[[52]]
CHAPTER V
THUCYDIDES' CONCEPTION OF HISTORY
In the foregoing chapters we have put forward a theory of the causes of
the Peloponnesian War. If that theory is well founded, the causes were such as
Thucydides could not have known. This is certainly a sufficient reason for his
not having told us what they were; but it does not explain why he did not look
for the origin of the war in the quarters where we have looked for it, or how
he came to regard his account as complete and satisfactory. He says that his
description of what immediately preceded the outbreak is written in order that
no one may ever have to ask `out of what so great a war arose'--the very
question, it might seem, which we have spent four chapters in trying to answer.
Whether the answer we found is the right one or not, what is certain is that
some answer is wanted. Our next question is: why was Thucydides content with
his First Book, and why are we not content with it?
There are on the surface indications of a wide divergence between his
conception of his task in writing history and our conception of it, between
what he offers and what we demand. Can we trace this divergence down to its
source? Putting our own, very different, hypothesis along-side of Thucydides'
introductory Book, and taking it (whether right or wrong in points of detail)
as at least the expression of a typically modern view, can we explain the
contrast between the two accounts? This is a wider and more interesting inquiry
than the search for the origin of a particular war between two ancient cities;
it should take us to the centre of Thucydides' general view of history and of
the historian's aim and office.
[[53]]
What, precisely, does Thucydides undertake to tell us?--that is the
point from which we must start. The answer lies in his own prefatory statement
of his scope and method. (note 1) In the first place, he undertakes to state
the plain truth about what happened. (note 2) In the second place he divides
his subject matter--the truths he means to record--under two heads: speeches
(lÒgoi), and the events ([[paragraph]]rga) of the war. The passage is
so important for our purpose that we will give it in full:
`As to the accounts given of themselves by the several parties in
speeches, (note 3) either on the eve of war or when they were already
engaged, it would be hard to reproduce the exact language used, whether I heard
it myself or it was reported to me by others. The speeches as they stand
represent what, in my opinion was most necessary to be said by the several
speakers about the matter in question at the moment, and I have kept as closely
as possible to the general sense of what was really said. Of the
events--what actually was done in the war, (note 4) I have thought fit
not to write from any chance information, nor yet according to any notion of my
own, but to record those at which I was present, or where I heard of from
others, with the greatest possible accuracy of investigation. To discover
these facts was laborious, because those who were present at the various events
differed in their reports of the same occurrences, according to the state of
their memories or as they sympathized with one side or the other.'
Observe that in this very careful account of what the history is to contain,
there is not a word about causes. Each episode in the military operations is to
be described just as it happened; we shall be told no more than an eyewitness
might have seen on the spot. Besides this, we are to listen to the `accounts'
given, the arguments used and pretexts alleged, by politicians and the
representatives of states--no more than the audience at the assembly or at a
congress of allies might actually have heard. The history as we have it
does
[1. i. 20-2. [2. t<<n genomdeg.nvn tÚ
safdeg.w, i. 22. 4.
[3. i. 22 ~sa mcentsn lÒg[[florin]]
ßkastoi.
[4. tå dÉ [[paragraph]]rga t<<n
praxydeg.ntvn [[section]]n t" poldeg.m[[florin]].]
[[54]]
consist, almost entirely, of these two elements. But why has Thucydides
deliberately adopted such an extraordinary method? Why, in particular, does he
say nothing about causes, but put us off with the ex parte `accounts'
of interested persons, as publicly and formally stated with a view to
persuading other interested persons? Here on the threshold we find, between
his notion of an historian's business and ours, as wide a gulf as can be
conceived. How could he think that it was enough to tell us what `the
Corinthians' or `the Athenians' alleged, instead of what were the real,
underlying causes of this war?
The method adopted by Thucydides was to a certain extent imposed upon him
inevitably by the circumstances in which he wrote. A brief account of these
will throw some light on the peculiarities of the work as we have it, and will
help us to determine how far these peculiarities are shaped by external
accident, and how far they result from the author's conception of history.
