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FRASER’S MAGAZINE
JUNE 1875.
MORAL ESTIMATE OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT.
R. AUBREY DE VERE opens
No one ever has grudged, and no
his preface to Alexander the one will ever grudge, praise to
Great, a Dramatic Poem, by in form Alexander for .military talent; but
ing us that in the last century it the talent was not that of a scientific
was thought philosophical to sneer general who plans a campaign, as a
at ‘the Macedonian madman,’ and Von Moltke or even a Napoleon;
moral to declaim against him as a it was only that of a quick-eyed
bandit. The ancients, he says, Garibaldi or Conde. Generalship
made no such mistake. He proceeds of the highest modern type was
to panegyrise Alexander as uniting then impossible, for the plain reason
the highest military genius with a that maps did not exist, and the
statesmanship instinctive and im- roads which Alexander traversed7
erring. His intellect, he tells us, were in every instance unknown to.
was at once vast and minute. His him. Not only was he without the
aim was to consolidate the whole means of forming previous plans of
world into a single empire, redeemed operation; he was also destitute of
from barbarism and irradiated with storehouses and stores for feeding
Greek science and art; an empire his troops, and of gold or silver
Such that its citizens, from the mouths to purchase food and remunerate
of the Ganges to the pillars of Hercules, their services. The Romans, who
should be qualified to learn from methodised war, accounted money
Plato and to take delight in to be its sinews (pecuniam nervos
Sophocles. It is not necessary to belli) ; but all agree that Alexander
quote further from Mr. Aubrey de enteredupon war against the opulent
Vere. The above sufficiently shows Persian monarchy with resources of
what a picture he aims to hold up money and stores of provisions
for our admiration, what impres utterly inadequate, so that nothing
sions he desires his drama to leave but instant and continuous success
on the minds of readers. In this could save him from. ruin. But,
article it is not purposed to discuss says Plutarch gaily, though his
its poetical merits, which must be resources were so small and narrow,
left to another pen and time, but he gave away his Macedonian
to enter into the historical questions possessions freely to his comrades ;
whether Alexander the Great was houses to one, a field to another,
a beneficent or a malignant star a village to a third, harbour dues to .
to Greece and to mankind, and a fourth ; and when some one asked.,
what sentiments are just concerning ‘ O king, what do you leave for ■
him. But it may concisely be said yourself ? ’ he replied, ‘ Hopes ! ’
at once that the present writer is This was very spirited, no doubt.
intensely opposed to Mr. de Vere’s In the midst of a martial people,
avowed judgment.
and from a prince barely of age,
VOL. XI,—NO. LXVI.
NEW SERIES.
3A2
M
�668
flforaZ Estimate of Alexander the Great.
[June
it may be thought very amiable; superior. (Persian cavalry always
but with Grecian statesmen and dreaded a night attack, and
philosophers the delusiveness of systematically, according to Xeno
hope was a frequent topic. Nothing phon, passed the night some twelve
is plainer than that from the miles distant from an enemy.)
beginning Alexander was a gambler Hence the Greeks would be able to
playing ‘double or quits,’ and that cross by night without opposition.
causes over which he had no con The young king replied that, after
trol, and knew he had none, might crossing the Hellespont, it was dis
at any moment have involved him graceful to be afraid of the little
in sudden overthrow. The unex Granicus; and presently plunged
pected death of Memnon as much into the stream, bidding his thirteen
as anything (says Arrian) ruined squadrons of cavalry to follow.
Darius’s fortunes. No doubt it The violence and depth of the
was just to count on the great water, the rugged banks, and the
superiority of Greek armour, Greek enemy awaiting him, rather incited
discipline, and Macedonian military than appalled Alexander. It seemed,
tactics; also on the feebleness says Plutarch, to be a strategy of
entailed on Persia by royal luxury despair, not of wisdom, and indeed
and half-independent satraps. The to be the deed of a maniac. But
successes of Xenophon and of the young king was certain of one
Agesilaus had long familiarised the thing—that wherever he led, his
Greeks to the belief that a moderate Macedonians would follow; and this
Greek army was superior to a fact was the impetus to all his
Persian host. Experienced Greek military conduct. The Macedonians,
generals did not esteem the invasion from their long spears, had advantage
of Persia to be a wild expedition ; in close combat over the Persians
the Congress of Greece,1 from which who fought with swords ; but darts
only the Spartans were conspi and arrows from above were
cuously absent, deliberately sanc severely felt while they were in the
tioned it. No one could foresee river. Struggling up with difficulty
such a commencement as was the through the mud, they could not
battle of the Granicus; everyone keep any ranks and lines of battle,
in the retrospect judged Alexander’s and the opposite squadrons became
conduct rash in the extreme. That mixed, horse pushing against horse.
it succeeded we know, but Mr. de The signal helmet displayed Alex
Vere has not said a word to pro ander to the enemy, and three
duce conviction that such conduct eminent Persians hurried into
is that of a wise general.
personal conflict with him. Accord
The Persian satraps had as ing to Arrian, Alexander slew the
sembled a force, powerful in cavalry, first, received . from the second a
but in infantry very inferior to the blow of the sword which cut off
Greeks, to prevent his crossing of the crest of his helmet; neverthe
this river, which, by the uncertainty less him too he slew with the
of the bottom and steepness of the Macedonian pike. The third would
banks, was in itself formidable undoubtedly have killed Alexander
enough. The day was far gone, had he not himself first been
and Parmenio urged that the enemy pierced through the body by the
would not dare to pass the night in Macedonian Cleitus.
proximity to Grecian infantry so
Not unlike was the conduct of
’ It is due to those who have read an article from my pen in Fraser April 1874
to confess that, from trusting my memory, I have erroneously stated, page 474 that
Philip was assassinated before the Congress met. Since it does not at all affect mv
argument, I need only regret the blunder.—F. W. N.
J
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
the younger Cyrus in the battle of
Cunaxa, as narrated by Xenophon ;
but Cyrus egregiously miscalculated
in expecting his mercenary, the
Spartan Clearchus, to obey orders.
Cyrus impetuously rushed against
the Persian king’s body-guard,
commanding Clearchus to support
him. But Clearchus thought this
a rash procedure, disobeyed, and
allowed Cyrus to be surrounded
and killed; thus sacrificing the
whole object of the expedition, and
exposing all the Greek troops to
difficulties so severe that their
ultimate escape appeared miracu
lous. Alexander’s troops and Alex
ander’s generals were of different
mettle; on that he counted, and
was never deceived. Fearless ex
posure of his own person was his
mode of inciting them; but they
quite understood the error and the
mischief of such conduct. Even
after the final overthrow of Darius,
if Alexander had been slain in
battle no one could measure the
calamity which such an event might
entail. Nevertheless he retained
this habit of acting the part of
soldier as well as of general, being
many times severely wounded with
swords, darts, arrows, and stones,
until he narrowly escaped with life
in his Indian campaign. Arrian
gives the account in great detail.
The wall was difficult to ascend.
The king thought his soldiers
deficient in spirit, seized a ladder,
and himself climbed to the top.
Alarm for his exposure made so
many hurry tumultuously that their
weight broke the ladders. Finding
himself alone on the top of the wall,
he leaped down on the other side,
and, in spite of prodigies of valour,
received a very dangerous arrow
wound in the breast. The Macedonians poured in after him just in
time to save his life, which for days
after was accounted doubtful. His
friends severely reproached him for
an imprudence which might have
been the ruin of them all; and (says
Arrian) he was greatly vexed, be
669
cause he knew that their reproaches
were just; but as other men are
overcome by other vices, so was he
by this impetus to fight. This
being his habit, surely no more
words are needed to show the
character of his generalship. Speed
of movement, urgency in pursuit,
were his two marked peculiarities ;
but to these he added a marvellous
quickness to perceive at the moment
whatever the moment admitted.
