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had sought to act a similar part with Pisistratus and his sons. He found, however, a powerful rival in Isagoras, who cherished the same ambitious views; and who, with the aid of Cleomenes and the Spartans, expelled Clisthenes and drove with him into banishment no less than seven hundred of the principal Athenian families. The selfish schemes of Isagoras were first manifested in an attempt to abolish the senate, or to change all its members and abridge their number. A proceeding thus violent and impolitic roused the people at once. They drove Cleomenes and his Spartans, together with Isagoras, out of Athens, and recalled Clisthenes with the whole of the exiled families.

The Lacedæmonians, indignant at this disgrace of their king and countrymen, were now wholly bent on revenge. A principal means appeared to be the re-establishment of Hippias, and for that purpose, the other states of Greece, and particularly Corinth, were urged to join in the enterprise. But Corinth loved her own liberty, and respected that of others. She refused to accede to the alliance; and the rest of the states followed her example.

Hippias, disappointed of that aid he expected from the jealousy. entertained by the petty states of the predominance of Athens, now looked towards a foreign alliance. Darius, the son of Hystaspes, under whom the Persian einpire was splendid and flourishing, meditated, at this juncture, the conquest of Greece. Hippias disgracefully availed himself of the views of an enemy against the general liberty of his country, and courted the assistance of Artaphernes, the Persian governor of Sardes, to re-establish him on the throne of Athens Artaphernes eagerly embraced a proposal, which promised effectually to second the views of his sovereign; and Greece now saw herself inevitably involved in a war with Persia.

The subject of the war with Persia naturally induces a retro spective view of the origin of this monarchy; its ancient history and the government, policy, and manners of this great empire; field of inquiry on which we shall enter in the following chapte

CHAPTER XI.

ORIGIN OF THE PERSIAN MONARCHY-End of the first Assyrian Empire-Era of Nabonassar- Monarchy of the Medes; Dejoces, Phraortes, Ĉyaxares, Nabopolassar- Nabuchodonozor II.-Captivity of the Jews-Cyrus the elder -Cambyses-Darius, son of Hystaspes-Conquest of Babylon-His War against the Scythians-His conquest of India-Government, Customs, and Manners of the Persians-Education of their Princes-General Education of the Persian Youth-National Character of the Persians-Military Character-Government-Administration of Justice-Religion of the Ancient Persians-Zoroaster; Uncertainty of his History-The Second ZoroasterTranslation of the Zendavesta by Anquetil-Cosmogony of the Zendavesta -Manicheism-Practical and Moral parts of the Persian Religion-The Sadder-Change in the Manners of the Persians-State of Greece at the time of the Persian War.

HAVING pursued, in some of the preceding chapters, the general outlines of the history of Greece, from the time when the leading republics of Sparta and Athens had assumed a fixed and regular constitution, to the commencement of the Persian war, I now propose, in conformity with the plan laid down in the beginning of this work, to look back to the origin of the Persian monarchy, to delineate very briefly the early periods of its history, and to exhibit a general view of the government, genius, policy, and manners of this ancient people. Such a retrospect will serve to throw light upon their subsequent history, and familiarize us to their acquaintance when, under Darius, the son of Hystaspes, Xerxes, Artaxerxes, Darius Ochus, and Codomanus, we see the force of that splendid empire opposed to the valor and intrepidity of Greece.

It will be recollected that the first empire of the Assyrians ended under Sardanapalus, when Arbaces, governor of the Medes, and Belesis, governor of Babylon, shook off the yoke of that effeminate prince. Three monarchies arose from the ruins of that empire that of Nineveh, or the second Assyrian empire, that of Babylon, and that of the Medes.

