Theognis suffered, and the new despot whom he indicates as either actually installed or nearly impending, must have come considerably after the despotism of Theagenês; for the life of the poet seems to fall between 570-490 B. C., while Theagenês must have ruled about 630-600 B. C. From the unfavorable picture, therefore, which the poet gives as his own early experience of the condition of the rural cultivators, it is evident that the despot Theagenês had neither conferred upon them any permanent benefit, nor given them access to the judicial protection of the city. [65] Aristot. Polit. iv, 12, 10; v, 2, 6; 4, 3. [66] Theognis, vv. 682, 715, 720, 750, 816, 914, Welcker’s edition:— Τῶν εἴη μέλαν αἷμα πιεῖν, etc. [67] Theognis, v, 20.— Κύρνε, πόλις μὲν ἔθ᾽ ἥδε πόλις, λαοὶ δὲ δὴ ἄλλοι, Οἳ πρόσθ᾽ οὕτε δίκας ᾔδεσαν οὔτε νόμους, Ἀλλ᾽ ἀμφὶ πλευρῇσι δορὰς αἰγῶν κατέτριβον, Ἔξω δ᾽ ὥστ᾽ ἔλαφοι τῆσδ’ ἐνέμοντο πόλεος. [68] See, especially, the lines from 500-560, 816-830, in Welcker’s edition. [69] Consult the Prolegomena to Welcker’s edition of Theognis; also, those of Schneidewin (Delectus Elegiac. Poetar. pp. 46-55). The Prolegomena of Welcker are particularly valuable and full of instruction. He illustrates at great length the tendency common to Theognis, with other early Greek poets, to apply the words _good_ and _bad_, not with reference to any ethical standard, but to wealth as contrasted with poverty,—nobility with low birth,—strength with weakness,—conservative and oligarchical politics as opposed to innovation (sect. 10-18). The ethical meaning of these words is not absolutely unknown, yet rare, in Theognis: it gradually grew up at Athens, and became popularized by the Socratic school of philosophers as well as by the orators. But the early or political meaning always remained, and the fluctuation between the two has been productive of frequent misunderstanding. Constant attention is necessary when we read the expressions οἱ ἀγαθοὶ, ἐσθλοὶ, βέλτιστοι, καλοκἀγαθοὶ, χρηστοὶ, etc., or on the other hand, οἱ κακοὶ, δειλοὶ, etc., to examine whether the context is such as to give to them the ethical or the political meaning. Welcker seems to go a step too far, when he says that the latter sense “fell into desuetude, through the influence of the Socratic philosophy.” (Proleg. sect. 11, p. xxv.) The two meanings both remained extant at the same time, as we see by Aristotle (Polit. iv, 8, 2),—σχεδὸν γὰρ παρὰ τοῖς πλείστοις οἱ εὔποροι, τῶν καλῶν κἀγαθῶν δοκοῦσι κατέχειν χώραν. A careful distinction is sometimes found in Plato and Thucydides, who talk of the oligarchs as “the persons called super-excellent,”—τοὺς καλοὺς κἀγαθοὺς ὀνομαζομένους (Thucyd. viii, 48),—ὑπὸ τῶν πλουσίων τε καὶ καλῶν κἀγαθῶν λεγομένων ἐν τῇ πόλει (Plato, Rep. viii, p. 569).