Two centuries before (510 B. C.), when the Lacedæmonians expelled the despot Hippias and his mercenaries from Athens, there sprang up at once among the Athenian people a forward and devoted patriotism, which made them willing to brave, and competent to avert, all dangers in defence of their newly-acquired liberty.[876] At that time, the enemies by whom they were threatened were Lacedæmonians, Thebans, Æginetans, Chalkidians, and the like (for the Persian force did not present itself until after some interval, and attacked not Athens alone, but Greece collectively). These hostile forces, though superior in number and apparent value to those of Athens, were yet not so disproportionate as to engender hopelessness and despair. Very different were the facts in 307 B. C., when Demetrius Poliorketes removed the Kassandrian mercenaries with their fortress Munychia, and proclaimed Athens free. To maintain that freedom by their own strength—in opposition to the evident superiority of organized force residing in the potentates around, one or more of whom had nearly all Greece under military occupation,—was an enterprise too hopeless to have been attempted even by men such as the combatants of Marathon or the contemporaries of Perikles. “Who would be free, themselves must strike the blow!” but the Athenians had not force enough to strike it; and the liberty proclaimed by Demetrius Poliorketes was a boon dependent upon him for its extent and even for its continuance. The Athenian assembly of that day was held under his army as masters of Attica, as it had been held a few months before under the controlling force of the Phalerean Demetrius together with the Kassandrian governor of Munychia; and the most fulsome votes of adulation proposed in honor of Demetrius Poliorketes by his partisans, though perhaps disapproved by many, would hardly find a single pronounced opponent.
One man, however, there was, who ventured to oppose several of the votes—the nephew of Demosthenes—Demochares; who deserves to be commemorated as the last known spokesman of free Athenian citizenship. We know only that such were his general politics, and that his opposition to the obsequious rhetor Stratokles ended in banishment, four years afterwards.[877] He appears to have discharged the functions of general during this period—to have been active in strengthening the fortifications and military equipment of the city—and to have been employed in occasional missions.[878]
The altered politics of Athens were manifested by impeachment against Demetrius Phalereus and other leading partisans of the late Kassandrian government. He and many others had already gone into voluntary exile; when their trials came on, they were not forthcoming, and all were condemned to death. But all those who remained, and presented themselves for trial, were acquitted;[879] so little was there of reactionary violence on this occasion. Stratokles also proposed a decree, commemorating the orator Lykurgus (who had been dead about seventeen years) by a statue, an honorary inscription, and a grant of maintenance in the Prytaneum to his eldest surviving descendant.[880] Among those who accompanied the Phalerean Demetrius into exile was the rhetor or logographer Deinarchus.
The friendship of this obnoxious Phalerean, and of Kassander also, towards the philosopher Theophrastus, seems to have been one main cause which occasioned the enactment of a restrictive law against the liberty of philosophizing. It was decreed, on the proposition of a citizen named Sophokles, that no philosopher should be allowed to open a school or teach, except under special sanction obtained from a vote of the Senate and people. Such was the disgust and apprehension occasioned by the new restriction, that all the philosophers with one accord left Athens. This spirited protest, against authoritative restriction on the liberty of philosophy and teaching, found responsive sympathy among the Athenians. The celebrity of the schools and professors was in fact the only characteristic mark of dignity still remaining to them—when their power had become extinct, and when even their independence and free constitution had degenerated into a mere name. It was moreover the great temptation for young men, coming from all parts of Greece, to visit Athens. Accordingly, a year had hardly passed, when Philon, impeaching Sophokles the author of the law, under the Graphê Paranomôn, prevailed on the Dikastery to find him guilty, and condemn him to a fine of five talents. The restrictive law being thus repealed, the philosophers returned.[881] It is remarkable that Demochares stood forward as one of its advocates; defending Sophokles against the accuser Philon. From scanty notices remaining of the speech of Demochares, we gather that, while censuring the opinions no less than the characters of Plato and Aristotle, he denounced yet more bitterly their pupils, as being for the most part ambitious, violent, and treacherous men. He cited by name several among them, who had subverted the freedom of their respective cities, and committed gross outrages against their fellow-citizens.[882]
Athenian envoys were despatched to Antigonus in Asia, to testify the gratitude of the people, and communicate the recent complimentary votes. Antigonus not only received them graciously, but sent to Athens, according to the promise made by his son, a large present of 150,000 medimni of wheat, with timber sufficient for 100 ships. He at the same time directed Demetrius to convene at Athens a synod of deputies from the allied Grecian cities, where resolutions might be taken for the common interests of Greece.[883] It was his interest at this moment to raise up a temporary self-sustaining authority in Greece, for the purpose of upholding the alliance with himself, during the absence of Demetrius; whom he was compelled to summon into Asia with his army—requiring his services for the war against Ptolemy in Syria and Cyprus.
