In the view, however, of raising a state without the peninsula, to balance the power and curb the ambition of Athens, they formed a close alliance with the Thebans, and willingly seconded their attempt to recover that supremacy in Bceotia, which they had been accustomed to claim before the event of the Persian war. But the Athenians under I\lyronides speedily regained the influence which they had lost by their defeat at Tanagra ; a, d all Bceotia, with the exception of Thebes, was brought either into their alli ance, or under their dominion. Burdened at length by the variety of their military operations, and even by the extent of their conquests, they were disposed to enter Into with their Peloponnesian adversaries; and by the good offices of Cimon, whom they recalled from exile, and who had always been greatly esteemed at Lacedemon, a truce for five years was concluded be tween the rival powers. But after the death of that tinguished commander, who had uniformly exerted him self to divert the military spirit of the Greeks from in ternal wars, hostilities were again renewed. The Athe nians, however, being hard pressed, and even invaded by the Peloponnesian confederates, as well as encumbered by the numerous islands and colonies subject to their empire, a second time sought an accommodation ; and a truce was concluded for the space of thirty years, upon terms by no means advantageous • to their influence. But the con stitution of Greece, composed of so many small and in dependent states, was unfavourable to a long continuance of general tranquillity. Its governments were so distinct, that no common authority could prevent the occurrence of partial wars ; and yet so connected, that war in any part always endangered the peace of the whole. This was more especially the consequence of a practice, which had become universal among the weaker states, to provide for their pro tection by courting.the alliance, or rather acknowledging the dominion, of one of the two leading republics of Lacede mon or Athens. These two rival powers also differed con siderably in the political principles which they respectively favoured, the former being generally the patroness of aris tocracy, and the latter of democracy. Hence their influence was extended, according as one or other of these opposite factions prevailed in the different states ; or rather, ac cording as their arms were severally crowned with suc cess, the party to which they were friendly gained the as cendency, and succeeded in bringing the state which it ruled to the side of Sparta or of Athens. This constant rivalship, never wholly dormant, and kept in continual ex citement by the frequent quarrels of the minor common wealths, at length gave rise to the long and bloody con test of the Peloponnesian war. The Athenians, having assisted the Corcyrxans against the Corinthians, were for mally accused by the latter people, joined by many other complainants, of having broken the truce, and insulted the Peloponnesian confederacy. An assembly of deputies from the different states, of which that confederacy was composed, having met at Sparta, a great majority de cided for an immediate recourse to arms ; and even the historian Thucydides admits, in the most explicit terms, that a general sentiment of indignation had been excited among a large portion of the Grecian people, by the ar bitrary and oppressive sway of the Athenian republic. See ARISTIDES, &c.
The two hostile confederacies, though very differently composed, divided between them very equally the force of the Greek nation. All the Peloponnesian states, except the Argians, who remained neutral, joined the Lacede monians. In Northern Greece, the Megarians, Bceotians, Locrians, Phocians, &e. formed a part of the same alli ance; and external assistance was expected from the king of Persia, and the Grecian colonies of Italy and Sicily. The Athenians had a few allies, and some of them not very zealously inclined to their cause. The princi pal were the Thessalians, and Acarnanians, and the islands of Corcyra, Zacinthus, Chios, and Lesbos. But all the other islands of the /Egean Sea, except Melos and Thera, and all the wealthy Grecian cities of Thrace, of the Hellespont, and of Asia Minor, were tributary subjects of Athens, and entirely subject to its controul. The Spartan king Archidamus, who had the chief command of the Peloponnesian forces, amounting to 60,000 men, advanced slowly to the invasion of Attica ; but, before actually commencing hostilities, he once more proposed the terms of accommodation, which the Athenians had formerly rejected. The celebrated Peri cles, who had long directed the councils of Athens, and who is supposed to have plunged his country into war, for the ptirpose of prolonging his personal influence in the state, easily induced his fellow citizens to refuse all farther negotiation ; but all his extraordinary talents were neces sary to persuade the Athenian people to adopt measures of defence, to which they were reduced by the power of their enemies. Abandoning their country to the ravages of the hostile army, they were compelled to secure them selves and their effects within the walls of the metropolis, filling the temples, the turrets of the ramparts, the tombs even, and the lowest hovels, with their wives and children. Pericles, reproached and threatened as the principal author of their calamities, and