We have the titles of two lost works of Aristotle--[Greek: Peri\
Basilei/as], and [Greek: A)le/xandros, ê)\ u(pe\r a)poi/kôn] (or
[Greek: a)poikiô=n]). Both seem to have been dialogues. In one, or in
both, he gave advice to Alexander respecting the manner of ruling his
newly acquired empire in Asia; and respecting the relations proper to
be established between Hellenes and native Asiatics (see Rose, Arist.
Pseud. pp. 92-96; Bernays, Die Dialoge des Aristot. pp. 51-57).]
In June, 323 B.C., occurred the premature and unexpected decease of
the great Macedonian conqueror, aged 32 years and 8 months, by a
violent fever at Babylon. So vast was his power, and so unmeasured
his ambition, that the sudden removal of such a man operated as a
shock to the hopes and fears of almost every one, both in Greece and
Asia. It produced an entire change in the position of Aristotle at
Athens.
To understand what that position really was, we must look at it in
connection with his Macedonian sympathies, and with the
contemporaneous political sentiment at Athens. It was in the middle
of the year 335 B.C., that Alexander put down by force the revolt of
the Thebans, took their city by assault, demolished it altogether
(leaving nothing but the citadel called Kadmeia, occupied by a
Macedonian garrison), and divided its territory between two other
Boeotian towns. Immediately after that terror-striking act, he
demanded from the Athenians (who had sympathized warmly with Thebes,
though without overt acts of assistance) the surrender of their
principal anti-Macedonian politicians. That demand having been
refused, he at first prepared to extort compliance at the point of
the sword, but was persuaded, not without difficulty, to renounce
such intention, and to be content with the voluntary exile of
Ephialtes and Charidemus from Athens. Though the unanimous vote of
the Grecian Synod at Corinth constituted him Imperator, there can be
no doubt that the prevalent sentiment in Greece towards him was that
of fear and dislike; especially among the Athenians, whose dignity
was most deeply mortified, and to whom the restriction of free speech
was the most painful.[15]
[Footnote 15: See History of Greece, chap. xci. pp. 18, 41, 64.]