FOOTNOTES
[41] ἔστι δὲ τέτταρα σχεδόν, ἃ παιδεύειν εἰώθασι, γράμματα καὶ γυμναστικὴν καὶ μουσικήν, καὶ τέταρτον ἔνιοι γραφικήν.—Pol., viii. p. 259.
[42] Ὑπογράφεσθαι is the technical term for this drawing of models.
[43] Aristotle implies in his discussion (“Pol.,” bk. vii. 1) that there had arisen in his day radical critics who asserted that music was merely an amusement, with no other importance. But he sets aside this opinion as hardly deserving of refutation, seeing how strong was the consensus of opinion against it.
[44] Aristotle fully appreciates this, and admits, even in his perfect polity, popular music to suit the vulgar listener, who cannot understand what is really classical (“Pol.,” viii.: ὁ γὰρ θεατὴς φορτικὸς ὤν. κ.τ.λ.).
[45] In some cases a very florid adagio is succeeded by a lively plain tune in galop time.
[46] Some people have thought these scales only indicated differences of pitch. This is false, or rather a misapprehension, because in a fixed set of notes—like the white notes in our pianos—various scales could only be found by starting higher or lower. But how could a difference of pitch affect morals?
[47] It is not difficult for a man who has devoted sufficient time to music, and has known many musical people, to find some analogy to Dorian, Phrygian, and Lydian modes, as moral agents, in our modern music. For surely the real meaning, the real depth, in the art is this: that it represents, and by representing stimulates within us, various emotions. Like all the other faculties of man, the emotions are a great class of mental phenomena improved and strengthened by a certain quantity of stimulus, but exaggerated and injured by being overstrained, or too perpetually exercised. And it is the peculiar province of music to awaken emotions too subtle and various for the coarser utterance of words, and therefore to fill the mind with feelings delightful, indeed, and deep, but from their very nature unutterable in words and inexplicable except by sympathy. You cannot convey to an unmusical man what is called the expression of an air—that is to say, the emotion it has caused within you. Let us add that if you could explain it, it would not have the distinctive value which it really possesses. It is this very feature in the question which has caused the moral effects of music to be wholly overlooked in a cold and logical age, when many men are not affected by it, and in which everything inexplicable by direct statement is likely to be considered unreal.
The emotions, then, which it is the proper object of music to stimulate, are of that subtle character that they cannot be defined. Different composers will, no doubt, excite a different complexion of feeling in the mind. The works of Handel and J. S. Bach produce a thoroughly satisfied and cheerful temper, even when they treat sad subjects; whereas Beethoven has almost always about him that profound melancholy which is to a mind in distress more sustaining in its sympathy than all the comfort of consolation. But this only describes the general character of the emotions produced, and not the emotions themselves. For these are often not consciously before us at all, but influence us, like our prejudices, from a hidden vantage-ground within the soul.
But, alas! the history of this delicious stimulant is like that of all the rest. Men begin to crave for it, and then constantly pursue it; they will not be satisfied without stronger doses, and, presently, even these cease to have their effect except by intoxication. In such case, the stimulant is no longer applied to exciting an emotion, but to satisfying a passion. And this latter differs from the former in being more violent (being, perhaps, compounded of several emotions), and in containing some coarser bodily element, either consciously or unconsciously.
It may be illustrated from what are called sentimental songs. If we compare the old chaste love-songs that are found among the national melodies of England, and still better of Ireland, with the love-songs in one of the greatest of modern operas, Gounod’s “Faust,” the distinction will be easily apprehended. When an Irish girl puts sweet wild music to the words of her song, and is then better satisfied with it than if she merely spoke it, the reason is this, that there are in her love a number of tender emotions, far too subtle to be uttered in the words, but which are conveyed in the expression of the melody. The very same may be said of the solemn, almost religious love-songs of the old Italian composers, in which knightly reverence for the gentler sex is so apparent. Let the soberest critic compare this music with the splendid duet in the garden scene of Gounod’s “Faust,” and more especially with the concluding song of the act (that in six flats). Expressive this music is beyond description, and expressive of love; but how different!
