[Illustration: PLATE LXXXI. BUST OF “SOCRATES”
εἴπερ ἴσην ῥώμην γνώμῃ, Δημόσθενες, εἶχες οὔποτ’ ἂν Ἑλλήνων ἦρξεν Ἄρης Μακεδών. PLUTARCH.
The fate of that old god Cronos, supplanted by his own children whom he had tried in vain to devour, is more or less the common lot of all parents of vigorous offspring. The Athenians had a nocturnal festival in which young men ran in relays, each member of the team handing his torch to another, and, as Æschylus says in a fine metaphor, “the first is the victor, even though he be last in the running.” So at this point of our history we begin to be aware of new forces arising in the Greek world, new powers on the fringe of the Hellenic circle now stepping into the light and taking their places in the torch-race of civilisation. Such were Rhodes, the new commercial republic, Caria under Mausolus, Thessaly under Jason, Cyprus under Evagoras, Pergamum under Attalus, the two Leagues, Ætolian and Achæan, and above all Macedon under Philip and Alexander. The stream of culture and intelligence that emanated from Athens and the other ancient cities was now pulsing in the finger-tips of Greece. Many of these new powers are more than half barbarian. They are either monarchies or confederations. What generally happens is that leaders arise who are themselves sufficiently endowed with civilised intelligence to utilise the latent force in a race of untamed and uncivilised warriors. In the military sense the case is that the old powers had grown into the habit of replacing their citizen militias by paid professional soldiers, and their citizens accordingly had grown slack and unwarlike. Rulers like Philip of Macedon were able to raise much larger native levies and to drill them into the professional tactics of the day. Economically it was wealth that told. The old cities were, partly, no doubt through their own lack of foresight, in a state of financial exhaustion, while Philip, by his control of the gold-mines, Attalus and Evagoras by their private wealth, and the Phocians by their sacrilegious seizure of the treasures of Delphi, were still able to bring large forces into the field. The old powers were thus left behind in the race through the force of circumstances beyond their control. In fact, the day of the city-state seemed for a time to be drawing to a close, and larger units, either kingdoms or confederacies, to be taking its place according to their natural superiority.