On this account he will ever be
named among the greatest generals
of antiquity, although he was never
matched against troops at all to
compare to his own, nor against
any experienced leader.
Without for a moment under
valuing his high military qualities,
we must not put out of sight the
pre-eminent army which his able
father had bequeathed to him. The
western world had never before seen
such an organisation. A reader of
Greek accustomed to Thucydides,
Xenophon, and Demosthenes finds
it hard to translate the new Greek
phrases made necessary in King
Philip’s army. The elaborate
ness of modern times seems to come
upon us suddenly. We find Guards,
Horse Guards, Foot Guards, the
King’s own Body Guard, the Van
guard, the King’s Horse, the
Cavalry, Equestrian Tetrarchies,
the Agema (which may seem to be
the Gros, whether of an army or of
each brigade), the Horse Darters,
the Lancers, the Horse Archers, the
Archers, the Forerunners (or
Scouts ?), besides all the Infantry
common in Greece; and an
apparatus for sieges, such as the
old Assyrians and Egyptians dis
play to us in sculpture and painting.
The history of the transmission of
this art is curious. We have no
reason for supposing that the Per
sians ever used its higher mechanism,
but the Phoenicians carried the
knowledge of it to Carthage. The
Carthaginians practised it ela
borately in some of their Sicilian
wars, and from them Dionysius of
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Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
Syracuse learned it. Philip II. of
Macedon is said to have imported
it into Greece from Dionysius ; but
his temperament was adverse to the
use of force where bribery could
effect his object. To him is im
puted the saying, that he deemed
no fortress to be impregnable if an
ass laden with gold could climb up
to the gate. He must have incor
porated with his army sappers and
miners, and men furnished with
engines and ladders, skilled also in
extempore construction; for in his
son’s campaigns these agencies
come forth whenever they are
wanted. It is quite unexplained
how in his rapid marches through
mountainous countries (as Caubul)
he could carry with him huge
machines that rained arrows on an
enemy from a distance farther than
a human arm could send them. The
speed with which his engineers
make bridges to cross rivers, even
the great river Indus, takes one
quite by surprise. Long skill and
training is here presupposed. Under
Alexander’s successors the engines
of siege attain a magnitude and im
portance previously unparalleled.
Philip disciplined every class of
troops to its own work, and from
Thrace and Thessaly had men and
horses beyond any previous Greek
potentate. Greece had been accus
tomed to admire Spartan discipline ;
but Spartan troops were nearly all
of one kind, heavy infantry. They
had scarcely any cavalry, and, with
all their solid armour, were unable
to stand against arrows, or even
against slingers and darters. Before
walls or ditches they were helpless.
Yet Agesilaus had not found the
Persians formidable. He never en
countered such clouds of arrows as
Mardonius showered on the Spartans
at Plataea; hence in general the
Greeks feared Greek mercenaries
fighting on the side of Persia far
more than they feared Persians.
Every Macedonian captain knew
[June
so well the superiority of a Mace
donian army, that they counted on
victory if only they could meet the
foe in the field, whether a Philip,
a Parmenio, or an Antipater was to
be the general. This must be re
membered in estimating Alexander’s
victories.
Plutarch, desirous of exalting
Alexander, makes much of his boy
ish utterances, among which is one
of jealousy against his father for
too great success. ‘ Why, boys,’
said he, ‘ my fathei’ will leave me
nothing to conquer.’ Everything
which is told of him by his panegy
rists points to the same intense
egotism. To be a conqueror greater
than his father, and to be a fighter
equal to Achilles, and if possible
to be celebrated by a poet as noble
as Homer, was his ardent and con
stant aspiration. Alexander him
self told Darius plainly what were
his motives for ‘persevering in
hostility. At least Arrian (who
follows the accounts of Ptolemy,
son of Lagus, and Aristobulus, one
of Alexander’s commanders) pro
fesses to have before him the
actual despatch.2 After the battle
of Issus, in which Darius’s queen
and young son and mother and
other ladies had been captured,
Darius wrote to ask of Alexander
that he would restore them, and
accept from him friendship and
alliance ; for which he offered full
pledges, and begged for the same in
turn. Alexander had treated the
captive ladies- with ostentatious
honour; therefore a mild reply
might have been hoped. Instead of
this, from beginning to end the
letter breathes reproach and defiance.
In conclusion it says: ‘ Since I
have defeated, first thy generals and
satraps, and next thee and the
forces with thee; since I hold the
country, and have now in my army
numbers of those who fought on
thy side, come to me as to him who
is lord of all Asia: then thou shaft
8 ‘ The despatch of Alexander,’ says he, * stands tutts : 23e
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
receive back thy mother, thy wife
and children, and much beside,
whatever thou canst persuade me
by asking for it. But in future do
not send to me as thine equal, but
as the lord of all that is thine; else
I shall regard thee as injurious.’
Such a repulse of friendly overtures,
when Alexander had attained far
more than any Greek hoped or
wished, must surely be censured by
every modern. Yet, before any new
defeat was encountered, Darius
made yet another attempt at peace.
As Arrian tells it, while Alexander
was engaged in the siege of Tyre,
ambassadors came, offering to him
ten thousand talents (say, two
millions sterling) as ransom for the
king’s family ; Darius was willing
to yield to him the country as
far as the Euphrates •, he proposed
that Alexander should accept his
daughter in marriage, and that they
should be friends and allies. The
only reply of Alexander was ‘ that
he wanted no money of Darius, for
he counted all Darius’s money to
be his own; he would not accept a
part of the country instead of the
whole ; and if he wished to marry a
daughter of Darius, he would take
her by force without her father’s
leave.’ The historian who tells
this does not seem to be aware
how very inhuman was such a reply;
no censure escapes him. As far as
we can learn, to make Alexander
great and glorious, is Alexander’s
motive according to his own account.
Mr. de Vere would persuade us that
his aims were philanthropic. The
notion is in itself wholly ana
chronistic.
Ambition, not philanthropy, down
to the present time is the motive for
conquest. Philanthropy does some
times lead to annexation; we see
an instance in the archipelago of
Fiji, which has been accepted re
luctantly, not conquered, by the
rulers of England. So, we make
no doubt, the Incas of Peru bene
volently accepted the responsibility
of rule over various barbarian and
671
scattered tribes, whom they pre
sently attached to themselves by
benefits. Instances of this kind
exist in history, enough barely to
show what is possible to human
nature; but, alas! they are very
rare. Where the philanthropic
object is sincere, the sense of duty
and responsibility is keen, and there
is no coveting of territory and
power, no claim that might makes
right, no violence is used to establish
the claim. To make armed invasion
and attack on another country is an
avowal that you are not seeking
the welfare of the invaded, but
some interests or imagined rights of
your own or of your ally. Now, it
is obvious in Greek literature that
up to the time of Aristotle and
Alexander no idea of international
right existed. In the discourses
reported by Xenophon we have no
hint that Socrates thought a war of
Greeks even against Greeks to need
justification; and Aristotle lays
down that, by the natural superio
rity of the Greek mind, barbari
ans are made for subjection to
Greeks ; and if they do not submit,
they may rightly be forced to sub
mission—in fact, as brute animals.
When Aristotle so reasoned and
so believed, we cannot expect any
Greek prince, or any Greek republic,
to have moral scruples against in
vading any foreigner. If, from a
modern point of view, anyone
now call Alexander a ‘ bandit,’ as
Mr. de Vere complains, it is noton
the bare ground that he was an
invader ; it must mean that he was
a peculiarly reckless invader, who,
with no motive then generally
esteemed adequate, marked his
course with blood and devastation.
That is a question of detail. But
up to that time the world had seen
no right of territory or of empire
asserted on any other argument
than that of simple force. The
great Darius, son of Hystaspes,
piously records on his monuments
the names of the successive nations
which God gave to his sceptre.
