Xenophon will never cease to be a popular figure, and most deservedly; for he added to the full education of an Athenian citizen in general intelligence, in politics, and in art, the special training given by the conversations of Socrates, and the tincture of occasional abstract thinking. But this was only a part of his education. He learned knowledge of the world and of war by travel and exciting campaigns, and completed his admirable and various training by a close intimacy with the best and most aristocratic Spartan life, together with that devotion to field-sports which is so far more gentlemanly and improving than training for athletics. In the whole range of Greek literature he appears the most cultivated of authors, in his external life he combines everything which we desire in the modern gentleman, though his superficiality of judgment and lesser gifts place him far below Thucydides, or even Polybius.
FOOTNOTES:
[92:1] Mr. Sayce will not admit even this, and indeed the habit of appropriating previous work, which Greek literary honesty seems to have allowed, must naturally offend an original inquirer like Mr. Sayce, whose ideas are so often pilfered without acknowledgment. But Greek historians seldom name their authority unless they are about to differ from it, and criticise or censure it. It is for this reason that I distrust the usual enumeration of Herodotus' travels (e.g. Busolt, G. G. ii. 90 sq.), which assumes that whatever lands he describes he must himself have seen. I feel sure that he borrowed a great deal, even a great many bare facts, from other books. But I call attention with pleasure to the suggestion of Holm (ii. 330), who shows that with the extended trade relations of Periclean Athens, information upon Pontus, Persia, and Egypt was of great practical value, and that the story of the ten talents reward given him by the Athenians may point to a real reward for his valuable reports, which were most important to their 'Foreign Office.' Hence the great and immediate popularity of his work. Holm feels as I do, that Herodotus has been underrated, in comparison with Thucydides (G. G. ii. 346).
[96:1] ii. 11, 12, 16-20.
[96:2] I call it the work of Aristotle, in spite of the many critical doubts expressed in England, for I cannot ignore the persistent citations of Plutarch and of many good Greek grammarians and antiquarians, who express no word of doubt, nor do the peculiarities of style seem to me to prove anything more than carelessness in revision, or perhaps the work of a pupil under the master's direction. Cf. § 53.
[98:1] Cicero specially mentions this as a grave defect in Greek democracies, and compares it with the Roman precaution of making the voting by tribes or centuries a formal act at a distinct time. Here is this important and little-known passage (pro Flacco, cap. vii.): 'Nullam enim illi nostri sapientissimi et sanctissimi viri vim concionis esse voluerunt; quae scisceret plebes, aut quae populus juberet, summota concione, distributis partibus, tributim et centuriatim descriptis ordinibus, classibus, aetatibus, auditis auctoribus, re multos dies promulgata et cognita, juberi vetarique voluerunt. Graecorum autem totae respublicae sedentis concionis temeritate administrantur.' The Roman safeguards were, however, quite insufficient, as the course of history proved. The Athenians also had some safeguards, especially in preparing resolutions for the assembly by a previous council; but these too were almost useless.
[101:1] Cf. my Hist. Gk. Lit. ii. 1, chap. 5.
[103:1] Above, § 28.
[106:1] Some of the historians note naïvely enough, that the performance of Xenophon is very wonderful, seeing he had never learned the art of war, or commanded in any previous campaign. Wonderful indeed, but was it a real fact? Holm, who seems to me really awake to the common-sense difficulties which seldom strike learned men, feels this, but accounts for it (iii. 182) in a very surprising way. I may premise that Xenophon is perhaps his favourite authority, whom he defends against all attacks with great spirit. His answer to the question why Xenophon never again commanded an army, is this: He could have, but he would not, because he was exiled from his native city, and despised the career of a mercenary chief! In other words a very ambitious young man, who had deliberately chosen the profession of foreign adventure, when he had succeeded and shown his transcendent powers, stops short because he despises that profession. Is not this most improbable? Had Xenophon brought home with him a really first-rate reputation, he would not have been required to fight the battles of his native city as a mercenary leader: he would very soon have recovered himself in popularity, and have become a leading Athenian. It was not therefore because he could and would not, but because he would and could not, that he retired into obscurity. There is no reason to think he had excited any great or lasting odium at Athens. We hardly know for certain why he was banished.