ATHENS. 301 
people : although annihilated in almost every CHAP. 
country of the earth, it lives in England ; and < r 
its extinction there, like the going-out of the 
sacred flame in the Temple of Delphi, would be 
felt as a general calamity. The circumstances 
connected with the history of the Pnyx prove 
how difficult a thing it was to subdue the love 
of freedom among the Antlent Grecians. The 
Athenian tyrants vainly imagined that it ori- 
ginated solely in the position of the (By^a,, 
or stone pulpit, whence the orators harangued 
the people ; forgetting that it is a natural prin- 
ciple implanted by Providence in the human 
heart. Under the notion they had thus con- 
ceived, they altered the plan of the Pnyx : the 
(Bypa had been fronted towards the sea ; they 
fronted it towards the land; believing that a 
people diverted from allusions to maritime 
affairs towards those of agricultural labour 
would be more easy under an oligarchical 
dominion 1 . The project was not attended with 
the consequences that were expected ; the same 
spirit yet prevailed: but this place was still , 
(1) A;o KXI TO ft-fifta, TO In nvyx/ vi*tntfiii/ov urr civofi).ivtit iraei r>ii 
fxXaffffav, 'vffiyii el r/>nixat<ra *J0 TJ %tu(>Kv ccrirf^i^xv, oiifiitai <ry>t ftit 
xara, fa.Ka<Tia.i ug%tit, yiilffH titm 2tiftox/>(t'rias, e).ij>tcg%'ixi 5' nrrat ^vv%l- 
fa/vs/y rovs yfugyiutra;. Plutarch, in Themist, ;>.268. torn. I. Land. 1729. 
