became the image of its master's spirit, it
was truly Panhellenic. When Mausolus, prince of Caria, died in 351 B.C.,
his widow Artemisia instituted a contest of panegyrical eloquence in
honour of his memory. Among all the competitors there was not one--if
tradition may be trusted--who had not been the pupil of Isocrates.
Meanwhile the teacher who had won this great reputation had also been
active as a public writer. The most interesting and most characteristic
works of Isocrates are those in which he deals with the public questions
of his own day. The influence which he thus exercised throughout Hellas
might be compared to that of an earnest political essayist gifted with a
popular and attractive style. And Isocrates had a dominant idea which
gained strength with his years, until its realization had become, we
might say, the main purpose of his life. This idea was the invasion of
Asia by the united forces of Greece. The Greek cities were at feud with
each other, and were severally torn by intestine faction. Political
morality was become a rare and a somewhat despised distinction. Men who
were notoriously ready to sell their cities for their private gain were,
as Demosthenes says, rather admired than otherwise.[6] The social
condition of Greece was becoming very unhappy. The wealth of the country
had ceased to grow; the gulf between rich and poor was becoming wider;
party strife was constantly adding to the number of homeless paupers;
and Greece was full of men who were ready to take service with any
captain of mercenaries, or, failing that, with any leader of
desperadoes. Isocrates draws a vivid and terrible picture of these
evils. The cure for them, he firmly believed, was to unite the Greeks in
a cause which would excite a generous enthusiasm. Now was the time, he
thought, for that enterprise in which Xenophon's comrades had virtually
succeeded, when the headlong rashness of young Cyrus threw away their
reward with his own life.[7] The Persian empire was unsound to the
core--witness the retreat of the Ten Thousand: let united Greece attack
it and it must go down at the first onset. Then new wealth would flow
into Greece; and the hungry pariahs of Greek society would be drafted
into fertile homes beyond the Aegean.
A bright vision; but where was the power whose spell was first to unite
discordant Greece, and, having united it, to direct its strength against
Asia? That was the problem. The first attempt of Isocrates to solve it
is set forth in his splendid _Panegyricus_ (380 B.C.). Let Athens and
Sparta lay aside their jealousies. Let them assume, jointly, a
leadership which might be difficult for either, but which would be
assured to both. That eloquent pleading failed. The next hope was to
find some one man equal to the task. Jason of Pherae, Dionysius I. of
Syracuse, Archidamus III., son of Agesilaus--each in turn rose as a
possible leader of Greece before the imagination of the old man who was
still young in his enthusiastic hope, and one after another they failed
him. But now a greater than any of these was appearing on the Hellenic
horizon, and to this new luminary the eyes of Isocrates were turned with
eager anticipation. Who could lead united Greece against Asia so fitly
as the veritable representative of the Heracleidae, the royal descendant
of the Argive line--a king of half-barbarians it is true, but by race,
as in spirit, a pure Hellene--Philip of Macedon? We can still read the
words in which this fond faith clothed itself; the ardent appeal of
Isocrates to Philip is extant; and another letter shows that the belief
of Isocrates in Philip lasted at any rate down to the eve of
Chaeronea.[8] Whether it survived that event is a doubtful point. The
popular account of the orator's death ascribed it to the mental shock
which he received from the news of Philip's victory. He was at Athens,
in the palaestra of Hippocrates, when the tidings came. He repeated
three verses in which Euripides names three foreign Conquerors of
Greece--Danaus, Pelops, Cadmus--and four days later he died of voluntary
starvation. Milton (perhaps thinking of Eli) seems to conceive the death
of Isocrates as instantaneous:--
"As that dishonest victory
At Chaeronea, fatal to liberty,
Killed with report that old man eloquent."
Now the third of the letters which bears the name of Isocrates is
addressed to Philip, and appears to congratulate him on his victory at
Chaeronea, as being an event which will enable him to assume the
leadership of Greece in a war against Persia. Is the letter genuine?
