FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND CHANGES IN GRECIAN POLITICS.

Although Greek political writers taught that there were, primarily, but three forms of government--monarchy, or the rule of one; aristocracy, that of the few; and democracy, that of the many--the latter always limited by the Greeks to the freemen--yet it appears that when anyone of these degenerated from its supposed legitimate object, the welfare of the state, it was marked by a peculiar name. Thus a monarchy in which selfish aims predominated became a tyranny; and in later Grecian history, such was the prevailing sentiment in opposition to kingly rule that all kings were called tyrants: an aristocracy which directed its measures chiefly to the preservation of its power became an oligarchy; and a democracy that departed from the civil and political equality which was its supposed basis, and gave ascendancy to a faction, was sometimes designated by the term ochlocracy, or the dominion of the rabble. "A democracy thus corrupted," says THIRLWALL, "exhibited many features of a tyranny. It was jealous of all who were eminently distinguished by birth, fortune, or reputation; it encouraged flatterers and sycophants; was insatiable in its demands on the property of the rich, and readily listened to charges which exposed them to death or confiscation. The class which suffered such oppression, commonly ill satisfied with the principle of the Constitution itself, was inflamed with the most furious animosity by the mode in which it was applied, and it regarded the great mass of its fellow-citizens as its mortal enemies."

As in all the Greek states there was a large class of people not entitled to the full rights of citizenship, including, among others, persons reduced to slavery as prisoners of war, and foreign settlers and their descendants, so there was no such form of government as that which the moderns understand by a complete democracy. Of a republic also, in the modern acceptation of the term--that is, a representative democracy--the Greeks knew nothing. As an American statesman remarks, "Certain it is that the greatest philosophers among them would have regarded as something monstrous a republic spreading over half a continent and embracing twenty-six states, each of which would have itself been an empire, and not a commonwealth, in their sense of the word."[Footnote: Hugh S. LegarÉ's Writings, vol. i., p.440.]

I. CHANGES FROM ARISTOCRACIES TO OLIGARCHIES.

During several centuries succeeding the period of the supposed Trojan war, a gradual change occurred in the political history of the Grecian states, the results of which were an abandonment of much of the kingly authority that prevailed through the Heroic Age. At a still later period this change was followed by the introduction and establishment, at first, of aristocracies, and, finally, of democratic forms of government; which latter decided the whole future character of the public life of the Grecians. The three causes, more prominent than the rest, that are assigned by most writers for these changes, and the final adoption of democratic forms, are, first, the more enlarged views occasioned by the Trojan war, and the dissensions which followed the return of those engaged in it; second, the great convulsions that attended the Thessalian, Boeotian, and Dorian migrations; and, third, the free principles which intercourse and trade with the Grecian colonies naturally engendered.

But of these causes the third tended, more than any other one, to change the political condition of the Grecians. Whether the migrations of the Greek colonists were occasioned, as they generally were, by conquests that drove so many from their homes to seek an asylum in foreign lands, or were undertaken, as was the case in some instances, with the consent and encouragement of the parent states, there was seldom any feeling of dependence on the one side, and little or no claim of authority on the other. This was especially the case with the Ionians, who had scarcely established themselves in Asia Minor when they shook off the authority of the princes who conducted them to their new settlements, and established a form of government more democratic than any which then existed in Greece.

With the rapid progress of mercantile industry and maritime discovery, on which the prosperity of the colonies depended, a spirit of independence grew up, which erelong exerted an influence on the parent states of Greece, and encouraged the growth of free principles there. "Freedom," says an eloquent author,[Footnote: Heeren, "Polities of Ancient Greece," p. 103.] "ripens in colonies. Ancient usage cannot be preserved, cannot altogether be renewed, as at home. The former bonds of attachment to the soil, and ancient customs, are broken by the voyage; the spirit feels itself to be more free in the new country; new strength is required for the necessary exertions; and those exertions are animated by success. When every man lives by the labor of his hands, equality arises, even if it did not exist before. Each day is fraught with new experience; the necessity of common defence is more felt in lands where the new settlers find ancient inhabitants desirous of being free from them. Need we wonder, then, if the authority of the founders of the Grecian colonies, even where it had originally existed, soon gave way to liberty?"

But the changes in the political principles of the Grecian states were necessarily slow, and were usually attended with domestic quarrels and convulsions. Monarchy, in most instances, was abolished by first taking away its title, and substituting that of archon, or chief magistrate, a term less offensive than that of king; next, by making the office of chief ruler elective, first in one family, then in more--first for life, then for a term of years; and, finally, by dividing the power among several of the nobility, thus forming an aristocracy or oligarchy. At the time in Grecian history to which we have come democracy was as yet unknown; but the principal Grecian states, with the exception of Sparta, which always retained the kingly form of government, had abolished royalty and substituted oligarchy. This change did not better the condition of the people, who, increasing in numbers and intelligence, while the ruling class declined in numbers and wealth, became conscious of their resources, and put forward their claims to a representation in the government.

