Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 09.djvu/267

* GREEK LITERATURE. 233 GREEK LITERATURE. rect. His real distinction is based on the fact that he was the first to compose a great historical work with unity of plan, and to bring large masses of facts into an ordered whole. The founder of iihilosophical history was Tliu- cydides ic.455-c.4O0 B.C.). His history of the Peloponnesian War from its beginning to B.C. 411 — he did not live to complete it — is an at- tempt to give an accurate and concise record of events: it also shows deep study of causes and a careful investigation of facts. The account is dispassionate and impartial; certain passages are unsurpassed in their nobility and stern pathos. While we may regret Thucj-dides's neglect of social conditions, his work is one of the great- est histories ever written. Xenophon (c.434-c.355 B.C.) continued Thucydides's work in his Bellc- nica to the battle of JIantinea. Xenophon was the author of many other works, of which the most important are his Aiiabanis, an account of the expedition of Cyrus the Younger and of the suc- cessful retreat of the 10.000 Greeks from the heart of the Persian Empire; the Ci/ropwdia, an historical romance with Cyrus the Great as its hero; and the Monorabilia, a report of the teach- ings of Socrates. In his minor works Xenophon appears as the first Greek essayist. Among the later historical writers, none of whose works are preserved, must be named Ctesias, the real founder of Oriental history in Greek; Theopompus (c.3S0-c..31.j B.C.), and Ephorus (flourished c,3,50 B.C.), who introduced the rhetorical method of historical composition. From about B.C. 3(10 several writers known as the Atthids devoted tliemselves to Athenian history and archiTology. Athenian oratory received a powerful impulse from the teachings of the Sophists, of whom Protagoras and Prodicus were the chief, and was also greatly influenced by Sicilian rhetoric, which Gorgias of Leonlini introduced in B.C. 427. In the canon of the ten Attic orators, Antiphon (c.480-11) holds the earliest place. His speeches retain the character of the older oratory, and have much in common with the speeches Thu- cydides has placed in his history. The next three are Andocides (born c.440 B.C.), Lvsias (e.450-380 B.C.), and Isocrates (c.430-338 B.C.). Of these. Lysias shows the perfection of the simple style, while that of Isocrates is more ornate and rhetorical. The latter's prose became the literary standard from the middle of the fourth century. Isaeus (c.420-350 B.C.). the pupil of Isocrates, won his chief fame in cases of inheri- tance. All the preceding, however, were sur- passed by Demosthenes (B.C. 383-22). who by his complete mastery of language and rhetoric, and still more by his originality, his political insight, and his ardent zeal for the freedom of his native State, is the greatest orator, not only of all Greece, but of all history. His heroic, though fruitless, struggle lo save Greece from subjec- tion tiy Macedon. which he saw impending, is a splendid example of what can be accomplished by the genius of one man. .Eschines (B.C. 389- 14), the great rival of Demosthenes, was second to him alone in eloquence, while Lycurgus, Hyperi- des. and Dinarchns were less famous contem- poraries. Although the early Ionian philosophers had in some cases reduced parts of their doctrines to writing in both prose and verse, and the Eleatics, Xenophanes and Parmenides, and also Emped- ocles, composed long philosophical poems, little is left of their works. The same is true of the famous work On Sature by Anaxagoras (born e.oOO B.C.), who transferred pliilosophy from lunia to Attica. Socrates left no writings. The literary history of Athenian philosopliy, there- fore, begins with Socrates's greatest pupil, Plato (c. 427-347 B.C.), the founder of the Academic School, allhough others — e.g. .Escliines, Euclid of ilegara, Pha-do, and Antisthcnes — composed works which reflected the manner and teaching of their master. Plato was born of .a noble and ricli family, traveled widely, and was for ten years the disciple of Socrates, He was endowed with a remarkable poetic imagination, and had attained a charming and flexible style which lies between prose and poetry. In all, 42 dialogues are extant under his name, of which 3.5 are prob- ably genuine. The Republic, Pliwdo, and Vvrgias are perhaps the greatest. Phito's pupil. Aristotle (B.C. 384-22), the founder of the Peripatetic School, wag the first to apply a rigidly scientific method to investiga- tion. He sought to map out tlie provinces of human knowledge, and to show the principles underlying each and the problems with which each was concerned. He was the founder, in a strict sense, of scientific rhetoric, logic, political science, and natural history. His genius has in- fluenced human methods of thought from his day to the present time. Aristotle's successor, Theo- phrastus (c. 372-287 B.C.), has left us tw'O botani- cal works and a collection of thirty character sketches, as well as some fragments of philosophi- cal and scientific works. (4) The Alexandrian Age. With the decay of local political life in Greece and the gradual withdrawal of thoughtful men from public alTairs, there came an enlargement of intellectual sym- pathy and a cosmopolitan attitude of mind un- known to the Greeks of the earlier period. The conquests of Alexander, which enormously en- larged the sway of Greek ideas and bound the world together as never before, contributed great- ly to the new spirit which is characteristic of the Hellenistic period. Alexandria became the centre of this new world ; and in that city was developed a literature, no longer spontaneous or creative, but derivative and erudite. Learned poetry was cultivated by Callimachus (e.310- C.240 B.C.), famous for his elegies, hymns, and epigrams, some of which we still have; Aratus (born C.270 B.C.), author of an extant astronomi- cal epic; Lycophron (e, 270 B.C.), whose obscure poem Alexandra has survived; Apollonius Rhodi- us (e.295-c.215 B.c), whose artificial epic, Argo- tuiulica, is the best work of its kind that this period has left us: and finally Xicander (c.loO B.C.), who composed medicinal and other didac- tic works in epic form. The truest poet of the age was Theocritus (c.310-c.24.5). whose pastoral idyls are unsurpassed in any literature. Bion, a contemporary of Theocritus, and Moschus (e.l40 B.C.), wrote also in the pastoral man- ner. Three of Theocritus's poems are mimes, dramatic pictures of common life, .such as were first developed by Sophron in the fifth century. This class of literature was cultivated with great success by Herondas (e.2.50 B.C.). Closet tragedy, parody, and satire also flourished at this time. Prose literature was seienfific. The librarians Zenodotus. Aristoplianes. and .ristarchus estab- lished literarj' scholarship and grammatical