Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/311

 DEMOSTHENES AND LYKURGUS 279 influential position, though of course restricted to matters of in- ternal administration. Thus Lykurgus continued to be the real acting minister of finance, for three successive Panathenaic inter- vals of four years each, or for an uninterrupted period of twelve years. He superintended not merely the entire collection, but also the entire disbursement of the public revenue ; rendering strict periodical account, yet with a financial authority greater than had belonged to any statesman since Perikles. He im- proved the gymnasia and stadia of the city — multiplied the do- natives and sacred furniture in the temples — enlarged, or con- structed anew, docks and arsenals, — provided a considerable stock of arms and equipments, military as well as naval — and maintained four hundred triremes in a seaworthy condition, for the protection of Athenian, commerce. In these extensive func- tions he was never superseded, though Alexander at one time sent to require the surrender of his person, which was refused by the Athenian people.^ The main cause of his firm hold upon the public mind, was, his known and indisputable pecuniary pro- bity, wherein he was the parallel of Phokion. As to Demosthenes, he did not hold any such commanding public appointments as Lykurgus ; but he enjoyed great esteem and sympathy from the people generally, for his mai-ked line of public counsel during the past. The proof of this is to be found ' See tlie remarkable decree in honor of Lykurgus, passed by the Atheni- an people seventeen or eighteen years after liis death, in the archonship of Anaxikrates, b. c. 307 (Plutarch, Vit. X. Oratt. p. 852). The reciting por tion of this decree, constituting four-fifths of the whole, goes over the public conduct of Lykurgus, and is very valuable. It seems that the twelve years of financial administration exercised by Lykurgus, are to be taken probably, either from 342-330 b. c. — or four years later, from 338-326 b. o. Boeckh leaves the point undetermined be- tween the two. Droysen and Meier prefer the earlier period — O. Miiller the later. (Boeckh, Urkunden iiber das Attische Seewesen, also the sec- ond edition of his Staats-haushaltung der Athener, vol. ii. p. 114-118). The total of public money, recorded by the Inscription as having passed through the hands of Lykurgus in the twelve years, was 18,900 talents = jE 4,340.000, or thereabouts. He is said to have held, besides, in deposit, a great deal of money entrusted to him by private individuals. His official duties as treasurer were discharged, for the first four years, in his own name during the last eight years, in the names of two different Vierds.