litenefs, to the whole civilized world, is a fplendid distinction. But it is a peftilent mischief, when the very renown attending fuch brilliant advantages, becomes the vehicle for carrying into other countries the depraved manners by which thefe pre-eminent advantages are accompanied.

This

was confeffedly the cafe of Greece with refpect to Rome, Rome had conquered Greece by her arms; but whenever a fubjugated country contributes, by her vices, to enflave the state which conquered her, fhe amply revenges herself.

But the perils of this contamination do not terminate with their immediate confequences. The ill effects of Grecian manners did not cease with the corruptions which they engendered at Rome. There is still a ferious danger, left, while the ardent and high-spirited young reader contemplates Greece only through the fplendid medium of her heroes and her artifts, her poets and her orators; while his imagination is fired with the glories of conqueft, and captivated

with the charms of literature, that he may lofe fight of the diforders, the corruptions, and the crimes, by which Athens, the famous feat of arts and of letters, was difhonoured. May he not be tinctured (allowing for change of circumftances) with fomething of that fpirit which inflamed Alexander, when, as he was paffing the Hydafpes, he enthusiastically exclaimed, "O Athenians! could you believe to what dangers I expose myself, for the fake of being celebrated by you!"

Many of the Athenian vices originated in the very nature of their conftitution; in the very spirit of that turbulent democracy which Solon could not reftrain, nor the ableft of his fucceffors control. The great founder of their legislation felt the dangers infeparable from the democratic form of government, when he declared," that he had not given them the best laws, but the best which they were able to bear." In the very establishment of his inftitutions, he betrayed his diftruft of this fpecies of

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vernment,

vernment, by those guards and ramparts which he was so affiduous in providing and multiplying. Knowing himself to be incapable of fetting afide the popular power, his attention was directed to divest it, as much as poffible, of its mifchiefs, by the entrenchments that he ftrove to caft about it. His fagacious mind anticipated the ill effects of that republican restleffness, that at length completely overturned the ftate which it had fo often menaced, and fo conftantly distracted.

This unfettled government, which left the country perpetually exposed to the tyranny. of the few, and the turbulence of the many, was never bound together by any principle of union, by any bond of intereft, common to the whole community, except when the general danger, for a time, annihilated the diftinction of separate interefts.. The reftraint of laws was feeble; the laws themfelves often contradictory; often ill adminiftered; popular intrigues, and tumultuous affemblies, frequently obftructing their ope

ration.

ration. The nobleft fervices were not feldom rewarded with imprisonment, exile, or af faffination. Under every change, confiscation and profcription were never at a stand; and the only way of effacing the impreffion of any revolution which had produced these outrages, was to promote a new one, which engendered, in its turn, fresh outrages, and improved upon the antecedent diforders.

By this light and capricious, people, acute in their feelings, carried away by every fudden guft of paffion, as mutable in their opinions as unjuft in their decifions, the most illuftrious patriots were first facrificed, and then honoured with ftatues; their heroes were murdered as traitors, and then reverenced as Gods. This wanton abuse of authority, this rafh injustice, and fruitless repentance, would be the inevitable confequence of lodging fupreme power in the hands of a vain and variable populace, inconstant in their very vices, perpetually vibrating

vibrating between irretrievable crimes and ineffectual regrets.

That powerful oratory, which is to us fo just a fubject of admiration, was, doubtless, no inconfiderable cause of the public diforders. And to that exquifite talent, which conftitutes one of the chief boafts of Athens, we may look for one principal fource of her diforders:

Thofe ancients, whofe refiftlefs eloquence
Wielded at will the fierce Democracy,
Shook th' arfenal, and fulmin'd over Greece,
To Macedon and Artaxerxes' throne.

When we reflect what mighty influence this talent gave to the popular leaders, and what a powerful engine their demagogues poffeffed, to work upon the paffions of the multitude, who compofed their popular affemblies; when we reflect on the character of those crowds, on whom this ftirring eloquence was exercifed, and that their opinion decided on the fate of the country: all this will contribute to account for the frequency and violence of the public commotions,