�672
Moral Estimate oj Alexander the Great.
Hebrew princes spoke in the same
tone concerning whatever conquests
they could make on their narrower
scale. None can now wonder or
censure if Alexander, after the
battle of Issus, says to Darius, ‘ By
my victory God has given me
countries which were thine.’ The
Persians had no title but force to
the possession of Cilicia and Lydia ;
force might be repelled by force.
Brom the earliest times the Greeks
had swarmed out into colonies
planted on the coast of Asia, without
asking leave of Asiatic princes ; but
those princes no sooner became
powerful than they endeavoured to
recover the possession of their seabord,3 and the Lydian dynasty at
length absorbed into itself these
Asiatic Greeks. When the Persians
conquered Lydia, they naturally
regarded the Greek coast as an
integrant part of their domain;
but the Greeks, rejoicing in the
fall of the Lydian suzerain, hoped
for entire independence, and had
to be re-subdued. The Athenians
imprudently assisted them against
Darius, and sent a body of troops
which took part in the burning of
Sardis, the capital of Lydia. No
modern empire would wink at such
an outrage ; nor could King Darius ;
yet the Athenians always speak as
though his war against them had
been unprovoked. Each side knew
the outrages it had suffered and
forgot those which it had inflicted
—a common case. Unless treaties
and oaths forbade, war was received
as the natural and rightful relation
even , in Greece itself between city
and city.
But when ambition is the real
undeniable motive of war, there are
yet two kinds of ambition—personal
and national. However much we
may palliate, excuse, or even praise
the latter, all good feeling, all mo
rality, and all common sense unite
severely to rebuke the former. No
moral reasoner can justify the deeds
[June■
of Warren Hastings or of Clive,
yet we do not stigmatise the doers
as vile men; Cicero may defend
Bonteius, yet the reader sees that
the defence amounts to this, that
the oppressions complained of, if
criminal, were violences perpetrated
in the interests of Roman con
quest, not for Bonteius’s own en
richment or aggrandisement. Each
nation is strong by patriotism.
Patriotism seldom escapes a tinge
of national vanity, and generally
is deep dyed in absurd national
self-esteem. One who sacrifices
himself for the exaltation of his own
people has in him the vital element
of high virtue, even though he may
injuriously overlook the rights of
other peoples ; hence we can hon
our mere soldiers, faithful servants
of a dynasty or of a powerful re
public, when they wholly decline
all judgment of the right or wrong
of a war, and bestow their entire
energies and their lives to exalt
their nation and dynasty. The
more signally the selfish element is
suppressed, the higher is the hon
our due to them; but just in
proportion as the selfish element
is combined with unjust war, our
moral estimate is turned the other
way. If the separate commanders
are encouraged to love war because
it enables them to become rich by
plundering the conquered, the war
is demoralising to the victors. If
the king who decrees the war is
aiming at the exaltation not of his
own nation and race, but of his
own individual person; if he is
ready to trample his own people
underfoot, and set up the barbarian
as equal or superior, as soon as this,
in turn, conduces to his personal
magnificence; and if at the same
time he is utterly reckless of hu
man life and suffering on both, sides,
whenever he has a fancy or a whim
of glory—it is rather too great a
strain on our credulity to hold him
up to moral admiration. Now, in
3 Bord = edge, border; a different word from board.
�187S]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
the case of Alexander we have to
enquire, of which class was his am
bition P Was he aiming to exalt
himself, or his royal race, or to
exalt Macedonia, or to exalt Greece?
Kone of these alternatives contents
Mr. de Vere, who says that Alex
ander was aiming to make Indians
and Spaniards learn wisdom of
Sophocles and Plato. But we must
go into various details in order to
get at the truth.
Alexander, in Greek belief, de
scended from Hercules onhisfather’s
side and from Achilles on his mo
ther’s. He might naturally be
proud of each genealogy. The
Macedonians were half-Thracian,
and doubtfully Greek; but the
Macedonian dynasty claimed to be
Heracleid. Philip had satisfied the
Olympian umpires of his right, as
a genuine Greek, to send chariots
and horses to contend for the prize,
and was sincerely proud of the
honour. Plutarch, a great admirer
of Alexander, censures Philip for
the pleasure which he took in the
rivalry of cultivated Greek conver
sation, and for engraving on coins
hi® Olympian victories; while the
boyish Alexander, on the contrary,
said ‘ he must have kings for his
rivals before he would enter any
contest.’ Such royal airs did he
give himself when he was but six
teen, that a jocose saying became
current: ‘ Alexander is our king,
and Philip only our general;’ and
Philip himself was pleased with it.
But the politic Philip committed at
last one imprudence; it was great
and fatal. He had long been tired
of his queen Olympias, as well he
might be, for all agree that she
was proud, intemperate, and vio
lent. Plutarch believes the story
that, as the poets tell of Thracian
women, she practised Orphic and
Bacchanalian enthusiasm, and was
a zealot of ‘ possessions,’ inspira
tion, or catalepsy, which the mo
derns do not easily believe to have
been managed without drugs or
wine. Be the cause what it may,
673
she was very overbearing and unamiable. Alexander was moulded
into pride by his mother, and was
in general very much disposed to
yield to her; but an utterance of
his, after he was supreme in Asia,
has been stereotyped : ‘ My mother
really charges me a very high rent
for my ten months’ lodging [in her
womb].’ Philip is said already to
have had another wife, Eurydice
(Arrian, iii. 6), but apparently
Olympias still held the chief place as
queen, until he became fascinated
by a much younger lady, Cleopatra,
who was introduced to the Court
in a magnificent wedding-feast.
Her uncle, Attalus, when much the
worse forwine, uttered an imprudent
blessing on the marriage. Olympias
flamed out with all the wrath
of a Medea. Alexander expected
to be disowned as successor to the
throne and superseded by a new
heir. He escaped with his mother
into Epirus, and thence took refuge
with the Illyrians. This was when
he was about seventeen. With a
slight turn of events his history
might have been that of many
■ Oriental princes;—a son contending
with his father for the throne.
Philip, by kind messages, per
suaded him to return ; but Alex
ander was still jealous, and his new
jealousy was of his brother Arrhidaaus. Pexodorus, satrap of Caria,
desired to give his daughter in
marriage to Arrhidseus. Alexan
der, suspecting some treason in
this, sent a private messenger to the
satrap, dissuading the match, and
asking why the young lady was not
rather offered in marriage to him.
Plutarch, who tells this, does not
see how unamiable this makes Alex
ander towards his brother as well
as his father. With his cousin
Amyntas he had a deadly feud,
because Amyntas, his elder, was
son of Perdiccas, who preceded
Philip on the throne, and had osten
sibly a higher claim to the succes
sion than Alexander. All danger
of collision with Philip himself was
�■674
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
removed by the assassin Pausanias,
whom Olympias was believed by
the public to have instigated.
The new reign opened with all
the symptoms of a Court revolu
tion. Noblemen who had gone into
exile returned at once, among
whom was Ptolemy, son of Lagus.
Amyntas was put to death as a
dangerous rival. Cleopatra’s infant
son suffered the same fate. Attalus,
to whom Alexander was implacable
for a drunken speech, had been sent
forward by Philip with an army into
Asia, but was there assassinated by
Hecatasus, Alexander’s emissary.
Cleopatra herself was ‘ handled
cruelly ’ by Olympias—words of
Plutarch, which are generally in
terpreted to mean that she was put
to death with bodily outrage.4 But
when the violent deeds of princes
are secret we must make allowance
for credulous exaggerations of de
tail.
Though Alexander was proud of
his descent from Hercules through
his father, so quickly was his head
turned by too rapid and dazzlingsuccess, that he presently disowned
his father Philip, and wished to be'
accounted a son of Jupiter. This
was the beginning of disgust to the
Macedonians.
