they understood that Cimon was dead; and computing the time of the
oracle, they found that his death had been signified, he being then
already with the gods.
He died, some say, of sickness, while besieging Citium, in Cyprus;
according to others, of a wound he received in a skirmish with the
barbarians. When he perceived that he was going to die, he commanded
those under his charge to return, and by no means to let the news of his
death be known by the way; this they did with such secrecy that they all
came home safe, and neither their enemies nor the allies knew what had
happened. Thus, as Phanodemus relates, the Grecian army was, as it were,
conducted by Cimon thirty days after he was dead. But after his
death there was not one commander among the Greeks that did any thing
considerable against the barbarians, and instead of uniting against
their common enemies, the popular leaders and partisans of war animated
them against one another to such a degree, that none could interpose
their good offices to reconcile them. And while, by their mutual
discord, they ruined the power of Greece, they gave the Persians time
to recover breath, and repair all their losses. It is true, indeed,
Agesilaus carried the arms of Greece into Asia, but it was a long time
afterwards; there were some brief appearances of a war against the
king's lieutenants in the maritime provinces, but they all quickly
vanished; before he could perform any thing of moment, he was recalled
by fresh civil dissensions and disturbances at home. So that he was
forced to leave the Persian king's officers to impose what tribute they
pleased on the Greek cities in Asia, the confederates and allies of
the Lacedaemonians. Whereas, in the time of Cimon, not so much as a
letter-carrier, or a single horseman, was ever seen to come within four
hundred furlongs of the sea.
The monuments, called Cimonian to this day, in Athens, show that his
remains were conveyed home, yet the inhabitants of the city Citium pay
particular honor to a certain tomb which they call the tomb of Cimon,
according to Nausicrates the rhetorician, who states that in a time
of famine, when the crops of their land all failed, they sent to the
oracle, which commanded them not to forget Cimon, but give him the
honors of a superior being.
POMPEY
The people of Rome appear, from the first, to have been affected towards
Pompey, much in the same manner as Prometheus, in Aeschylus, was towards
Hercules, when after that hero had delivered him from his chains, he
says--
The sire I hated, but the son I loved.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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