Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/119

Rh appears in the state of education, in the regularity of its administration, especially in the matter of justice, and, above all, in the legal standard of the coinage being main tained invariable from first to last, which is a rare proof of a highly organized system. When its situation in the midst of barbarous nations is considered, and the inter mediate position it occupied between Asia and western Eurooe, it may safely be pronounced one of the most powerful civilizing agencies that the world has seen.

I. Period of Greek Subjection&thinsp;: from the Death of Alexander to the Accession of Constantine the Great as sole Emperor, 323 B.C. to 323 A.D.

The conquests of Alexander the Great differed from those of almost every other great conqueror in this that they were followed up by a scheme of civil government, the object of which was to secure the well-being and promote the civilization of all his subjects. That he was not the ambitious madman which he is often represented as being is amply proved by the forethought with which his cam paigns were planned, and by his attention to the commis sariat and to other details connected with the transport and maintenance of his vast armies. But his true greatness is most clearly shown by his endeavouring to introduce unity into his vast empire, not by subjecting one race to another, or crushing out the hope of further resistance by an iron rule, but by establishing in it centres of permanent institu tions and common culture. These were the Greek colonies with municipal government which he founded at intervals throughout Asia. By these the subject countries, without being forced into a common mould, or organized in defiance of their feelings and prejudices and without reference to their national institutions, were gradually leavened by the system that existed among them, and obtained a certain infusion of the Hellenic character and Hellenic modes of thought. Though Alexander himself did not survive to complete his project, yet enough had been accomplished at the time of his death to leave its influence firmly imprinted, even when his empire fell to pieces and was partitioned among his generals. The consequences of this to Asia were of incalculable importance, and continued unimpaired until the tide of Mahometan conquest swept over the country; and even then it was from Greek literature and art that the Arabs obtained the culture for which they have been celebrated. But its effect was hardly less marked on the Greeks themselves. The Hellenic world was henceforth divided into two sections the Greeks of Greece proper, and the Macedonian Greeks of Asia and Egypt. Between these there existed a common bond in similarity of educa tion, religion, and social feelings, in the possession of a com mon language and literature, and in their exclusiveness. whether as a free population ruling a large slave element, or as a privileged class in the midst of less favoured races ; but the differences were equally striking. The former re tained more of the independent spirit of the ancient Greeks, of their moral character and patriotism ; the latter were more cosmopolitan, more subservient, more ready to take the impress of those among whom they were thrown ; in them the Ulysses type of Greek character, if we may so speak its astuteness and versatility became predominant. This distinction is all-important for the subsequent history, since, in the earlier period, it is rather the Greeks of Hellas who attract our attention, whereas after the foundation of Constantinople the Macedonian Greeks occupy the most prominent position. At the same time a change passed over the Greek language ; while the ancient dialects were retained, more or less, in the provinces of Greece proper, the Attic dialect became the court language of the Macedonian monarchs, and was used almost exclusively by prose writers. Gradually Macedonian and other provincial isms crept into it, and it was modified by simpler expres sions, and words in more general use, being substituted for those preferred by the classic writers of Athens ; and thus was formed what was called the common or generally used dialect. The non-Greek inhabitants of the countries in which the Greeks were settled were described as " Hel- lenizing," and consequently their language, such as we find it in the Septuagint and the New Testament, w T as called Hellenistic Greek. The literary spirit also migrated to Alexandria, which became for a time the home of the principal Greek culture, and nurtured the genius of Theo critus, the first of pastoral poets, the taste and erudition of Aratus and Apollonius Rhodius, and the research of Aristarchus and other eminent Homeric critics.

The period of somewhat less than two centuries (323-146 B.C.) which intervened between the death of Alexander and the conquest of Greece by the Romans was a sort of twilight between liberty and subjection. The Lamian War, as the contest between a number of the Grecian states, with Athens at their head, and Antipater, one of Alexander s immediate successors in Macedonia, was called from the siege of Lamia, which was its most prominent event, soon convinced the Greeks that it was idle for them to struggle single-handed with their great neighbour. After that the country formed a bone of contention between the neighbouring potentates in Macedonia, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt ; and most of the states, with the exception of Sparta, were in the power sometimes of one sometimes of another of them, though the contests of their masters secured them from time to time a partial independence. At length the constant danger to which their liberties were exposed suggested the necessity of some kind of combination on the part of the separate states, and the famous Achaean league arose (280 B.C.), which revived the dying energies of the Greeks, and has thrown a lustre over their period of decline. For the origin of this federation w r e must go back to the early history of the district of Achaia in northern Peloponnesus, the inhabitants of which, from being isolated from other races by their position between the Arcadian mountains and the Corinthian Gulf, and occupying a succession of valleys and small plains, found a federal union to be the most natural political system by which they could be held together. Throughout the greater part of their history this people exercised little influence on the fortunes of Greece, but in her time of greatest need they came forward as her champions. The league was now revived, with a more definite organization and a wider political object, and under the leadership oi Aratus, the greatest of its early " strategi," it wrested Sicyon from the pow r er of its tyrant, and Corinth from the hands of the Macedonians, until at last it embraced Athens, and almost the whole of the Peloponnesus. Unfortunately Sparta held aloof. That city, which had succeeded in maintaining its independence, had fallen into the hands of a narrow oligarchy of wealthy proprietors, who rose in violent opposition to their reforming kings men whose names would be a glory to any period Agis and Cleomenes, and succeeded in putting the first to death, while the latter was enabled to overpower them through the influence won by his military successes. But circumstances involved Aratus in a war with Sparta, and here the old Greek spirit of discord betrays itself. When hard pressed by Cleomenes, the Achrean leader applied to the Macedonians, and the result was that Antigonus Doson invaded the country, and at Sellasia inflicted a final and crushing blow on the Spartan power (221 B.C.). The same spirit appears in the Social War, which occurred shortly after this between the Achseans and the ^Etolian league, a similar confederation in northern Greece, and was fomented by Philip V. of Macedon. Subsequently, when the Romans made war on Philip for assisting the Carthaginians in the Second Punic War, the consul 