There is no evidence, external or internal, against its authenticity,
except its supposed inconsistency with the views of Isocrates and with
the tradition of his suicide. As to his views, those who have studied
them in his own writings will be disposed to question whether he would
have regarded Philip's victory at Chaeronea as an irreparable disaster
for Greece. Undoubtedly he would have deplored the conflict between
Philip and Athens; but he would have divided the blame between the
combatants. And, with his old belief in Philip, he would probably have
hoped, even after Chaeronea, that the new position won by Philip would
eventually prove compatible with the independence of the Greek cities,
while it would certainly promote the project on which, as he was
profoundly convinced, the ultimate welfare of Greece depended,--a
Panhellenic expedition against Persia. As to the tradition of his
suicide, the only rational mode of reconciling it with that letter is to
suppose that Isocrates destroyed himself, not because Philip had
conquered, but because, after that event, he saw Athens still resolved
to resist. We should be rather disposed to ask how much weight is to be
given to the tradition. The earliest authority for it--Dionysius of
Halicarnassus in the age of Augustus--may have had older sources;
granting, however, that these may have remounted even to the end of the
4th century B.C., that would not prove much. Suppose that
Isocrates--being then ninety-eight and an invalid--had happened to die
from natural causes a few days after the battle of Chaeronea. Nothing
could have originated more easily than a story that he killed himself
from intense chagrin. Every one knew that Isocrates had believed in
Philip; and most people would have thought that Chaeronea was a crushing
refutation of that belief. Once started, the legend would have been sure
to live, not merely because it was picturesque, but also because it
served to accentuate the contrast between the false prophet and the
true--between Isocrates and Demosthenes; and Demosthenes was very justly
the national idol of the age which followed the loss of Greek
independence.[9]
Isocrates is said to have taught his Athenian pupils gratuitously, and
to have taken money only from aliens; but, as might have been expected,
the fame of his school exposed him to attacks on the ground of his
gains, which his enemies studiously exaggerated. After the financial
reform of 378 B.C. he was one of those 1200 richest citizens who
constituted the twenty unions ([Greek: symmoriai]) for the assessment of
the war-tax ([Greek: eisphora]). He had discharged several public
services ([Greek: leitourgiai]); in particular, he had thrice served as
trierarch. He married Plathane, the widow of the "sophist" Hippias of
Elis, and then adopted her son Aphareus, afterwards eminent as a
rhetorician and a tragic poet. In 355 B.C. he had his first and only
lawsuit. A certain Megaclides (introduced into the speech under the
fictitious name of Lysimachus) challenged him to undertake the
trierarchy or exchange properties. This was the lawsuit which suggested
the form of the discourse which he calls the _Antidosis_ ("exchange of
properties"--353 B.C.)--his defence of his professional life.
He was buried on a rising ground near the Cynosarges--a temenos of
Heracles, with a gymnasion, on the east side of Athens, outside the
Diomeian gate. His tomb was surmounted by a column some 45 ft. high,
crowned with the figure of a siren, the symbol of persuasion and of
death. A tablet of stone, near the column, represented a group of which
Gorgias was the centre; his pupil Isocrates stood at his side. Aphareus
erected a statue to his adopted father near the Olympieum. Timotheus,
the illustrious son of Conon, dedicated another in the temple of
Eleusis.
It was a wonderful century which the life of one man had thus all but
spanned. Isocrates had reached early manhood when the long struggle of
the Peloponnesian War--begun in his childhood--ended with the overthrow
of Athens. The middle period of his career was passed under the
supremacy of Sparta. His more advanced age saw that brief ascendancy
which the genius of Epameinondas secured to Thebes. And he lived to urge
on Philip of Macedon a greater enterprise than any which the Hellenic
world could offer. His early promise had won a glowing tribute from
Plato, and the rhetoric of his maturity furnished matter to the analysis
of Aristotle; he had composed his imaginary picture of that Hellenic
host which should move through Asia in a pageant of sacred triumph, just
as Xenophon was publishing his plain narrative of the retreat of the Ten
Thousand; and, in the next generation, his literary eloquence was still
demonstrating the weakness of Persia when Demosthenes was striving to
make men feel the deadly peril of Greece. This long life has an element
of pathos not unlike that of Greek tragedy; a power above man was
compelling events in a direction which Isocrates could not see; but his
own agency was the ally of that power, though in a sense which he knew
not; his vision was of Greece triumphant over Asia, while he was the
unconscious prophet of an age in which Asia should be transformed by the
diffusion of Hellenism.[10]
His character should be viewed in both its main aspects--the political
and the literary.
