The Progress of Hellenism in Alexander’s Empire PDF
Preview The Progress of Hellenism in Alexander’s Empire
The Progress of Hellenism in Alexander's Empire By John Pentland MahafFy, C.V.O., D.D., D.C.L. Sometime ProfessorofAncientHistory inthe UniversityofDublin CHICAGO: THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN, PATERNOSTER SQUARE 1905 T 7? A- -!.o<iU!ru copykight 1905 The University of Chicago 3 February, 1905 PREFACE The following Lectures, delivered in the Univer- sity of Chicago, represent the compendium of a long and brilliant development of human culture. To obtain a brief and yet accurate survey of it is certainly a desideratum to various classesof readers, and will, I trust, satisfy a real want. The general reader, who desires to learn something of the ex- pansion of Greek ideas toward the East, will here find enough for a working knowledgeof a verycom- plicated epoch. The specialist, who has devoted himself to some department of this field, will find here those general views of the whole which are necessary to every inteUigent research into the parts. More especially, the student or teacher of Christi- anity will find here the human side of its origin treated in a strictly historical spirit. To all such this little volume may be as welcome as were the lectures which compose it to the largeand verysym- pathetic class who heard them in the summer of 1904. Compendiums have so often been written bymere literary hacks that the public has been misled to believe it an easy task, which can be accomplished at second hand. But no collection of extracts from larger books ever made a sound hand-book. It PREFACE vi must be produced fresh from the sources by one who has made himself perfectly at home in the sub- ject. It is, in fact, rather the work suited to the close than to the beginning of a literary life. So far at least these lectures satisfy the proper conditions. This epoch has occupied me for more than twenty years. The appearance of Xenophon in this company will seem novel to many; and it is so in truth. But this new view of a familiar figure is amply justified by the works which any sceptic may consult for himself. This first lecture is, therefore, that which will chiefly attract classical scholars, to whom Xeno- phon is a household word in the class-room. If it encourages them to read him through, instead of confining themselves to his popular works, I shall have attained what I mostdesire. TomyAmerican readers, who have hitherto been very sympathetic friends, I offer myrespectful greeting onthe appear- ance of this my first American book. P. M. J. Dublin, January, 1905. CONTENTS LECTUEE I pj^OE .... Xenophon the Precursor ofHellenism i LECTURE n Macedonia and Greece 29 m LECTURE Egypt 63 lecture iv Syria 91 lecture v General Reflections on Hellenism 107 lecture vi Hellenistic Influences on Christianity 125 . . . . Index 151 XENOPHON THE PRECURSOR OF HELLENISM LECTURE I XENOPHON THE PRECURSOR OF HELLENISM You have done me a high honour in asking me to speakinthis great university. I shallbestexpress my deep gratitude by economising your time and by setting to work at once to teach what I can with- out further excuse or preamble. The first thing essential is that you and I should understand one another, especially regarding the topic ofmy discourse. I am not sure that all ofyou agree with me in the meaning you attach to the word "Hellenism." And no wonder; for ifyou read the immortal Grote, you will find it used by him for the high culture of Athens, and as the substantive corresponding to the adjective "Hellenic." If, on the other hand, you open the great work of Droysen, theHistoryofHellenism,youwillfindthatitexcludes the purest Greek culture, and corresponds to the adjective "Hellenistic." As you may see from the program of my lectures, I intend to use the word in the latter sense, and to speak of that diffusion of Greek speech and culture through Macedonia and the nearer East which, while it extended the influence, could not but dilute the purity, ofHellenic civiUsation. I wish Grote had adopted from the Germans the word "Hellenedom," to correspond 3 THE PROGRESS OF HELLENISM 4 with "Hellenic." Then all would have been clear. Or perhaps I should have coined "Hellenicism," to correspond to "Hellenistic." But what chance had I of accompHshing what the Roman emperor despaired of-^adding a new word to one's mother- tongue? I must therefore be content with repeating that by "Hellenism" I mean that so-caUed "silver age" of Greek art and Hterature, when they became cosmopoHtan, and not parochial; and by "Hellen- istic," not only what was Greek, but what desired and assumed to be Greek, from the highest and noblest imitation down to the poorest travesty.' The pigeon EngHsh of the Solomon islander is as far removed from the prose of Ruskin or of Froude as is the rudest Hellenistic epitaph or letter from the music of Plato's diction, but both are clear evidence of the imperial quality in that language which sways the life of miUions of men far beyond the limits of its original domain. Yet it must needs be that as the matchless idiom of Aristophanes passed out to Macedonian noble, to Persian grandee, to Syrian trader, to Egyptian priest, each and all of these added somewhat of their national flavour, and so produced an idiom and a culture uniform indeed in apphcation, though by no means uniform in construction. 'I noticewithsurprise that Mr. Bevan, inhis recentmas- terlybookonTheHouseojSeleucus, usestheword "Hellenism" indifferently in both senses, without apparentknowledgeof the ambiguity.
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