OF THEBES.
The accounts of the earlier ages of this ancient republick are so
enveloped in fable, that we must rather apply for them to the poets than
to the historians. Pausanias gives us a list of sixteen kings of this
country, down from Cadmus inclusive, who evidently belong to the
fabulous times of the heroes.[180] He seems indeed to acknowledge as
much, since he confesses, that as he could find no better account of
their origin, he was obliged to take up with fable.[181] After the death
of Xanthus,[182] the last of those kings, the Thebans, as the same
author relates, disgusted at monarchy, changed the form of their
government into a republick. But it is in vain to search for the cause,
or manner how this revolution was effected either in Pausanias, or any
other historian. All we can learn of the Thebans or Bœotians from
history,[183] is, that they were remarkable for their dulness and
stupidity, even to a proverb,[184] that, until the time of Pelopidas and
Epaminondas, they made as poor a figure in the art of war as in the
sciences: that their form of government was democratick, and that, as
usually happens in that kind of government, they were divided into
factions.
After the famous peace of Antalcidas, by which the honour and true
interest of Greece was sacrificed to the ambition of the Spartans,
whatever state refused to come into their measures, was condemned to
feel the effects of their resentment. They had compelled the Thebans to
accede to that treaty, though it deprived them of the dominion over
Bœotia; and afterwards, by the perfidy of the aristocratick faction, got
possession of their citadel, and reduced them to a state of absolute
subjection. This was the wretched state of the Thebans, until they were
delivered both from foreign and domestick slavery, and raised to a
height of power superior to every other state of Greece by the virtue of
Pelopidas and Epaminondas. I have selected therefore this revolution as
the most interesting, and most worthy of our attention; because it
exhibits a convincing proof, that a brave and warlike people are not the
produce of any particular spot,[185] but are the growth of every place
and country, where the natives are trained up in a true sense of shame
at mean and base actions, and inspired with that manly courage which
arises from the emulation after what is just and honourable. And that
those who are taught to dread infamy more than the greatest dangers,
prove the most invincible, and the most formidable to an enemy. It
instructs us too, that the most depressed, and most abject state may be
extricated from the calamities of oppression, and raised to superior
dignity and lustre by a very small number of virtuous patriots, whilst
the spirit of liberty yet remains, and the people second the efforts of
their leaders with unanimity and vigour.
The Thebans, by a fatal error in politicks, had chosen Ismenias and
Leontidas, who were at that time heads of two opposite parties, their
supreme annual magistrates. Ismenias was a steady assertor of the
liberty and just rights of the people, and laboured to preserve a due
balance in the powers of the constitution. Leontidas wanted to engross
the whole power into his own hands, and to govern, by a small, but
select number of his own creatures. It was impossible for union and
harmony to subsist between two men, who had views so diametrically
opposite. Leontidas therefore, who found his party the weakest,
bargained by a private convention with Phæbidas, the Spartan general, to
deliver up his country to the Lacedæmonians upon condition that the
government should be lodged in himself, and such as he should think
proper to intrust. The agreement was made, and Leontidas conveyed
Phæbidas with a strong body of troops into the citadel, at a time when
the poor Thebans, wholly unapprehensive of any danger from the Spartans,
with whom they had lately concluded a peace, were celebrating a publick
religious festival. Leontidas, now sole governor, gave an immediate
loose to his passions. He seized his colleague Ismenias, and, by the
assistance of the Spartans, procured him to be tried, condemned and
executed, for caballing against the state. A pretence however stale, yet
constantly urged by every iniquitous administration against all who have
the resolution to oppose their measures. The party of Ismenias, upon the
first news of the imprisonment of their chief, fled the city, and were
afterwards banished by a publick decree. A strong proof of the fatal
lengths a faction will run, which is composed of those profligate
wretches whose sole aim is their own private emolument! Yet such a
faction, in all free states, when once luxury and corruption are
introduced, is generally the most numerous, and most prevalent. Athens,
not long before, had been betrayed to the Spartans in the same manner,
and on the same infamous terms by a detestable faction, composed of the
most abandoned of her citizens, and groaned under the same species of
tyranny until she was freed by the great Thrasybulus. And, I believe, we
have not yet forgot the strong apprehensions we were lately under, that
a certain free state, upon the continent, was on the point of being sold
to a powerful neighbour by a similar faction, and by a like iniquitous
contract. We must remember too, after what manner that scheme was
defeated by the glorious efforts of patriotism and publick spirit. I
shall make no apology for this digression, because I thought the remark
too apposite to be omitted.
