III. HISTORY.
As we have stated in a former chapter, literary compositions in prose first appeared among the Greeks in the sixth century B.C., and were either mythological, or collections of local legends, whether sacred or profane, of particular districts. It was not until a still later period that the Grecian prose writers, becoming more positive in their habits of thought, broke away from speculative and mystical tendencies, and began to record their observations of the events daily occurring about them. In the writings of Hecatæ'us of Mile'tus, who flourished about 500 B.C., we find the first elements of history; and yet some modern writers think he can lay no claim whatever to the title of historian, while others regard him as the first historical writer of any importance. He visited Greece proper and many of the surrounding countries, and recorded his observations and experiences in a work of a geographical character, entitled Periodus. He also wrote another work relating to the mythical history of Greece, and died about 467 B.C.
HEROD'OTUS.
MAHAFFY considers Hecatæ'us "the forerunner of Herodotus in his mode of life and his conception of setting down his experiences;" while NIE'BUHR, the great German historian, absolutely denies the existence of any Grecian histories before Herodotus gave to the world the first of those illustrious productions that form another bright link in the literary chain of Grecian glory. Born in Halicarnas'sus about the year 484, of an illustrious family, Herodotus was driven from his native land at an early age by a revolution, after which he traveled extensively over the then known world, collecting much of the material that he subsequently used in his writings. After a short residence at Samos he removed to Athens, leaving there, however, about the year 440 to take up his abode at Thu'rii, a new Athenian colony near the site of the former Syb'aris. Here he lived the rest of his life, dying about the year 420. Lucian relates that, on completing his work, Herodotus went to Olympia during the celebration of the Olympic games, and there recited to his countrymen the nine books of which his history was composed. His hearers were delighted, and immediately honored the books with the title of the Nine Muses. A later account of this scene says that Thucydides, then a young man, stood at the side of Herodotus, and was affected to tears by his recitations.
Herodotus modestly states the object of his history in the following paragraph, which is all the introduction that he makes to his great work: "These are the researches of Herodotus of Halicarnassus, which he publishes in the hope of thereby preserving from decay the remembrance of what men have done, and of preventing the great and wonderful actions of the Greeks and the barbarians from losing their due meed of glory; and, withal, to put on record what were their grounds of feud." [Footnote: Rawlinson's translation.] But while he portrays the military ambition of the Persian rulers, the struggles of the Greeks for liberty, and their final triumph over the Persian power, he also gives us a history of almost all the then known world. "His work begins," says MR. LAWRENCE, "with the causes of the hostility between Persia and Greece, describes the power of Croe'sus, the wonders of Egypt, the expedition of Darius into Scythia, and closes with the immortal war between the allied Greeks and the Persian hosts. To his countrymen the story must have had the intense interest of a national ode or epic. Athens, particularly, must have read with touching ardor the graceful narrative of its early glory; for when Herodotus finished his work the brief period had already passed away. What Æschylus and the other dramatists painted in brief and striking pictures on the stage, Herodotus described with laborious but never tedious minuteness. His pure Ionic diction never wearies, his easy and simple narrative has never lost its interest, and all succeeding ages have united in calling him 'the Father of History.' His fame has advanced with the progress of letters, and has spread over mankind."
The following admirable description of Herodotus and of his writings is from an essay on "History," by LORD MACAULAY:
Herodotus and his Writings.
"Of the romantic historians, Herodotus is the earliest and the best. His animation, his simple-hearted tenderness, his wonderful talent for description and dialogue, and the pure, sweet flow of his language, place him at the head of narrators. He reminds us of a delightful child. There is a grace beyond the reach of affectation in his awkwardness, a malice in his innocence, an intelligence in his nonsense, and an insinuating eloquence in his lisp. We know of no other writer who makes such interest for himself and his book in the heart of the reader. He has written an incomparable book. He has written something better, perhaps, than the best history; but he has not written a really good history; for he is, from the first to the last chapter, an inventor. We do not here refer merely to those gross fictions with which he has been reproached by the critics of later times, but we speak of that coloring which is equally diffused over his whole narrative, and which perpetually leaves the most sagacious reader in doubt what to reject and what to receive. The great events are, no doubt, faithfully related; so, probably, are many of the slighter circumstances, but which of them it is impossible to ascertain. We know there is truth, but we cannot exactly decide where it lies.
"If we may trust to a report not sanctioned, indeed, by writers of high authority, but in itself not improbable, the work of Herodotus was composed not to be read, but to be heard. It was not to the slow circulation of a few copies, which the rich only could possess, that the aspiring author looked for his reward. The great Olympian festival was to witness his triumph. The interest of the narrative and the beauty of the style were aided by the imposing effect of recitation—by the splendor of the spectacle, by the powerful influence of sympathy. A critic who could have asked for authorities in the midst of such a scene must have been of a cold and skeptical nature, and few such critics were there. As was the historian, such were the auditors—inquisitive, credulous, easily moved by the religious awe of patriotic enthusiasm. They were the very men to hear with delight of strange beasts, and birds, and trees; of dwarfs, and giants, and cannibals; of gods whose very names it was impiety to utter; of ancient dynasties which had left behind them monuments surpassing all the works of later times; of towns like provinces; of rivers like seas; of stupendous walls, and temples, and pyramids; of the rites which the Magi performed at daybreak on the tops of the mountains; of the secrets inscribed on the eternal obelisks of Memphis. With equal delight they would have listened to the graceful romances of their own country. They now heard of the exact accomplishment of obscure predictions; of the punishment of climes over which the justice of Heaven had seemed to slumber; of dreams, omens, warnings from the dead; of princesses for whom noble suitors contended in every generous exercise of strength and skill; and of infants strangely preserved from the dagger of the assassin to fulfil high destinies.