The work was intended to cover the whole twenty-seven years of the
Peloponnesian War. The eight books we have--all that ever was written--actually
cover twenty years. They are divided into two nearly equal parts, of which the
second is unfinished. (note 1) Part I contains the Ten Years' war. Part II
begins with a fresh introduction in which the author for the first time remarks
that the Ten Years' War turned out to be only the first episode in a struggle
of which it was all along prophesied that it should last thrice nine years--the
only one of the many oracles which was fulfilled. From this remark, occurring
where it does, it is plain that Part I must have been far advanced before
Thucydides knew how long the war was to continue. Careful search, moreover,
has detected in it here and there several expressions which a thorough revision
would have removed, and it may be concluded that, although considerable
additions were made later, it was never rewritten as a whole. The second Part
is
[1. The division occurs at v. 20. The introduction to Part II
begins at v. 26; chapters 21-5 forming a connecting link.]
[[55]]
incomplete; Book VIII ends abruptly and is throughout in an unfinished
condition. On the other hand, Books VI and VII (the Sicilian Expedition) are
perhaps the most perfect part of the work.We may infer with
certainty that Thucydides having begun to write, as he says himself, (note 1)
so soon as the war broke out, worked at the history, as occasion offered, all
through the twenty-seven years of war and after his restoration from exile at
its close, until death ended his labours.
About his manner of working there can be little doubt. He evidently kept a
sort of diary, recording the bare events, with details of time and place, as he
heard of them. The entries form an annalistic thread, running through the
whole, on which the fuller narrative could be constructed. In some places they
actually remain embedded in the expanded story, which in other instances has
replaced them. (note 2) With this chronological framework as a basis, he would
write up the more elaborate descriptions whenever he met with an eye-witness
who could supply the necessary details, and the account would, no doubt, be
carefully revised, if fresh information came in later from another source. From
the circumstance that the unfinished Book VIII contains only short notes of the
contents of speeches, whereas the narrative is in parts fairly full, it is not
rash to conclude that in many cases the finished speeches of the earlier books
were the last additions to the narratives which they accompany.
His choice of incidents for fuller treatment was, of course, in part dependent
on the chance of his meeting with some one who possessed the necessary
information. Apart from this, ho appears to have selected typical episodes,
such as the siege of Plataea, the victory of Phormio, Demosthenes' campaign in
Aetolia, the capture of Sphacteria, Brasidas' great march to the North, the
siege of Syracuse. Each of these military
[1. i. 1. 1. [2.
See, for example, ii. 19. 1, where the formal record of the invasion is left in
the middle of the detailed description of it. On a close scrutiny it will be
seen that chapters 18 and 19, which precede and follow it, are slightly
inconsistent, and must have been written at different times.]
[[56]]
achievements had some peculiar circumstances which made the operations
interesting to contemporaries though not always in the same degree to us--from
the point of view of strategy and tactics. A few episodes, of which the most
remarkable is the Corcyrean sedition, are treated in the same way on account of
their political significance. The description of the plague at Athens is for
the instruction of physicians. In all these cases, which together make up the
greater part of the work, the intention is that which is stated in the
introduction. `I shall be satisfied if the facts are pronounced to be useful
by those who shall desire to know clearly what has happened in the past and the
sort of things that are likely, so far as man can foresee, to happen again in
the future.'Such was the plan originally laid down for himself
by Thucydides. He was not reviewing his whole period in focus and perspective
after a sufficient interval of time, but he was obliged to compose at odd
moments, determined by the accidents of opportunity and scattered over a period
of thirty to thirty-five years. During all the first part of his labours he
was writing concurrently with the events he recorded, often in the dark as to
their relative importance, their bearing and connexions, and necessarily
ignorant of their remoter consequences. All he could do at first was to keep
his journal, and now and then to work up a detached episode. The result could
not for a long time possess more unity than the collected volumes of a monthly
review; no general tendency or trend of events could be discerned, no shadow
cast before the unknown issue.