To Belesis succeeded Nabonassar, whose accession to the throne. is the beginning of an astronomical era, called the Era of Nabonassar. It is. fixed 747 years before Jesus Christ, at which time the Chaldæan astronomical observations began, which have been handed down to us by Ptolemy the geographer. The history of the kings of Babylon succeeding Nabonassar is entirely unknown. That of the monarchs of Nineveh is very little better known, unless by the ravages they committed in Palestine. We read in

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Scripture of the conquests of Tiglath-pilezer, whom the impious Achaz, king of Judah, had called to his aid against the Israelites; of the conquests of his son Salmanazar, who carried Hosea and the ten tribes of Israel into captivity; of those of Sennacherib, the son of Salmanazar, who was assassinated by his two elder sons, and succeeded by his third, Esarhaddon. With these general facts we are acquainted from the Holy Scriptures,* and we know that, under this last reign, the kingdom of Babylon was united to that of Nineveh, or the second empire of Assyria.

The monarchy of the Medes, the third of those which sprang from the ruins of the first Assyrian empire, appears to have begun later than the other two; for Dejoces, its first sovereign, mounted the throne the same year with Esarhaddon. The history of this Dejoces is extremely uncertain. He is reported to have built the city of Ecbatan, and to have bestowed much pains in polishing and civilizing his people: yet those laws which he is said to have enacted breathed strongly the spirit of despotism. It was common to the Asiatic monarchs very rarely to show themselves to their subjects. Dejoces is said to have carried the haughtiness of his deportment to an unusual height. It was death only to smile in his presence. We should be inclined to doubt many of those facts which are recorded of the capricious tyranny of some of the eastern monarchs, were they not transmitted to us by the gravest and most authentic of the ancient writers.

Dejoces left the crown of Media to his son Phraortes, who conquered the Persians, and subdued a great part of Asia; but was vanquished at length by Nabuchodonozor I., king of Assyria, made prisoner, and put to death. Cyaxares, the son and successor of Phraortes, in alliance with Nabopolassar, king of Babylon, besieged Nineveh, destroyed that splendid capital, and decided the monarchy between them.

The son of Nabopolassar was Nabuchodonozor II., a prince remarkable in those times for his extensive conquests. Necao (or Pharaoh Necho) king of Egypt, had wrested from the Assyrian monarchy the provinces of Syria and Palestine. They were recovered by Nabuchodonozor and Cyaxares, who, with a vast army of 10,000 chariots, 180,000 foot, and 120,000 horse, invaded and laid waste the country, besieged Jerusalem, and took its king, Jehoiakim, prisoner. Tyre was likewise taken after a siege of ten months. The allied princes divided their conquests; but we are ignorant of the precise shares of each sovereign. To Nabuchodonozor, or, as in Scripture he is named, Nebuchadnezzar, we must assign the dominion of Jerusalem, as it is to him that the seventy years' captivity of the Jews, predicted by Jeremiah, is

* See the Books of Kings, Chronicles, Hosea; likewise Josephus' Hist. and Prideaux Connex.

attributed by the inspired writers. Among the Jewish captives carried by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon was the prophet Daniel, then a youth named Belteshazzar, who attained high favor with the Assyrian monarch, and was made by him ruler of the province of Babylon. From Judæa, Nebuchadnezzar pushed his conquests into Egypt, and, dethroning Pharaoh Necho, gave the government of the country to Amazis. The chronology of these events is extremely confused, and it were a vain and fruitless labor to attempt to fix with precision their orders and series. Nebuchadnezzar II. died after a reign of forty-three years, leaving a monarchy more vast than powerful-an object which offered an easy conquest to the Persians, when Cyrus, their king, raised the Persian empire, hitherto a petty and barbarous dominion, to a height superior to that of all the contemporary nations of the earth.

