Page:Hesiod, and Theognis.djvu/166

152 But the time comes when such a chosen few have to be resorted to, as a last resource, in preference to the ruin certain to overtake them if, after their plots have been divulged, they sit still and await it. There is extant a passage of some length, which Mr Frere ingeniously conceives to have been the heads of Theognis's speech to the conspirators. Its conclusion represents the oath of the malcontents, a formula pledging assistance to friends and requital to foes to the very uttermost. It breathes the courage of desperation, but does not hold out a prospect of success which could justify the resort to action. The precise nature of what followed we know not. An elegiac and subjective poet like Theognis is readier to moralise than to describe. The outbreak may have had a gleam of success, or may have been crushed at the beginning by the foresight of its opponents, or the despair and faint heart of its promoters. It seems quite clear, however, that, perhaps by the aid of an armed force from some democratic state, most likely Corinth, the insurrection is beaten to its last breathing-place. Here is a fragment which vividly pictures the hurried resolve of the party of Cyrnus and Theognis to abandon their country and ill-starred enterprise:—