His comrade and
playmate Philotas, whom Philip
had employed to reprove him for
his foolish and wrongful meddlinoagainst the marriage of his brother
Arrhideeus, wrote to him honest
truth in Egypt, when first Alexander
trumped up this monstrous fiction,
and warned him of the mischief
which he would do to himself by it.
That Alexander never forgave him
for his plain speaking appears un
deniable : for, years after, when
Philotas was accused of complicity
in a plot against Alexander’s life,
Alexander, rising in the council of
chief Macedonians, bitterly accused
Philotas of having been a traitor
[June
from the beginning, and adduced
this letter as a proof of his early
disaffection. Whether Philotas was,
or was not, at last in complicity with
the plot, it is not probable that the
moderns will ever agree. Quintus
Curtins condemns him; but the
argument which Curtius puts into
his mouth appears a complete and
sufficient defence, and on this point
makes him reply: ‘ I wrote to the
king direct; I did not write to
others concerning the king ; I feared
for him; I did not raise odium
against him • my trust in friendship,
and the dangerous freedom ofgivingtrue advice, have ruined me.’ Be
the case of Philotas as it may, all
the historians agree that Alexander
insisted on the title Son of Jupiter,
for which he had obtained the
sanction of the oracle of Hammon by
a very dangerous journey through
the desert.
On one remarkable
occasion (Arrian, vii. 8), when the
army was able to speak with a com
bined shout, by which no one should
be singled out for vengance, they cry
to him that ‘ they had best all
return to Greece, and leave him to
campaign in Asia by help of his
father ’—meaning Jupiter Hammon,
says the historian. Plutarch, who
certainly does not censure him, says
that ‘ to the Persians he assumed
the haughty tone of one who was
quite convinced of his divine birth,
but to the Greeks he was more
moderate and sparing in his
assumption of divinity, except that
to the Athenians he wrote a letter
concerning Samos saying: “I,formy
part, should not have given to you
a free and glorious city [Samos] ;
but you have received it from him
who then was master of it, and used
to be called my father ”—meaning
Philip.’ But a king who could
gratuitously write thus in a public
despatch to the Athenians displayed
a determination to enforce his pre
4 Plutarch says that Alexander was very angry with his mother for her conduct
to Cleopatra. One might interpret his words to mean that Olympias inflicted some
bodily outrage that marred her beauty; but I fear that a still more terrible sense is
truer.
�f ' 1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
posterous claim.5 And here it is
difficult to understand the liberty
which Mr. Aubrey de Vere takes
with history. He represents Alex
ander as speaking with contempt
and disapproval of the mythical
tale of his miraculous origin (p. 7) :
Mark, Hephrestion!
The legend-mongers at their work! ’Twas
thus
They forg’d in Macedon that tale prepost’rous,
Scand’lous alike to me and to my mother,
Touching great Zeus.
Such a tale cannot have been in
vented before the battle of Issus,
and Alexander himself eagerly
adopted it (whoever was the in
ventor) within half a year after the
battle. It is evident, therefore, that
his head was turned by his sudden
and vast success ; and the Mace
donians saw it.
A second great disgust with them
$
I was his disparaging of his father
Philip, especially over his wine-cups.
The Macedonians were right loyal
royalists and justly proud of Philip.
He had raised their country from
a very feeble to a predominant
position. When he came to the
throne Macedonia had but half a
sea-coast, from the number of in
dependent Greek cities. He had
recovered all Macedonia and added
Thrace to it, including Byzantium
itself; had brought Thessaly and
Phocis into his dominion; had
defeated the Theban and Athenian
forces by land, and made himself at
sea equal or superior to Athens ;
had become master of Molossia and
Pseonia, and was at length ac
knowledged as the genuine Greek
K prince, who was the only rightful
50 leader of Greece.
His army he had
so organised as to make it un
675
equalled, and by the consent of one
and another State he had been
allowed to garrison many of the
most critical fortresses in Greece.
What Macedonian captain could be
willing to hear Philip the Great
disparaged by his own son ? All
the old officers of Philip were in
dignant at it. The habit of the
Macedonians, as of the Thracians,
was that of much wine-drinking,
and the king was expected to dine
with his chief captains and ministers.
It is a sufficient mark how national
customs preponderate over talents
and wisdom, that the father and son
who in all Greek history are signal
and pre-eminent were both gravely
damaged by the wine-cup. Mr.
de Vere is pleased to allude to it
as Alexander’s ‘ supposed intempe
rance ; ’ and no doubt Arrian tries
to excuse him, as does Plutarch, on
the ground that his tarrying over
the wine was from Jove of com
pany, not from sensuality.
Of
course; so it generally is. The
historical form of drunkenness
with Greeks, Romans, Persians,
Gauls, Germans, and we readily
believe also of Macedonians, was
different from that of an English
artisan who stands up at the bar of
a gin-palace to enjoy his solitary
glass. But the evidence of mischief
from these Macedonian banquets is
not to be sneered away. The be
ginning of ruin to the house of
Philip was from the wedding-feast
of the new queen Cleopatra; at which
her uncle Attalus, when overfilled
with wine,6 prayed ‘ that the gods
would give to Philip a legitimate
successor by Cleopatra.’ ‘Am I then
a bastard, you rascal?’ cried young
Alexander, and flung his cup7 at
the head of Attalus. Philip rose in
5 A curious story is told, that the priest of Hammon tried to give an oracular reply
1
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’
11
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J ' "
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, in Greek; and not ’being deep in the Greek language, thought that iraibiov for a „ A,
youth
j*? ought to be masculine; so, instead of addressing Alexander by a> iraioiov, 0 youth !
or 0 my son ! he said, a> iraibios ; and Alexander, in Greek fashion, instantly ‘ accepted
ai the omen,’ declaring that the x
priest had addressed him by the title
mxi Aios,
v
p
O child of Jupiter!
I 6 ev
irtfrcp fj,e0va>i/.
7 ‘ Scyphis pugnare, Thracum est,’ says Horace.
�676
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
anger, and, sword in hand, tried to
step across to his son; but his feet
failed him, and he fell on the floor.
‘Here is a man,’ said the youth,
‘ who is preparing to cross into Asia,
and is upset in passing from one
seat to another.’ Evidently Alex
ander, as well as Philip, was already
the worse for wine ; but that scene,
in which he might have been slain
by a tipsy father, must surely have
impressed him deeply, if he remem
bered his own scoff. One who was
planning to reorganise all Asia, one
who knew the frightful mischiefs
which a despotic king may inflict
on himself as well as on others,
when wine overmasters him, is not
exempt from our moral criticism.
The higher his intellect, the deeper
is the censure deserved. But that
Alexander was fond of wine, Plu
tarch regards as a fact, while he
apologises for it. Alexander’s body,
he says, had a delicious fragrance ;
no doubt from his hot and fiery
nature; for heat brings out aro
matic smells ; and the same heat
of body made Alexander addicted
to drink and passionate (rai irorucdv
Kat Ovpoetci]). A history written of
a king by another king, or by one of
his generals, is not likely to allude
to drunken bouts such as the
customs of the nation sanctioned,
except when special necessity re
quired; yet wine in this Macedonian
tale plays a part previously un
known in Greek history. The de
fence of Alexander rests on his love
of conversation ; but what was the
talk which he most loved ? The
poison of flattery. Arrian, his
defender, throws the fault upon
those who extolled him as superior
to Hercules and the other mythical
heroes, and of course as far and far
above his father Philip; but since
Alexander never checked them, but
manifestly enjoyed their praise, it
necessarily became the staple of
these feasts. At other times he was
too busy to listen to such reptiles ;
the essential evil of his long sittings
was, that there was plenty of time
[June
for him to drink in such adulation,
to the ever increasing disgust of
Philip’s old soldiers. Q. Curtius
regards it as a certain fact that
Alexander himself was fond of disparaging his father’s deeds and
exalting his own. The report of it
even reached Italy, where his uncle
Alexander of Epirus, who met his
death in Italian battle, uttered an
epigram which was re-echoed in
Asia—that in Italy he had had to
fight with men, but his nephew
Alexander in Asia had alighted on
women. Ho one can wonder that a
king who in his boyhood was already
comparing his own future deeds
with those of his father, should inwardly boast to himself, after conquering Asia Minor, Syria, and
Egypt in less than two years, that
he had far exceeded the deeds of
Philip ; and with each new success
new vanity and new arrogance
entered his heart. In vino veritas.