With regard to the first, two questions have to be asked: (1) How far
were the political views of Isocrates peculiar to himself, and
different from those of the clearest minds contemporary with him? (2)
How far were those views falsified by the event?
1. The whole tone of Greek thought in that age had taken a bent
towards monarchy in some form. This tendency may be traced alike in
the practical common sense of Xenophon and in the lofty idealism of
Plato. There could be no better instance of it than a well-known
passage in the _Politics_ of Aristotle. He is speaking of the gifts
which meet in the Greek race--a race warlike, like the Europeans, but
more subtle--keen, like the Asiatics, but braver. Here, he says, is a
race which "might rule all men, if it were brought under a single
government."[11] It is unnecessary to suppose a special allusion to
Alexander; but it is probable that Aristotle had in his mind a
possible union of the Greek cities under a strong constitutional
monarchy. His advice to Alexander (as reported by Plutarch) was to
treat the Greeks in the spirit of a leader ([Greek: hegemonikos]) and
the barbarians in the spirit of a master ([Greek: despotikos]).[12]
Aristotle conceived the central power as political and permanent;
Isocrates conceived it as, in the first place, military, having for
its immediate aim the conduct of an expedition against Asia. The
general views of Isocrates as to the largest good possible for the
Greek race were thus in accord with the prevailing tendency of the
best Greek thought in that age.
2. The vision of the Greek race "brought under one polity" was not,
indeed, fulfilled in the sense of Aristotle or of Isocrates. But the
invasion of Asia by Alexander, as captain-general of Greece, became
the event which actually opened new and larger destinies to the Greek
race. The old political life of the Greek cities was worn out; in the
new fields which were now opened, the empire of Greek civilization
entered on a career of world-wide conquest, until Greece became to
East and West more than all that Athens had been to Greece. Athens,
Sparta, Thebes, ceased indeed to be the chief centres of Greek life;
but the mission of the Greek mind could scarcely have been
accomplished with such expansive and penetrating power if its
influence had not radiated over the East from Pergamum, Antioch and
Alexandria.
Panhellenic politics had the foremost interest for Isocrates. But in
two of his works--the oration _On the Peace_ and the _Areopagiticus_
(both of 355 B.C.)--he deals specially with the politics of Athens.
The speech _On the Peace_ relates chiefly to foreign affairs. It is an
eloquent appeal to his fellow-citizens to abandon the dream of
supremacy, and to treat their allies as equals, not as subjects. The
fervid orator personifies that empire, that false mistress which has
lured Athens, then Sparta, then Athens once more, to the verge of
destruction. "Is she not worthy of detestation?" Leadership passes
into empire; empire begets insolence; insolence brings ruin. The
_Areopagiticus_ breathes a kindred spirit in regard to home policy.
Athenian life had lost its old tone. Apathy to public interests,
dissolute frivolity, tawdry display and real poverty--these are the
features on which Isocrates dwells. With this picture he contrasts the
elder democracy of Solon and Cleisthenes, and, as a first step towards
reform, would restore to the Areopagus its general censorship of
morals. It is here, and here alone--in his comments on Athenian
affairs at home and abroad--that we can distinctly recognize the man
to whom the Athens of Pericles was something more than a tradition. We
are carried back to the age in which his long life began. We find it
difficult to realize that the voice to which we listen is the same
which we hear in the letter to Philip.
