Of Solon and Theognis I have spoken in former chapters. They reproduce in part the moralizing vein of Simonidês, though with a strong admixture of personal feeling and a direct application to passing events. The mixture of political with social morality, which we find in both, marks their more advanced age: Solon bears in this respect the same relation to Simonidês, as his contemporary Alkæus bears to Archilochus. His poems, as far as we can judge by the fragments remaining, appear to have been short occasional effusions,—with the exception of the epic poem respecting the submerged island of Atlantis; which he began towards the close of his life, but never finished. They are elegiac, trimeter iambic, and trochaic tetrameter: in his hands certainly neither of these metres can be said to have any special or separate character. If the poems of Solon are short, those of Theognis are much shorter, and are indeed so much broken (as they stand in our present collection), as to read like separate epigrams or bursts of feeling, which the poet had not taken the trouble to incorporate in any definite scheme or series. They form a singular mixture of maxim and passion,—of general precept with personal affection towards the youth Kyrnus,—which surprises us if tried by the standard of literary composition, but which seems a very genuine manifestation of an impoverished exile’s complaints and restlessness. What remains to us of Phokylidês, another of the gnomic poets nearly contemporary with Solon, is nothing more than a few maxims in verse,—couplets, with the name of the author in several cases embodied in them.
Amidst all the variety of rhythmical and metrical innovations which have been enumerated, the ancient epic continued to be recited by the rhapsodes as before, and some new epical compositions were added to the existing stock: Eugammon of Kyrênê, about the 50th Olympiad, (580 B. C.) appears to be the last of the series. At Athens, especially, both Solon and Peisistratus manifested great solicitude as well for the recitation as for the correct preservation of the Iliad. Perhaps its popularity may have been diminished by the competition of so much lyric and choric poetry, more showy and striking in its accompaniments, as well as more changeful in its rhythmical character. Whatever secondary effect, however, this newer species of poetry may have derived from such helps, its primary effect was produced by real intellectual or poetical excellence,—by the thoughts, sentiment, and expression, not by the accompaniment. For a long time the musical composer and the poet continued generally to be one and the same person; and besides those who have acquired sufficient distinction to reach posterity, we cannot doubt that there were many known only to their own contemporaries. But with all of them the instrument and the melody constituted only the inferior part of that which was known by the name of music,—altogether subordinate to the “thoughts that breathe and words that burn.”[181] Exactness and variety of rhythmical pronunciation gave to the latter their full effect upon a delicate ear; but such pleasure of the ear was ancillary to the emotion of mind arising out of the sense conveyed. Complaints are made by the poets, even so early as 500 B. C., that the accompaniment was becoming too prominent. But it was not until the age of the comic poet Aristophanês, towards the end of the fifth century B. C., that the primitive relation between the instrumental accompaniment and the words was really reversed,—and loud were the complaints to which it gave rise;[182] the performance of the flute or harp then became more elaborate, showy, and overpowering, while the words were so put together as to show off the player’s execution. I notice briefly this subsequent revolution for the purpose of setting forth, by contrast, the truly intellectual character of the original lyric and choric poetry of Greece; and of showing how much the vague sentiment arising from mere musical sound was lost in the more definite emotion, and in the more lasting and reproductive combinations, generated by poetical meaning.
The name and poetry of Solon, and the short maxims, or sayings, of Phokylidês, conduct us to the mention of the Seven Wise Men of Greece. Solon was himself one of the seven, and most if not all of them were poets, or composers in verse.[183] To most of them is ascribed also an abundance of pithy repartees, together with one short saying, or maxim, peculiar to each, serving as a sort of distinctive motto;[184] indeed, the test of an accomplished man about this time was his talent for singing or reciting poetry, and for making smart and ready answers. Respecting this constellation of wise men,—who in the next century of Grecian history, when philosophy came to be a matter of discussion and argumentation, were spoken of with great eulogy,—all the statements are confused, in part even contradictory. Neither the number, nor the names, are given by all authors alike. Dikæarchus numbered ten, Hermippus seventeen: the names of Solon the Athenian, Thalês the Milesian, Pittakus the Mitylenean, and Bias the Prienean, were comprised in all the lists,—and the remaining names as given by Plato[185] were, Kleobulus of Lindus in Rhodes, Myson of Chênæ, and Cheilon of Sparta. By others, however, the names are differently stated: nor can we certainly distribute among them the sayings, or mottoes, upon which in later days the Amphiktyons conferred the honor of inscription in the Delphian temple: Know thyself,—Nothing too much,—Know thy opportunity,—Suretyship is the precursor of ruin. Bias is praised as an excellent judge, and Myson was declared by the Delphian oracle to be the most discreet man among the Greeks, according to the testimony of the satirical poet Hippônax. This is the oldest testimony (540 B. C.) which can be produced in favor of any of the seven; but Kleobulus of Lindus, far from being universally extolled, is pronounced by the poet Simonidês to be a fool.[186] Dikæarchus, however, justly observed, that these seven or ten persons were not wise men, or philosophers, in the sense which those words bore in his day, but persons of practical discernment in reference to man and society,[187]—of the same turn of mind as their contemporary the fabulist Æsop, though not employing the same mode of illustration. Their appearance forms an epoch in Grecian history, inasmuch as they are the first persons who ever acquired an Hellenic reputation grounded on mental competency apart from poetical genius or effect,—a proof that political and social prudence was beginning to be appreciated and admired on its own account. Solon, Pittakus, Bias, and Thalês, were all men of influence—the first two even men of ascendency,[188]—in their respective cities. Kleobulus was despot of Lindus, and Periander (by some numbered among the seven) of Corinth. Thalês stands distinguished as the earliest name in physical philosophy, with which the other contemporary wise men are not said to have meddled; their celebrity rests upon moral, social, and political wisdom exclusively, which came into greater honor as the ethical feeling of the Greeks improved and as their experience became enlarged.