After wine had sufficiently lessened
his self-restraint, he was liable not
merely to listen to praise from
others, but to trumpet his own
praise. The same wine sometimes
affected the self-restraint of his
comrades ; and he surely must have
foreseen each possibility.
Mr. de Vere wishes us to make
light of his killing his faithful com
rade Cleitus ; and since Cleitus
could not be brought to life again,
and Alexander was shocked at his
own deed, of course all the Macedo
nians tried to comfort the king, and
to accuse Cleitus as having provoked
his own death. Arrian, a profound
royalist, is very severe upon Cleitus;
yet the fact comes out that Cleitus’s
high words were elicited by the disparagement of King Philip, which
Cleitus could not endure, whether
from Alexander or from Alexander’s
flatterers. It is seldom indeed that
one can attempt to guess the utterances of tipsy men ; but if you cut
short eithei’ the long story of Arrian
or the still longer story of Q. Curtius, you get something like this as
the result: ‘ King Philip, my prede-
’
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�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
cessor,’ says Alexander, 1 was no
ticing1 of a general compared to me.
In twelve years he did not conquer
half of what I conquered in twelve
months.’ ‘ Stop ! ’ replies Cleitus ;
‘remember that he never had the
chance Of fighting with Persians:
ho had to deal with stubborn Greeks.
Besides, he never committed such
a blunder as you did at the Granicus, where you nearly ruined us
all, and nothing but this right hand
saved your life.’ The last words
Arrian regards as abominable and
inexcusable from a soldier to a king;
and so, no doubt, all the flatterers
urged ? the greater the truth, the
worse the offence. But the absur
dity is, to expect a man who is halftipsy io retain prudence and mo
desty. Alexander, according to his
warm admirer Plutarch, was of a ‘ furious and violent nature ’ (faylalov
iceti (b£f>6p.ETov
and now,
being full of wine, of course he was
uncontrollable. When reminded
that he owed his life to Cleitus, and
virtually all his after-successes, he
could not bear such an amount of
indebtedness ; and although all the
armed men around, seeing his state,
disobeyed his orders, he succeeded
in, snatching a weapon from one of
them, and with it laid Cleitus dead.
Might not one have hoped that such
a tragedy would for ever have cured
him of long drinking ? But it did
not. Indeed, Arrian, wishing to
defend him, represents him as
already* somewhat corrupted into
Asiatic depravity, implying that he
was on the downhill track—not
that we know anything so bad of
Persian kings.
Another grievous offence to Ma
cedonian feeling was, that he ex
acted of them prostration on the
ground before him in Persian fa
shion. This was as detestable to
Greeks as to Englishmen. It was
emphatically the unmanning of free
men. JEschylus puts into the mouth
677
of Agamemnon the sentiment of
every Greek :
Nor yet, in fashion of barbaric wight,
Prostrate before me, mouth unmanly
words.
There could not be a more decisive
proof that Alexander intended to
destroy every vestige of Greek sen
timent and Greek freedom, and
reduce them all to the level of Orien
tal slaves. Disaffection was inevit
able ; his noblest comrades were the
most certain to disapprove; the
basest took the opportunity of ca
lumniating them, and ingratiated
themselves with the king by slander.
We cannot know the exact time of
this and that detestable whisper,
nor whether it be true that Alexan
der tampered with Philotas’s mis
tress, and bribed her to report
month by month whatever words
of indignation Philotas might drop.
Such is Plutarch’s account, who
indeed represents Philotas as put
to torture, and Alexander behind a
curtain listening to every word;
and when, overcome by suffering,
Philotas uttered piteous entreaties
to Hephmstion the torturer, Alex
ander drew back the curtain and
reproached Philotas with unmanli
ness. Plutarch in general is just and
tenderhearted; yet he can tell this
horrible story without seeing how
odious it makes Alexander. Arrian
cuts the tale of Philotas short, but
relates on the authority of King
Ptolemy that he was killed by the
darts of the Macedonians—equiva
lent to the modern shooting of a sol
dier. On this comes a second deadly
crime, to which Mr. Aubrey de
Vere will hardly reconcile us. ‘ Silly
is he, ’ said the Greek proverb, 1 who
slays the father and spares the son.’
‘ Silly shall I be,’ argued Alexander,
‘ if I kill Philotas and leave his
father Parmenio alive.’ Parmenio
had conquered Media for the king,
and was there at the head of a large
army. Letters are therefore sent
8 ‘For Alexander had already, in the matter of drinking-bouts, made innovation
towards more barbaric manners.’
�678
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
with the utmost speed, to three ge
nerals in high command, ordering
them to assassinate Parmenio while
he is engaged in reading certain de
spatches, which are sent to put him
off his guard. That they were all
base enough to obey proves how com
pletely the Macedonian commanders
were already enslaved; but the
wrath of the common soldiers was
extreme, and might have been dan
gerous. There can be no doubt that
Alexander was now hated as much
as he was feared.
The accusation against Philotas
had risen out of a real conspiracy
of the pages when Alexander was
in Bactria, of which, it was al
leged, Philotas had had knowledge.
Philip had established the system of
royal pages—youths of the noblest
families, who waited on the king,
acted as grooms, helped him to
mount his horse, and hunted with
him. On one occasion, when a
dangerous wild boar rushed at the
king, the page Hermolaus killed the
animal with his dart. The king
was enraged at losing his own
chance of killing it, and ordered
the page to be flogged. Such a
reward for such a service was of
course unendurable to a noble Ma
cedonian youth, who at once vowed
revenge. Whether he would actual
ly have taken the king’s life we
cannot now ascertain. Other pages
shared the indignation of Hermo
laus. The evidence against them,
according to Aristobulus, was swol
len by Alexander’s belief in the
supernatural powers of a Syrian
woman who was subject to ‘ posses
sions,’ and was allowed access to the
king day and night, to warn him of
danger. She was believed to have
saved his life from Hermolaus. One
thing only is here clear—that he
knew himself to be hated, and
through his suspicions degraded
himself to precautions at once per
nicious and odious. One of the
alleged conspirators, Dimnus, slew
himself when he found what reports
and beliefs were accepted ; the rest
[June
were stoned to death, guilty or.
guiltless. For us it suffices to
know that Alexander was definitely
engaged in the task of trampling
out the Greek sentiment of freedom
from his own people. This is very
unlike the task to which Mr. de
Vere thinks he set himself, of re
deeming the world from barbarism,
and irradiating it with Greek science
and art, with the wisdom of Plato
and Sophocles.
Callisthenes the philosopher had
been the tutor of Hermolaus and a
great favourite with him. The
flatterers knew that Alexander
dreaded his honesty and his courage,
and they laid a plot to force him
to deliver his opinion on the ques
tion of prostration before the king
by questions over the wine. Arrian,
who calls him clownish or rude
(crypoiKoc), gives his speech at great
length ; but no rudeness is apparent
in it to us. He says that he honours
Alexander as the first of men, but
different honours are due to men
and to gods ; that prostration is fit
honour to gods only; that Alexander
would not approve of a low multi
tude voting a common man into the
royal throne, nor can the gods be
pleased with men voting a man
into divine honours ; that Darius,
honoured by prostrations, was
defeated by Alexander, to whom no
prostrations had been used. Indeed,
the great Cyrus, who first received
such honour, had been chastised by
the Massagetans, and the great
Darius by other Scythians, as
Xerxes and the later kings by
Greeks.
