THE GRECIAN HISTORY, FROM THE EARLIEST STATE TO THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT. BY DR. GOLDSMITH. TWO VOLS. IN ONE, REVISED AND CORRECTED, AND A VOCABULARY OF PROPER NAMES PRONUNCIATION. BY WILLIAM GRIMSHAW. PHILADELPHIA: GRIGG, ELLIOT & CO. NO. 14 NORTH FOURTH STREET. 1847. G65 Eastern District of Pennsylvania, to wit: BE IT REMEMBERED, That on the nineteenth day of June, L S.) in the fiftieth year of the Independence of the United States of America, A. D. 1826, JOHN GRIGG, of the said District, nath deposited in this office the title of a book, the right whereof he claims as Proprietor, in the words following, to wit: "The Grecian History, from the earliest state to the death of Alexander the Great. By DR. GOLDSMITH. Two volumes in one. Revisea and corrected, and a Vocabulary of Proper Names appended; with Prosodial Marks, to assist in their Pronunciation; by WILLIAM GRIMSHAW." In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, entitled, "An Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the Authors and Proprietors of such copies, during the times therein mentioned.And also to the Act, entitled, "An Act supplementary to an Act, entitled,An Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books. to the Authors and Proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned,' and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical and other prints." D. CALDWELL, Gift Profe Whitten Printed by T. K. & P. G. Collins. ADVERTISEMENT. WHEN, many years ago, I offered to the Public, a revised edition of Goldsmith's Rome, I judged it necessary to accompany it with. my reasons for so bold an attempt, and an exposition of the principal faults of the original. To that exposition, as well as to this revised edition of the History of Greece, by the same author, I refer the curious in literature; that they may decide, whether or not I have been warranted, in attempting an improvement, or have been inexcusably presumptuous. Bold, indeed, may seem the undertaking, to improve the pages of an author, of whom the great moralist and lexicographer has said, "Nori tetigit, quod non ornavit." This compliment, however, that fastidious critic certainly did not apply to Dr. Goldsmith, as an Historian. In history, scarcely any other writer has so completely failed. Nothing but his high merit, in other walks of literature, could have prolonged the existence of his works, in this branch of composition, for so great a length of time. He wrote with too great rapidity, for an historian, and, consequently, without a due regard to the arrangement and perspicuity of his matter, or the purity and correctness of his style. Obscurity and ambiguity-inaccuracy and impurity-confusion and indelicacy are every where visible, in his historical productions; upon which, alone, had he relied for reputation, his name would, now, after the lapse of half a century, be unknown. Harrisburg, June 1, 1826. * Accompanying this edition, there is a small Book of Historical Questions, for the use of schools, also, for the convenience of Teachers, a Key, containing the Answers. THE HISTORY OF GREECE. CHAPTER I. Of the earliest state of Greece. THE first notices we have, of every country, are fabulous and ncertain. Among an unenlightened people, every imposture is likely to be practised; for ignorance is the parent of creduli ty. Nothing, therefore, which the Greeks have transmitted to us, concerning their earliest state, can be relied on. Poets were the first who began to record the actions of their countrymen; and it is a part of their art to strike the imagination, even at the expense of probability. For this reason, in the earliest accounts of Greece, we are presented with the machinations of gods and demi-gods, the adventures of heroes and giants, the ravages of monsters and dragons, and all the potency of charms and enchantments. Man, plain historical man, seems to have no share in the picture; and, while the reader wanders through the most delightful scenes the imagination can offer, he is scarcely once presented with the actions of such a being as himself. It would be vain, therefore, and beside the present purpose, to give an historical air to accounts, which were never meant to be transmitted as true. Some writers, indeed, have laboriously undertaken to separate the truth from the fabie, and to give us an unbroken narrative, from the first dawning of tradition, to the display of undoubted history. They have levelled down all mythology to their own apprehensions: every fable is made to look with an air of probability. In stead of a golden fleece, Jason goes in pursuit of a great treasure; instead of destroying a chimera, Bellerophon reclaims a mountain; instead of a hydra, Hercules overcomes a robber. Thus, the fanciful pictures of a strong imagination, are aught to assume a serious severity; and tend to deceive the reader still more, by offering, in the garb of truth, what had been meant only to delight and allure him. The fabulous age, therefore, of Greece, must have no place |