Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/126

 104 HISTORY OF GREECE. urged by his enemies, and even by Aristophanes, in the year of the Peloponnesian war, implies that no trial took place: for it was alleged that Perikles, in order to escape this danger, "blew up the Peloponnesian war," and involved his country in such confusion and peril as made his own aid and guidance indispensa- bly necessary to her : especially that he passed the decree against the Megarians by which the war was really brought on. 1 We know enough, however, to be certain that such a supposition is alto- gether inadmissible. The enemies of Perikles were far too eager, and too expert in Athenian political warfare, to have let him escape by such a stratagem : moreover, we learn from the assur- ance of Thucydides, that the war depended upon far deeper causes, that the Megarian decree was in no way the real cause of it, that it was not Perikles, but the Peloponnesians, who brought it on, by the blow struck at Potidrca. 1 Aristophan. Pac. 587-603 : compare Acharn. 512; Ephorus, ap. Diodor. xii, 38-40 ; and the Scholia on the two passages of Aristophanes ; Phi tarch, Perikles, c. 32. Diodorus (as well as Plutarch, Alkibiad. c. 7) relates another tale, that Alkibiades once approached Perikles when he was in evident low spirits and embarrassment, and asked him the reason : Perikles told him that the time was near at hand for rendering his accounts, and that he was consid- ering how this could be done : upon which Alkibiades advised him to con- sider rather how he could evade doing it The result of this advice was that Perikles plunged Athens into the Peloponnesian war : compare Aris- tophan. Nub. 855, with the Scholia, and Ephorus, Fragm. 118, 119, ed. Marx, with the notes of Marx. It is probable enough that Ephorus copied the story, which ascribes the Peloponnesian war to the accusations against Phcidias and Perikles, from Aristophanes or other comic writers of the time. But it deserves remark, that even Aristophanes is not to be considered as certifying it. For if we consult the passage above referred to in his comedy Pax, we shall find that, first, Hermes tells the story about Pheidias, Perikles, and the Pelopon- ncsian war; upon which both Trygreus, and the Chorus, remark that they never heard a word of it before : that it is quite new to them. Tryg. Tavra roivvv, fiu rbv 'ATroA/lej, 'yu '7reTri>a/iT)v OW OTruf airy (E/p^vy) Kpoafjicci $ei6i Chorus. OW lyuye, nMjv ye vvvi. If Aristophanes had stated the story ever so plainly, his authority could only have been taken as proving that ic was a part of the talk of the time : but the lines just cited make him as much a contradicting as an affirming witness.