SOLON.*

DIDYMUS the grammarian, in his answer

piades concerning the laws of Solon, cites the t of one Philocles, by which he would prove Solo of Euphorion, contrary to the opinion of others wrote of him. For they all with one voice dec Execestides was his father; a man of moderate and power, but of the noblest family in Athens, scended from Codrus. His mother, according clides of Pontus, was cousin-german to the m Pisistratus. This tie of friendship at first united S Pisistratus in a very intimate friendship, which w closer (if we may believe some writers) by the which the former had for the beauty and excelle ties of the latter. Hence we may believe it was, t they differed afterwards about matters of state, sention broke not out into any harsh or ungenero ment of each other; but their first union kept s of their hearts, some sparks of the flame still r and the tenderness of former friendship was n forgotten.

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Solon's father having hurt his fortune, as He tells us, by indulging his great and munificen

* Solon flourished about the year before Christ 597. † Pisistratus was remarkably courteous, affable, and lib had always two or three slaves near him with bags of si when he saw any man look sickly, or heard that any died he relieved the one, and buried the others at his own exp he perceived people melancholy he inquired the cause, found it was poverty, he furnished them with what mig them to get bread, but not to live idly. Nay, he left even dens and orchards open, and the fruit free to the citize looks were easy and sedate, his language soft and modest. if his virtues had been genuine, and not dissembled, with

though the son might have been supported by his friends,/ yet as he was of a family that had long been assisting to others, he was ashamed to accept of assistance himself; and therefore in his younger years applied himself to merchandize. Some, however, say that he travelled, rather to gratify his curiosity and extend his knowledge, than to raise an estate. For he professed his love of wisdom, and when far advanced in years made this declaration, I grow old in the pursuit of learning. He was not too much attached to wealth, as we may gather from the following

verses:

The man that boasts of golden stores,
Of grain that loads his bending floors,
Of fields with fresh'ning herbage green,
Where bounding steeds and herds are seen,
I call not happier than the swain
Whose limbs are sound, whose food is plain,.
Whose joys a blooming wife endears,
Whose hours a smiling offspring cheers.

Yet in another place he says:

The flow of riches, though desir'd,,
Life's real goods, if well acquir'd,
Unjustly let me never gain,
Lest vengeance follow in their train.

Indeed, a good man, a valuable member of society, should neither set his heart upon superfluities, nor reject the use of what is necessary and convenient. And in those times, as Hesiod † informs us, no business was looked upon as a disparagement, nor did any trade cause a disad

he was mightily addicted to poetry. And Plato (in Timeo) says, that if he had finished all his poems, and particularly the History of the Atlantic Island, which he brought out of Egypt, and had taken time to revise and correct them as others did, neither Homer,, Hesiod, nor any other ancient poet would have been more famous. It is evident both from the life and writings of this great man, that' he was a person not only of exalted virtue, but of a pleasant and agreeable temper. He considered men as men; and keeping both their capacity for virtue, and their proneness to evil in his view, he adapted his laws so as to strengthen and support the one, and to check and keep under the other. His institutions are as remarkable for their sweetness and practicability, as those of Lycurgus are. for harshness and forcing human nature.

* This passage of Solon's, and another below, are now found. artong the sentences of Theognis.

t Lib. Ob, & Di. ver. 309.

vantageous distinction. The profession of merchandize was honourable, as it brought home the produce of barbarous countries, engaged the friendship of kings, and opened a wide field of knowledge and experience. Nay, some merchants have been founders of great cities; Protus, for instance, that built Marseilles, for whom the Gauls about the Rhone had the highest esteem. Thales also, and Hippocrates the mathematician, are said to have had their share in commerce; and the oil that Plato disposed of in Egypt,* defrayed the expence of his travels.

If Solon was too expensive and luxurious in his way of living, and indulged his poetical vein in his description of pleasure too freely for a philosopher, it is imputed to his mercantile life. For as he passed through many and great dangers, he might surely compensate them with a little relaxation and enjoyment. But that he placed himself rather in the class of the poor than the rich, is evident from these lines:

For vice, tho' PLENTY fills her horn,
And virtue sinks in want and scorn;
Yet never; sure, shall Solon change
His truth for wealth's most easy range!
Since virtue lives, and truth shall stand,
While wealth eludes the grasping hand.

He seems to have made use of his poetical talent at first, not for any serious purpose, but only for amusement, and to fill up his hours of leisure; but afterwards he inserted moral sentences, and interwove many political transactions in his poems, not for the sake of recording or remembering them, but sometimes by way of apology for his own administration, and sometimes to exhort, to advise, or to censure the citizens of Athens. Some are of opinion, that he attempted to put his laws too in verse, and they give us this beginning.

