Book II. nothing fo known and received as Troy, Helen, and the War about her, when perhaps there was never any such Thing. Our Children are still called by Names that he feigned above three thousand Years ago. Who is ignorant of the Story of Hector and Achilles? Not only some par ticular Families, but most Nations feek their Original in his Inventions. Mabomet, the fecond of that Name, Emperor of the Turks, writing to our Pope Pius the Second; I am aftonished, fays he, that the Italians fhould appear against me, confidering that we have our common De⚫fcent from the Trojans; and that it concerns me, as well as it does them, to revenge the Blood of Hector upon the Greeks, whom they Countenance against me.' Is it not a noble Farce wherein Kings, Republics, and Emperors have fo many Ages played their Parts, and to which all this vaft Universe ferves for a Theatre? Seven Grecian Cities contended for his Birth, fo much Honour did he derive even from his Obfcurity. Great, the fe cond of thefe excellent PerJonages, Smyrna, Rhodus, Colophon, Salamis, Chios, Argos, Athens & The fecond of my Three Perfonages is Alexander the Great: For who ever will confider the Age Alexander the at which he began his Enterprises; the fmall Means by which he effected fo glorious a Defign; the Authority he obtained, at fo flender an Age, with the greatest and most experienced Captains of the World, by whom he was followed; and the extraordinary Favour wherewith Fortune embraced him, and favoured fo many hazardous, I had almost faid rafh Designs of his! impellens quicquid fibi fumma petenti, Obftaret, gaudenfque viam fecifle ruinẩ». i. e. Whofe high Defigns no hoftile Force could ftay, That Grandeur, to have, at the Age of thirty-three Years, paffed victorious through the whole habitable Earth, and in half a Life to have attained to the utmost Effort Aul. Gell. lib. iii. c. 11. Lucan. lib. i. v. 149, 150, of of human Nature; fo that you cannot imagine its Duration just, nor the Continuance of his Increase in Virtue and Fortune, even to a due Maturity of Age, but that you must withal imagine something more than Man: To have made so many Royal Branches to fpring from his Soldiers; leaving the World, at his Death, divided amongst four Succeffors, who were no better than Captains of his Army, whose Pofterity have so long continued, and maintained that vaft Poffeffion; fo many excellent Virtues as he was poffeffed of, Juftice, Temperance, Liberality, Truth in his Word, Love towards his own People, and Humanity towards thofe he overcame; for his Manners, in the general, feem, in truth, incapable of any juft Reproach, tho' fome particular and extraordinary Action of his may, peradventure, fall under Cenfure: But it is impoffible to carry on fo great Things, as he did, with the ftrict Rules of Juftice; fuch as he are willing to be judged in grofs, by the governing Motive of their Actions. The Ruin of Thebes; the Murder of Menander; and of Epheftion's Physician; the Maffacre of so many Perfian Prisoners at once; of a Troop of Indian Soldiers', not without Prejudice to his Word; and of the Coffeyans", fo much as to the very Children; are Sallies that are not well to be excufed: For, as to Clytus, the Fault was more than recompenfed in his Repentance, and that very Action, as much as any other whatever, manifefts the Gentleness of his Nature, a Nature excellently formed to Goodness; and it was ingeniously faid of him, That he had his Virtues from Nature, and his Vices from Fortune "." As to his being a little given to Boafting, and a little too impatient of hearing himself ill spoken of; and as to those Mangers, Arms, and Bits he caused to be ftrewed in the Indies; all thofe little Vanities, methinks, may very well be allowed to his Youth, and the prodigious Profperity of his Fortune: And who will confider, withal, his many Military Virtues, his Diligence, Forefight, Patience, Difcipline, Subtlety, Magnanimity, ReO 04 folution, i Plutarch in the Life of Q. Curtius, lib. ii. fect. 4. QCurtius, lib. x. fect, 5, Alexander, c. 18. * Idem, ibid. c. 22. m Idem, ib. c. 32, Book II. folution, and good Fortune, wherein (tho' we had not had the Authority of Hannibal to affure us) he was the chief of Men; the uncommon Beauty and State of his Perfon, even to a Miracle, his majestic Port, and awful Deportment in a Face fo Young, fo Ruddy, and so Radiant : -S Qualis ubi Oceani perfufus Lucifer undâ, Quem Venus ante alios aftrorum diligit ignes, i. e. So does the Day-ftar from the Ocean rife, Above all Lights, grateful to Venus' Eyes; When he from Heaven darts his facred Light, And diffipates the fullen Shades of Night. Whoever, moreover, confiders the Excellency of his Knowledge and Capacity, the Duration and Grandeur of his Glo ry, pure, clear, without Spot or Envy; and that, even long after his Death, it was a religious Belief, that his very Medals