Christian era it was besieged and conquered by the Roman general Sylla, who with his characteristic ferocity allowed his soldiers to plunder the city, massacre some of the inhabitants, and injure the public buildings; but the devastations he committed are probably exaggerated from the well-known character of the man, it being now admitted he spared the city, which he had devoted to destruction before the surrender of the Piræus; and, as if struck with reverence at the beautiful porticoes where the philosophic followers of Socrates and Plato had often disputed, that he pardoned the living for the sake of the dead. The city continued in the possession of the Romans during the reigns of the Cæsars. We have already mentioned the high reputation of the Areopagitæ, or the judges of the Areopagus, and their subsequent decline and fall by the crafty schemes of Pericles. Although Attica became only part of a Roman province, Athens still maintained its celebrity in the republic of letters as the seat of learning, science, and philosophy; and thither all proceeded who were anxious to learn the true principles of eloquence, or who wished to estimate with accuracy the works of genius and art. Cicero repaired to Athens to benefit by the instructions of the great masters of oratory, and thither he sent his son to hear the lectures of Cratippus. Horace was also sent to Athens. Every Roman of rank indeed held an educational residence in this city to be indispensable; and Plutarch informs us that Greek learning was judged so necessary, that a Roman who did not understand that language never attained any degree of estimation. Such was Athens during the time of St Paul, celebrated as the residence of philosophers, and as the nursery of youth in every department of literature. St Paul visited Athens in A. D. 54, and shrank not from a controversy with their most distinguished philosophers. The Apostle and Silas had proceeded from Philippi, celebrated in sacred history on account of the memorable scene in the prison there, to Amphipolis and Apollonia, whence they came to Thessalonica, the chief city of Macedonia, where St Paul disputed with the Jews three successive "sabbath-days." A few of the Jews, and a considerable number of Greeks, became converts to Christianity, but the great majority of the former raised a furious clamour against the Apostle and his companion, and assaulted the house of Jason, a Christian who entertained and lodged St Paul. Not willing to provoke a popular tumult, St Paul and Silas were sent away during the night to Berea, another Macedonian city, where they found a people even more willing than the believers of Thessalonica "to receive the word with all readiness of mind," Acts xvii. 11. But when the Thessalonian Jews heard that the Apostle and his companion were in Berea, a party of them proceeded to that city, and succeeded in exciting a popular tumult against the Christian community there. St Paul found it necessary to leave Berea, but Timothy and Silas remained behind. Provided with a suitable escort, the Apostle proceeded to Athens, where his friends left him, carrying from him an injunction to Timothy and Silas to join him with all convenient speed. It does not appear what were the Apostle's intentions by repairing to Athens, but while he was waiting for the arrival of Silas and Timothy, he took a survey of the city, and "his spirit was stirred within him when he saw the city wholly given up to idolatry;" or, as it is expressed in the marginal reading, "full of idols." this fact, indeed, and that the Athenians were peculiarly addicted to the worship of false gods, we have sufficient evidence from the testimonies of ancient writers. Hesiod reckons their number at thirty thousand, and even admitting this to be greatly overstated, it proves that they were very numerous. Pausanias observes that there was no place in Greece where so many idols and altars were to be seen as in this city; for, not content with the usual mythological deities worshipped in common both in Greece and Rome, Of the Athenians had added a multitude peculiar to themselves, and not only the adjacent mountains, valleys, plains, and streams, but every house, building, and place of resort, had their respective divinities, which made Patronius ironically observe that the country was so full of idols, that one might more easily find a god than a man. There was at this time a synagogue of the Jews at Athens, and St Paul, as was his usual custom in every city where there was a synagogue, resorted thither, and disputed with them; and also discoursed" in the market"-the place of public resort for business and discussion-" daily with them that met with him," a practice common in Eastern countries. The Apostle, however, in his investigation of the city, and the multiplicity of idols and altars set up in every street and at every corner, found an altar with the short and significant inscription, "TO THE UNKNOWN GOD." There is no tradition as to the particular part of the city in which this altar was erected. The fact itself is of great