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278 of the practice of war. Hence the Athenians were forced to be constantly on the look-out, and to seek for opportunities of extending their empire. At the same time, while the Athenians sought to improve their political constitution, they strove to increase the liberty of the people; and a man like Solon could not have arisen in an Ionian state of Asia Minor, to become the peaceful regulator of the state with the approbation of the community. Solon was able to reconcile the hereditary rights of the aristocracy with the claims of the commonalty grown up to manhood; and to combine moral strictness and order with freedom of action. Few statesmen shine in so bright a light as Solon; his humanity and warm sympathies with all classes of his countrymen appear from the fragments of his elegies and iambics which have been already cited.

After Solon comes the dominion of the Pisistratids, which lasted, with some interruptions, for fifty years (from 560 to 510 B. C.). This government was administered with ability and public spirit, so far as was consistent with the interests of the ruling house. Pisistratus was a politic and circumspect prince: he extended his possessions beyond Attica, and established his power in the district of the gold mines on the Strymon, to which the Athenians subsequently attached so much importance. In the interior of the country, he did much to promote agriculture and industry, and he is said to have particularly encouraged the planting of olives, which suited the soil and climate in so remarkable a manner. The Pisistratids also, like other tyrants, showed a fondness for vast works of art; the temple of the Olympian Zeus, built by them, always remained, though only half finished, the largest building in Athens. In like manner, tyrants were fond of surrounding themselves with all the splendour which poetry and other musical arts could give to their house: and the Pisistratids certainly had the merit of diffusing the taste for poetry among the Athenians, and of naturalising among them the best literary productions which Greece then possessed. The Pisistratids were unquestionably the first to introduce the recital of the entire Iliad and Odyssey at the Panathenæa ; and the gentle and refined Hipparchus, the son of Pisistratus, was the means of bringing to Athens the most distinguished lyric poets of the time, as Anacreon, Simonides , and Lasus. Some of the collectors and authors of the mystical poetry also found a welcome reception at the court of the Pisistratids, as Onomacritus; whom they took with them, at their expulsion from Athens, to the court of the King of Persia. But, notwithstanding their patronage of literature and art, Herodotus is undoubtedly right in stating that it was not till after the fall of their dynasty, that Athens shot up with the vigour which can only be