stimulating soldiers to bravery by means of the whip. His descendant
Cyrus, on the contrary, had learnt by personal observation to
enter into the feeling of personal dignity prevalent in the Greeks
around him, based as it was on the conviction that they governed
themselves and that there was no man who had any rights of his
own over them,—that the law was their only master, and that in
rendering obedience to it they were working for no one else but for
themselves.[77] Cyrus knew where to touch the sentiment of Hellenic
honor, so fatally extinguished after the Greeks lost their political
freedom by the hands of the Macedonians, and exchanged for that
intellectual quickness, combined with moral degeneracy, which Cicero
and his contemporaries remark as the characteristic of these once
high-toned communities.
[75] Xen. Anab. i, 5, 16.
[76] See Herodot. vii, 102, 103, 209. Compare the observations of
the Persian Achæmenês, c. 236.
[77] Herod. vii, 104. Demaratus says to Xerxes, respecting the
Lacedæmonians—Ἐλεύθεροι γὰρ ἐόντες, οὐ πάντα ἐλεύθεροί εἰσι·
ἔπεστι γάρ σφι δεσπότης, νόμος, τὸν ὑποδειμαίνουσι πολλῷ μᾶλλον ἢ
οἱ σοὶ σέ.
Again, the historian observes about the Athenians, and their
extraordinary increase of prowess after having shaken off the
despotism of Hippias (v. 78)—Δηλοῖ δ᾽ οὐ καθ᾽ ἓν μόνον ἀλλὰ
πανταχοῦ, ἡ ἰσηγορίη ὥς ἐστι χρῆμα σπουδαῖον· εἰ καὶ Ἀθηναῖοι
τυραννευόμενοι μὲν, οὐδαμῶν τῶν σφέας περιοικεόντων ἦσαν τὰ
πολέμια ἀμείνους, ἀπαλλαχθέντες δὲ τυράννων, μακρῷ πρῶτοι
ἐγένοντο. Δηλοῖ ὦν ταῦτα, ὅτι κατεχόμενοι μὲν ἐθελοκακεέον, ὡς
δεσπότῃ ἐργαζόμενοι· ἐλευθερωθέντων δὲ, αὐτὸς ἕκαστος ἑωϋτῷ
προθυμέετο ἐργάζεσθαι.
Compare Menander, Fragm. Incert. CL. ap. Meineke, Fragm. Comm.
Græc. vol. iv. p. 268—
Ἐλεύθερος πᾶς ἑνὶ δεδούλωται, νόμῳ·
Δυσὶν δὲ δοῦλος, καὶ νόμῳ καὶ δεσπότῃ.
Having concerted the order of battle with the generals, Cyrus
marched forward in cautious array during the next day, anticipating
the appearance of the king’s forces. Nothing of the kind was seen,
however, though abundant marks of their retiring footsteps were
evident. The day’s march, (called three parasangs) having been
concluded without a battle, Cyrus called to him the Ambrakiotic
prophet Silanus, and presented him with three thousand darics or
ten Attic talents. Silanus had assured him, on the eleventh day
preceding, that there would be no action in ten days from that time;
upon which Cyrus had told him,—“If your prophecy comes true, I will
give you three thousand darics. My brother will not fight at all, if
he does not fight within ten days.”[78]
[78] Xen. Anab. i, 7, 14-17.
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