This discourse, says
Arrian, violently displeased Alex
ander, but was acceptable to the
Macedonians. Callisthenes after
wards distinctly refused to prostrate
himself. He now was accused of
having incited the pages to their
conspiracy. That the mode of his
death was uncertain, Arrian regards
as remarkable; for Aristobulus
says he was put in fetters and
carried about wherever the army
went, until he died of disease;
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
Ptolemy says he was first tortured
on the rack and then hanged.
Every honourable Greek philoso
pher had now full warning to keep
his distance from Alexander. To
Aristotle the king had already sent
from Asia a characteristic complaint,
when the philosopher published
some lectures. Plutarch professes
to give the very words of the letter.
‘ Alexander sends greeting to Aris
totle. You do wrong in publishing
your lectures. For wherein shall
we excel other men, if you impart
to them the instruction which you
gave to us ? But I, for my part,
would rather excel men in the
noblest experiences [science] than
in military forces. Farewell.’ This
is not in the tone of one who desires
all foreign peoples to imbibe Greek
science and philosophy, as Mr. de
Vere fancies.
The pride and violence of Alex
ander, his vices and his crimes, one
by one, Arrian seems able to defend
or excuse ; but when all culminates
in his assumption and enforcement
of the Persian dress, the historian’s
eyes seem at last to be opened.
‘I do not praise,’ says he, ‘his
excessive punishment of Bessus ’
(whom he first scourged and ex'hibited naked in a cage, afterwards
cut off his nose and ears, and sent
him to be put to death by his own
countrymen), ‘and I confess that
Alexander was enticed to imitate
Persian luxury and barbaric cere
monialism ; nor can I praise that
he, being a Heracleid, wore Median
vesture instead of his native Mace
donian, and assumed the Persian
tiara instead of his own victorious
garb. But if the mighty deeds of
Alexander can teach us anything
they teach this, that no accumulation
of outward magnificence conduces
to any man’s welfare, if he cannot
retain sobriety of mind ((T<l)(|>po(Tvvr|f,
Let this be a set-off to Mr. de Vere’s
other quotation from Arrian, which
he says ‘ is doubtless right ’—that
Alexander assumed the Persian
dress that he might appear not
679
altogether to despise the barbarians.
The matter is indeed quite plain.
He himself took three noble Persian
ladies as his wives, one of them a
daughter of Darius — a frank
adopting of the Oriental seraglio,,
the curse of princes and nations.
He induced eighty of his high
officers similarly to take Persian
wives. The marriages were all
conducted with Persian ceremonies,
and to all of them the king gave
liberal dowries. More than 10,000
Greek soldiers followed the example
of marrying native women. The
king had the names of them all
registered, and sent marriage gifts
to every one. Nothing is clearer
than that he desired to shift his
centre of support.
Instead of
depending on Greeks, who were
sure to abhor and resist his striving
after Oriental despotism, he aimed
simply to step into the shoes of
Darius, and let the Persians feel
that their institutions remained
unchanged ; they had only changed
one king for another. To Mace
donians, and to all Greeks who had
a particle of free spirit, such con
duct appeared treason to Greece,
who had freely chosen him as leader,
treason also to freedom.
As
Callisthenes said to his face, the
progenitors of the Macedonian
dynasty came from Argos to Mace
donia ; there, not by force, but by
law, they were accepted as rulers,
and received honour as men, not
as gods. Surely the idea that
Alexander was bent on imparting
the blessings of Greek civilisation
to all Asia is, in the face of the
facts, only a wild fiction.
And here the thought presents
itself, What is the erudition of Mr,
Aubrey de Vere ? Has he enough
knowledge of Greek to read Arrian
oi’ Plutarch for himself? A matter
in itself slight moves strong dis
belief. Nine times in his drama he
pronounces the name Kpartpoe
Craterus. It would appear that he
cannot ever have seen the name in
Greek letters, common as it is, or
�680
MbruZ Estimate of Alexander the Great.
he could not make such a blunder.
There is no ambiguity about it.
Thus:
p. 27. Or keen-edg’d, like Craterus. This
I grant him—
p. 74. But sacrilege. I scorn your words,
Craterus.
p. 79. Which by Craterus, Ptolemy, Hepliaestion—
p. 90. Forth, sirs, and meet them. Let
Craterus bide—
He is uniformly consistent with
himself in the error. So too he
pronounces Heraclides (p. 212)
with short penultima, evidently un
aware that it is 'Hpct/ALch/c in the
Greek. The Niscean horses ('ittwoi
Nio-cuot) he converts into Nyseean
(p. 164), misled by Nvo-a, Nysa, the
supposed Bacchanalian centre. In
p. 96 he makes the Macedonians
talk familiarly of the philosophy of
Epicurus, whom our books re
present as ‘ flourishing ’ half a
century later. At that day Epicurus
surely cannot have been known.
On the whole, Mr. de Vere does
not, primd facie, command any
deference to his opinions ; else one
might be curious to know, whence
he gets his information that Alex
ander planned the conquest of Italy
and Spain. ‘ The empire which
Alexander had resolved to create
was that of the whole world. Had
he lived, he must have created it
. . . . had ten years more been
accorded. But it was not to be.
Alexander was not to tread the
banks of the Tiber....................... He
had aspired to give to one small
spot on earth’s surface, Greece, a
power extending over the earth. . ..’
Will he, perhaps, appeal to the wild
speech in which he strives to per
suade his soldiers to march to the
mouths of the Ganges, assuring them
that the sea of Bengal joins the
Caspian Sea, and that he will carry
his army from the Ganges round
Africa to the pillars of Hercules,
1 and so all Africa becomes ours ’ ?
How can a modern who knows any
thing of geography fail to see that
if he was serious, he was a fool,
[June
rather than a statesman with un
erring judgment ?
The schemes of Alexander were
wild enough, and it is not requisite
to attribute to him what is wilder
still. All his generals—and one may
add, all his soldiers—knew that
his dream of holding India to the
mouths of the Ganges was morally
and physically impossible. To ima
gine that the native Indians would
submit voluntarily and become
loyal to his sceptre, was simply
ridiculous. Greek heroism and
discipline must make the conquest;
but the entire military population of
Greece was insufficient to garrison
and maintain even the Persian em
pire, say nothing of India proper.
Alexander showed admirable mili
taryjudgment in choosing sites for
Greek colonies, but he could not
people them without unpeopling
Greece. The vast drain of young
men and mature men to fill his
armies quickly made the native
population decay, and the Mace
donian army there under Antipater
crushed all that remained of liberty.
Mr. de Vere whimsically says that
Alexander was aiming ‘ to give to
Greece (!) a power extending over the
whole earth,’ at the very time when
he was actually trampling Greece
itself, as tvell as Greek institutions
and sentiments, under foot, training
Persian levies to control what he
regarded as Greek insolence, and
putting forward native Persians,
who willingly submitted to pros
tration and all Oriental servility, into
high posts expressly as a curb on
the Macedonians. It may even
seem that from the day that Alex
ander set foot on Asia he abandoned
all thought of returning to Greece.
This explains his lavish giving away
of Macedonian revenues.
Like
Achilles, that type of pride and
royal egotism, he meant to conquer
or die; at best Macedonia was
nothing to him but a distant re
cruiting-ground. When Parmenio
or any other general dropped the
suggestion, ‘ Is it not time to think
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
of home ? ’ he at once treated it as
disaffection. The desire of soldiers
to return to their native lands and
friends, was with him base and
stupid ingratitude. On two occa
sions Arrian gives a very full
account of his resentment, but con
densation is here desirable. After
Alexander’s victories over the In
dian king Porus the army showed
extreme reluctance to march farther
eastward, and the dissatisfaction
was too great and general to be
dissembled. He tried to persuade
them to march to the mouths of the
Ganges, and his speech shows us on
what motives he relies. ‘ He makes
them rich by plunder-, he shares
toil and danger with them; no
nation has yet withstood them, and
none will be able. Me will mahe them
satraps over new and new lands. He
gives them even now good pay. After
they have overrun all Asia he will
load them with riches, and either will
let them go home, or will lead them
home, or will make those envied
who prefer to stay with him in Asia.