vehemently urged to meet the in vaders in the field, directed all his attention to the defence of the city and the preservation of good order. The La. cedemonians and theft allies, having exhausted the means of subsistence, and loaded themselves with plunder, return ed to Peloponnesus, and dispersed to their respective cities. The Athenian fleet, in the mean time, ravaged the coasts of Peloponnesus, taking, in its return, the island of /Egina ; and, towards the end of autumn, Pericles, with the whole of the land forces, laid waste the neighbouring territory of Megara. At the commencement of the second summer, the confederates under Archidamus again entered and ravaged the country of Attica ; while a more dreadful scourge, a pestilential fever, resembling the modern dis ease of the plague, raged in the crowded streets of the city. The war, however, was not arrested by this awful calamity; and, for several years, was regularly conducted in the same manner. The Peloponnesian states were so superior in land forces, that they annually invaded the territories of the Athenians, who could not risk a general action without exposing themselves to certain ruin ; yet the confederates were, on the other hand, so ignorant of the art of attack ing fortified places, that they could make no impression upon a city like Athens, defended by 30,000 men, and supplied by a powerful fleet. The war thus continued to rage, for many years, with nearly the same success, and equal losses on both sides. It consisted in a succession of partial engagements, hasty excursions, and distant sieges, which never affected the main object in view, or brought the contest one step nearer to a conclusion. Par taking also in a great degree of the nature of a civil war, it was carried on with a spirit of ferocity rarely exemplified among civilized nations ; and, though the time of its con tinuance, the very age of Socrates himself, was an era, at least in the history of Athens, characterised by the high perfection to which arts and sciences, philosophy and refinement, had been brought ; yet, in no period of Grecian history, were more atrocious barbarities com mitted. Every transaction has been minutely recorded by the Athenian,historians, Thucydides and Xenophon, who were contemporary with most of the events which they describe ; and our account must be greatly compressed, not from the scarcity, but from the abundance of materials. The league, headed by the Athenians, was almost entirely under their command ; while that of Pelopotmesus, being composed of independent states, was continually changing in its component parts, and liable every instant to he ut terly dissolved. Had the Athenian people therefore stea dily adhered to the plan of Pericles, and, renouncing every idea of conquest, confined themselves to a defensive war by land, and offensive operations by sea, they might ulti mately have triumphed over their numerous opponents ; and, at least, have inflicted more serious injuries than they could have received. From the excessive diversity and
disproportion of the forces engaged in the contest, the One over-running the land, and the other scouring the seas and coasts, the war was inevitably spun out to an indefinite length ; and often were both parties, wearied of their ac cumulated sufferings, desirous of peace ; but • proposals for negotiation were as often prevented by the vain ambi tion of Cleon, who had succeeded, at the death of Peri des, to the direction of the Athenian councils, and by the warlike spirit of Brasidas, the bravest of the Spartan lead ers. After their death, a truce was concluded for the space of fifty years; and every thing was restored to the same situation in which it had stood at the commencement of hostilities: but mutual hatred, and boundless ambition, had acquired such hold of the minds of the principal men on all sides, that the appearance of concord was of short duration. New leagues and dissensions arose, which led to reciprocal recriminations and partial hostilities ; but it was not till the expiration of nearly seven years, that they again came to an open rupture. Athens was the aggres sor, and the ambition of Alcibiades was the sole cause of the renewal of hostilities. This celebrated character, with all his accomplishments and talents, was guided by princi ples so inveterately vicious, that he alone may be charged with having accelerated the ruin of the Athenian state, and completed the corruption of its citizens. He per suaded the people, without any other reason, except that the city Egesta in Sicily had solicited the assistance of the Athenians to undertake the conquest of that island ; but, scarcely had the expedition, in which he was appoint ed a commander, commenced its operations, when he was recalled to stand his trial upon a charge of impiety. Aware of the caprices of his countrymen, he took refuge in Pe loponnesus; and, enraged by the sentences pronounced against him in his absence, he instigated the Lacedemo nians to assist the Syracusans, and to attack the Athenians, while their army was engaged in the remote and romantic enterprize which himself had planned. The Sicilian ex pedition terminated in the most disastrous manner ; and almost the whole of the Athenian army was destroyed or taken captive. The Lacedemonians, supported by a pow erful confederacy, and assisted even by the Persian viceroys, invaded