The honest citizens, who had fled Athens, enraged to see their country
thus tricked out of her liberty, and groaning under the most ignominious
servitude, determined to set her free, or perish in so glorious an
attempt. The scheme was well concerted, and as boldly executed by
Pelopidas, who entering the city with a small number of the most
resolute of his party in disguise, destroyed Leontidas and his colleague
Archias, with the most dangerous of his faction; and, by the assistance
of Epaminondas and his friends,[186] with the additional aid of a large
body of Athenians, recovered the citadel. The Spartans,[187] at the
first news of this surprising event, entered the Theban territories with
a powerful army to take vengeance of the authors of this rebellion, as
they termed it, and to reduce Thebes to its former subjection. The
Athenians, conscious of their own weakness, and the mighty power of
Sparta, which they were by no means able to cope with, not only
renounced all friendship with the Thebans, but proceeded with the utmost
severity against such of their citizens as favoured that people. Thus
the Thebans, deserted by their allies, and destitute of friends,
appeared to the rest of Greece as devoted to inevitable destruction. In
this desperate situation of affairs, the virtue and abilities of these
two great men shone forth with greater lustre. They began by training
their countrymen to the use of arms as well as the shortness of the time
would permit, and inspiring them with a hatred of servitude, and the
generous resolution of dying in defence of the liberty and glory of
their country. As they judged it imprudent to hazard a decisive battle
against the best troops in the world, with their new raised militia,
they harrassed the Spartans with daily skirmishes to instruct their men
in military discipline, and the trade of war. By this method they
animated the minds of their people with the love of glory, and inured
their bodies to the fatigues of war by exercise and labour, whilst they
acquired experience and courage by those frequent encounters. Thus, as
Plutarch remarks, when these able generals, by never engaging rashly,
but watching every favourable opportunity, had fleshed the Thebans, like
young stag-hounds, upon their enemies, and rendered them staunch by
tasting the sweets of victory, and bringing them off in safety, they
made them fond of the sport, and eager after the most arduous
enterprises. By this able management they defeated the Spartans at
Platea and Thespia,[188] where they killed Phæbidas who had before so
treacherously surprised their citadel, and again routed them at
Tenagra, the Spartan general himself falling by the hand of Pelopidas.
Flushed with this success, the Thebans feared no enemy, however superior
in number; and the battle of Tegyra soon after raised the reputation of
their arms to a degree unknown before.[189] In this action the brave
Pelopidas, with a small body of horse, and no more than three hundred
foot, broke through, and dispersed a body of Spartans consisting of
above three times that number, made a terrible slaughter of the enemy,
killed both their generals upon the spot, took the spoils of the dead,
raised a trophy on the field of battle, and brought his little army home
in triumph. Here the astonished Greeks first saw the Spartans defeated
by a much inferior number, and by an enemy too whom they had always held
in the greatest contempt. They had never, until that time, been beaten
by equal, and rarely by much superior numbers, and, until that fatal
day, were justly reputed invincible. But this action was only the
prelude to that decisive stroke at Leuctra, which gave a fatal turn to
the Spartan affairs, and stripped them of that dominion which they had
so long exercised over the rest of Greece. For this series of success,
though it greatly elated the Thebans, yet rather enraged than
discouraged the Spartans. The Athenians, jealous of the growing power of
Thebes, struck up a peace with their ancient rivals, in which all the
Grecian states were included, except the Thebans, who were given up a
sacrifice to the Spartan vengeance. Cleombrotus, joint king with
Agesilaus, entered Bœotia with the largest, and finest army the Spartans
had ever sent into the field. The great Epaminondas engaged them at
Leuctra with a body of six thousand Thebans, which scarce equalled a
third part of their enemies, but the admirable disposition he made,
joined to the skill and dexterity of Pelopidas, and the bravery of their
troops supplied the defect of numbers. Cleombrotus was slain on the
spot, his army totally routed, and the greatest slaughter made of the
native Spartans that had ever happened until that day, with the loss
only of three hundred Thebans. Diodorus Siculus gives a concise account
of this action in these remarkable words,[190] “that Epaminondas, being
reduced to the necessity of engaging the whole confederate force of the
Lacedæmonians, and their allies, with only a handful of his city
militia, gained so complete a victory over those hitherto invincible
warriors, that he slew their king Cleombrotus, and cut off the Spartan
division, which was opposed to him, almost to a man.”
