life. When Vectius was examined in the fenate, he faid, it was at the inftigation of others; but in the affembly of the people he affirmed, Lucullus was the man who put him upon it. No one gave credit to the affertion; and a few days after, it was very evident that the wretch was fuborned to accufe an innocent man, when his dead body was thrown out of the prifon. Pompey's party faid, he had laid violent hands upon himfelf; but the marks of the cord that had strangled him, and of the blows he had received, fhowed plainly that he was killed by the perfons who fuborned him.

Corne

This event made Lucullus ftill more unwilling to interfere in the concerns of government; and when Cicero was banished, and Cato fent to Cyprus, he quitted them entirely. It is faid, that his understanding gradually failed, and that before his death it was abfolutely gone. lius Nepos, indeed, afferts, that this failure of his intellects was not owing to fickness or old age, but to a potion given him by an enfranchised flave of his, named Callifthenes. Nor did Callifthenes give it him as poifon, but as a lovepotion. However, inftead of conciliating his master's regards to him, it deprived him of his fenfes; fo that, during the last years of his life, his brother had the care of his estate.

Nevertheless, when he died, he was as much regretted by the people, as if he had departed in that height of glory to which his merit in war and in the administration had raifed him. They crowded to the proceffion; and the body being carried into the forum by fome young men of the firft quality, they infifted it fhould be buried in the campus martius, as that of Sylla had been. As this was a motion entirely unexpected, and the preparations for the funeral there could not eafily be made, his brother with much entreaty prevailed with them to have the obfequies performed on the Tufculan eftate, where every thing was provided for that purpose. Nor did he long furvive him. As he had followed him clofe in the course of years and honours, fo he was not far behind him in his journey to the grave; to which he bore the character of the best and most affectionate of brothers.

CIMON AND LUCULLUS COMPARED.

WE cannot but think the exit of Lucullus happy, as he did not live to fee that change in the conftitution which fate was preparing for his country in the civil wars. Though the commonwealth was in a fickly ftate, yet he left it free. In this refpect the cafe of Cimon was particularly fimilar; for he died while Greece was at the height of her profperity, and before fhe was involved in thofe troubles which proved fo fatal to her. It is true there is this difference, Cimon died in his camp, in the office of general; not like a man, who, fatigued with war, and avoiding its conflicts, fought the reward of his mili tary labours and of the laurels he had won, in the delica cies of the table, and the joys of wine. In this view, *Plato was right in his cenfure of the followers of Orpheus, who had placed the rewards of futurity provided for the good in everlasting intoxication. No doubt, eafe, tranquillity, literary refearches, and the pleasures of contemplation, furnish the moft fuitable retreat for a man in years, who has bid adieu to military and political purfuits. But to propofe pleafure as the end of great atchievements, and, after long expeditions and commands, to lead up the dance of Venus, and riot in her fmiles, was fo far from being worthy of the famed academy, and a follower of the fage Xenocrates, that it rather became a difciple of Epicurus. This is the more furprifing, because Cimon feems to have spent his youth in luxury and diffipation, and Lucullus in letters and fobriety. It is certainly another thing notwithstanding to change for the better; and happier is the nature in which vices gradually die, and virtue flourishes.

They were equally wealthy, but did not apply their riches to the fame purpofes. For we cannot compare the palace

at

*The paffage here alluded to is in the fecond book of Plato's Republic. Plato cenfures not Orpheus, but Mufæus and his fon, for teaching this doctrine. Mufæus and his fon Eumolpus were, ever, difciples of Orpheus; and 785 wepi Toy Oposa may admit of that interpretation.

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at Naples and the Belvideres, amidst the water which Lu cullus erected with the barbarian fpoils, to the fouth wall of the citadel which Cimon built with the treafure he brought from the wars. Nor can the fumptuous table of Lucullus, which favoured too much of eastern magnificence, be put in competition with the open and benevolent table of Cimon. The one, at a moderate charge, daily nourished great numbers of poor; the other, at a vast expence, pleased the appetites of a few of the rich and the voluptuous. Perhaps, indeed, fome allowance must be made for the difference of the time. We know not, whether Cimon, if he had lived to be old, and retired from the concerns of war and of the state, might not have given into a more pompous and luxurious way of living for he' naturally loved wine and company, was a promoter of public feafts and games, and remarkable, as we have observed, for his inclination for the fex. But glorious enterprifes and great actions, being attended with pleafures of another kind, leave no leifure for inferior gratifications; nay, they banish them from the thoughts of perfons of great abilities for the field and the cabinet. And if Lucullus' had finished his days in high commands and amidst the conflicts of war, I am perfuaded, the moft envious caviller' could have found nothing to reproach him with. So much with respect to their way of living.