brought good Fortune to all that carried them about them; and that more Kings and Princes have writ his Acts, than other Hiftorians have written the Acts of any other King or Prince whatever; and that, to this very Day, the Mahometans, who defpife all other Hiftories, admit of, and honour his alone, by a fpecial Privilege : Whoever, I fay, will ferioufly confider all thefe Particulars, will confefs, that I had reafon to prefer him before Cefar himself, who alone could make me doubtful in my Choice: And it cannot be denied, but that there was more of his own Conduct in his Exploits, and more of Fortune in thofe of Alexander. They were, in many Things, equal, and, peradventure, Cafar had the Advantage in fome particular Qualities. They were two Fires, or two Torrents, to ravage the World by feveral Ways: Et velut immiffi diverfis partibus ignes Dant fonitum fpumofi amnes, et in æquora currunt, • Æneid. lib. viii. v. 589, &c. ? Ibid. lib. xii. v. 521, & i.. i. e. And like to Fires in fev'ral Parts apply'd They bear all down before them where they go. But tho' Cæfar's Ambition was, in itself, more moderate, it was fo mischievous, having the Ruin of his Country, and the universal Devastation of the World for its abo minable Object; that, all Things collected together, and put into the Balance, I cannot but incline to Alexander's Side. Epaminondas, the Third, and the most Ex cellent. The third Great Man, and, in my Opinion, the moft Excellent of all, is EPAMINONDAS: Of Glory he has not near fo much as the other two (which alfo is but a Part of the Substance of the Thing:) Of Valour and Refolution, not of that Sort which is pushed on by Ambition, but of that which Wisdom and Reason can plant in a regular Soul, he had all that could be imagined: Of this Virtue of his he has, in my Thoughts, given as ample Proof, as Alexander himself, or Cafar: For, although his military Exploits were neither fo frequent, nor fo renowned, they were yet, if duly confidered in all their Circumftances, as important, as vigorous, and carried with them as manifeft a Teftimony of Boldness, and military Capacity, as those of any whatever. The Greeks have done him the Honour, without Contradiction, to pronounce him the greatest Man of their Nation; and to be the firft Man of His Honour by Greece is easily to be the first of the World. 9 the Greeks. His Know ledge. As to his Knowledge and Capacity, we have this ancient Judgment of him, That never any Man knew fo much, and pake fo little as he : For he was of the Pythagorean Sect: But, when he did fpeak, never any Man fpake better; being an excellent and most persuasive Orator. But, as to his Manners and Conscience, he has vaftly Plutarch of Socrates's Familiar Spirit, c. 23. furpaffed His Manners. furpaffed all Men that ever undertook the Management of Affairs; for in this one Thing, which ought chiefly to be confidered, which alone truly denotes us for what we are, and which alone I counter-balance with all the reft put together, he comes not fhort of any Philofopher whatever, not even of Socrates himself. Innocency, in this Man, is a Quality, peculiar, fovereign, conftant, uniform, and incorruptible; compared to which, it appears, in Alexander, fubaltern, uncertain, variable, effeminate, and accidental. His confummate and uniform Virtue. Antiquity has judged, that, in thoroughly fifting all the other great Captains, there is found, in every one, fome peculiar Quality that illuftrates him. In this Man only there is a full and equal Virtue and Sufficiency throughout, that leaves nothing to be wifhed for in him, in all Offices of Human Life, whether in private or public Employments, either of Peace or War, in order for living and dying with Grandeur and Glory. I do not know any Form or Fortune of a Man that I fo much honour and love. 'Tis true, that I look upon his obftinate Poverty, as it is fet out by his beft Friends, a little too fcrupulous and nice. And this is the only in Powerty. Action, tho' high in itself, and well worthy of Admiration, that I find fo unpleasant as not to defire to imitate myself, to the Degree it was in him. His Obftinacy Scipio Æmilianus the only one to be compared with bim. Scipio Emilianus, would any attribute to him as brave and magnificent an End, and as profound and univerfal a Knowledge of the Sciences, is the only Perfon fit to be put into the other Scale of the Balance: Oh! what a Mortification has Time given us, to deprive us of the Sight of two of the moft noble Lives, which, by the common Confent of all the World, one the greatest of the Greeks, and the other of the Romans, were in all Plu tarch! What a Subject! What a Workman! For a Man that was no Saint, but, as we fay, a gal lant Man, of civil and ordinary Manners, and of a moderate Eminence, the richest Life that I know, and full of the most valuable The Figure which Alcibiades made. and |