136 THE AGE OF PERICLES, 



Slates was opened, and its contents lavished indiscriminately upon an 

 idle multitude, what other consequences could be anticipated ? 



In addition to this, we must not forget the dissolute school of the 

 accomplished and wanton Aspasia. Previous to the period under con- 

 sideration woman was secluded and confined to the retirement of the 

 domestic circle, except on certain festival occasions. It was considered 

 immodest for a female to be seen abroad. At home she was admitted 

 to the privilege of superintending the affairs of the household, but never 

 to an equality with her husband. Ignorant and degraded, unlike her 

 sex in the rival state of Sparta, sKe was the slave of her master. But 

 now from the fruitful and sunny plains of Asia where the colonists had 

 learned the refinements and luxuries of the East, Aspasia returns to the 

 mother city, endowed with every personal charm to captivate, and rich- 

 ly stored with those mental attainments, which render conquest not only 

 secure but permanent. With these attractive charms she brought pas- 

 sions fanned into licentiousness by the nature of her education and 

 manners, lewd and wanton from the customs of her native country. If 

 philosophy and the arts passed from the East to the West, from Ionia to 

 Greece, they were accompanied by the corruption which had so long 

 been nourished by the sensuality of Asia Minor. Aspasia, vvith all the 

 defects which belonged to her character, must have been a wonderful 

 example of female accomplishment, else Pericles would neither liave been 

 guided by her counsels, nor the venerable Socrates sat at her feet a 

 humble disciple. It is said, that her instructions helped to form the 

 greatest and most distinguished orators of Greece. However, this may 

 be, her example and instructions helped to introduce a bold and opened 

 shameless licentiousness, such as had not before been seen at Athens. 

 From this time forward laxity of morals advanced in an increased ratio, 

 until this city became emphatically, if not the most, one of the most 

 dissolute, in all Greece. 



At the same time, there flourished at Athens the sophists, who, pos- 

 sessing in truth, the art of persuasion in a high degree, and skilled in all 

 the rhetorical rules of the day, employed their genius and skill not in 

 recommending virtue, but in acquiring fame and wealth, and pandering 

 to the desires of their wealthy pupils. They sought the friendship of 

 the rich and the many. They professed the knowledge of every art 

 and science, and during the celebration of the great Grecian festivals 

 had presented to them the finest field for the display of their power. 

 Their manners were elegant, their life splendid, and their language glow- 

 ing and harmonious ; in a word, they were tlie polished gentlemen of 

 no principle but selfishness, by their polish and taste captivating the 



