The most famous orators,* of whom any fragments have been preserved, are the following: Gorgias Leontinus, (d. 398) pupil of Empedocles, who excited, by the elegance of his speeches, the attention of the Attic public, and opened a sophistical institution. Two of his speeches are extant: the praise of Helena, and the defence of Palamedes, the authenticity of which has been disputed by F. Orsini.t Antiphon Rhamnusius, (b. 480, d. 411) pupil of the orator Sophilus, and tutor of Thucydides; he was a very active statesman, but was ruined and condemned to death by Theramenes; he is said to have been the first who reduced to writing the precepts of the rhetorical art, and cultivated judicial eloquence; he also composed speeches for others, for payment; his exhibition of his subject is remarkable for ingenuity and persuasion. Of sixty speeches, twenty-five of which Cæcilius declared forgeries, fifteen are extant, twelve of which are sophistical defences in criminal cases. His composition on the theory of rhetoric is lost; many fragments of his still exist. Andocides, (b. 468, d. 397) an aristocrat, whose interference in state affairs, was repaid with exile, is known to us by four speeches; in two of them, he defends himself against imputed crimes; the third is directed against Aleibiades, and the fourth treats of the peace with Sparta; they are of great historical importance, and his style and representation are simple. Lysias, (b. 458, d. 379) a friend of Socrates, seems seldom to have spoken publicly, and was more employed in composing for others; of four hundred and twenty-five, or two hundred and thirty true speeches, thirty-four in a corrupted text, and many fragments have been preserved. Their characteristics are Attic elegance, and nicety, and much softness, wherefore Socrates rejected the speech which he composed for his defence. Isocrates (b. 436, d. 338) is renowned equally as an instructor and a pattern; his works are full of those sacred and patriotic feelngs, which would not permit him to survive the unhappy day of Cheronea; he was too timid to appear publicly; he gave instruction at Chios and Athens. We possess twenty-one speeches of his, of which, the publicly delivered panegyrics and panathenaica are the most celebrated. His arrangement is simple, and without pretension; his display of his subject careful, and answering the * In the Alexandrian canon, Antiphon, Andocides, Lysias, Isocrates, Isæus, Demosthenes, Æschines, Hyperides, Lycurgus, and Dinarchus. Reiske: Lexicon technologiæ Græcorum rhetoricæ Ernesti. + Reiske, b. 8: Fabr. B. G. vol. ii. p. 805. requisites of art; his sentences, in their construction, are complete, full sounding and euphonious; his language is spotless; ardour and force are sometimes wanting, but never correct ness. Of Isocrates' contemporary, Alcidamas, whom the ancient critics reproach for too much elegance, we possess three speeches in the Aldine collection. Isæus of Chalcis, pupil of Lysias and Isocrates, was entirely engaged, without any participation in politics, in the instruction of eloquence, and in composing speeches for others; his representation is simple, beautiful, and not without energy. Of fifty of his speeches, eleven have been preserved.t Lycurgus, (b. 408, d. 328?) generally esteemed for his severity in the administration of justice. Of his fifteen orations, that against Socrates is especially distinguished by its energy and dignity. Demosthenes, (b. 384, d. 322) pupil of Plato, Euclides, Isæus, and Isocrates, great by his penetration and views, and still greater by his animated love for liberty, and unwavering zeal for the common welfare, laboured to the last for the preservation of his country's independence, and inflicted death upon himself rather than he should be delivered up to the oppressors of his country. His course of ideas manifests profound and entire knowledge of his subject; his arrangement of the matter is artless, and yet most wisely calculated for the effect intended to be produced. His delivery entirely answered the necessities and demands of the people; his style is sometimes harsh, and assumes too much a conversational tone; in his demonstrations he is masterly; comprehensibility and sublimity, simpleness and elegance, plainness and precision, firmness and force, correctness and energy, are united in his representations. In the three Olynthiacs, the four Philippics and his speeches against Æschines, Leptines and Midias, the original qualities of his mind shine most conspicuously. We have of him sixty-one speeches, sixty-five introductions and projects, partly forged, and six forged letters; we also possess scolias and a commentary of Ulpian, a grammarian of the second or fourth century after Christ. Whether the seventeenth speech of Demosthenes be authentic, or may be really ascribed to Hyperides, is not ascertained. * Mem. de l'Acad. des Inscrip. vol. xiii. p. 162. Fab. B. G. vol. ii. p. 777. + Ibid. p. 808. Observations of W. Jones. Fabr. p. 806. Mem. de l'Acad. des Inscrip. 24: 1. Eschines (b. 393, d. 323) was a man of the world, and in his efforts to obtain influence and importance, became a sophistical and capricious rival of Demosthenes, yielded to courtly temptations, and taught, after his well-deserved exile, (330) eloquence at Rhodes and Samos. His three speeches are plain and clear, and unite much mildness with rich energy. The affairsof public life, at that time, could give no encouragement to the composition of letters. This, of itself, is a sufficient ground to doubt the authenticity of those which are extant. Those which are ascribed to Plato, Aristotle, and, perhaps, Isocrates, are true; but those palmed upon Demosthenes and Eschines, are false. Many others may be considered as innocent oratorical practices, a part of which are indebted for their existence to the Alexandrian age; to which may be referred the supposed letters of Pythagoras and his followers, of Socrates, his friends, pupils and followers.