Problems in Greek history

by J. P. Mahaffy

Money considerations

acted upon both extremes.

§ 83. Moreover, both the extreme parties had strong pecuniary interests to stimulate them. The party which promoted complete submission to Rome were the people of property, to whom a settled state of things without constitutional agitations or sudden war-contributions afforded the only

chance of retaining what they possessed. Rome had never favoured the needy mob in her subject cities, but had always ruled them through the responsible and moneyed classes. Roman dominion therefore meant at least peace and safety for the rich. The grinding exactions of Roman prætor and Roman publican were as yet unknown to them. The Nationalist party, on the other hand, consisted of the needy and discontented, who expected, if allowed to exercise their political power, to break down the monopolies of the rich, and, in any case, to make reputation and money by the practice of politics; for, as I have shown above, and as is not strange to our own day, politics had become distinctly a lucrative profession. These people's hope of gain, as well as their local importance, would vanish with full subjection to Rome; and this was a strong motive, even though in many it may have only been auxiliary to the real patriotism which burned at the thought of the extinction of national independence.

Exaggerated statements on both sides.

The Separatists would not tolerate separation from themselves.

Democratic tyranny.

The debate soon went beyond the stage of rational argument or the possibility of rational persuasion. To the Nationalist, the Romanizing aristocrat or moneyed man was a traitor, sacrificing his country's liberties for his mess of potage, grovelling and touting for Roman favour, copying Roman manners, and sending his sons to be educated in Roman ways. To the advocate of union with Rome, the so-called Nationalist was a needy and

dishonest adventurer, using the cry of patriotism and of nationality to cloak personal greed, socialistic schemes, and hatred of what was orderly and respectable. If he succeeded, his so-called liberty would be used in coercing and plundering the dissentients; and, after all, such stormy petrels in politics must be quite unfit to form any stable government. If any portion of the Peloponnesus asserted its right to several liberty, no politicians would have recourse to more violent coercion than these advocates of national independence. They protested against enforced union with Rome: they would be the first to promote enforced union with themselves, and carry it through in bloody earnest. This was actually what happened during the last despairing struggle. The coercion practised by the last presidents of the Leagues, the violent Nationalists who forced the nation into war, was tyrannous and cruel beyond description.

But of course the issue was certain; and with the reeking smoke of the ruins of Corinth closes the history of Greece, as most historians, even of wider views, have understood it.