This victory gave so happy a turn to the affairs of the Thebans, that
their alliance was now as much courted as before it had been despised
and shunned. The Arcadians applied to them for succours against the
Spartans. Epaminondas and Pelopidas were sent with a powerful army to
their assistance. At the head of the joint forces these two great men
entered Laconia, and appeared with a hostile army at the gates of
Sparta. The first sight of that kind ever seen by that haughty people.
The masterly conduct of Agesilaus, and the desperate valour of the
Spartans saved the city, but could not prevent the ravage of their
territories by the two Theban generals, who restored the Messenians to
their kingdom, of which the Spartans had deprived them near three
hundred years before, defeated the Athenians, who came to the assistance
of the Spartans, and returned home with glory.
The Theban arms were now so terrible, and their power grown so
formidable, that whilst some states applied to them for protection, and
others for assistance, the Macedonians referred the disputes about the
succession to that crown to their decision, and gave hostages as a
security that they would abide by their determination. The chief of
these hostages was the famous Philip, father of Alexander the Great, who
employed his time so well, under those two able masters, in the art of
war, that from them he acquired that military knowledge which proved
afterwards so fatal to all Greece in general. Thus the publick virtue of
two private citizens not only restored Thebes to her former liberty,
but raised her to a much more respectable rank than she had ever held
before amongst the Grecian republicks.
But this eminent, and newly acquired degree of power was but of short
duration. Pelopidas had freed the Thessalians from the insults of
Alexander the Pherean; but going to him afterwards, accompanied only by
Ismenias, to compose some differences, he was not only unjustly made
prisoner, but treated with the most spiteful cruelty by that perfidious
tyrant. The Thebans, enraged at this treacherous act, sent an army
against the tyrant, under the command of two new generals, who returned
with loss and dishonour. The command was again committed to Epaminondas,
who, by the terror of his name alone, brought the tyrant to reason, and
procured the release of his friend Pelopidas and Ismenias. But the
tyrant soon after renewing his usual depredations upon the Thessalians,
Pelopidas was once more sent with forces to their assistance. The two
armies came soon to action, when Pelopidas, blinded by resentment, and
eager after revenge, rushed into the right wing, where the tyrant
commanded in person, and fell, covered with wounds, in the midst of his
surrounding enemies. His death however was not unrevenged, for his
troops, quite furious at the loss of a general they so much revered and
loved, routed the enemy, and sacrificed three thousand of them to his
_manes_.