Such were the base arguments by
which from the beginning he had
trained his soldiers to thrive on the
misery of the conquered peoples. But
the army felt the toils, the wounds,
the numbers who had perished, the
little chance of carrying home a ro
bust frame: in short, they were
home-sick :and, to his extreme dis
gust, he was forced to listen to an
honest speech from his old officer
Coenus, who, after long silence, ex
pounded to him the views and
feelings of the army. Mr. Aubrey
de Vere seems to think that the
soldiers were fools and narrow
minded, and that, even years later,
an inscrutable Providence, cutting
short Alexander’s life, alone
hindered the accomplishment of
conquests far more difficult than
any which he had achieved. If he
681
had economised his own strength
and that of his Greek troops, he
might doubtless have reigned over
all Darius’s empire and over Greece
in addition, but certainly not while
he lavished Greek life recklessly.
Mr. de Vere is indignant that
Alexander should be spoken of as
the Macedonian 1 madman, ’ and
evidently does not understand what
is the justification of that epithet.
It is because he was not satisfied
with encountering inevitable dangers
and losses, but gratuitously espoused
and invented needless dangers and
new losses. The battle of the
Granicus was the first manifestation
of this folly. His war against Tyre
was a signal and needless cruelty,
which might have been fatal to him.
The Tyrians, having no aid from
Darius, sent ambassadors to say they
would perform all his commands,
except that they must receive neither
a Persian nor a Macedonian force
within their city—an island. If he
had accepted this compromise, their
fleet and their resources would at
once have been at his disposal; and
as soon as the fortunes of Darius
were manifestly irretrievable, the
very small reserve of respect for
Persian rule9 was certain to vanish.
But Alexander’s pride was inflamed
that any exception or reserve, how
ever temporary, should oppose his
absolute will. He sent away the am
bassadors in anger, and commenced
a war which proved extremely
difficult. In it he received and in
flicted cruel wounds, wasting time
and enormous effort. At the end
he won a ruined city, having spoiled:
its site for ever by his works ; and
after all the slaughter in the siege,
and frightful carnage in the final
storming, he had the miserable
satisfaction of selling into slavery
thirty thousand Tyrians and fo
reigners who were in the city.
* The case is not fully explained. Perhaps the Persian kings had so far honoured
and gratified the Tyrians as to stipulate that no Persian force should enter their city.
A highly reasonable request.
VOL. XI.—NO. LXVI,
NEW SEEIES.
3 B
�682
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
No other Greek general would have
committed such an error, if we may
not call it crime. Again and again
we find him undertake dangerous
and difficult enterprises, wasteful of
Greek life, not because they are
needful, but barely because of the
difficulty.
In Sogdiana there was a natural
rock, supposed to be impregnable ;
among the Paraitakse a second
rock; among the Bazeri (modern
Caubul ?) a third, which it was
said Hercules had failed to take.
He must waste blood and time to
capture them all. The mention of
Hercules instantly inflamed his pas
sion to outdo the mythical hero.
When he came to the Iaxartes (the
Sir Deria), the river which sepa
rated the Massagetan Scythians
from the Persian empire, he of
■ course found Scythian cavalry
watching him. They shoot arrows
into the stream to show him that
he must not cross. It is an un
endurable insult, he says : he must
chastise them. He crosses the
river, undergoes hard fighting, takes
credit for victory, but presently
has to come back again, half
poisoned by drinking foul water,
with no reward but needless blood
shed. Naturally, when he turns his
back, they come over to help his
enemy. But nothing so much de
serves to be called a wicked destruc
tion of his soldiers as his march
through Gedrosia, the modern Beloochistan. After the toils, wounds,
and losses encountered to conquer
in India territories which could
not be kept permanently, he built
a fleet of transports and sailed
down to the mouths of the Indus.
There he heard that no army had
ever passed safe through Gedrosia ;
that Queen Semiramis had at
tempted it, and brought through
only twenty men, and the great
Cyrus had come through with seven
only. This immediately determined
him to do (says Nearchus, his ad
[June
miral) what to them had been
impossible. (The tales were, no
doubt, mythical; but Alexander had
an open ear to every lying legend,
equally as to soothsayers and cata
leptic women.) All the sufferings
elsewhere endured by the army
were as nothing compared to this.
Heat, want of water and of fodder,
presently reduced them to the ut
most distress. They could not feed
or water their cattle; they killed
them for food. Alexander knew it,
and did not dare to forbid it. The
waggons had to be abandoned.
They dug into the sand for partial
supplies of water. A miserable
stream and timely rain saved a part
of the army. Many are said to
have perished by excess of drinking
after long thirst and heat, probably
also after long fatigue and fasting.
Alexander in the worst suffer
ing displayed great;10 magnanimity,
and, like the Hebrew king David,
when water was brought to him
that did not suffice for many, poured
it out on the ground. The guides
professed to have quite lost the
tracks, and a miserable time had
still to be endured. That he, got
through safe with any considerable
part of his men, seemed to be a
miracle; and meanwhile several
satraps took great liberties, not
expecting that he would ever reappear. It cannot be pretended
that such a king either economised
his resources or acted as one who
understood the difficulties of his
own task. It- is vain to talk of
his statesmanship, when his mili
tary impetus and habit of sacri
ficing everything for the victory of
the moment uniformly carried him
away.
His cruelties to the unfortunate
and innocent Asiatics would not
deserve censure from a Greek point
of view, if they had proceeded
from any long-sighted policy. Philip
also was cruel to the Phocians
where it served his ambition. No
M Plutarch tells a story not unlike this on a different occasion.
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
one greatly blamed Alexander for
his severity to Thebes; though all
shuddered. He sold all the Thebans
who survived his attack, men, wo
men, and children, into slavery,
divided their country among his
allies, and razed the walls to the
ground. This was intended to
strike terror into every Greek city,
and teach to all the danger of his
enmity. Beyond a doubt it was
politic, but not the act of one who
desired to exalt Greece. It was in
his uniform style of pure egotism.
But his cruelties to the unhappy
Asiatics who for the first time heard
his name are repeated to satiety.
He comes suddenly into Bactria,
where is only one strong place,
Gyrupolis. He captures five cities
in two days, and massacres as many
of the people as he can. He places
cavalry round one city to intercept
fugitives who might report his pre
sence to the next, lest the people
run away into the woods and moun
tains and be harder to catch.
Nevertheless the smoke of the burn
ing city gave warning. Tidings
also of the disaster came, and the
population took flight; but they
Were mercilessly slaughtered—un
armed and without discrimination.
In storming these hapless and ut
terly weak places Alexander gave
strict orders to kill every man, and
make slaves of the women and
children. (What the army could
possibly do with so many slaves,
and how they could be fed, here as
elsewhere is unexplained.) When
Alexander was wounded, as often
happened, the Macedonians were
made doubly ferocious. Nothing so
bloody is ever imputed by the
Greeks to Xerxes. Our historians
would never have been silent had
he committed such atrocities as
they tell of Alexander.
683
.And this may remind us of the
burning of the palace in Persepolis.
Alexander himself was afterwards
ashamed of it, and so, apparently,
was King Ptolemy, who represents
it as an act of mistaken policy.