importance, and has afforded a theme for ample discussions among the learned, whose conjectures have been as varied as they are ingenious and plausible. These opinions we here place before the reader in a brief and condensed state. St Jerome alleges that the inscription on this remarkable altar was not, as St Paul quotes it, "TO THE UNKNOWN GOD," but, "TO THE GODS OF ASIA, AND EUROPE, AND AFRICA, UNKNOWN AND STRANGE GODS," and he therefore infers that the Apostle has not quoted, or did not intend to quote, the literal inscription, but only so much of it as was necessary to illustrate his argument when addressing his learned and intelligent audience. Theophylact and Oecumenius also maintain that the inscription was in the plural number; and, among modern writers, Le Clerc is also of that opinion, although he contends that St Paul could use it in the singular number without committing any inaccuracy of expression. On the other hand, St Chrysostom and other ancient ecclesiastical authors maintain that the inscription was exactly as it is quoted by St Paul, in which he is supported by the evidence of all the old manuscripts of the Acts of the Apostles; and that venerable Father of the Church ascribes the erection of this altar to the excessive superstition of the Athenians, who, fearing lest they would be punished if they neglected to render worship and homage to some deity of whom they were ignorant, dedicated an altar to the Unknown God, thus providing for any possible omission. The Rev. Richard Biscoe, M. A. Prebendary of St Paul's, in his work, entitled "The History of the Acts of the Holy Apostles, confirmed from other authors, and considered as full evidence of the truth of Christianity," being the substance of his sermons preached at the Boyle Lecture in 1736, 1737, and 1738, and published in two volumes in 1742, has some observations on this subject which are worthy of notice. "The opinion," says this learned divine, "supported and embraced by many, is, that by the Unknown God the Athenians meant the God of the Jews. It is well known that this people always showed great facility in admitting the objects of worship of other nations into the catalogue of their deities; and since, subsequently to the time of Alexander the Great, considerable intercourse had taken place between the Greeks and the Jews, it is highly probable that the former should have obtained some knowledge, indistinct and imperfect at least, of the religion of the latter. Nor is it difficult to explain why the Athenians should have given the name of Unknown to the God of the Jews, for the Jews invariably abstained from uttering the name of God, and always spoke of him as unutterable and incomprehensible. No foreigner could ever learn to distinguish him by any peculiar name, and hence the Athenians might naturally describe Him by the title of the Unknown God." The occasion on which this altar at Athens was erected to the Unknown God, is thus traditionally narrated by Diogenes Laertius. It appears from the story of that ancient writer, that about six hundred years before the Christian era "the fame of Epimenides was very great among all the Greeks, and he was supposed to be in favour with the gods. The Athenians being afflicted with a pestilence, were directed by the Pythian oracle to get their city purified by expiation. They invited Epimenides, who was at Crete, to come to them. He came accordingly in the forty-sixth Olympiad, purified their city, and delivered them from the pestilence in this manner:-Taking several sheep, some black, others white, he brought them up to the Areopagus, and then let them go where they would, and gave orders to those who followed them, wherever any one of them should lie down, to sacrifice it to the god to whom it belonged; and so the plague ceased. Hence it came to pass that to this present time may be found in the towns of the Athenians anonymous altars-a memorial of the expiation then made." Dr Lardner, in commenting on the above story, infers from it that there were several anonymous altars at Athens, and that all these altars were in the singular number, for each sheep when it lay down was to be sacrificed to the god to whom it belonged. This author quotes several ancient writers to prove that the inscription was in the singular number, and it does not appear that there were any in the plural to Unknown Gods. St Paul in his disputations with the "devout persons" who met him daily in the market-place of Athens, attracted the notice of the Athenian philosophers, and two parties or sects of them, the Epicureans and Stoics, adventured into the field of argument and controversy with the Apostle. The Epicureans of that time acknowledged no gods except in name only, and denied that they exercised any superintendence of the world; while the Stoics professed to believe not only the existence of the gods, and their providence in the world, but they ascribed all human actions, like the fatalists of modern times, to fixed and unalterable fate, to which they considered the gods them selves to be subjected, and