cessary for containing a whole army, of which the phalanx is but a part.

But let us suppose (it is Polybius who still speaks) that a tract of ground, exactly such as could be wished, were found; yet of what use could a body of troops drawn up in the form of a phalanx be, should the enemy, instead of advancing forward and offering battle, send out detachments to lay waste the country, plunder the cities, or cut off the convoys? In case the enemy should come to a battle, the general need only command part of his front (the centre for instance) designedly to give way and fly, that the phalanx may have an opportunity of pursuing them. In this case, it is manifest the phalanx would be broken, and a large cavity made in it, in which the Romans would not fail to throw themselves in order to charge the phalanx in flank on the right and left, at the same time that those soldiers who are pursuing the enemy, may be attacked in the same manner.

This reasoning of Polybius appears to me very clear, and at the same time gives us a very just idea of the manner in which the ancients fought; which certainly ought to have its place in history, as it is an essential part of it.

Hence it appears, as a Mr. Bossuet observes, after Polybius, the difference between the Macedonian phalanx, formed of one large body, very thick on all sides, which was obliged to move all at once, and the Roman army divided into small bodies, which for that reason were nimbler, and consequently more calculated for movements of every kind. The phalanx cannot long preserve its natural property, (these are Polybius's words,) that is to say its solidity and thickness, because it requires peculiar spots of ground, and those, as it were, made purposely for it; and that, for want of such spots, it encumbers, or rather breaks, itself by its own motion; not to mention, that, if it is once broken, the soldiers who compose it can never rally again. Whereas the Roman army, by its division into small bodies, takes advantage of all places and situations, and suits itself to them. It is united or separated at pleasure. It files off, or draws together, without the least difficulty. It can very easily form detachments, rally, and go through every kind of evolution, either in the whole in or part, as occasion may require. In fine, it has a greater variety of motions, and consequently more activity and strength than the phalanx.

a Discourse on Universal History.

Statarius uturque miles, ordines servans; sed illa phalanx immobilis, et unius generis: Romana acies distinctior, ex pluribus partibus constans : facilis partienti quacumque opus essêt, facilis jungenti. Tit. Liv. 1. ix. n. 19.

Erant pleraque sylvestria circa, incommoda phalangi, maxime Macedonum, que, nisi ubi prælongis hastis velut vallum ante clypeos objecit, (quod ut fiat, libero campo opus est) nuljius admodum usus est. ́id, 1. xxxi. n. 39.

b

• This enabled Paulus Æmilius to gain his celebrated victory over Perseus. He first attacked the phalanx in front. But the Macedonians, (keeping very close together,) holding their pikes with both hands, and presenting this iron rampart to the enemy, could not be either broken or forced in any manner, and so made a dreadful slaughter of the Romans. But, at last, the unevenness of the ground and the great extent of the front of the battle not allowing the Macedonians to continue in all parts that range of shields and pikes, Paulus Æmilius observed, that the phalanx was obliged to leave several openings and intervals. Upon this, he attacked them at these openings, not, as before, in front and in a general onset, but by detached bodies and in different parts, at one and the same time. By this means the phalanx was broken in an instant, and its whole force, which consisted merely in its union, and the impression it made all at once, was entirely lost, and Paulus Æmilius gained the victory.

C

The same Polybius, in the twelfth book above cited, describes in few words the order of battle observed by the cavalry. According to him, a squadron of horse consisted of 800, generally drawn up 100 in front and eight deep; consequently such a squadron as this took up a furlong, or 100 fathoms, allowing the distance of one fathom, or six feet, for each horseman; a space which he must necessarily have, to make his evolutions and to rally. Ten squadrons, or 8000 horse, occupied ten times as much ground, that is, ten furlong's, or 1000 fathoms, which make about half a league.

From what has been said, the reader may judge how much ground an army took up, by considering the number of infantry and cavalry of which it consisted.

SECT. II.

