Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/38

 6 HISTORY OF GRI'.r:CE. but aggravated dissension and difficulties for Alexander. Mon;- over his strong will and imperious temper, eminently suitable for supreme command, disqualilied him from playing a subordin- ate part, even to his ovrn fiither. The pmulence of Philip, when about to depart on his Asiatic expedition, induced him to attempt to heal these family dissensions by giving his daughter Kleo- patra in marriage to her uncle Alexander of Epirus, brother of Olympias. It was during the splendid marriage festival, then celebrated at -3^gae, that he was assassinated — Olympias, Kleo- patra, and Alexander, being all present, while Attalus Avas in Asia, commanding the Macedonian division sent forward in ad- vance, jointly with Parmenio. Had Philip escaped this catas- trophe, he would doubtless have carried on the war in Asia Minor with quite as much energy and skill as it was afterwards prosecuted by Alexander : though we may doubt whether the father would have stretched out to those ulterior undertakings which, gigantic and far-reaching as they were, fell short of the insatiable ambition of the son. But successful as Philip might have been in Asia, he would hardly have escaped gloomy family feuds ; with Alexander as a mutinous son, under the instigations of Olympias, — and with Kleopatra on the other side, feeling that her own safety depended upon the removal of regal or quasi-regal competitors. From such formidable perils, visible in the distance, if not im- mediately impending, the sword of Pausanias guaranteed both Alexander and the Macedonian kingdom. But at the moment when the blow was struck, and when the Lynkestian Alexander, one of those privy to it, ran to forestall resistance and place the crown on the head of Alexander the Great* — no one knew what to expect from the young prince thus suddenly exalted at the age of twenty years. The sudden death of Philip in the ful- ness of glory and ambitious hopes, must have produced the strongest impression, first upon the festive crowd assembled, — next throughout Macedonia, — lastly, upon the foreigners whom he had reduced to dependence, from the Danube to the borders of Paeonia. All these dependencies were held only by the fear ' Arrian, i. 2r>, 2 ; Justin, xi. 2. See Vol. XL p. 517.