thus, equally with the Epicureans, destroyed in their way the foundation of all religion. There seems to have been no inconsiderable analogy between those two celebrated Athenian sects and those of the Sadducees and Pharisees among the Jews. The doctrines of Christianity which the Apostle inculcated arrested the attention of the philosophers, although he was treated personally with little respect, some of them asking, "What will this babbler say?" Others, however, viewed St Paul's sentiments in a much more serious light, and accordingly, imagining that he was a "setter forth of strange gods because he preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection," they took him to Areopagus, or Mars' Hill, where the supreme judges sat, and demanded an investigation of the "new doctrines," saying that the Apostle brought "certain strange things" to their ears, and that they were anxious to discover his meaning. The character of the Athenians given by the sacred historian is curious, and is proved by their own writers. "All the Athenians," says St Luke, "and strangers which were there, spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing;" and Demosthenes, their celebrated orator, represents them as spending their time in the places of public resort, inquiring whether there was any thing new. The charge was a serious one to St Paul, and affected his life, it being one of the capital offences of the Athenians either to speak disrespectfully of the gods, or to set forth "strange gods," as objects of adoration. But the Apostle appeared before his illustrious audience in the most undaunted and yet most respectful manner. The discourse which he delivered on that occasion has been always admired as a fine specimen of manly and learned eloquence, well adapted to the capacity of his hearers. He stood in the midst of Areopagus, and began with the energetic address, "Ye men of Athens." He told them that he perceived in all things they were "too superstitious." The Apostle did not use the word didaerTigovs, had been foretold by the Prophets, for which in our authorised version is ren- the Gentiles knew nothing of the Prodered too superstitious, in an offensive phets, or at least could have no regard sense, for if we observe the spirit of the for their writings, and had no particular oration, which is mild and conciliatory, reason to believe them true. On this it is evident that nothing more was in- subject Bishop Sherlock has an excellent tended than to describe the acknowledged character of the Athenians for their attention to religious worship above all other nations. He assigns a reason for thus complimenting them on their zeal. In addition to the numerous deities they already worshipped, as he "passed by, and beheld their devotions," that is, the gods which they worshipped, he found "an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD: whom, therefore, ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you." This commencement of his oration refuted the charge brought against him that he was "a setter forth of strange gods," by showing from the inscription on that altar that he introduced no new deity, but the true God, whose right worship they had ignorantly debased by the wrong worship of a multitude of false gods. "A deceiver," says Lord Lyttleton, "would on such an occasion as this have retracted his doctrine to save his life; an enthusiast would have lost his life without trying to save it by in nocent means. St Paul did neither the one nor the other; he availed himself of an altar inscribed to the Unknown God, and pleaded that he did not propose the worship of any new god, but only explained to the people the nature and attributes of that unknown Divinity whom their government had already received. Thus he eluded condemnation without departing in the least from the truth of the gospel, or violating the honour of his God-an admirable proof of the good sense with which he acted, and of there being no mixture of fanaticism in his religion." St Paul's selection of topics in this celebrated discourse is peculiarly happy and appropriate. He does not address the Athenian philosophers as he had done the Jews, and declare to them that they ought to believe in Christ, because he remark. "To the Jew," says that great prelate, "prophecy was the first proof, to the Gentiles it was the last. The Jew believed in Christ, because foretold by the Prophets; the Gentiles believed the Prophets, because they had so exactly predicted Jesus Christ; both became firm. believers, having each in his own way a full view of all the dispensations of providence towards mankind." St Paul tells his learned hearers that God "made the world, and all things therein." This truth was directly opposed to the doctrine of Epicurus and Aristotle, the former of whom maintained that the world was formed from the accidental meeting of atoms, and the latter asserting that the world was not created at all, but had existed as it is from eternity. The Apostle asserts the spirituality and omnipresence of God, and that he "hath made of one