The sacred war. Sequel of the history of Philip.

d Discord, which perpetually fomented among the Greeks dispositions not very remote from an open rupture, broke out with great violence upon account of the Phocæans. Those people, who inhabited the territories adjacent to Delphos,

a Plutarch. in Paul. Emil. p. 165, 266. Liv. l. xliv. n. 41.

b Secunda legio immissa dissipavit phalangem ; neque ulla evidentior causa victoriæ fuit, quam quod multa passim prælia erant, quæ fluctuantem turbarunt primo,deinde disjecerent phalangem; cujus confertæ, et intentis horrentis hastis intolerabiles vires sunt. Si carptim aggrediendo circumagere immobilem longitudine et gravitate hastam cogas, confusa strue implicantur: si vero ab latere, aut ab tergo, aliquid tumultus increpuit, ruinæ modo turbanter Sicut tum adversus catervatim irruentes Romanos, et interrupta multifariam acie, ob. viam ire cogebantur : et Romani, quacumque data intervalla essent, insinuabant ordines suos Qui si universa acie in frontem adversus instructam phalangem concurrissent-induissent se hastis, nec consertam aciem sustinuissent. Tit.

Liv.

e Lib. xii. p. 668.

d A. M. 3649. Ant. J. C. 355. Diod. 1. xvi. p. 425–433.

ploughed up certain lands that were consecrated to Apollo, which were thereby profaned. Immediately the people in the neighbourhood exclaimed against them, as guilty of sacrilege, some from a spirit of sincerity, and others in order to cover their private revenge with the veil of religion. The war that broke out on this occasion was called the sacred war, as undertaken from a religious motive, and lasted ten years. The people guilty of this profanation were summoned to appear before the Amphictyons, or states-general of Greece; and, the whole affair being duly examined, the Phocæans were declared sacrilegious, and sentenced to pay a heavy fine.

Philomelus, one of their chief citizens, a bold man, and of great authority, having proved, by some verses in a Homer, that the sovereignty of the temple of Delphos belonged anciently to the Phocæans, inflames them against this decree, induces them to take up arms,and is appointed their general. He immediately proceeds to Sparta, to engage the Lacedæmonians in his interest. They were very much disgusted at a sentence which the Amphictyons had pronounced against them, at the solicitation of the Thebans, by which they had been also condemned to pay a fine, for having seized upon the citadel of Thebes by fraud and violence. Archidamus, one of the kings of Sparta, gave Philomelus a handsome reception. This monarch, however, did not dare to declare openly in favour of the Phocæans, but promised to assist him with money, and to furnish him secretly with troops, as he accordingly did.

Philomelus, on his return home, raises soldiers, and begins by attacking the temple of Delphos, of which he possessed himself without any great difficulty, the inhabitants of the country making but a weak resistance. The Locrians, a people in the neighbourhood of Delphos, took arms against him, but were defeated in several rencounters. Philomelus, encouraged by these first successes, increased his troops daily, and put himself in a condition to carry on his enterprise with vigour. Accordingly he enters the temple, tears from the pillars the decree of the Amphictyons against the Phocæans, publishes all over the country, that he has no design to seize the riches of the temple, and that his sole view is to restore to the Phocæans their ancient rights and privileges. It was necessary for him to have a sanction from the god who presided at Delphos, and to receive such an answer from the oracle as might be favourable to him. The priestess at first refused to co-operate on this occasion; but, being terrified by his menaces, she answered, that the god permitted him to do whatever he should think proper; a cir a Eliad. 1. ii. v. 516.

& Or Lecri.

cumstance which he took care to publish to all the neighbouring nations.

The affair was now become serious. The Amphictyons meeting a second time, a resolution was formed to declare war against the Phocæans. Most of the Grecian nations engaged in this quarrel, and sided with the one or the other party. The Boeotians, the Locrians, Thessalians, and several other neighbouring people declared in favour of the god; whilst Sparta, Athens, and some other cities of Peloponnesus, joined with the Phocæans. Philomelus had not yet touched the treasures of the temple; but, being afterwards not so scrupulous, he believed that the riches of the god could not be better employed than in his (the deity's) defence, for he gave this specious name to this sacrilegious attempt; and being enabled, by this fresh supply, to double the pay of his soldiers, he raised a very considerable body of of troops.