CHAPTER VII.
THE LAST STAGE OF EDUCATION—MILITARY TRAINING OF THE EPHEBI.
§ 45. The small size and narrow bounds of Greek states made the support of a professional army seldom possible, and accordingly we find expedients now suddenly again become fashionable from very different causes—a citizen army, and general liability to military service. No Greek boy was allowed to pass from his school-days into citizen life without some preliminary training and practice in the use of arms and in military discipline. This is the discipline of the ephebi, or grown-up boys, concerning which so much has been written of late years by the learned. A number of inscriptions regarding the duties and ceremonies to be performed by them have been lately discovered, and we seem to see in them a sort of general agreement throughout Greece, rather differing in the time allotted, and in other details, than in principles.[48] There were actual masters in the art of using arms, so far as this was not included in the gymnastic exercises of the palæstra; we do not hear, however, of much drilling, and probably the drill of Greek armies, if we except the Spartans, was very imperfect in the best period. It was not until the growth of mercenary armies, and (almost simultaneously) the great military outburst at Thebes under Epaminondas, that war became a science in our sense.
On the other hand, all the patrol duty of the frontier was done by these ephebi, who, at about the age of sixteen, were brought into the rank of citizens by a solemn service and sacrifice, at which they swore oaths of fidelity and patriotism, and undertook their military duties as a preliminary to their full life of political burgesses. The orphans of citizens killed in battle had their arms and military dress presented to them (at Athens) by the State. The youths assumed the short dark-gray cloak (χλαμύς), and the broad-brimmed soft hat (πέτασος), suitable for marching duty, and then, as περίπολοι, or patrolling police, they looked to the safety of the country, the condition of the roads, and occupied the frontier forts, of which we see such striking remains still in Attica. The mountain fort of Phylæ, that of Dekelea, of Œnoe (or Eleutheræ), of Sunium, of Thorikos, of Oropos, and others, were the stations from which the frontiers were patrolled.
It is doubtless owing to this precaution that, though we read of insecurity in the streets of Athens by night, we never read of brigandage through the country. Some scholars have, indeed, asserted that the περίπολοι had police duty to perform in the city, and at the public assembly. This we need not accept; though on solemn occasions, and when a great ceremony was to be held, they appeared, not only to preserve order, but to participate in the show. It is the latter duty which we see them performing in the famous friezes of the Parthenon, which represent the Panathenaic procession. They were allotted a separate place in the theatre, and were in every respect regarded as a distinct order in the State, the hope and pride of their city, and its ornament on all stately occasions.
Their patrol duty on the frontier was appointed to them for divers reasons. They attained through it the discipline of arms, and learned some of the hardships of campaigning. They learned an accurate knowledge of the roads and ways through their country, and of the nature of their frontier, and that of their neighbors. They were kept away from the mischiefs which threaten youths of their age in every city.
But the Athenians and other Greeks were careful not to commit the mistake of which we now hear so much—that of expecting these youths under twenty to face the enemy in battle. They were specially reserved for garrison duty, and one of Myronides’ victories was particularly noted, because he fought it with these boys, who were not expected to stand firm in the horrors of a battle.
§ 46. According to the words of the oath, indeed, as preserved by Stobæus and Pollux, the standing firm beside one’s comrade is specially mentioned; but even if this interesting document be not spurious, as Cobet supposes,[49] this particular declaration may be considered prospective, and applying to the remainder of the citizen’s life. I add the words here for the benefit of those who have not the Greek text at hand: “I will never disgrace these hallowed weapons, or abandon my comrade, beside whomsoever I am placed, and I will fight for both sacred and common things personally and with my fellows. I will not leave my country less, but greater and better by sea and land, than I may have received it. I will obey the rulers for the time being, and obey the established laws, and whatsoever others the commonwealth may agree to establish; and if any one abolish the ordinances or disobey them, I will not allow it, but will defend them personally and with the rest. I will obey the established religion. Be my witnesses Aglauros, Enyalios, Ares, Zeus, Thallo, Auxo, Hegemone.” Though Cobet be right that some features of this oath can hardly have been generally used through the course of Athenian history, and that it was probably made up at a late period, the list of gods, so curious and unlike what a late pedant would invent, points to some old source; and perhaps there are other really historical traditions in it.