But these considerations of outward circumstance, while they account for many
of the features which make the work so unlike a modern history, leave our
present question untouched. However much he might be in the dark about the
causes of the war when he began to write, however impossible it may have been
for the darkness to be dispelled later, the strange thing is that he should
have thought that he had dispelled it. It is stranger still that in describing
the
[[57]]
contents of his book he should have altogether omitted to mention
causes, and laid down a plan of writing which, if adhered to, would
exclude any discussion of them.Another a ancient historian,
Polybius (note 1), has told us explicitly what class of things he considers are
the `causes' of a war. In his superior and priggish way, he speaks with
contempt of men who cannot distinguish the `beginning' (érxÆ), or
first overt act of hostilities, from the `cause and pretext'
(afit[[currency]]aw ka< profãsevw). `I,' he says, `shall regard the
first attempt to put in execution what had already been determined, as a
"beginning"; but I shall mean by "causes" (afit[[currency]]aw) those
decisions and counsels which precede and lead to such attempts; I mean
considerations and states of mind and calculations, and the things which bring
us to make a decision or form a purpose.' A pretext is an alleged
`cause'. Polybius illustrates his use of terms from the war of Antiochus, of
which the `cause' (afit[[currency]]a) was the anger of the Aetolians;
the pretext (prÒfasiw) was the liberation of Greece; the
beginning (érxÆ) was the descent of Antiochus upon
Demetrias. The whole passage is in a didactic tone; Polybius is evidently
pleased with his powers of discrimination.
With this in mind let us look at the passage (note 2), where Thucydides for a
moment goes beyond his prescribed limits and expresses his own opinion about
the `cause' of the Peloponnesian War. We shall find all the three terms
distinguished by Polybius.
`The Athenians and Peloponnesians began (>=rjanto) by breaking the
thirty years' truce which they had made after the capture of Euboea. Why they
broke it--their grievances and differences (tåw afit[[currency]]aw ka<
tåw diaforãw), I have first set forth, that no one may ever have
to inquire from what origin ([[section]]j ~tou) so great a war arose among the
Hellenes. The most genuine pretext, though it appeared least in what was
said, (note 3) I believe to have been the increasing power of Athens,
and
[1. iii. 6-7. [2. i. 23. 4. We shall discuss later the
digression (i. 88-118) where this statement is repeated and the grounds of the
Spartans' fear are explained.
[3. tØn mcentsn
élhyestãthn prÒfasin, éfanestãthn dcents
lÒg[[florin]].]
[[58]]
the alarm which they gave to the Lacedaemonians, and so forced them into
war. But the grievances publicly alleged (note 1) by each side for
breaking the truce and going to war were as follows.' Then he passes at once
to the description of civil strife at Epidamnus, of her appeal to Corinth, and
so forth.The first point in this passage to which we would draw
attention is a point of disagreement between Polybius and Thucydides. Polybius
carefully. distinguishes between a `cause' (afit[[currency]]a) and a `pretext'
(prÒfasiw). The pretext of the war of Antiochus was the liberation of
Greece--an avowed, but not a true, `cause'; its (true) cause was the
Aetolians' anger. Now Thucydides (note 3) we note, inverts the use of these
terms. The alarm of the Lacedaemonians, which Polyblus would call a `cause'
(true, but not avowed), Thucydides calls `the most genuine pretext, though it
appeared least in what was said'. When he comes to the `grievances publicly
alleged'--what Polybius would call `pretexts' (avowed, but not true), he calls
them afit[[currency]]ai.
We could hardly have better evidence that Thucydides draws no clear distinction
between an afit[[currency]]a and a prÒfasiw. No respectable writer who
had such a distinction in his thoughts could speak of a `most genuine
pretext (prÒfasiw) which appeared least in what was said'--which,
in fact, was least of all a pretext. Jowett, in rendering this phrase,
instinctively substitutes the modernism: `the real, though unavowed,
cause.' Hobbes is less modern and renders it faithfully: `the truest
Quarrell, though least in speech.' (note 2)
[1. afl
dÉ [[section]]w tÚ fanerÚn lefÒmenai afitiai.