Several battles were fought, and the success for some time seemed equal on both sides. Every body knows how much religious wars are to be dreaded, and the prodigious lengths to which a false zeal, when veiled with so venerable a name, it apt to go. The Thebans, having in a rencounter taken several prisoners, condemned them all to die as sacrilegious wretches, who were excommunicated. The Phocæans did the same by way of reprisal. The latter had at first gained several advantages; but, having been defeated in a great battle, Philomelus, their leader, being closely attacked upon an eminence from which there was no retreating, defended himself for a long time with invincible bravery, which however not availing, he threw himself headlong from a rock, in order to avoid the torments which he had reason to dread if he should fall alive into the hands of his enemies. Onomarchus, his brother, was his successor, and took upon him the command of the forces.

This new general had soon levied a fresh army, the advantageous pay he offered procuring him soldiers from all sides. He also by dint of money brought over several chiefs of the other party, and prevailed upon them either to retire or to act with remissness, by which he gained great advantages.

In this general movement of the Greeks, who had taken up arms in favour either of the Phocæans or the Thebans, Philip thought it most consistent with his interest to remain neuter. It was consistent with the policy of this ambitious prince, who had little regard for religion or the interest of Apollo, but was always intent upon his own, not to engage in a war by which he could not reap the least benefit; and

a A. M. 3650. Ant. J. C. 351.

A. M. 3651. Ant. J. C. 353°

to take advantage of a juncture, in which all Greece, em→ ployed and divided by a great war, gave him an opportunity to extend his frontiers and push his conquests without any apprehension of opposition. He was also well pleased to see both parties weaken and consume each other, as he should thereby be enabled to fall upon them afterwards with greater advantage.

a Being desirous of subjecting Thrace, and of securing the conquests he had already made in it, he determined to possess himself of Methone, a small city, incapable of supporting itself by its own strength, but which gave him disquiet, and obstructed his designs, whenever it was in the hands of his enemies. Accordingly he besieged that city, made himself master of it, and razed it. It was before this city that he lost one of his eyes, by a very singular accident. Aster, of Amphipolis, had offered his service to Philip, as so excellent a marksman, that he could bring down birds in their most rapid flight. The monarch made this answer, “Well, I will take you into my service when I make war upon starlings;" which answer stung the cross-bowman to the quick. A repartee proves often of fatal consequence to him who makes it, and it is not a small merit to know when to hold one's tongue. After having thrown himself into the city, he let fly an arrow, on which was written, "To Phi'lip's right eye," and gave him a most cruel proof that he was a good marksman; for he hit him in his right eye. Philip sent him back the same arrow, with this inscription, "If Philip takes the city, he will hang up Aster;" and accordingly he was as good as his word.

66

A skilful surgeon drew the arrow out of Philip's eye with so much art and dexterity, that not the least scar re-. mained; and, though he could not save his eye, he yet took away the blemish. d But nevertheless this monarch was so weak as to be angry whenever any person happened to let slip the word Cyclops, or even the word eye, in his presence. Men, however, seldom blush for an honourable imperfection. A Lacedæmonian woman thought more like a man, when, to console her son for a glorious wound that had lamed him, she said, "Now, son, every step you take will put you in mind of your valour.'

e

After the taking of Methone, Philip, ever studious either to weaken his enemies by new conquests or gain new friends by doing them some important service, marched into Thes-saly, which had implored his assistance against the tyrants. The liberty of that country seemed now secure, since Alexander of Phere was no more. Nevertheless, the brothers of his wife Thebe, who, in concert with her, had murdered a A. M. 3651. Ant. J. C. 353. Diod. p. 434. & Suidas in Καραν. c Plin. l. vii. c. 37. d Demet, Phaler. de Efocu. c. ii. e Died. P. 432-435.