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There is however one remarkable difference between Greek and Roman history, during the ages immediately preceding the period of the earliest historians. For the first five centuries after the foundation of the city, Rome had no literature, either in verse or prose. In Greece however it was otherwise. Here there was a long series of poets, beginning with Homer and Hesiod, whose poems descended from an undated antiquity, and proceeding through Arctinus, Callinus, and Archilochus, who are placed in the eighth century B.C., to Simonides of Amorgus, Tyrtæus, Aleman, Mimnermus, Sappho, Alcæus, Stesichorus, Solon, Anacreon, Simonides of Ceos, Hipponax and Theognis, who lived in the seventh and sixth centuries. There is no good reason for supposing that the poems of Homer and the other early epic poets contain any historical matter, or that they narrate events which really happened ;(206) but the works of the elegiac and lyric poets, though not designedly historical, include allusions to contemporary men and events, which preserved their memory, and served as an incentive to perpetuate such oral traditions as would explain the allusions. Thus Gyges, the first Mermnad king of Lydia, who reigned from about 715 to 680 B.C., was mentioned by Archilochus, his contemporary: (207) and Mimnermus composed an elegy upon the battle of the Smyrnæans against

they were propagated in the form of poetry, or became the common property of the people as mere prose narratives, like fairy tales. All the traditions of the early times, as that of Othryades, and a great many others, are of this description; all those graceful and beautiful stories can claim no higher value than the Roman ones;' ib. p. 190.

(206) Niebuhr considers the war of Troy as belonging entirely to the mythic or heroic period; to the region of fable, so that we cannot select any one of its incidents as more or less probable than the rest; Lect. on Anc. Hist. vol. i. p. 192; Hist. of Rome, vol. i. p. 180. Nevertheless he thinks that the Greeks really went to Troy, and that the Atride were real kings; Lect. p. 165; Hist. ib. Col. Mure treats the Homeric account of the Trojan war as typical of the Eolian migration from Greece to the Troad; vol. ii. p. 211-3. On the other hand, Niebuhr considers the fall of Troy as a symbol of the fall of the Pelasgians; Hist. vol. i. p. 177.

(207) Γύγης, τοῦ καὶ ̓Αρχίλοχος ὁ Πάριος κατὰ τὸν αὐτὸν χρόνον γενόμενος, Ev íúμẞų TρiμÉTρ ¿πεμvýσon, Herod. i. 22. The verse referred to has been preserved: o poi тà l'úуεw Toй woλvxoúσov μéλei, fragm. 10, ed. Gaisford. The Mermnad dynasty, consisting of Gyges, Ardys, Sadyattes, Alyattes, and Croesus, appears to be entirely historical. See Grote, vol. iii. p. 279; Clinton, vol. ii. p. 296.

Gyges and the Lydians. (208) The references of Tyrtæus to the Messenian wars, and of Solon to his own legislation, have been already described. Alcæus mentioned Melanchrus the despot, and Pittacus the dictator of Mytilene : (209) he alluded to his brother Antimenidas fighting in the Babylonian army, and slaying a gigantic champion of the enemy;(210) he likewise sang of the arms, which the Athenians took from him in battle, and hung up in the temple of Minerva at Sigeum.(211) All these events were long anterior to contemporary history, and were unrecorded at the time of their occurrence, by any prose writer; and hence the history of literature precedes political history in Greece.(12) The seven wise men, moreover, marked an era in the progress of Greece, anterior to coeval history, but subsequent to the growth of a sense of admiration for social and political prudence, as well as for poetical excellence. (213)

§ 19 In proportion as the uncertainty of the history, increasing as it recedes from the age of contemporary authors, is perceived and acknowledged, there seems to arise a desire of supplying the want of sound and credible evidence by conjecture, and of framing hypotheses, which shall remove inconsistencies, diminish improbabilities, and introduce coherence in the traditionary accounts. To some inquirers indeed this uncertain period of history presents greater attractions than a period of comparative certainty, lying within the observation of contemporary historical writers. (214) Such a preference of the uncertain to the certain period; of the period of conjecture to the period of

(208) Μίμνερμος δὲ ἐλεγεῖα ἐς τὴν μάχην ποιήσας τὴν Σμυρναίων πρὸς Γύγην τε καὶ Λυδούς, φησὶν ἐν τῷ προοιμίῳ, &c.; Paus. ix. 29, § 4. The campaign of Gyges against Smyrna is mentioned by Herod. i. 14.

(209) Fragm. 13, 30, ed. Schneidewin. The life of Pittacus is placed at 651-569 B.C.; Clinton, ad ann.

(210) Fragm. 25-6.

(212) Compare vol. i. P. 237.

(211) Fragm. 24; Herod. v. 95.

(213) See Grote, vol. iv. p. 126-30.