Turning from the political to the literary aspect of his work, we are
at once upon ground where the question of his merits will now provoke
comparatively little controversy. Perhaps the most serious prejudice
with which his reputation has had to contend in modern times has been
due to an accident of verbal usage. He repeatedly describes that art
which he professed to teach as his [Greek: philosophia]. His use of
this word--joined to the fact that in a few passages he appears to
allude slightingly to Plato or to the Socratics--has exposed him to a
groundless imputation. It cannot be too distinctly understood that,
when Isocrates speaks of his [Greek: philosophia], he means simply his
theory or method of "culture"--to use the only modern term which is
really equivalent in latitude to the Greek word as then current.[13]
The [Greek: philosophia], or practical culture, of Isocrates was not
in conflict, because it had nothing in common, with the Socratic or
Platonic philosophy. The personal influence of Socrates may, indeed,
be traced in his work. He constantly desires to make his teaching bear
on the practical life. His maxims of homely moral wisdom frequently
recall Xenophon's _Memorabilia_. But there the relation ends. Plato
alludes to Isocrates in perhaps three places. The glowing prophecy in
the _Phaedrus_ has been quoted; in the _Gorgias_ a phrase of Isocrates
is wittily parodied; and in the _Euthydemus_ Isocrates is probably
meant by the person who dwells "on the borderland between philosophy
and statesmanship."[14] The writings of Isocrates contain a few more
or less distinct allusions to Plato's doctrines or works, to the
general effect that they are barren of practical result.[15] But
Isocrates nowhere assails Plato's philosophy as such. When he declares
"knowledge" ([Greek: episteme]) to be unattainable, he means an exact
"knowledge" of the contingencies which may arise in practical life.
"Since it is impossible for human nature to acquire any science
([Greek: epistemen]) by which we should know what to do or to say, in
the next resort I deem those wise who, as a rule, can hit what is best
by their opinions" ([Greek: doxas]).[16]
Isocrates should be compared with the practical teachers of his day.
In his essay _Against the Sophists_, and in his speech on the
_Antidosis_, which belong respectively to the beginning and the close
of his professional career, he has clearly marked the points which
distinguish him from "the sophists of the herd" ([Greek: agelaioi
sophistai]). First, then, he claims, and justly, greater breadth of
view. The ordinary teacher confined himself to the narrow scope of
local interests--training the young citizen to plead in the Athenian
law courts, or to speak on Athenian affairs in the ecclesia. Isocrates
sought to enlarge the mental horizon of his disciples by accustoming
them to deal with subjects which were not merely Athenian, but, in his
own phrase, Hellenic. Secondly, though he did not claim to have found
a philosophical basis for morals, it has been well said of him that
"he reflects the human spirit always on its nobler side,"[17] and
that, in an age of corrupt and impudent selfishness, he always strove
to raise the minds of his hearers into a higher and purer air.
Thirdly, his method of teaching was thorough. Technical exposition
came first. The learner was then required to apply the rules in actual
composition, which the master revised. The ordinary teachers of
rhetoric (as Aristotle says) employed their pupils in committing model
pieces to memory, but neglected to train the learner's own faculty
through his own efforts. Lastly, Isocrates stands apart from most
writers of that day in his steady effort to produce results of
permanent value. While rhetorical skill was largely engaged in the
intermittent journalism of political pamphlets, Isocrates set a higher
ambition before his school. His own essays on contemporary questions
received that finished form which has preserved them to this day. The
impulse to solid and lasting work, communicated by the example of the
master, was seen in such monuments as the _Atthis_ of Androtion, the
_Hellenics_ of Theopompus and the _Philippica_ of Ephorus.