As to their military character, it is certain they were able commanders both at fea and land. But as the champions, who in one day gain the garland not only in wrestling but in the * Pancration, are not fimply called victors, but by the custom of the games, the flowers of the victo

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*The Pancration confifted of boxing and wrestling together. † Ώσπερ δε των αθλητων τας ήμερα μια παλη μια και παγκρα τιω σεφανεμένες, εθει τιν: παραδόξω νικας καλεσι

Here the fecond is visibly redundant, and therefore fome other part of the paffage may probably be corrupted. Henry Stephens conjec tures, that instead of wagadiga xas we should read in one word wagabogovizes, and Salvini fays he found the term in an ancient infcription. Dacier, when he propofes to read wegrodovimas, conquerors in the whole circle of games, feems, by confounding it with the Pentathlon, to have forgot what the Pancration was The Pentathlon or five games were boxing, the race, leaping, playing at quoits, and wrestling. Da

cier's

ry; fo Cimon, having crowned Greece with two victories gained in one day, the one at land, the other a naval one, deferves fome preference in the lift of generals.

Lucullus was indebted to his country for his power, and Cimon promoted the power of his country. The one found Rome commanding the allies, and under her aufpices extending her conquefts; the other found Athens obeying, inftead of commanding, and yet gained her the chief authority among her allies, as well as conquered her enemies. The Perfians he defeated, and drove them out of the fea, and he perfuaded the Lacedemonians voluntarily to furrender the command.

If it be the greatest work of a general, to bring his men to obey him from a principle of affection, we shall find Lucullus greatly deficient in this respect. He was despised by his own troops, whereas Cimon commanded the veneration, not only of his own foldiers, but of all the allies. The former was deferted by his own, and the latter was courted by strangers. The one fet out with a fine army, and returned alone, abandoned by that army; the other went out with troops fubject to the orders they should receive from another general, and at his return they were at the head of the whole league. Thus he gained three of the most difficult points imaginable, peace with the enemy, the lead among the allies, and a good understanding with Sparta,

They both attempted to conquer great kingdoms, and to fubdue all Afia, but their purposes were unfuccefsful. Cimon's courfe was ftopt by fortune; he died with his commiflion in his hand, and in the height of his profperity. Lucullus, on the other hand, cannot poffibly be excufed, as to the lofs of his authority, fince he must either have been ignorant of the grievances of his army, which ended in fo incurable an averfion, or unwilling to redress them.

This he has in common with Cimon, that he was impeached by his countrymen. The Athenians, it is true,

went

cier's words are thefe" Cinq combats compofoient ce qu'on appelloit "le Pancrace, dont les Athletes etoient appelleés Pentathles." But in fact, as we have obferved above, the Pancration confifted only of two of the five united.

went farther; they banished Cimon by the oftracifm, that they might not, as Plato expreffes it, hear his voice for ten years. Indeed, the proceedings of the ariftocratical party are feldom acceptable to the people; for while they are obliged to use fome violence for the correction of what is amifs, their measures resemble the bandages of furgeons, which are uneafy at the fame time that they reduce the dislocation. But in this refpect perhaps we may exculpate both the one and the other.

Lucullus carried his arms much the fartheft. He was the first who led a Roman army over Mount Taurus, and paffed the Tigris. He took and burnt the royal cities of Afia, Tigranocerta, Cabira, Sinope, Nifibis, in the fight of their respective kings. On the north he penetrated as far as the Phafis, on the east to Media, and on the fouth to the Red Sea by the favour and affiftance of the princes of Arabia. He overthrew the armies of the two great kings, and would certainly have taken them, had they not fled, like favages, into distant folitudes and inacceffible woods. A certain proof of the advantage Lucullus has in this refpect, is, that the Perfians, as if they had fuffered nothing from Cimon, foon made head against the Greeks, and cut in pieces a great army of theirs in Egypt; whereas Tigranes and Mithridates could effect nothing, after the blow they had received from Lucullus. Mithridates, enfeebled by the conflicts he had undergone, did not once venture to face Pompey in the field: inftead of that, he fled to the Bofphorus, and there put a period to his life. As for Tigranes, he delivered himself naked and unarmed to Pompey, took his diadem from his head, and laid it at his feet, in which he complimented Pompey, not with what was his own, but with what belonged to the laurels of Lucullus. The poor prince, by the joy with which he received the enfigns of royalty again, confeffed that he had absolutely loft them. However, he must be deemed the greater general, as well as the greater champion, who delivers his adversary weak and breathless, to the next combatant.

Befides, Cimon found the king of Perfia extremely weakened, and the pride of his people humbled by the loffes and defeats they had experienced from Themiftocles, Paufanias and Leotychidas; and their hands could not make much refiftance, when their hearts were gone. M 5

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