Though the death of this truly great man was an irretrievable loss to
Thebes, yet Epaminondas still survived, and whilst he lived, the good
fortune and power of his country remained unaltered. But new
disturbances breaking out not long after, Epaminondas, at the head of
his Thebans, broke again into Peloponnesus, eluded the vigilance of
Agesilaus, and advanced into the very suburbs of Sparta. But as they had
just before received intelligence of his approach by a messenger from
Agesilaus, they were so well prepared for his reception, that he judged
proper to retire, and, in his return, fell unexpectedly upon the
Spartans and their allies at Mantinea. The disposition of his forces
upon this occasion is esteemed a masterpiece of generalship; nor was his
valour inferior to his conduct. He routed and made a terrible slaughter
of the Spartans, but, pushing on too eagerly to complete his victory, he
received a mortal wound in his breast, and was carried to his tent. As
soon as he recovered his speech, and was satisfied that his shield was
safe, and the Thebans were victors, he ordered the broken part of the
weapon to be drawn out of his wound, and died rejoicing at the good
fortune of his country. Thus fell the incomparable Epaminondas, who, as
Polybius observes, overcame his enemies, but was overcome by
fortune.[191] The same judicious historian,[192] in his remarks on the
different constitutions of the ancient republicks, observes, “that the
flourishing state of the Thebans was but of short duration, nor was
their decay gradual, because their sudden rise was not founded on right
principles. He affirms that the Thebans took the opportunity of
attacking the Spartans when the imprudence and haughtiness of that
people had made them quite odious to their allies; and that they had
acquired amongst the Greeks their high reputation for valour by the
virtue and abilities of one or two great men, who knew how to make the
best use of those unexpected incidents, which so fortunately offered. He
adds, that the sudden change in their affairs made it quickly appear to
all, that their remarkable success was not owing to the system of their
government, but to the publick virtue of those who were at the head of
the administration. For that the power and grandeur of the Thebans
arose, flourished, and fell with Epaminondas and Pelopidas is too
evident, he says, to be denied. Whence he concludes, that the splendid
figure the Thebans at that time made in the world must not be ascribed
to their civil polity, but to those two great men only.” I have hitherto
considered them only in the light of virtuous citizens, and able
generals; perhaps a short sketch of their characters as
patriot-statesmen may not be unacceptable nor uninstructing.
Pelopidas and Epaminondas were both descended from ancient and worthy
families. Pelopidas inherited a large fortune, which he enjoyed with
honour to himself and utility to his friends, and by avoiding the two
extremes of avarice and dissipation, showed that he was the master of,
not the slave to riches. The patrimony of Epaminondas on the contrary
was extremely small, yet equal to his utmost wants or desires. Devoted
wholly to the sciences and the study of history and philosophy, which
mend the heart, whilst they instruct the head, he preferred the sweets
of retirement and study to a life of pleasure and ostentation. He
avoided all lucrative employments and state honours, with as much
assiduity, as they were courted and intrigued for by others: nor did he
accept of the highest office in the state, until he was called to it by
the united cry of the people, and the exigencies of the publick. When
dragged out of his retirement, and placed by force, as it were, at the
head of affairs, he convinced his countrymen, as Justin informs us, that
he was fully equal to the task, and seemed rather to give lustre to,
than receive any from the dignity of his employment.[193] He excelled in
the art of speaking, and was the most consummate orator of his time;
persuasion hung upon his tongue, and he was the master of the passions
of his auditors by his eloquence, and of his own by philosophy. With
this truly great man Pelopidas was joined as colleague, who, when he
could not prevail upon his friend Epaminondas to share the enjoyment of
his own fortune with him, copied him in the humble virtues of private
life. Thus both became the admiration of their countrymen for their
temperance and moderation, as well as their plainness in dress; and
frugality at their table. But the most striking part of their character,
was that unexampled union and perfect harmony which subsisted between
these two great men, and ended only with their lives. They filled at one
and the same time the two highest posts in the state. The whole
management of publick affairs was intrusted to their conduct, and all
business passed through their hands. Yet during all that time, no latent
spark of envy, jealousy or ambition, no private or selfish views or
difference of sentiments (the fatal, but too general sources of disunion
amongst statesmen) could in the least affect their friendship, or ever
make any impression upon an union, which was founded upon the immovable
basis of publick virtue. Animated, as Plutarch observes, and directing
all their actions by this principle only, they had no other in view but
that of the publick; and instead of enriching or aggrandizing their own
families, the only emulation between them was, which should contribute
most to the advancement of the dignity and happiness of his country. To
crown all, they both died gloriously in defence of that independency,
which they had acquired and preserved to the state, and left the Thebans
free, great, and flourishing.