In one of his letters to Atticus, Cicero says that he has used "all
the fragrant essences of Isocrates, and all the little stores of his
disciples."[18] The phrase has a point of which the writer himself was
perhaps scarcely conscious: the style of Isocrates had come to Cicero
through the school of Rhodes; and the Rhodian imitators had more of
Asiatic splendour than of Attic elegance. But, with this allowance
made, the passage may serve to indicate the real place of Isocrates in
the history of literary style. The old Greek critics consider him as
representing what they call the "smooth" or "florid" mode of
composition ([Greek: glaphyra, anthera harmonia]) as distinguished
from the "harsh" ([Greek: austera]) style of Antiphon and the perfect
"mean" ([Greek: mese]) of Demosthenes. Tried by a modern standard, the
language of Isocrates is certainly not "florid." The only sense in
which he merits the epithet is that (especially in his earlier work)
he delights in elaborate antitheses. Isocrates is an "orator" in the
larger sense of the Greek word _rhetor_; but his real distinction
consists in the fact that he was the first Greek who gave an artistic
finish to literary rhetoric. The practical oratory of the day had
already two clearly separated branches--the forensic, represented by
Isaeus, and the deliberative, in which Callistratus was the forerunner
of Demosthenes. Meanwhile Isocrates was giving form and rhythm to a
standard literary prose. Through the influence of his school, this
normal prose style was transmitted--with the addition of some florid
embellishments--to the first generation of Romans who studied rhetoric
in the Greek schools. The distinctive feature in the composition of
Isocrates is his structure of the periodic sentence. This, with him,
is no longer rigid or monotonous, as with Antiphon--no longer terse
and compact, as with Lysias--but ample, luxuriant, unfolding itself
(to use a Greek critic's image) like the soft beauties of a winding
river. Isocrates was the first Greek who worked out the idea of a
prose rhythm. He saw clearly both its powers and its limits; poetry
has its strict rhythms and precise metres; prose has its metres and
rhythms, not bound by a rigid framework, yet capable of being brought
under certain general laws which a good ear can recognize, and which a
speaker or writer may apply in the most various combinations. This
fundamental idea of prose rhythm, or number, is that which the style
of Isocrates has imparted to the style of Cicero. When Quintilian (x.
1. 108) says, somewhat hyperbolically, that Cicero has artistically
reproduced (_effinxisse_) "the force of Demosthenes, the wealth of
Plato, the charm of Isocrates," he means principally this smooth and
harmonious rhythm. Cicero himself expressly recognizes this original
and distinctive merit of Isocrates.[19] Thus, through Rome, and
especially through Cicero, the influence of Isocrates, as the founder
of a literary prose, has passed into the literatures of modern Europe.
It is to the eloquence of the preacher that we may perhaps look for
the nearest modern analogue of that kind in which Isocrates
excelled--especially, perhaps, to that of the great French preachers.
Isocrates was one of the three Greek authors, Demosthenes and Plato
being the others, who contributed most to form the style of Bossuet.
WORKS.--The extant works of Isocrates consist of twenty-one speeches
or discourses and nine letters.[20] Among these, the six forensic
speeches represent the first period of his literary life--belonging to
the years 403-393 B.C. All six concern private causes. They may be
classed as follows: 1. _Action for Assault_ ([Greek: dike aikias]),
Or. xx., _Against Lochites_, 394 B.C. 2. _Claim to an Inheritance_
([Greek: epidikasia]), Or. xix., _Aegineticus_, end of 394 or early in
393 B.C. 3. _Actions to Recover a Deposit_: (1) Or. xxi., _Against
Euthynus_, 403 B.C.; (2) Or. xvii., _Trapeziticus_, end of 394 or
early in 393 B.C. 4. _Action for Damage_ ([Greek: dike blabes]), Or.
xvi., _Concerning the Team of Horses_, 397 B.C. 5. _Special Plea_
([Greek: paragraphe]), Or. xviii., _Against Callimachus_, 402 B.C. Two
of these have been regarded as spurious by G. E. Benseler, viz. Or.
xxi., on account of the frequent hiatus and the short compact periods,
and Or. xvii., on the first of these grounds. But we are not warranted
in applying to the early work of Isocrates those canons which his
mature style observed. The genuineness of the speech against Euthynus
is recognized by Philostratus; while the _Trapeziticus_--thrice named
without suspicion by Harpocration--is treated by Dionysius, not only
as authentic, but as the typical forensic work of its author. The
speech against Lochites--where "a man of the people" ([Greek: tou
plethous eis]) is the speaker--exhibits much rhetorical skill. The
speech [Greek: Peri tou zeugous] ("concerning the team of horses") has
a curious interest. An Athenian citizen had complained that Alcibiades
had robbed him of a team of four horses, and sues the statesman's son
and namesake (who is the speaker) for their value. This is not the
only place in which Isocrates has marked his admiration for the genius
of Alcibiades; it appears also in the _Philippus_ and in the
_Busiris_. But, among the forensic speeches, we must, on the whole,
give the palm to the _Aegineticus_--a graphic picture of ordinary
Greek life in the islands of the Aegean. Here--especially in the
narrative--Isocrates makes a near approach to the best manner of
Lysias.
