Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/153

 BAD END OF DION. 12? no experience of a free and jealous popular miud in persuasion, he was utterly unpractised : his manners were haughty and dis pleasing. Moreover, his kindred with the Dionysian family ex- posed him to antipathy from two different quarters. Like the Duke of Orleans (Egalite) at the end of 1792, in the first French Revolution he was hated both by the royalists, because, though related to the reigning dynasty, he had taken an active part against it and by sincere democrats, because they suspected him of a design to put himself in its place. To Dion, such coalition of antipathies was a serious hinderance ; presenting a strong basis of support for all his rivals, especially for the unscrupulous He- rakleides. The bad treatment which he underwent both from the Syracusans and from Herakleides, during the time when the offi- cers of Dionysius still remained masters in Ortygia, has been already related. Dion however behaved, though not always with prudence, yet with so much generous energy against the common enemy, that he put down his rival, and maintained his ascendency unshaken, until the surrender of Ortygia. That surrender brought his power to a maximum. It was the turning-point and crisis of his life. A splendid opportunity was now opened, of earning for himself fame and gratitude. lie might have attached his name to an act as sublime and impressive ws any in Grecian history, which, in an evil hour, he left to be performed in after days by Timoleon the razing of the Diony- Man stronghold, and the erection of courts of justice on its site. He might have taken the lead in organizing, under the discussion and consent of the people, a good and free government, which, more or less exempt from defect as it might have been, would at least have satisfied them, and would have spared Syracuse those ten years of suffering which intervened until Timoleon came to make the possibility a fact. Dion might have done all that Timo- leon did and might have done it more easily, since he was less embarrassed both by the other towns in Sicily and by the Car- thaginians. Unfortunately he still thought himself strong enough to resume his original project. In spite of the spirit, kindled part- ly by himself, among the Syracusans in spite of the repugnance, already unequivocally manifested, on the mere suspicion of his despotic designs he fancied himself competent to treat the Syracusans as a tame and passive herd; to carvr; out for them just