The general authenticity of this text has rather been confirmed by the discovery of the oath of the ephebi of Dreros (near Knossus) in Crete—an inscription of undoubted authenticity. Here, there are not only the general declarations of loyalty and patriotism, but special oaths to support the allied Knossus, and declarations of hatred and hostility against the town of Lyttos.[50] This formal declaration of hatred may be compared with the outspoken aristocratic oath quoted by Aristotle: “I will be ill-disposed to the demos, and will do it whatever harm I can devise.”
The various religious ceremonies connected with the admission to the status of an ephebus, which was considered distinct both from a boy and from a man—the sacrifices, the cutting of the long hair (except in Sparta), the solemn assembly of relatives, remind us strongly of the confirmation of the Christian Church, to which it is the heathen parallel.
§ 47. What a solemn procession of ephebi must have been is best shown by the equestrian and sacrificial procession on the frieze of the Parthenon. We notice some young men naked, some in the short cloak and hat, riding horses and leading victims. The riding of the horses was not so easy as with us, for, in the first place, they had no saddles and stirrups, and, in the second, it was thought necessary for a good display to have the horse continually on his hind-legs. A quiet walking horse in a procession was thought very tame by the Greeks. Hence the management of these curvetting and caracoling steeds must have necessitated careful training in their riders. Again, we find others leading bulls to the sacrifice, and the frequent mention of contests with bulls has even misled many authorities to imagine that the Attic ephebi practised bull-fighting. The fact is that an unruly victim was of evil omen, and hence the careful leading of these beasts, with skill and strength combined, so as to make a proper part of a great show, came under ephebic training. This, too, we see on the Parthenon frieze. Wherever, in fact, any public display was required, the artistic taste of the Greeks ordained that the fairest and most stalwart men should be there to adorn it; and as nothing is so beautiful as a crowd of vigorous fresh youths, in the bloom of life and the happiness of youth, we can conceive how splendid was a State procession then compared with those of our day, when the grandest show is one of old generals, effete officials, and other venerable but decrepit magnates, who must be covered with fine clothes, brilliants, and orders to prevent their real ugliness and decay from being painfully obtrusive. In Roman days we hear of these youths being employed as guards of honor when distinguished foreigners visited Athens.
§ 48. Though this ephebic training is spoken of as universal—and it seems that after his inscription into the register (ληξιαρχικὸν γραμματεῖον) of his deme, which was his patent of citizenship, every Athenian lad was bound to serve as patroller (περίπολος) and undergo his military training—there must have been many exceptions; and, indeed, this whole education is evidently that of the higher classes, and unsuitable for the poor. In Roman days, we even find strangers coming to Athens and enrolling themselves among the ephebi, as those wealthy foreigners who understand what culture means often send their sons to England to receive the unique training of the English public schools. But this points to its being a privilege, a special and much-prized education, though we do not know what restrictions there were, or how the sons of poorer men, who could not afford the time and outlay, avoided it. The number of official ephebi was never, I fancy, large, and always a class from which Phidias might well select for his models, when seeking for ideal types of youth and manliness.
It has, indeed, not been sufficiently noticed, in the various essays on this ephebic training, that the very idea of such a class never occurs in Herodotus or in Thucydides, though it does in Xenophon;[51] and if Plutarch speaks of Alcibiades influencing the ephebi in the gymnasia with his wild schemes of western conquest, we may be sure the historian transferred the titles and notions of his age to older times. In the third century B.C., there are so many inscriptions about this class extant that it must have assumed a most prominent place in Attic life. From that time onward into Roman times, we hear of it constantly, and from many sources. It is impossible that Socrates and his school should not have alluded to it, had it already formally existed. We may therefore infer that though its component parts—the formal enrolment and sacrifices at a certain age, the patrol duties, the gymnastic and musical training, the procession duty at festivals—were developed in the best period of Attic history, their official reduction to a State system of education could not have taken place till later, till the decay of practical public life had given men time to theorize about methods of restoring by education what was irreparably lost.