The name of Cyrus is extremely illustrious among ancient writers; yet nothing can be more uncertain than his history. Herodotus, Ctesias, and Xenophon, the latest of whom was not above two centuries posterior to the supposed age of Cyrus, have given accounts of him so extremely contradictory, that it is quite impossible to reconcile them. The Cyrus of Ctesias and Herodotus obtains possession of the empire of the Medes by dethroning his grandfather Astyages, and, like most extensive conquerors, is the terror and scourge of the human race. The Cyrus of Xenophon fights solely in defence of his uncle Cyaxares, the son of Astyages, and is in every respect the model of a great and virtu ous prince. The Cyrus of Herodotus is killed, fighting against Toyris, the queen of the Massagetæ, who plunges his head into a basin of blood, in revenge of her son, whom Cyrus had put to death. The Cyrus of Ctesias is killed by a wound he received in Hyrcania; and the Cyrus of Xenophon, after a glorious reign of thirty years, dies a natural death. Uncertain as are the particulars of the history of the elder Cyrus, it is generally agreed that his conquests were extensive; that he vanquished the Babylonians; defeated their ally, Croesus, the king of Lydia, the most powerful of the contemporary sovereigns; subjected a great part of the lower Asia, and made himself master of Syria and Arabia. The policy of such conquerors, who found it impossible to preserve their conquests, was to ruin the countries which they gained by their arms. Devastation was held to be the natural right of war. Those princes had no plan in their military enterprises-chance directed their course. Nebuchadnezzar II., whom we have seen the conqueror of Judæa and Egypt, is said to have cast lots to determine to which point of the compass he should direct his progress: the lot fell towards Jerusalem; he marched on accordingly, and subdued it.

Cambyses, the son and successor of Cyrus, had neither the talents of his father, nor his virtues. He planned a military expedition into Egypt, which was signalized only by folly and extrava

gance. His vast army speedily overpowered this feeble people, who have been successively subdued by every nation that attacked them; but the conqueror after all reaped nothing but dishonor; for his conduct was such as to bear every mark of insanity. In an inconsiderate expedition against the Ethiopians, he threw away the greater part of his army: 50,000 men, sent into the deserts of Ammon, perished through fatigue and famine. With a deliberate purpose of wantonly exasperating the Egyptians, who were disposed to the most peaceable submission, Cambyses ordered the magnificent temple of Thebes to be pillaged and burnt. At the celebration of the festival of Apis, at Memphis, he stabbed the sacred ox with his poniard, ordered the priests to be scourged, and massacred all the people who assisted at the sacrifice. He put to death his brother Smerdis, because he dreamed that he saw him seated on the throne; and when his wife and sister, Meroe, lamented the fate of her brother, he killed her with a stroke of his foot. To prove his dexterity in archery, he pierced the son of his favorite Prexaspes through the heart with an arrow.

This madman was on his return to his dominions of Persia, when he learned that the order of the magi had effected a dangerous revolution; and that, by their aid, one of their own number had assumed the character of his brother Smerdis, and had becn elected king in his absence. He hastened to punish this usurpation, but died on his way, from a wound of his poniard, which struck him in the groin while mounting his horse. The false Smerdis did not long enjoy his dignity. Two grandees of the court, Darius the son of Hystaspes, and Otanes, conspired to dethrone him, and the usurper was strangled in the imperial palace. Darius had influence enough to obtain the vacant throne of Persia; though we cannot easily rely on the authority of Herodotus, that he owed his election to the neighing of his horse.

Darius the son of Hystaspes was a prince of talents, and ambition: he was the first of the Persian monarchs who imposed a regular tax upon the conquered provinces of the empire, which till then had only given occasional gratuities to the sovereign. He chose, however, to conciliate the great body of his subjects to the new government, by exempting the Persians from those burdens. The Babylonians were the first of the provinces which endeavored to shake off the yoke of servitude; but their attempt cost them extremely dear. Darius encircled Babylon with his army so as to cut off all supplies from the adjacent country. The inhabitants exerted a savage resolution. All who were useless for the defence of the city, and served only to consume its provisions,-the women, the old men, and the children,-were strangled by a public decree; each head of a family being allowed to preserve one of his wives and a maid servant. At length, after a siege of twenty months, Darius won the city by a treacherous stratagem. One of his captains, mutilating his visage with hideous wounds,

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