(214) Niebuhr alludes, in his Lectures on Roman History, to this erroneous tendency. We must not (he says) believe that Roman history ceases to have any interest, where we have contemporary authorities, and that only those parts are interesting which must be made up by conjectures and combination;' vol. 1, p. xc.

proof; of the period of imagination to that of the reason, is founded on a misconception of the ends of history. If the past is to furnish instruction, and to serve as a beacon for the future, history must be a well-authenticated narrative of facts; it must not be a vague and indistinct sketch, formed by doubtful conjectures. Such a preference for the dim and indefinite portions of history likewise generally implies a sacrifice of the interests of the reader to the reputation of the writer. In proportion as the materials are confused, obscure, and imperfect, there is scope for the ingenuity of the historian; for bold theories, novel combinations, startling hypotheses, brilliant fancies. The historian who contents himself with the less aspiring but more difficult task of collecting, digesting, weighing, and interpreting evidence is, in comparison with a writer of the former class, regarded as a mere drudge or pioneer of literature. His fidelity to facts is taken as the mark of a barren and uninventive mind. But a historian who emancipates himself from a close adherence to authentic testimony may be able, perhaps with little cost of labour, to exhibit himself in a favourable light, and to dazzle his readers by the appearance of important discoveries; though in fact he has produced nothing but arbitrary fiction under the garb of history, and has furnished no solid material for the instruction and profit of the student. Learned writers, moreover, are not always exempt from a desire of imposing upon the unwary public by a cultivation of obscure and difficult subjects, which are essentially indeterminate, and can never yield any useful result.

If the conclusions arrived at in the preceding examination of the early Roman annals are sound, and well-established, no reasonable certainty, with respect to the accounts which were preserved by the ancient writers, and have descended to us in their extant works, is attainable. Professors of speculative history can make this period the subject of hypotheses, which may be more or less ingenious and attractive; but their theories must be all equally unsusceptible of proof; and our knowledge of the first five centuries of the city will receive no increase.

We must, however, guard ourselves against the error of supposing that the uncertainty of the early Roman history furnishes a reason why the later history should not be cultivated. The obscurity of the ancient period ought not to deter us from attempting to illustrate and revive the truly historical period. In some important respects, indeed, the history of Greece possesses a superiority over the history of Rome. The Greeks first. raised mankind out of the oriental state of despotism and polygamy to freedom of public and private life; they were pre-eminent in literature, art, and science; they first created philosophy, history, and oratory; they first taught men to reason, to speak, and to write. They have this imperishable fame, which no other nation can share with them. But the history of Rome is not without its peculiar interest and attractions for the modern world. The Romans were the great masters of civil government, jurisprudence, military organization, and war in antiquity. By their efficiency as soldiers they conquered the ancient world; by their skill as rulers they held it in permanent subjection. Hence (as Niebuhr has truly remarked), the history of all nations in the ancient world ends in that of Rome, and that of all modern nations has grown out of that of Rome.(215) Modern Europe is connected by a thousand different threads with the ancient Roman empire; all the origins of its civilization, of its political institutions, law, literature, science, and languages, are traceable to Rome. The great recollections of antiquity made the Bishop of Rome the head of the Western Church. The modern Greeks even call their language Romaic, and look to Constantinople as their capital. So intimate and manifest is the connexion of modern Europe with ancient Rome, that Roman history must continue to be studied and cultivated in Europe and America, while man remains a historical animal, and occupies himself about the past destinies of his own race and nation.

(215) Lect. vol. 1, p. xcvi. He also observes that 'in modern history the English alone have passed through the same perfect career of development as the Romans; and in a cosmopolitan point of view, therefore, the history of these two nations must always be the most important;' ib. p. ii.

All the historical labour bestowed upon the early centuries of Rome will, in general, be wasted. The history of this period, viewed as a series of picturesque narratives, will be read to the greatest advantage in the original writers, and will be deteriorated by reproduction in a modern dress. If we regard a historical painting merely as a work of art, the accounts of the ancients can only suffer from being retouched by the pencil of the modern restorer. On the other hand, all attempts to reduce them to a purely historical form, by conjectural omissions, additions, alterations, and transpositions, must be nugatory. The workers on this historical treadmill may continue to grind the air, but they will never produce any valuable result.

Those who are disposed to labour in the field of Roman history will find a worthier reward for their toils, if they employ themselves upon the time subsequent to the Italian expedition of Pyrrhus. At this epoch, the Romans, though a formidable, were not a predominant power; their rule was still confined to a part of Italy; they had not yet begun to run their course of universal empire, and they had only given obscure indications of the prodigious energy, and overwhelming ascendancy, which they afterwards exhibited. Their old republican constitution, moreover, which was now fully developed with respect to the Roman community itself, and its relations to a few municipia and colonies, continued in a substantially unchanged state, for nearly two centuries; during which period its character and operation are fully displayed. For the whole of this time, an authentic history, proof against all reasonable doubt, can be recovered. It is indeed subject to the imperfections which beset a large part of the annals of antiquity. The original contemporary authors, unassisted by the use of printing, and by the numerous mechanical contrivances which facilitate the researches and widen the horizon of the modern historian, were limited in their means of obtaining trustworthy intelligence. Their works are moreover lost, and our knowledge of the facts is, to a great extent, derived only from secondary compilations.

But, even under these disadvantages, it is possible to con

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