"As the narrative approached their own times the interest became still more absorbing. The chronicler had now to tell the story of that great conflict from which Europe dates its intellectual and political supremacy—a story which, even at this distance of time, is the most marvelous and the most touching in the annals of the human race—a story abounding with all that is wild and wonderful; with all that is pathetic and animating; with the gigantic caprices of infinite wealth and despotic power; with the mightier miracles of wisdom, of virtue, and of courage. He told them of rivers dried up in a day, of provinces famished for a meal; of a passage for ships hewn through the mountains; of a road for armies spread upon the waves; of monarchies and commonwealths swept away; of anxiety, of terror, of confusion, of despair! and then of proud and stubborn hearts tried in that extremity of evil and not found wanting; of resistance long maintained against desperate odds; of lives dearly sold when resistance could be maintained no more; of signal deliverance, and of unsparing revenge. Whatever gave a stronger air of reality to a narrative so well calculated to inflame the passions and to flatter national pride, was certain to be favorably received."
THUCYDIDES.
Greater even than Herodotus, in some respects, but entirely different in his style of composition, was the historian Thucydides, who was born in Athens about 471 B.C. In early life he studied in the rhetorical and sophistical schools of his native city; and he seems to have taken some part in the political agitations of the period. In his forty-seventh year he commanded an Athenian fleet that was sent to the relief of Amphip'olis, then besieged by Bras'idas the Spartan. But Thucydides was too late; on his arrival the city had surrendered. His failure to reach there sooner appears to have been caused by circumstances entirely beyond his control, although some English scholars, including GROTE, declare that he was remiss and dilatory, and therefore Deserving of the punishment he received—banishment from Athens. He retired to Scaptes'y-le, a small town in Thrace; and in this secluded spot, removed from the shifting scenes of Grecian life, he devoted himself to the composition of his great work. Tradition asserts that he was assassinated when about eighty years of age, either at Athens or in Thrace.
The history of Thucydides, unfinished at his death, gives an account of nearly twenty-one years of the Peloponnesian war. The author's style is polished, vigorous, philosophical, and sometimes so concise as to be obscure. We are told that even Cicero found some of his sentences almost unintelligible. But, as MAHAFFY says: "Whatever faults of style, whatever transient fashion of involving his thoughts, may be due to a Sophistic education and to the desire of exhibiting depth and acuteness, there cannot be the smallest doubt that in the hands of Thucydides the art of writing history made an extraordinary stride, and attained a degree of perfection which no subsequent Hellenic (and few modern) writers have equaled. If the subject which he selected was really a narrow one, and many of the details trivial, it was nevertheless compassed with extreme difficulty, for it is at all times a hard task to write contemporary history, and more especially so in an age when published documents were scarce, and the art of printing unknown. Moreover, however trivial may be the details of petty military raids, of which an account was yet necessary to the completeness of his record, we cannot but wonder at the lofty dignity with which he has handled every part of the subject. There is not a touch of comedy, not a point of satire, not a word of familiarity throughout the whole book, and we stand face to face with a man who strikes us as strangely un-Attic in his solemn and severe temper." [Footnote: "History of Greek Literature," vol. ii., p. 117.]
The following comparison, evidently a just one, has been made between Thucydides and Herodotus:
Thucydides and Herodotus.
"In comparing the two great historians, it is plain that the mind and talents of each were admirably suited to the work which he took in hand. The extensive field in which Herodotus labored afforded an opportunity for embellishing and illustrating his history with the marvels of foreign lands; while the glorious exploits of a great and free people stemming a tide of barbarian invaders and finally triumphing over them, and the customs and histories of the barbarians with whom they had been at war, and of all other nations whose names were connected with Persia, either by lineage or conquest, were subjects which required the talents of a simple narrator who had such love of truth as not willfully to exaggerate, and such judgment as to select what was best worthy of attention. But Thucydides had a narrower field. The mind of Greece was the subject of his study, as displayed in a single war which was, in its rise, progress, and consequences, the most important which Greece had ever seen. It did not in itself possess that heart-stirring interest which characterizes the Persian war. In it united Greece was not struggling for her liberties against a foreign foe, animated by one common patriotism, inspired by an enthusiastic Jove of liberty; but it presented the sad spectacle of Greece divided against herself, torn by the jealousies of race, and distracted by the animosities of faction.
"The task of Thucydides, therefore, was that of studying the warring passions and antagonistic workings of one mind; and it was one which, in order to become interesting and profitable, demanded that there should be brought to bear upon it the powers of a keen, analytical intellect. To separate history from the traditions and falsehoods with which it had been overlaid, and to give the early history of Greece in its most truthful form; to trace Athenian supremacy from its rise to its ruin, and the growing jealousy of other states, whether inferiors or rivals, to which that supremacy gave rise; to show its connection with the enmities of race and the opposition of politics; to point out what causes led to such wide results; how the insatiable ambitions of Athens, gratifying itself in direct disobedience to the advice of her wise statesman, Pericles, led step by step to her ultimate ruin,—required not a mere narrator of events, however brilliant, but a moral philosopher and a statesman. Such was Thucydides. Although his work shows an advance, in the science of historical composition, over that of Herodotus, and his mind is of a higher, because of a more thoughtful order, yet his fame by no means obscures the glory which belongs to the Father of History. Their walks are different; they can never be considered as rivals, and therefore neither can claim superiority." [Footnote: "Greek and Roman Classical Literature," by Professor R. W. Browne, King's College, London.]