116 GREEK PHILOSOPHY. 



Ghent regent of Flanders, and the Medici dukes of Tuscany. A 

 struggle for national existence calls forth the confidence of the 

 governed in those who possess the genius which alone can preserve 

 them, as unboundedly as it stimulates that genius itself; and there 

 appears no reason why the name of tyrant or dynast should have been 

 bestowed upon Eubulus more than upon Philip van Artevelde or 

 William of Orange. He was assisted in the duties of his government, 



Hermias. and afterwards succeeded, by Hermias, who is termed by Strabo his 

 slave, a term which a Greek would apply no less to the vizier than 

 to the lowest menial servant of an Asiatic potentate. He is also 

 described as an eunuch ; but, whether this was the case or not, he was 

 a man of education and philosophy, and had during a residence at 

 Athens attended the instructions of both Plato and Aristotle. 1 By 

 the invitation of this individual the latter, accompanied by Xenocrates, 

 passed over at this particular juncture into Mysia ; and it will surely 

 not seem an improbable conjecture that the especial object for which 

 their presence was desired was to frame a political constitution, in 

 order that the little confederacy, of which Hermias may perhaps be 

 regarded as the general and stadtholder, might be kept together and 

 enabled to maintain its independence in spite of the formidable power 

 of the Persian empire. Ably as such a task would doubtless have 

 been executed by so wise a statesman as even the fragmentary political 

 work that has come down to us proves Aristotle to have been, it was 

 not blessed with success. Fortune for a time favoured the cause of 

 freedom, but the barbarian's hour was not come. The treachery of a 

 Ehodian leader of condottieri in the service of the revolted Egyptians 

 enabled the Persian king, Artaxerxes Ochus, rapidly to overrun Phoe- 

 nicia and Egypt, and to devote the whole force of his empire to the 

 reduction of Asia Minor. Yet Hermias made his ground good, until 

 at last he suffered himself to be entrapped into a personal conference 

 with the Greek general Mentor, the traitor whose perfidy had rained 

 the Egyptian cause, and who now commanded the Persian army that 



Death of ' was sent against Atarneus. In spite of the assurance of a solemn 



Hermias. oa th ? his person was seized and sent to the court of the Persian king, 

 who ordered him to be strangled. The fortresses which commanded 

 the country surrendered at the sight of his signet ; and Atarneus and 



Ari ^ otl . ( : flies Assos were occupied by Persian troops. 2 The two philosophers were 

 oiymp. ' only enabled to save themselves by a precipitate flight to Mytilene, 

 taking with them Pythias, the sister and adopted daughter of Her- 

 mias. 3 It is singular that Aristotle's intercourse with the prince 

 of Atarneus, and more especially that part which related to his con- 

 nexion with this woman, whom he married, should have brought more 

 calumny upon him than any other event of his life ; and the strangest 

 thing of all, according to our modern habits of thinking, is that he 

 himself should have thought it necessary, for the satisfaction of his 



1 Strabo, loc. cit. 2 Ibid. loc. cit. Diodorus, xvi. sec. 52, 53, 54. 



3 Aristocles, ap. Euseb. loc. cit. 



CV111 