The following three years were spent by Demetrius—1. In victorious operations near Cyprus, defeating Ptolemy and making himself master of that island; after which Antigonus and Demetrius assumed the title of kings, and the example was followed by Ptolemy, in Egypt—by Lysimachus, in Thrace—and by Seleukus in Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and Syria[884]—thus abolishing even the titular remembrance of Alexander’s family. 2. In an unsuccessful invasion of Egypt by land and sea, repulsed with great loss. 3. In the siege of Rhodes. The brave and intelligent citizens of this island resisted for more than a year the most strenuous attacks and the most formidable siege-equipments of Demetrius Poliorketes. All their efforts however would have been vain had they not been assisted by large reinforcements and supplies from Ptolemy, Lysimachus, and Kassander. Such are the conditions under which alone even the most resolute and intelligent Greeks can now retain their circumscribed sphere of autonomy. The siege was at length terminated by a compromise; the Rhodians submitted to enrol themselves as allies of Demetrius, yet under proviso not to act against Ptolemy.[885] Towards the latter they carried their grateful devotion so far, as to erect a temple to him, called the Ptolemæum, and to worship him (under the sanction of the oracle of Ammon) as a god.[886] Amidst the rocks and shoals through which Grecian cities were now condemned to steer, menaced on every side by kings more powerful than themselves, and afterwards by the giant-republic of Rome—the Rhodians conducted their political affairs with greater prudence and dignity than any other Grecian city.
Shortly after the departure of Demetrius from Greece to Cyprus, Kassander and Polysperchon renewed the war in Peloponnesus and its neighborhood.[887] We make out no particulars respecting this war. The Ætolians were in hostility with Athens, and committed annoying depredations.[888] The fleet of Athens, repaired or increased by the timber received from Antigonus, was made to furnish thirty quadriremes to assist Demetrius in Cyprus, and was employed in certain operations near the island of Amorgos, wherein it suffered defeat.[889] But we can discover little respecting the course of the war, except that Kassander gained ground upon the Athenians, and that about the beginning of 303 B. C., he was blockading or threatening to blockade, Athens. The Athenians invoked the aid of Demetrius Poliorketes, who, having recently concluded an accommodation with the Rhodians, came again across from Asia, with a powerful fleet and army, to Aulis in Bœotia.[890] He was received at Athens with demonstrations of honor equal or superior to those which had marked his previous visit. He seems to have passed a year and a half, partly at Athens, partly in military operations carried successfully over many parts of Greece. He compelled the Bœotians to evacuate the Eubœan city of Chalkis, and to relinquish their alliance with Kassander. He drove that prince out of Attica—expelled his garrisons from the two frontier fortresses of Attica,—Phylê and Panaktum—and pursued him as far as Thermopylæ. He captured, or obtained by bribing the garrisons, the important towns of Corinth, Argos, and Sikyon; mastering also Ægium, Bura, all the Arcadian towns (except Mantineia), and various other towns in Peloponnesus.[891] He celebrated, as president, the great festival of the Heræa at Argos; on which occasion he married Deidameia, sister of Pyrrhus, the young king of Epirus. He prevailed on the Sikyonians to transfer to a short distance the site of their city, conferring upon the new city the name of Demetrias.[892] At a Grecian synod, convened in Corinth under his own letters of invitation, he received by acclamation the appointment of leader or Emperor of the Greeks, as it had been conferred on Philip and Alexander. He even extended his attacks as far as Leukas and Korkyra. The greater part of Greece seems to have been either occupied by his garrisons, or enlisted among his subordinates.
So much was Kassander intimidated by these successes, that he sent envoys to Asia, soliciting peace from Antigonus; who, however, elate and full of arrogance, refused to listen to any terms short of surrender at discretion. Kassander, thus driven to despair, renewed his applications to Lysimachus, Ptolemy, and Seleukus. All these princes felt equally menaced by the power and dispositions of Antigonus—and all resolved upon an energetic combination to put him down.[893]
After uninterrupted prosperity in Greece, throughout the summer of 302 B. C., Demetrius returned from Leukas to Athens, about the month of September, near the time of the Eleusinian mysteries.[894] He was welcomed by festive processions, hymns, pæans, choric dances, and bacchanalian odes of joyous congratulation. One of these hymns is preserved, sung by a chorus of Ithyphalli—masked revellers, with their heads and arms encircled by wreaths,—clothed in white tunics, and in feminine garments reaching almost to the feet.[895]
This song is curious, as indicating the hopes and fears prevalent among Athenians of that day, and as affording a measure of their self-appreciation. It is moreover among the latest Grecian documents that we possess, bearing on actual and present reality. The poet, addressing Demetrius as a god, boasts that two of the greatest and best-beloved of all divine beings are visiting Attica at the same moment—Demeter (coming for the season of her mysteries), and Demetrius, son of Poseidon and Aphroditê. “To thee we pray (the hymn proceeds); for other gods are either afar off—or have no ears—or do not exist—or care nothing about us; but thee we see before us, not in wood or marble, but in real presence. First of all things, establish peace; for thou hast the power—and chastise that Sphinx who domineers, not merely over Thebes, but over all Greece—the Ætolian, who, (like the old Sphinx) rushes from his station on the rock to snatch and carry away our persons, and against whom we cannot fight. At all times, the Ætolians robbed their neighbors; but now, they rob far as well as near.[896]”