Apparently, the earliest formal notice is in a fragment of the orator Lycurgus, who, in his famous speech on his own management of the Athenian exchequer, alluded to the statue of a certain Epicrates, which had been set up in bronze on account of his law about the ephebi. We cannot tell whether this was a special enactment or not. But it may have been the very law which established this famous system, so praised and sought after by all the Hellenistic world in Roman days. If so, the establishment would date from the very time when it proved of little real importance to the history of Attica or of the world.
Nevertheless, the many inscriptions reveal to us certain curious and interesting features, which make us approve of the good taste of Cicero and his friends, when they sent their boys away from Rome to Athens, as we send our sons to schools in England. Thus the learned Germans who have investigated with great pains the various titles of the magistrates or dignitaries among these ephebi are often at a loss to determine whether they are masters set over them, or leaders among the ephebi themselves. Indeed, the so-called ἄρχων τῶν ἐφηβῶν (head of the ephebi) appears to have been no other than the most successful and brilliant youth, the representative and spokesman of the rest, like the senior prefect at some of our public schools. No doubt, learned men who, in future ages, investigate the ephebic training of the English will puzzle themselves over the senior prefect at Winchester, and wonder whether he was a master or a boy; and, if a boy, how he could have so much power intrusted to him. We also find that the expenditure of keeping up the solemn processions and public contests was so great that the ephebi themselves were encouraged to contribute largely; and if they were rich, they gained an importance disproportionate (we may suspect) to their age. What is even more interesting to English students is that they had independent clubs and associations, and even held solemn meetings, where they used the terms of public life, and entitled the resolutions (ψηφίσματα) enacted in their assembly (ἀγορά) laws (νόμοι). They had archons, strategi, agoranomi, and even areopagites in these associations of youths. It must have been with the approval of these formal meetings that the gymnastic side of the ephebic training became gradually discredited. Whether the dislike of great generals like Alexander and Philopœmen to athletics contributed to change public opinion, we cannot tell. But I confess to feeling a considerable sympathy with the reform which asserted the superiority of hunting and riding to the exercises of the gymnasium—a change which is regarded by some German critics as a melancholy sign of degradation.
§ 49. In these later days, when the seven subjects of knowledge, including rhetoric, philosophy, etc., were formally adopted, the ephebic training assumed the character of a university course. There were, indeed, masters appointed for fencing, the use of arms, dancing, and wrestling, as of old; but the leading philosophical schools did not then carry off the youths from the ephebic training; they rather supplied it with formal professors. In the better and strictly classical days, before we hear of the technical term ephebi, the practical training of the youths for patrols, and then as incipient citizens, rather corresponded to what we call the sixth form at a public school, and did not embrace really philosophic teaching, such as is supposed to be found at our universities. It had the same mixture of the physical and intellectual, the same attention to mere accomplishments, the same careful surveillance which we practise in schools, but which are not a complete introduction to full citizen life. This was the summit of Spartan training, where the object was not to train really political men able to discuss public affairs and assist in the government of the State, but brave soldiers, and fine men, physically able to endure hardship and submit to strict discipline. Something quite different and intellectually higher was needful for a really democratic life, for an intelligent understanding of State functions, and the proper discussion of them. It was all very well to dance complicated figures with grace, to play the lyre and sing sweetly with it, to wrestle and run with force and ease. This was the old training, which made fine soldiers, but good citizens only in the sense of stupidly ignorant, and therefore obedient, hearers of the orders of their superiors. The necessity of a change came with the rise of democracy in Greece, and the Greeks provided themselves, when the need arose, with teachers suited to their wants. These men, the Sophists, were the first who gave any education corresponding to our university courses, and to these we now turn.