In these celebrated names we have social philosophy in its early and infantine state,—in the shape of homely sayings or admonitions, either supposed to be self-evident, or to rest upon some great authority divine or human, but neither accompanied by reasons nor recognizing any appeal to inquiry and discussion as the proper test of their rectitude. From such unsuspecting acquiescence, the sentiment to which these admonitions owe their force, we are partially liberated even in the poet Simonidês of Keôs, who (as before alluded to) severely criticizes the song of Kleobulus as well as its author. The half-century which followed the age of Simonidês (the interval between about 480-430 B. C.) broke down that sentiment more and more, by familiarizing the public with argumentative controversy in the public assembly, the popular judicature, and even on the dramatic stage. And the increased self-working of the Grecian mind, thus created, manifested itself in Sokratês, who laid open all ethical and social doctrines to the scrutiny of reason, and who first awakened among his countrymen that love of dialectics which never left them,—an analytical interest in the mental process of inquiring out, verifying, proving, and expounding truth. To this capital item of human progress, secured through the Greeks—and through them only—to mankind generally, our attention will be called at a later period of the history; at present, it is only mentioned in contrast with the naked, dogmatical laconism of the Seven Wise Men, and with the simple enforcement of the early poets: a state in which morality has a certain place in the feelings,—but no root, even among the superior minds, in the conscious exercise of reason.
The interval between Archilochus and Solon (660-580 B. C.) seems, as has been remarked in my former volume, to be the period in which writing first came to be applied to Greek poems,—to the Homeric poems among the number; and shortly after the end of that period, commences the era of compositions without metre or prose. The philosopher Pherekydês of Syros, about 550 B. C., is called by some the earliest prose-writer; but no prose-writer for a considerable time afterwards acquired any celebrity,—seemingly none earlier than Hekatæus of Milêtus,[189] about 510-490 B. C.,—prose being a subordinate and ineffective species of composition, not always even perspicuous, but requiring no small practice before the power was acquired of rendering it interesting.[190] Down to the generation preceding Sokratês, the poets continued to be the grand leaders of the Greek mind: until then, nothing was taught to youth except to read, to remember, to recite musically and rhythmically, and to comprehend poetical composition. The comments of preceptors, addressed to their pupils, may probably have become fuller and more instructive, but the text still continued to be epic or lyric poetry. We must recollect also that these poets, so enunciated, were the best masters for acquiring a full command of the complicated accent and rhythm of the Greek language,—essential to an educated man in ancient times, and sure to be detected if not properly acquired. Not to mention the Choliambist Hippônax, who seems to have been possessed with the devil of Archilochus, and in part also with his genius,—Anakreon, Ibykus, Pindar, Bacchylidês, Simonidês, and the dramatists of Athens, continue the line of eminent poets without intermission. After the Persian war, the requirements of public speaking created a class of rhetorical teachers, while the gradual spread of physical philosophy widened the range of instruction: so that prose composition, for speech or for writing, occupied a larger and larger share of the attention of men, and was gradually wrought up to high perfection, such as we see for the first time in Herodotus. But before it became thus improved, and acquired that style which was the condition of wide-spread popularity, we may be sure that it had been silently used as a means of recording information; and that neither the large mass of geographical matter contained in the Periegêsis of Hekatæus, nor the map first prepared by his contemporary, Anaximander, could have been presented to the world, without the previous labors of unpretending prose writers, who set down the mere results of their own experience. The acquisition of prose-writing, commencing as it does about the age of Peisistratus, is not less remarkable as an evidence of past, than as a means of future, progress.