The remaining fifteen orations or discourses do not easily lend
themselves to the ordinary classification under the heads of
"deliberative" and "epideictic." Both terms must be strained; and
neither is strictly applicable to all the pieces which it is required
to cover. The work of Isocrates travelled out of the grooves in which
the rhetorical industry of the age had hitherto moved. His position
among contemporary writers was determined by ideas peculiar to
himself; and his compositions, besides having a style of their own,
are in several instances of a new kind. The only adequate principle of
classification is one which considers them in respect to their
subject-matter. Thus viewed, they form two clearly separated
groups--the scholastic and the political.
_Scholastic Writings._--Under this head we have, first, three letters
or essays of a hortatory character. (1) The letter to the young
Demonicus[21]--once a favourite subject in the schools--contains a
series of precepts neither below nor much above the average practical
morality of Greece. (2) The letter to Nicocles--the young king of the
Cyprian Salamis--sets forth the duty of a monarch to his subjects. (3)
In the third piece, it is Nicocles who speaks, and impresses on the
Salaminians their duty to their king--a piece remarkable as containing
a popular plea for monarchy, composed by a citizen of Athens. These
three letters may be referred to the years 374-372 B.C.
Next may be placed four pieces which are "displays" ([Greek:
epideixeis]) in the proper Greek sense. The _Busiris_ (Or. xi.,
390-391 B.C.) is an attempt to show how the ill-famed king of Egypt
might be praised. The _Encomium on Helen_ (Or. x., 370 B.C.), a piece
greatly superior to the last, contains the celebrated passage on the
power of beauty. These two compositions serve to illustrate their
author's view that "encomia" of the hackneyed type might be elevated
by combining the mythical matter with some topic of practical
interest--as, in the case of _Busiris_, with the institutions of
Egypt, or, in that of Helen, with the reforms of Theseus. The
_Evagoras_ (Or. ix., 365 B.C.?), the earliest known biography, is a
laudatory epitaph on a really able man--the Greek king of the Cyprian
Salamis. A passage of singular interest describes how, under his rule,
the influences of Hellenic civilization had prevailed over the
surrounding barbarism. The _Panathenaicus_ (Or. xii.), intended for
the great Panathenaea of 342 B.C., but not completed till 339 B.C.,
contains a recital of the services rendered by Athens to Greece, but
digresses into personal defence against critics; his last work,
written in extreme old age, it bears the plainest marks of failing
powers.
The third subdivision of the scholastic writings is formed by two most
interesting essays on education--that entitled _Against the Sophists_
(Or. xiii., 391-390 B.C.), and the _Antidosis_ (Or. xv., 353 B.C.).
The first of these is a manifesto put forth by Isocrates at the outset
of his professional career of teaching, in which he seeks to
distinguish his aims from those of other "sophists." These "sophists"
are (1) the "eristics" ([Greek: hoi peri tas eridas]), by whom he
seems to intend the minor Socratics, especially Euclides; (2) the
teachers of practical rhetoric, who had made exaggerated claims for
the efficacy of mere instruction, independently of natural faculty or
experience; (3) the writers of "arts" of rhetoric, who virtually
devoted themselves (as Aristotle also complains) to the lowest, or
forensic, branch of their subject (see also E. Holzner, _Platos
Phaedrus und die Sophistenrede des Isokrates_, Prague, 1894). As this
piece is the prelude to his career, its epilogue is the speech on the
"Antidosis"--so called because it has the form of a speech made in
court in answer to a challenge to undertake the burden of the
trierarchy, or else exchange properties with the challenger. The
discourse "Against the Sophists" had stated what his art was not; this
speech defines what it is. His own account of his [Greek:
philosophia]--"the discipline of discourse" ([Greek: he ton logon
paideia])--has been embodied in the sketch of it given above.