blood all nations of men," which, observes Bishop Newton, "was opposed not only to the disciples of Epicurus, who derived the origin of the human race from the mere effects of matter and motion, and to those of Aristotle, who denied that mankind had any beginning, maintaining that they had subsisted in eternal succession; but was, moreover, opposed to the general pride and conceit of the people of Athens, who boasted themselves to be descended from no other stock, but to be themselves original natives of their own country." St Paul quotes one of their own poets, who observes, "For we are all his offspring," referring, it is supposed, to Aratus, who in a poem on the heavenly bodies has the same expression; Aratus, however, was not an Athenian, but a native of St Paul's country, Cilicia. He concludes with a short detail of God's government of the world—that "the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men every where to repent;" asserting the message and appearance of the Saviour of the world; declaring the appointment of a day in which God" will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom he hath ordained;" and maintaining that great and leading truth of Christianity, the resurrection of the dead. This discourse appears to have been heard with various feelings by the Athenians. The Apostle had completely exculpated himself from any criminal accusation, and they listened with philosophical patience to his oration until he spoke of the resurrection of the dead, which they instantly scouted; and we are told that "some mocked," while a few whose curiosity had been excited said that they would hear him again on that matter. This doctrine was the chief obstacle to the reception of the Gospel among the Greeks at the first preaching of Christianity; and we find the Apostle discussing this subject in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, referring to a party of professing Christians in Corinth who were inclined to deny the fact of the resurrection as a thing altogether incredible. The philosophers allowed St Paul to depart, but his discourse was not altogether fruitless. The inspired historian informs us that certain persons "clave unto him," among whom were one of the judges of the Areopagus, named Dionysius, and a woman named Damaris. The Apostle remained only a short time at Athens, for he immediately left the city and proceeded to Corinth. It appears from 1 Thess. iii. 1, that Timothy had joined St Paul at Athens, but that, concerned at the persecutions to which the Thessalonians were exposed from the malicious Jews at Thessalonica, he had sent Timothy back to them, to comfort and support them under their distresses, while he preferred "to be left at Athens alone." Dionysius the Areopagite is traditionally reported to have become the first bishop of Athens, and is traditionally known in ecclesiastical history under the name of St Denis. This is all which the New Testament contains respecting this justly celebrated city, and as it is no part of the plan of this work to describe the massive and stupendous ruins of its magnificent temples and other edifices, we merely insert a few short notices of its subsequent history and present state. The Roman Emperors and other foreign sovereigns were great benefactors to Athens, some of its most splendid buildings having been erected at their expense. Even in the third century of the Christian era, Athens had not lost much of its unrivalled works of art. The gradual decay of its buildings, as Colonel Leake conjectures, has been attributed to the decline of Paganism, and to the slow but sure progress of Christianity. In A.D. 258, the walls of the city were repaired by Valerian. The Goths entered Athens in A.D. 267, but they were repelled by a citizen named Dexippus. In A.D. 398, Alaric took Athens, but there is no evidence to show that he treated it with great severity. The general overthrow of Paganism throughout Greece occurred in A.D. 420, during the reign of Theodosius the Younger. About this time, or perhaps earlier, the Parthenon, the Temple of the virgin goddess Minerva, was converted into a church dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and the Temple of Theseus was appropriated to the warrior St George. In A.D. 1204, the city became a Duchy conferred on one of his followers by Boniface, Marquis of Montferrat, who assumed the title of king of Thessalonica. It continued, with many changes, in the possession of the Christians till 1456, when it fell into the hands of the Turks during the reign of Mohammed II. The Venetians besieged and took the Acropolis in 1687, when the Parthenon and other buildings suffered great injury, and on that occasion the former is said to have sustained more damage than it had previously done during the two thousand years of its existence. The explosion of some powder, which had been placed in it by the Turks, reduced it from its then almost perfect state to a ruin. After that event Athens is little known in history till 1821, at the commencement of the Greek Revolutionary War, when it |