Forsooth, Xerxes burnt Athens, and
Alexander wished to avenge the
outrage ! Had, then, the countless
multitudes 11 relentlessly slaugh
tered in pursuit, after his great
victories, been insufficient revenge
for ancient deeds ? And did Alex
ander forget that Persepolis was
now his own city, and that he was
burning his own palace ? Arrian
elsewhere, in courtier fashion, says
that Ptolemy, being a king, was
likely to tell the truth; but he
forgets that it must have been very
painful to him to tell facts dis
agreeable to his royal patron and
friend, on whose favour and suc
cesses his own fortune had been
built up. Plutarch gives another
account, which Mr. de Vere believes,
that the palace was burnt under
the initiative of the Attic courtesan
Thais in the midst of drunken
festivity ; that she was the mistress
of Ptolemy; that Alexander was
not master of himself when, with
garland on his head and lamp in
hand, he assisted and aided in the
conflagration ; finally, that the
Macedonians eagerly assisted, be- '
cause they thought it a certain proof
that Alexander did not mean to keep
Persia and live among barbarians.
This is the more probable account,
but it was morally impossible for
King Ptolemy to publish it.
One cannot read the details of
battle, and fire, and ravage of
peaceable homes, without seeing the
vast amount of suffering, of star
vation, and of ruined prosperity
entailed by this ruthless conquest
over a vast area of country. If it
_ J1 In all mere estimates of force we may justly suspect 'immense exaggeration. Ar
rian says that, after the last great hattie with Darius, as many as 300,000 corpses
oi barbarians were gathered, and a far greater number of persons were captured.
One may suspect that he wrote A, and that it has been corrupted to A. This would
reduce the number to 40,000, and agree with Q. Curtius.
3 B 2
�684
MoraZ Estimate of Alexander the Great.
had been followed by a total over
throw of old corrupting despotism,
and the introduction of nobler in
stitutions, we might say it was a
dreadful price paid for a great good;
but when Alexander carefully pre
served all the worst Persian insti
tutions, who will show us any good
at all from it ? So successfully
did he act. the part of a mere
Asiatic, born in a seraglio, that
Persian tradition, and the cele
brated Persian epic, represent him
as a younger Persian prince who
dethroned his own brother, and so
succeeded to the throne. If we
ask, Wherein did he improve Per
sia ? we get from some the reply,
‘ He diffused a knowledge of the
Greek language.’ Yet the Greek
language and Greek literature could
not save Greece itself from decay,
nor from worse and worse corrup
tion, under the despotism which
he imposed and bequeathed. He
exposed his own life recklessly,
month by month, yet never took a
single precaution for the benefit of
the empire in case of his death.
This is in perfect harmony with
the essential egotism of his charac
ter. He believed himself the most
generous of mankind, because he
gave away the fruit of other men’s
labour to his soldiers; and he fre
quently boasted that he retained
nothing for himself, when he was
claiming supreme power over all
their property, their lives, and their
honour. At the last, when they
saw he was dying, they implored
him to name his successor; but to
the question, ‘ To whom do you
leave the empire ? ’ he would give
no other answer than, 1 To the
strongest man among you.’ Here
by he entailed on Asia the new
misery of twenty years’ civil war
among his generals.
The mischief to Greece in each
new generation was worse and
worse. Freedom was almost every
where crushed. All the young men
had to unlearn patriotism, and
accept the creed that to become
[June
mercenary soldiers in Asia, or suffer
conscription under & tyrant, was a
life good enough for a Greek. Thai
genius in Greece perished with
Demosthenes is so often remarked,
that it is difficult to understand
how any scholars blind themselves
to the evidence that Alexander was
the assassin both of liberty and of
genius. Of course the evil result®
from the overthrow of law and of
all semblance of right could not
appear at once. The vast system
of standing armies undermined in
Greece industrial pursuits, cultiva
tion of the soil, and family life.
The same result, depopulation, fol
lowed in Italy from the demand of
men for the Roman legions; and
we cannot be wrong in tracing to
the same cause the marked and
steady decay of population in Greece.
As to Asia, we have no documents
to base assertion upon, but nothing
visible denotes that under Mace
donian or Parthian despots things
were better than under Persian.
While princes are born in a seraglio,
and practise polygamy from an early
age, no royal dynasty is long equal
to common men in body or mind.
To join personal despotism to poly
gamy is fatal to all enduring good
government; yet this is exactly
what Alexander did. Of durable
prosperity he laid no foundation®.
Military posts in abundance he
planned and fortified; docks for
ship-building he established on the
rivers of the Panjab; but how
could he hope to obtain allegiance
from the people ? He depended on
mere force. When his back was
turned they revolted. He might
well say, as Napoleon I. said, ‘ Ah I
I cannot be everywhere.’ When an
Indian king—Musicanus—revolted,
Alexander in revenge razed to the
ground the walls of the cities which
he had placed under Musicanus,
and reduced the people into slavery
(what he did with them as slaves
is never explained, and this makes
one hope there is exaggeration),
and where he had himself placed
�1875]
Moral Estimate of Alexander the Great.
garrisons he dismantled and de
stroyed the citadels; an impotent
mod® of securing future submission.
Musicanus, having been caught by
the Macedonian Pei th on, was sent
back by Alexander to be hanged
among his own people. It must
surely be evident that Alexander
could not always be an Achilles,
and that the Panjab was certain
to be lost to him the moment that
it ceased to fear an overwhelming
military force. The description of
the army with which he conquered
it, takes one quite by surprise,
though in his letter to Darius after
the battle of Issus he boasts that
many who in that battle were in
the king’s ranks now fight in his.
But in India the Greeks in Alex
ander’s army were so outnumbered
by Asiatics that, if the king had
died of the arrow-shot in his lungs,
they feared to be massacred by their
own auxiliaries. Were these to
garrison all India for the king ?
We cannot wonder at the entire
absence of prudence in a young
man spoiled from childhood, intoxi
cated with military success, and
bent on egotistical glory; but to
extol such conduct as ‘ instinctive
and unerring statesmanship ’ is very
delusive doctrine. ‘ If I were Alex
ander I would accept Darius’s
offers,’ said Parmenio. ‘ So would
I, if' I were Parmenio,’ replied
Alexander, insolently and foolishly ;
yet it is lauded as a right royal
sentiment. Parmenio thought it
better to accept treasure freely
granted by Darius, and use resources
accumulated in the past, than to
seize supplies by wasteful and odious
685
rapine ; better to accept three solid
countries with the whole sea-coast
fronting Greece, and take time to
consolidate the conquests and press
lightly on the conquered, than to
push farther at once and risk their
communications with home ; better
to establish peace with Darius, even
if it could not last very long, and
secure their home predominance,
than to make the quarrel with
Darius implacable and give hope to
all the Grecian enemies of Mace
donia. If Antipater had been de
feated in Greece, Alexander might
have been ruined by it in Asia; the
loss of a single battle by Alexander
himself against Darius might have
been fatal. Parmenio, it seems, is
a stupid pedant in Mr. de Vere’s
estimate. If his advice had been
taken—if the Greek dominion had
never gone beyond the Euphrates—
we cannot be sure that the history
of mankind would have been hap
pier, simply because vast contin
gencies always elude certain know
ledge. But, without rashness, we
may say,-—acquaintance with the
masterpieces of Greek literary
genius would even then have been
diffused in the East among minds
capable of appreciating them.
Whether Parthians or Babylonians
ever got much benefit from such
literature, it is truly hard to ascer
tain ; but high literary eminence
does not need war to extend the
sphere of its admiration. If any
one lay stress on such a result of
Macedonian conquest, he confesses
that it was very barren of good in
Asia; that it was deadly to Greece
is no theory, but manifest fact.
E. W. Newman.
�
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Moral estimate of Alexander the Great
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Newman, Francis William
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 667-685 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From Fraser's Magazine, Vol. XI, no. LXVI. Printed in double columns. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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[s.n.]
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1875
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Greece
Classics
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Alexander the Great
Ancient Greece
Conway Tracts