_Political Writings._--These, again, fall into two classes--those
which concern (1) the relations of Greece with Persia, (2) the
internal affairs of Greece. The first class consist of the
_Panegyricus_ (Or. iv., 380 B.C.) and the _Philippus_ (Or. v., 346
B.C.). The _Panegyricus_ takes its name from the fact that it was
given to the Greek public at the time of the Olympic
festivals--probably by means of copies circulated there. The orator
urges that Athens and Sparta should unite in leading the Greeks
against Persia. The feeling of antiquity that this noble discourse is
a masterpiece of careful work finds expression in the tradition that
it had occupied its author for more than ten years. Its excellence is
not merely that of language, but also--and perhaps even more
conspicuously--that of lucid arrangement. The _Philippus_ is an appeal
to the king of Macedon to assume that initiative in the war on Persia
which Isocrates had ceased to expect from any Greek city. In the view
of Demosthenes, Philip was the representative barbarian; in that of
Isocrates, he is the first of Hellenes, and the natural champion of
their cause.
Of those discourses which concern the internal affairs of Greece, two
have already been noticed,--that _On the Peace_ (Or. viii.), and the
_Areopagiticus_ (Or. vii.)--both of 355 B.C.--as dealing respectively
with the foreign and the home affairs of Athens. The _Plataicus_ (Or.
xiv.) is supposed to be spoken by a Plataean before the Athenian
ecclesia in 373 B.C. In that year Plataea had for the second time in
its history been destroyed by Thebes. The oration--an appeal to Athens
to restore the unhappy town--is remarkable both for the power with
which Theban cruelty is denounced, and for the genuine pathos of the
peroration. The _Archidamus_ (Or. vi.) is a speech purporting to be
delivered by Archidamus III., son of Agesilaus, in a debate at Sparta
on conditions of peace offered by Thebes in 366 B.C. It was demanded
that Sparta should recognize the independence of Messene, which had
lately been restored by Epameinondas (370 B.C.). The oration gives
brilliant expression to the feeling which such a demand was calculated
to excite in Spartans who knew the history of their own city. Xenophon
witnesses that the attitude of Sparta on this occasion was actually
such as the _Archidamus_ assumes (_Hellen._ vii. 4. 8-11).
_Letters._--The first letter--to Dionysius I.--is fragmentary; but a
passage in the _Philippus_ leaves no doubt as to its object. Isocrates
was anxious that the ruler of Syracuse should undertake the command of
Greece against Persia. The date is probably 368 B.C. Next in
chronological order stands the letter "To the Children of Jason"
(vi.). Jason, tyrant of Pherae, had been assassinated in 370 B.C.; and
no fewer than three of his successors had shared the same fate.
Isocrates now urges Thebe, the daughter of Jason, and her
half-brothers to set up a popular government. The date is 359 B.C.[22]
The letter to Archidamus III. (ix.)--the same person who is the
imaginary speaker of Oration vi.--urges him to execute the writer's
favourite idea,--"to deliver the Greeks from their feuds, and to crush
barbarian insolence." It is remarkable for a vivid picture of the
state of Greece; the date is about 356 B.C. The letter to Timotheus
(vii., 345 B.C.), ruler of Heraclea on the Euxine, introduces an
Athenian friend who is going thither, and at the same time offers some
good counsels to the benevolent despot. The letter "to the government
of Mytilene" (viii., 350 B.C.) is a petition to a newly established
oligarchy, begging them to permit the return of a democratic exile, a
distinguished musician named Agenor. The first of the two letters to
Philip of Macedon (ii.) remonstrates with him on the personal danger
to which he had recklessly exposed himself, and alludes to his
beneficent intervention in the affairs of Thessaly; the date is
probably the end of 342 B.C. The letter to Alexander (v.), then a boy
of fourteen, is a brief greeting sent along with the last, and
congratulates him on preferring "practical" to "eristic" studies--a
distinction which is explained by the sketch of the author's [Greek:
philosophia], and of his essay "Against the Sophists," given above. It
was just at this time, probably, that Alexander was beginning to
receive the lessons of Aristotle (342 B.C.). The letter to Antipater
(iv.) introduces a friend who wished to enter the military service of
Philip. Antipater was then acting as regent in Macedonia during
Philip's absence in Thrace (340-339 B.C.). The later of the two
letters to Philip (iii.) appears to be written shortly after the
battle of Chaeronea in 338 B.C. The questions raised by it have
already been discussed.
