of the Magi and soothsayers, with regard to his dying in Babylon, so exactly fulfilled. It is certain and indisputable, that God has reserved to himself only the knowledge of futurity; and if the soothsayers and oracles have sometimes foretold things which really came to pass, they could do it no other way than by their impious correspondence with devils, who, by their penetration and natural sagacity, find out several methods whereby they dive to a certain degree into futurity, with regard to approaching events; and are enabled to make predictions, which, though they ap pear above the reach of human understanding, are yet not above that of malicious spirits of darkness. The knowledge those evil spirits have of all the circum. stances which precede and prepare an event; the part they frequently bear in it, by inspiring such of the wicked as are given up to them, with the thoughts and desire of doing certain actions, and committing certain crimes; an inspiration to which they are sure those wicked persons will consent: by these things, devils' are enabled to foresee and foretel certain particulars. They, indeed, often mistake in their conjectures, but d God also sometimes permits them to succeed in them, in order to punish the impiety of those, who, in contradiction to his commands, inquire their fate of such lying spirits.

Dæmones perversis, solent, malefacta suadere, de quorum moribus certi sunt quod sint eis talia suadentibus consensuri. Suadent autem miris et invisibilibus modis. S. August. de Divinat. Dæmon. p. 509.

Facile est et non incongruum, ut omnipotens et justus, ad eorum pœnam quibus ista prædicuntur; occulto apparatu ministeriorum suorum etiam spiritibus talibus aliquid divinationis impertiat. S. August. de Div. Quæst. ad Simplic. 1. ii. Quæst 3.

The moment that Alexander's death was known, the whole palace echoed with cries and groans. The vanquished bewailed him with as many tears as the victors. The grief for his death occasioning the remembrance of his many good qualities, all his faults were forgotten. The Persians declared him to have been the most just, the kindest sovereign that ever reigned over them; the Macedonians the best, the most valiant prince in the universe; and all exclaimed against the gods, for having enviously bereaved mankind of him, in the flower of his age, and the height of his fortune. The Macedonians imagined they saw Alexander, with a firm and intrepid air, still lead them on to battle, besiege cities, climb walls, and reward such as had distinguished themselves. They then reproached themselves for having refused him divine honours; and confessed they had been ungrateful and impious, for bereaving him of a name he so justly merited.

After paying him this homage of veneration and tears, they turned their whole thoughts and reflections on themselves, and on the sad condition to which they were reduced by Alexander's death. They considered, that they were on the farther side, with respect. to Macedonia, of the Euphrates, without a leader to head them; and surrounded with enemies, who abhorred their new yoke. As the king died without nominating his successor, a dreadful futurity presented itself to their imagination; and exhibited nothing but divisions, civil wars, and a fatal necessity of still shedding their blood, and of opening their former wounds, not to con

quer Asia, but only to give a king to it; and to raise to the throne perhaps some mean officer or wicked wretch.

This great mourning was not confined merely to Babylon, but spread over all the provinces; and the news of it soon reached Darius's mother. One of her daughters was with her, who being still inconsolable for the death of Hephestion her husband, the sight of the public calamity recalled all her private woes. But Sysigambis bewailed the several misfortunes of her family; and this new affliction awaked the remembrance of all its former sufferings. One would have thought that Darius was but just dead, and that this unfortunate mother solemnized the funeral of two sons at the same time. She wept the living no less than the dead: "who now," would she say, "will take care of my daughters? Where shall we find another Alexander?" She would fancy she saw them again reduced to a state of captivity, and that they had lost their kingdom a second time; but with this difference, that, now Alexander was gone, they had no refuge left. At last, she sunk under her grief. This princess, who had borne with patience the death of her father, her husband, of fourscore of her brothers, who were murdered in one day by Ochus; and, to say all in one word, that of Darius her son, and the ruin of her family; though she had, I say, submitted patiently to all these losses, she however had not strength of mind sufficient to support herself after the death of Alexander. She would not take any sustenance, and starved herself to death, to avoid her surviving this last calamity.

After Alexander's death, great contentions arose among the Macedonians, about appointing him a suc

cessor, of which I shall give an account in the succeeding volume. After seven days spent in confusion and disputes, it was agreed that Arideus, bastard brother to Alexander, should be declared king; and that in case Roxana, who was eight months gone with child, should be delivered of a son, he should share the throne in conjunction with Arideus, and that Perdiccas should have the care of both; for Arideus was a weak man, and wanted a guardian as much as a child.

• Two

The Egyptians and Chaldeans having embalmed the king's corpse after their manner, Arideus was appointed to convey it to the temple of Jupiter Ammon. whole years were employed in preparing for this magnificent funeral, which made Olympias bewail the fate of her son, who having had the ambition to rank himself among the gods, was so long deprived of burial; a privilege allowed to the meanest of mortals.

SECTION XIX.

THE JUDGMENT WE ARE TO FORM OF ALEXANDER.

THE reader would not be satisfied, if, after having given a detail of Alexander's actions, I should not take notice of the judgment we are to form of them; especially as authors have entirely differed in their opinions, with regard to the merits of this prince. Some have applauded him with a kind of ecstacy, as the model of a perfect hero, which opinion seems to have prevailed : others, on the contrary, have represented him in such

colours, as at least fully, if not quite eclipse, the splendour of his victories.

This diversity of sentiments denotes that of Alexander's qualities; and it must be confessed, that good and evil, virtues and vices, were never more equally blended, than in the prince whose history we have written. But this is not all; for Alexander appears very different, according to the times or seasons in which we consider him, as Livy has very justly observed. In the inquiry he makes concerning the fate of Alexander's arms, supposing he had turned them towards Italy, he discovers in him a kind of double Alexander; the one wise, temperate, judicious, brave, intrepid, but at the same time prudent and circumspect : the other, immersed in all the wantonness of an haughty prosperity; vain, proud, arrogant, fiery; softened by delights, abandoned to intemperance and excesses; in a word, resembling Darius rather than Alexander; and having made the Macedonians degenerate into all the vices of the Persians, by the new turn of mind, and the new manners he assumed after his conquests.

I shall have an eye to this plan, in the account I am now to give of Alexander's character, and shall consider it under two aspects, and, in a manner, two eras; first, from his youth till the battle of Issus, and the siege of Tyre, which followed soon after; and secondly, from that victory to his death. The former will

f Luxuria, industria; comitate, arrogantia; malis bonisque artibus mixtus. Tacit.

& Et loquimur de Alexandro nondum merso secundis rebus, quarum nemo intolerantior fuit. Qui si ex habitu novæ fortunæ, novique, ut ita dicam, ingenii, quod sibi victor induerat, spectetur, Dario magis similis quam Alexandro in Italiam venisset, et exercitum Macedoniæ oblitum, degene rantemquæ jam in Persarum mores adduxisset. Liv. l. ix. n. 18.