II. FROM OLIGARCHIES TO DESPOTISMS.

The fall of the oligarchies was not accomplished, however, by the people. "The commonalty," says THIRLWALL, "even when really superior in strength, could not all at once shake off the awe with which it was impressed by years of subjection. It needed a leader to animate, unite, and direct it; and it was seldom that one capable of inspiring it with confidence could be found in its own ranks," Hence this leader was generally found in an ambitions citizen, perhaps a noble or a member of the oligarchy, who, by artifice and violence, would make himself the supreme ruler of the state. Under such circumstances the overthrow of an oligarchy was not a triumph of the people, but only the triumph of a then popular leader. To such a one was given the name of tyrant, but not in the sense that we use the term. HEEREN says, "The Grecians connected with this word the idea of an illegitimate, but not necessarily of a cruel, government." As the word therefore signifies simply the irresponsible rule of a single person, such person may be more correctly designated by the term despot, or usurper; although, in point of fact, the government was frequently of the most cruel and tyrannical character.

"The merits of this race of rulers," says BULWER, "and the unconscious benefits they produced, have not been justly appreciated, either by ancient or modern historians. Without her tyrants Greece might never have established her democracies. The wiser and more celebrated tyrants were characterized by an extreme modesty of deportment: they assumed no extraordinary pomp, no lofty titles--they left untouched, or rendered yet more popular, the outward forms and institutions of the government--they were not exacting in taxation--they affected to link themselves with the lowest orders and their ascendancy was usually productive of immediate benefit to the working-classes, whom they employed in new fortifications or new public buildings--dazzling the citizens by a splendor that seemed less the ostentation of an individual than the prosperity of a state. It was against the aristocracy, not against the people, that they directed their acute sagacities and unsparing energies. Every politic tyrant was a Louis the Eleventh, weakening the nobles, creating a middle class. He effected his former object by violent and unscrupulous means. He swept away by death or banishment all who opposed his authority or excited his fears. He thus left nothing between the state and a democracy but himself; and, himself removed, democracy naturally and of course ensued."[Footnote: "Athens: Its Rise and Fall," vol. i., pp. 148, 149.]

From the middle of the seventh century B.C., and during a period of over one hundred and fifty years, there were few Grecian cities that escaped a despotic government. While the history of Athens affords, perhaps, the most striking example of it, the longest tyranny in Greece was that in the city of Si'Çyon, which lasted a hundred years under Orthag'orus and his sons. Their dynasty was founded about 676 B.C., and its long duration is ascribed to its mildness and moderation. The last of this dynasty was Clis'thenes, whose daughter became the mother of the Athenian Clisthenes, the founder of democracy at Athens on the expulsion of the Pisistrat'idÆ. The despots of Corinth were more celebrated. Their dynasty endured seventy-four years, having been founded in the year 655. Under Perian'der, who succeeded to power in 625, and whose government was cruel and oppressive, Corinth reached her highest prosperity. His reign lasted upward of forty years, and soon after his death the dynasty ended, being overpowered by Sparta.

Across the isthmus from Corinth was the city of Meg'ara, of which, in 630 B.C., Theag'enes, a bold and ambitious man, made himself despot. Like many other usurpers of his time, he adorned the city with splendid and useful buildings. But he was overthrown after a rule of thirty years, and a violent struggle then ensued between the oligarchy and the people. At first the latter were successful; they banished many of the nobles, and confiscated their property, but the exiles returned, and by force of arms recovered their power. Still the struggle continued, and it was not until after many years that an oligarchical government was firmly established. Much interest is added to these revolutions in Megara by the writings of THEOG'NIS, a contemporary poet, and a member of the oligarchical party. "His writings," says THIRLWALL, "are interesting, not so much for the historical facts contained in them as for the light they throw on the character and feelings of the parties which divided his native city and so many others."

In the poems of THEOGNIS "his keen sense of his personal sufferings is almost absorbed in the vehement grief and indignation with which he contemplates the state of Megara, the triumph of the bad [his usual term for the people], and the degradation of the good [the members of the old aristocracy]." Some of the social changes which the popular revolution had effected are thus described:

It appears, also, that some of the aristocracy by birth had so far forgotten their leading position as to inter-marry with those who had become possessed of much wealth; and of this condition of things the poet complains as follows:

The usurpations in Sicyon, Corinth, and Megara furnish illustrations of what occurred in nearly all of the Grecian states during the seventh and sixth centuries before the Christian era. Some of those of a later period will be noticed in a subsequent chapter.