No lost work of Isocrates is known from a definite quotation, except
an "Art of Rhetoric," from which some scattered precepts are cited.
Quintilian, indeed, and Photius, who had seen this "Art," felt a doubt
as to whether it was genuine. Only twenty-five discourses--out of an
ascriptive total of some sixty--were admitted as authentic by
Dionysius; Photius (_circ._ A.D. 850) knew only the number now
extant--twenty-one.
With the exception of defects at the end of Or. xiii., at the
beginning of Or. xvi., and probably at the end of Letters i., vi.,
ix., the existing text is free from serious mutilations. It is also
unusually pure. The smooth and clear style of Isocrates gave few
opportunities for the mistakes of copyists. On the other hand, he was
a favourite author of the schools. Numerous glosses crept into his
text through the comments or conjectures of rhetoricians. This was
already the case before the 6th century, as is attested by the
citations of Priscian and Stobaeus. Jerome Wolf and Koraes
successively accomplished much for the text. But a more decided
advance was made by Immanuel Bekker. He used five MSS., viz. (1) Codex
Urbinas III., [Gamma] (this, the best, was his principal guide); (2)
Vaticanus 936, [Delta]; (3) Laurentianus 87, 14, [Theta] (13th
century); (4) Vaticanus 65, [Lambda]; and (5) Marcianus 415, [Xi]. The
first three, of the same family, have Or. xv. entire; the last two are
from the same original, and have Or. xv. incomplete.
J. G. Baiter and H. Sauppe in their edition (1850) follow [Gamma]
"even more constantly than Bekker." Their apparatus is enriched,
however, by a MS. to which he had not access--Ambrosianus O. 144,
[Epsilon], which in some cases, as they recognize, has alone preserved
the true reading. The readings of this MS. were given in full by G. E.
Benseler in his second edition (1854-1855). The distinctive
characteristic of Benseler's textual criticism was a tendency to
correct the text against even the best MS., where the MS. conflicted
with the usage of Isocrates as inferred from his recorded precepts or
from the statements of ancient writers. Thus, on the strength of the
rule ascribed to Isocrates--[Greek: phoneenta me sympiptein]--Benseler
would remove from the text every example of hiatus (on the MSS. of
Isocrates, see H. Burmann, _Die handschriftliche Uberlieferung des
Isocrates_, Berlin, 1885-1886, and E. Drerup, in _Leipziger Studien_,
xvii., 1895). (R. C. J.)
EDITIONS.--In _Oratores Attici_, ed. Imm. Bekker (1823, 1828); W. S.
Dobson (1828); J. G. Baiter and Hermann Sauppe (1850). Separately
_Ausgewahlte Reden, Panegyrikos und Areopagitikos_, by Rudolf
Rauchenstein, 6th ed., Karl Munscher (1908); in Teubner's series, by
G. E. Benseler (new ed., by F. Blass, 1886-1895) and by E. Drerup
(1906- ); _Ad Demonicum et Panegyricus_, ed. J. E. Sandys (1868);
_Evagoras_, ed. H. Clarke (1885). Extracts from Orations iii., iv.,
vi., vii., viii., ix., xiii., xiv., xv., xix., and Letters iii., v.,
edited with revised text and commentary, in _Selections from the Attic
Orators_, by R. C. Jebb (1880); vol. i. of an English prose
translation, with introduction and notes by J. H. Freese, has been
published in Bohn's _Classical Library_ (1894). See generally Jebb's
_Attic Orators_ (where a list of authorities is given) and F. Blass,
Die attische Beredsamkeit (2nd ed., 1887-1898), and the latter's _Die
Rhythmen der attischen Kunstprosa_ (1901). There is a special lexicon
by S. Preuss (1904). On the philosophy of Isocrates and his relation
to the Socratic schools, see Thompson's ed. of Plato's _Phaedrus_,
Appendix 2.