It is natural to think, that men of such superior merit, and so
eminently disinterested, could never possibly be the objects of party
resentment. Yet we are assured in history, that they were frequently
persecuted by a virulent faction composed of the selfish, those leeches
whom these two virtuous men prevented from fattening upon the blood of
the publick, and of the envious, from that strong antipathy which bad
men naturally bear to the good.[194] For envy, that passion of low
uncultivated minds, has a greater share in party opposition than we are
apt to imagine. A truth of which we have strong proof in that celebrated
passage, recorded by Plutarch,[195] between Aristides and the Athenian
countrymen. Though the virtue of these great men triumphed over all the
malicious efforts of these domestick enemies; yet they had power enough
at one time to impeach and bring them both to a publick trial for a
breach of formality relative to their office, though that very act had
enabled them to render the most signal services to their country.[196]
They were tried however, but honourably acquitted. At another time,
whilst Pelopidas was detained prisoner by Alexander the Pherean, this
malignant faction had weight enough to exclude Epaminondas from the
office of polemarque or general, and to procure for two of their
friends, the command of that army which was sent to punish the tyrant
for his treachery. But the new generals made such wretched work of it,
when they came to face the enemy, that the whole army was quickly thrown
into the utmost confusion, and compelled for their own preservation, to
put Epaminondas at their head, who was present at the action only as a
volunteer: for the malice of his enemies had excluded him from the least
shadow of trust or power. This able man, by a _manœuvre_ peculiar to
himself, extricated the Theban troops out of those difficulties in which
the ignorance and incapacity of their generals had involved them,
repulsed the enemy, and by a fine retreat brought the army safe to
Thebes. His countrymen, now sensible of their error, and how greatly
they had been imposed upon by the faction, immediately recalled him to
the highest offices in the state, which he continued to execute until
his death, with the greatest honour to himself, and emolument, as well
as glory, to his country. As the management of publick affairs, after
the death of these two illustrious patriots fell by the intrigues of
faction, into the hands of men of a quite different character, we need
not wonder that the Thebans sunk alike in power and reputation until
Thebes itself was totally destroyed by Alexander the Great, and their
country, with the rest of Greece, swallowed up at last by the insatiable
ambition of the Romans.
[180] Pausan, Grec. Descript. lib. 9. c. 5 p. 718. Edit.
Ketchnii.
[181] Οὐ γάρ τι ἠδυνάμην ἐς αὐτοὺς παρευρεῖν, ἕπομαι τῷ μύθῳ.
Id. Ibid.
[182] Ibid. p. 723
[183] Thebes was the capital of Bœotia.
[184] Bœotum in crasso jurares aere natum. Hor. epis. 1. lib.
2. lin. 244.
[185] Plut. in Vit. Pelopid. p. 287.
[186] Diodor. Sicul. lib. 15. p. 470.
[187] Plut. in Vit. Pelop. p. 284. et sequent.
[188] Plut. in Vit. Pelop. p. 285.
[189] Id. p. 286, 287.
[190] Διὸ καὶ συναναγκαθεὶς ὀλίγοις πολιτικοῖς, &c. Diodor.
Sicul. lib. 15. p. 477. Edit. Henr. Stephani.
[191] Polyb. Comparat. Epaminond. et Hannib. lib. 9. p. 762.
[192] Id. lib. 6. p. 678....79.
[193] Justin. lib. 6. p. 74.
[194] Plutarch, Justin, Corn. Nepos.
[195] When Aristides had acquired the surname of Just he became
the object of the Athenian envy, and the Ostracism was demanded
against him. Whilst the people were preparing their shells, a
country voter, who could neither read nor write, brought his
shell to Aristides, and desired him to write the name of
Aristides upon it. Aristides, not a little surprised at his
request, asked him what injury that Aristides had done him. Me!
none, replied the fellow, for I do not so much as know the man
by sight, but it galls me to the soul to hear him every where
called the Just.... Plut. in Vit. Aristid. p. 322, 323.
[196] They kept the field and attacked Sparta, when the time of
their office was near expired, by which means they were in
office more than the regular time.