[2. Mr. Forbes, in his edition of Thuc. i, translates: `For (and this was the
truest cause, though least was said about it, &c.' (p. 28). In his glossary
(p. 166) he says `prÒfasiw is twice used emphatically for the
real, as opposed to the pretedended, motive or cause', citing i.
23 and vi. 6. He adds a note: `The idea in these places probably is "if they
had openly said what they really meant"; of course prÒfasiw cannot
mean "real motive". Cf. Dem. de Cor. 156 (201), probably an
imitation of Thucydides, ~ti tØn mcentsn élhy[[infinity]]
prÒfasin t<<n pragmãtvn...épekpÊpteto.'
afit[[currency]]ai. Mr. Forbes renders `grievances' (p. 25); but slips into
using `causes' on p. 75: `Thucydides has thus far' (up to chap. 88) `been
explaining the avowed causes of the war. He now goes on to the real cause--the
alarm of Sparta...' On i. 146 he translates prÒfasiw by `cause', without
comment.]
[[59]]
Thucydides, in fact, throughout his first book uses the words
afit[[currency]]a and prÒfasiw interchangeably. (note 1) In Polybius
afit[[currency]]a is perhaps more nearly equivalent to `reason' (in the
psychological sense), than to `cause'. In Thucydides it does not mean `cause'
at all, and should seldom be translated `reason'. It means `grievance'. There
is in Thucydidean Greek no word which even approaches the meaning and
associations of the English `cause', with its correlative `effect'.
This truth is recognized as a linguistic fact; but surely it is something
more. It implies that when Thucydides sat down to write his first Book, he
never so much as asked himself the question which we have asked and tried to
answer: `What were the causes of the war?' The questions he did ask were: What
was the `beginning' (érxÆ)--the first act of war? and: What were
the grievances, quarrels, pretexts of the combatants?--t[[currency]]new
[[Sigma]]san afl afit[[currency]]a; The answers to these two questions he
regards as containing a complete account of that `out of which' ([[section]]j
~tou) the war arose. The combatants `began', he says, by breaking the treaty
of thirty years' peace; the grievances, accusations, and pretexts occupy the
rest of Book I (except the digression, 88-118). But that is all which he
attempts to tell. We ought to give up speaking of the first Book as being
about the causes of the war; it is much truer to say that there is hardly a
word about causes in it from beginning to end. Thucydides has not told us the
causes, and one reason for this omission is that he never raised the question,
and never could raise it, in distinct and unambiguous terms.
The first Book is not an analysis of causes, but the story of a quarrel.
Thucydides approaches his subject in the same
[1. Compare iv. 85.
1, where Brasidas says, of his expedition to Acanthus, <=
reg.kpemc[[currency]]w mou...gegdeg.nhtai tØn afit[[currency]]an
[[section]]palhyeÊousa [[partialdiff]]n érxÒmenoi toË
poldeg.mou proe[[currency]]pomen, ÉAyhna[[currency]]oiw
[[section]]leuyeroËntew tØn ÑEllãda polemÆsein,
and section 6 tØn afit[[currency]]an pistØn
épodeiknÊnai. Here afit[[currency]]a is used to mean a pretext or
alleged ground of quarrel which (in the speaker's view) was always genuine, but
needed to be proved genuine by corresponding action. i. 55. 2 afit[[currency]]a
dcents aÓth pr~th [[section]]gdeg.neto toË poldeg.mou to>w
Koriny[[currency]]oiw [[section]]w toÁw ÉAyhna[[currency]]ouw,
~ti...[[section]]naumãxoun: i. 118. 1 ~sa prÒfasiw toËde
toË poldeg.mou katdeg.sth, referring to the same events.]