Of that splendid genius in sculpture and architecture, which shone forth in Greece after the Persian invasion, the first lineaments only are discoverable between 600-560 B. C., in Corinth, Ægina, Samos, Chios, Ephesus, etc.,—enough, however, to give evidence of improvement and progress. Glaukus of Chios is said to have discovered the art of welding iron, and Rhœkus, or his son Theodôrus of Samos, the art of casting copper or brass in a mould: both these discoveries, as far as can be made out, appear to date a little before 600 B. C.[191] The primitive memorial, erected in honor of a god, did not even pretend to be an image, but was often nothing more than a pillar, a board, a shapeless stone, a post, etc., fixed so as to mark and consecrate the locality, and receiving from the neighborhood respectful care and decoration, as well as worship. Sometimes there was a real statue, though of the rudest character, carved in wood; and the families of carvers,—who, from father to son, exercised this profession, represented in Attica by the name of Dædalus, and in the Ægina by the name of Smilis,—adhered long, with strict exactness, to the consecrated type of each particular god. Gradually, the wish grew up to change the material, as well as to correct the rudeness, of such primitive idols; sometimes the original wood was retained as the material, but covered in part with ivory or gold,—in other cases, marble or metal was substituted. Dipœnos and Skyllis of Krête acquired renown as workers in marble, about the 50th Olympiad (580 B. C.), and from them downwards a series of names may be traced, more or less distinguished; moreover, it seems about the same period that the earliest temple-offerings, in works of art, properly so called, commence,—the golden statue of Zeus, and the large carved chest, dedicated by the Kypselids of Corinth at Olympia.[192] The pious associations, however, connected with the old type were so strong, that the hand of the artist was greatly restrained in dealing with statues of the gods. It was in statues of men, especially in those of the victors at Olympia and other sacred games, that genuine ideas of beauty were first aimed at and in part attained, from whence they passed afterwards to the statues of the gods. Such statues of the athletes seem to commence somewhere between Olympiad 53-58, (568-548 B. C.).
Nor is it until the same interval of time (between 600-550 B. C.) that we find any traces of these architectural monuments, by which the more important cities in Greece afterwards attracted to themselves so much renown. The two greatest temples in Greece known to Herodotus were, the Artemision at Ephesus, and the Heræon at Samos: the former of these seems to have been commenced, by the Samian Theodorus, about 600 B. C.,—the latter, begun by the Samian Rhœkus, can hardly be traced to any higher antiquity. The first attempts to decorate Athens by such additions proceeded from Peisistratus and his sons, near the same time. As far as we can judge, too, in the absence of all direct evidence, the temples of Pæstum in Italy and Selinus in Sicily seem to fall in this same century. Of painting, during these early centuries, nothing can be affirmed; it never at any time reached the same perfection as sculpture, and we may presume that its years of infancy were at least equally rude.
The immense development of Grecian art subsequently, and the great perfection of Grecian artists, are facts of great importance in the history of the human race. And in regard to the Greeks themselves, they not only acted powerfully on the taste of the people, but were also valuable indirectly as the common boast of Hellenism, and as supplying one bond of fraternal sympathy as well as of mutual pride, among its widely-dispersed sections. It is the paucity and weakness of these bonds which renders the history of Greece, prior to 560 B. C., little better than a series of parallel, but isolated threads, each attached to a separate city; and that increased range of joint Hellenic feeling and action, upon which we shall presently enter, though arising doubtless in great measure from new and common dangers threatening many cities at once,—also springs in part from those other causes which have been enumerated in this chapter as acting on the Grecian mind. It proceeds from the stimulus applied to all the common feelings in religion, art, and recreation,—from the gradual formation of national festivals, appealing in various ways to tastes and sentiments which animated every Hellenic bosom,—from the inspirations of men of genius, poets, musicians, sculptors, architects, who supplied more or less in every Grecian city, education for the youth, training for the chorus, and ornament for the locality,—from the gradual expansion of science, philosophy, and rhetoric, during the coming period of this history, which rendered one city the intellectual capital of Greece, and brought to Isokratês and Plato pupils from the most distant parts of the Grecian world. It was this fund of common tastes, tendencies, and aptitudes, which caused the social atoms of Hellas to gravitate towards each other, and which enabled the Greeks to become something better and greater than an aggregate of petty disunited communities like the Thracians or Phrygians. And the creation of such common, extra-political Hellenism, is the most interesting phenomenon which the historian has to point out in the early period now under our notice. He is called upon to dwell upon it the more forcibly, because the modern reader has generally no idea of national union without political union,—an association foreign to the Greek mind. Strange as it may seem to find a song-writer put forward as an active instrument of union among his fellow-Hellens, it is not the less true, that those poets, whom we have briefly passed in review, by enriching the common language, and by circulating from town to town either in person or in their compositions, contributed to fan the flame of Pan-Hellenic patriotism at a time when there were few circumstances to coöperate with them, and when the causes tending to perpetuate isolation seemed in the ascendant.