* Alexamenes of Teos, and Zeno, (458) first cultivated the Dialogue. Socrates and his scholars, especially Plato, completely formed and refined it. The first rudiments of the Greek philosophy,† were of a mythological and religious character, and made an important branch of priestly education; they were transferred to the epic bards, and we find them most perfectly and nationally bodied forth in the poems of Homer and Hesiod. The results of these deep and excited meditations on divine and human matters, on social duties and rights, were reduced to practice by Lycurgus‡ in Sparta, by Zaleucus and Charondas in Græcia Magna, and by Solon in Athens; the seven sages, expressed them in short vigorous scntences, and the poets in gnomes, by which means they were brought to the public ear. Thus was opened the road to philosophical researches which made rapid progress with a nation susceptible of mental developement, favoured by a firm and well regulated government, and always increasing in experience and science; no wonder then, that the philosophy of the Greeks was acknowledged to be the basis and foundation of all the sublime and pure philosophical researches of latter ages. Philosophy issued in Ionia from mere external observations of nature, and was soon directed, by the Doric Pythagoras, to R. Bentley's Diss. upon the Epistles of Phalaris, &c. Comp. Fabr. B. G. vol. i. p. 662. + Stephani Poesis Philosophica, g. Schiller's Thalia, Heyne Opusc. Acad. vol. ii. p. 31. § Periander, Pittacus, Thales, Solon, Bias, Chilo and Cleobulus. mental reflections. The Eleatics pointed out the difference between reason and experience, which again the Atomists endeavoured to reconcile. Philosophy, even long after the introduction of prose, retained its poetic form; its communication was at first oral; and it was only after the lapse of some ages, (since Thales, 525) that philosophical writings were composed. A reconciliation between the Ionic and Doric philosophy was attempted by Heraclitus, and tolerably effected by Anaxagoras. After the Eleatic Zeno had introduced the dialectic art, and sophistry was systematized in Sicily, Athens became, in the time of Pericles, the seat of philosophy. Socrates struggled against the errors of the sophists, by constituting morals as the foundation of all sound thinking; after him a long series of philosophical schools and systems followed. The Ionic philosophy consisted of mere observations of nature, and embodied deep considerations of the laws of nature. Anaxagoras attempted to unite it with the mechanic, which failed, as of course, it ought to have done. The founder of the Ionic philosphy, was the Milesian Thales, (600) who was endowed with mathematical and astronomical knowledge, and besides, informed by travels. His system is obscure, because but a trifling part of it is known to us by traditions and interpretations. He considered water as the primitive substance, power or soul. He was followed in his system by Pherecydes of Scyros, (550) one of the oldest prose writers, of whom we possess some fragments; among which are also found those of the younger Pherecydes of Leros, by his contemporary Anaximander, who is said already to have acknowledged an infinite and eternal being, and by his pupil Anaximines, (520) who supposed the air to be the primitive element. Some centuries afterwards, the Italic school in Crotona arose. Its founder was Pythagoras of Samos (550?) who was also the creator of an order, the object of which was to unite, by philosophical instruction, political reformation and nobleness of social life with moral discipline and practice, but his doctrines have been variously interpreted and misunderstood. He himself was, undoubtedly, a powerful example of humanity, which this singular man laboured to elevate from sensual life to a divine and moral one. He had a scientific intercourse with Pherecydes of Scyros, and, probably, also with other thinkers of the Ionic school; travelled in Greece and Egypt, acquired rich and scientific experience, especially extensive and profound mathematical know H. Ritter's History of Philosophy. ledge, and distinguished himself from his predecessors by endeavouring to examine, philosophically, like them, not only nature itself, but also the existence of the world and man. He made use of cyphers as a symbolical expression for the supernatural knowledge of man, and thus he founded the science of metaphysics. He imagined the world an harmonious unity, the substances of which have their centre in the sun, the source of warmth and life; the human soul as an offspring of the divine, central fire, consequently related to it, and capable of a progressive approach to the deity; to these hypotheses, he associated his opinions of virtue, justice, reward, and, perhaps, also of the transmigration of the soul. Our knowledge of him, rests upon very numerous, various, and often contradictory traditions and hints; for he, probably, never composed many works of his own; the "Golden Sentences" are of a far later date." Of the most ancient followers of Pythagoras, among whom, Alemæon is renowned as a philosopher, there remain no or very few true fragments. The Book of the Universe, ascribed to Ocellus of Lucania, (500) was, at least, written before Plato. Philolaus (probably) of Tarentum, (d. 400) subordinated morality to the knowledge of physical sciences. The eleatic school pursued a peculiar course; it established the first rational and conclusive system, opposed reason to delusive experience, and pretended the most perfect unity of the universe. Its founder was Xenophanes of Colophon, (500?) who taught at Elea; he found the notion of creation incomprehensible, maintained the eternal existence of reality and the power of thinking, as the only real subjects, and founded the pantheism and ideal philosophy. Of his works, especially on nature, some poetical fragments exist. Parmenides of Elea, (460) maintained, obstinately, the opinion of his master,' and endeavoured to shew, strictly, the difference between experience and reason. His pupil, Zeno of Elea, (444) defended this system with unshaken constancy, disputed the dependence of experience, founded the dialectic art, and led the way to scepticism. This system was still more strongly defended by Melissus of Samos, (444) and proved by new demonstrations derived from the sphere of infinity. Diagoras of Melos, (416) a sophist, is supposed to have advocated atheism. To the eleatic school was opposed the new eleatic, or Atomic, or mechanic school, which taught materialism, and acquired no * Fabr. B. G. vol. i. p. 750. H. Dodwell de ætate Phalaridis et Pythagoræ. Mem. de l'Acad. des Inscrip. vol. xiv. |