Supreme of gods, whose power we first address
This plan to honour, and these laws to bless.

Like most of the sages of those times, he cultivated chiefly that part of moral philosophy which treats of civil obliga

*It was usual to trade into Egypt with the oil of Greece and Judea. It is said in the prophet Hosea, (c. xii. v. 1.) Ephraim currieth oil into Egypt.

tions. His physics were of a very simple and ancient cast, as appears from the following lines:

From cloudy vapours falls the treasur'd snow,
And the fierce hail: from light'ning's rapid blaze
Springs the loud thunder-winds disturb the deep,
Than whose unruffled breast, no smoother scene
In all the works of nature -

Upon the whole, Thales seems to have been the only philosopher, who then carried his speculations beyond things in common use, while the rest of the wise men maintained their character by rules for social life.

They are reported to have met at Delphi, and afterwards at Corinth upon the invitation of Periander, who made provision for their entertainment. But what contributed most to their honour, was their sending the tripod from one to another, with an ambition to outvie each other in modesty. The story is this: When some Coans were drawing a net, certain strangers from Miletus bought the draught unseen. It proved to be a golden tripod, which Helen, as she sailed from Troy, is said to have thrown in there, in compliance with an ancient oracle. A dispute arising at first between the strangers and the fishermen about the tripod, and afterwards extending itself to the states to which they belonged, so as almost to engage them in hostilities, the priestess of Apollo took up the matter, by ordering that the wisest man they could find should have the tripod. And first it was sent to Thales at Miletus, the Coans voluntarily presenting that to one of the Milesians, for which they would have gone to war with them all. Thates declared that Bias was a wiser man than he, so it was brought to him. He sent it to another, as wiser still. After making a farther circuit, it came to Thales the second time. And at last, it was carried from Miletus to Thebes, and dedicated to the Ismenian Apollo. Theophrastus relates, that the tripod was first sent to Bias at Priene; that Bias sent it back again to Thales at Miletus; that so having passed through the hands of the seven, it came round to Bias again, and at last was sent to the temple of Apollo at Delphi. This is the most current account; yet some say the present was net a tripod, but a bowl sent by Croesus; and others, that it was a cup which one Bathycles had left for that purpose.

We have a particular account of a conversation which Solon had with Anacharsis,* and of another he had with Thales. Anacharsis went to Solon's house at Athens, knocked at the door, and said he was a stranger who desired to enter into engagements of friendship and mutual hospitality with him. Solon answered, Friendships are best formed at home. Then do you, said Anacharsis, who are at home, make me your friend, and receive me into your housē. Struck with the quickness of his repartee. Solon gave him a kind welcome, and kept him some time with him, being then employed in public affairs and in modelling his laws. When Anacharsis knew what Solon was about, he laughed at his undertaking, and at the absurdity of imagining he could restrain the avarice and injustice of his citizens by written laws, which in all respects resembled spiders webs, and would like them, only entangle and hold the poor and weak, while the rich and powerful easily broke through them. To this Solon replied, Men keep their agrec ments, when it is an advantage to both parties not to break them; and he would so frame his laws, as to make it evident to the Athenians, that it would be more for their interest to observe them than to transgress them. The event, however, shewed, that Anacharsis was nearer the truth in his conjecture, than Solon was in his hope. Anacharsis having seen an assembly of the people at Athens, said, he was surprised at this, that in Greece wise men pleaded causes, and fools determined them,

When Solon was entertained by Thales at Miletus, he expressed some wonder that he did not marry and raise a family. To this Thales gave no immediate answer; but some days after he instructed a stranger to say, That he came from Athens ten days before. Solon inquiring, What news there was at Athens? the man, according to his in

* The Scythians, long before the days of Solon had been celebrated for their frugality, their temperance, and justice. Anacharsis was one of these Scythians, and prince of the blood. He went to Athens about the forty-seventh olympiad, that is, 590 years before Christ. His good sense, his knowledge, and great experience made him pass for one of the seven wise men. But the greatest and wisest men have their inconsistencies: for such it certainly was, for Anacharsis to carry the Grecian worship, the rights of Cybele, into Scythia, contrary to the laws of his country. Though he performed those rites privately in a woody part of the country, a Scythian happened to see him, and acquainted the king with it, who came immediately and shot him with an arrow upon the spot. HERODOT. 1. iv. c. 76.