Attica, blockaded the city of Athens, and would speedily have terminated the war by its reduction. But Alcibiades, having been expelled from Sparta on account of his licentious practices, exerted himself to detach their Persian allies, and to retrieve the falling hopes of his coun try. Recalled by the army, and raised to the chief com mand by the unanimous acclamations of the people, he re covered many of the lost colonies, defeated the fleet of the confederates, and so alarmed the Lacedemonians, that they were ready to have treated for peace. But the Athenians, intoxicated with success, prolonged the war ; and, insen sible to their interest, again threw away the instrument of their victories. Their fleet having sustained a trifling loss while Alcibiades was absent, and employed in levying con tributions in Iowa, for the support of his forces, he was instantly disgraced by the fickle voice of the populace ; and the power of Peloponnesus again acquired the ascen dancy. The confederates, taught by experience, had ex erted themselves to increase the number of their ships, and had at length succeeded in attaining also a portion of that maritime skill, which had hitherto given to the Athenians so decided a superiority by sea. The Athenian navy, how ever, trusting to their long acknowledged eminence, and elated by a victory which they had gained over the Spar tan fleet at Arginusa, near Lesbos, despised their enemies, and neglected all ordinary precautions, with unexampled imprudence. Lysander, the ablest of the Lacedemonian r4enerals, having succeeded to the command of the allied fleet, and taken the city of Lampsacus upon the coast of the llellespont, resolved to avail himself of that self-con fidence which guided the councils of the Athenian cap tains. In order to increase their insolent security., he re peatedly declined battle, which they daily offered him, but kept his own crew prepared for action at a moment's warning. Having learned that they regularly drew their fleet ashore on the open beach at Aigospotami, on the op posite coast, not more than two miles from his own station, and then suffered the soldiers and crews to disperse over the adjoining country in quest of lodgings and provisions ; he easily found means to surprise them in this unguarded condition, made himself master of their whole fleet ex cept nine galleys, and took prisoners the greater part of their forces, by which it had been manned. A striking instance now occurred of that savage barbarity, with which the different powers in the Peloponnesian war were gene rally chargeable. The Athenians had resolved, in their assurance of victory, to cut off the right hand of every prisoner whom they should capture ; and this intended cruelty, with many similar acts which they had perpetra ted, was immediately requited by'a general massacre of the captives at Aigospotami. Lysander, with his own hand, cut down their general Philocles, after reproaching him with having first set the example among the Greeks of such violations of the laws of war ; and, upon this sig nal, about 3000 Athenian citizens were butchered in cold blood, by the allied troops. The Lacedemonian comman der, now completely master of the seas, speedily reduced the principal colonies and dependencies of Athens ; and then hastened, with a fleet of 200 galleys, to blockade the port of that devoted city, while the land forces of the con federates, at the same time, surrounded its walls. No as sault was attempted, and its reduction was left entirely to the sure operation of famine. The haughty and turbulent citizens discovered not even the courage of despair in their defence ; but were solely anxious to avert the sen tence of utter extermination, with which they were threat ened by some of the allied states. The Lacedemonians, however, probably as much from policy as generosity, se cured for them more favourable terms, and saved their persons from servitude and slaughter. But it was deter. mined, as a measure absolutely necessary to the safety and repose of Greece, that their tyrannical spirit should be ef fectually humbled, and their power as a state entirely bro ken. They were spared upon the following conditions ; that all their ships of war should he surrendered, except 12 ; that the long walls and the fortifications of Peirxus should be destroyed ; that all exiles and fugitives should be restored to the rights of the city ; that the Athenians should hold always as friends or enemies those states, who were the allies or the adversaries of Lacedemon .; and should be ready to attend the Spartan power, by sea or land, as they might receive orders. These terms being accepted, the Spat tan fleet entered the Reirxus, and the army took possession of the walls. The fortifications, which had been condemned, were instantly thrown down, to the sound of military music, and their demolition cele brated with triumph as an xra of recovered freedom to Greece. The popular assembly was abolished; the go vernment changed from democracy to oligarchy ; and thirty magistrates were appointed to form the new admi nistration of the commonwealth. Such was the termina tion of the Peloponnesian war, in its twenty-seventh year ; and Lacedemon, now in alliance with Persia, having again become the leading power in Greece, the aristocratical in terest reigned paramount in almost every Grecian state. See ALCIBIADES, Stc.