[[60]]
way that Herodotus approaches his in the opening chapters, where he
recounts the earlier stages in `the quarrel for which the Greeks and barbarians
fought'. (note 1) That feud began with the rape of the Argive princess, Io, by
some Phoenician traders. Certain Greeks retaliated by carrying off Europa,
daughter of the King of Tyre, and so `squared the account'. Next time the
aggressors were the Greeks, who sailed to Colchis and carried away Medea. Then
Alexander, son of Priam, bent on vengeance, made a prize of Helen. Diplomatic
protests failing, the Trojan war followed, Priam's kingdom was overthrown, and
thenceforth the barbarians regarded the Greeks as enemies. The expeditions of
Darius and Xerxes were conceived as reprisals for the expedition of
Agamemnon.Similarly, the first book of Thucydides traces the
feud between Athens and `the Peloponnesians'. Seen in that light, the structure
and contents of the book become natural and intelligible: accusations and
pretexts and ex parte statements, which are ridiculously out of place in
a discussion of causes, are just what we expect in the story of a quarrel. The
speakers are like litigants in a process; one party states its grievances, the
other attempts refutation. Thucydides seems to take it as his primary duty to
put forward both cases fairly, and to leave the reader to judge. He does not,
like a modern historian, assume the judicial position himself, treat the
allegations as so much (almost worthless) evidence to be `summed up', and then
attempt an independent investigation of the causes which these allegations were
partly designed to conceal.
We may observe a further psychological consequence entailed by this manner of
approaching the subject: Thucydides' thoughts, being bent on the earlier
stages of the quarrel, are fixed solely on the past. Now, the policy of
commercial expansion to the West, which we have ascribed to the
Piraeus,
[1. diÉ [[partialdiff]]n afit[[currency]]nh
[[section]]poldeg.mhsan, Herod. i. 1. Compare the story of the feud between
Athens and Aegina (Herod. v. 82) which opens thus: +/-dcents [[paragraph]]xyrh
+/- proofeilomdeg.nh [[section]]w ÉAyhna[[currency]]ouw [[section]]k
t<<n Afiginhtdeg.vn [[section]]gdeg.neto [[section]]j
érx[[infinity]]w toi[[infinity]]sde. Similarly the earlier stages in the
quarrel between Persia and Scythia are resumed (Herod. iv. 1) to explain
Darius' invasion.]
[[61]]
lay wholly in the future. It was not a `grievance' on either side; and
no one who was looking for grievances could possibly come to think of it.
Hence the alliance with Corcyra, for instance, instead of being regarded as a
step in the execution of this policy, is treated from the Corinthians'
standpoint, as an interference on the part of Athens in a private feud between
Corinth and one of her colonies. The situation of the island on the route to
Italy and Sicily, which to us is the significant fact, is, as we have seen,
barely mentioned, in a couple of sentences, without any emphasis or
explanation; it has nothing to do with any grievance.But, if the
bulk of this first Book is not about causes, there remains the one statement
that `the most genuine pretext was the Spartans' fear of the increasing power
of Athens'. Although Thucydides has no word for cause, a `most genuine
pretext' means one which is based on some genuine, real feeling; and this
feeling we may describe, though he cannot so describe it, as a cause. We
remark here an agreement between the two passages we quoted from Thucydides and
Polybius: both alike find the `reason', or `genuine pretext', of a war in a
feeling, a state of mind, attributed to one of the nations involved. The
anger of the Aetolians was the reason (afit[[currency]]a) of the war of
Antiochus; the fear of the Lacedaemonians is the `most genuine pretext' for
this war. The digression in chapters 88-118 is intended to explain this fear,
by describing the growth of Athens. We will glance through it, in order to note
from what point of view the description is written.
Thucydides goes back to the retreat of the Persians. When the invaders were
gone, the Athenians set about restoring their desolated homes and rebuilding
their walls (89). The Lacedaemonians, urged by their allies and fearing the
new growth of the Athenian navy, send envoys to dissuade them from fortifying
their city. The diplomatic manoeuvres by which Themistocles hoodwinked the
Spartans until the walls were built are told in detail (90-1). The Spartans
concealed their anger and disappointment (92). The Piraeus is founded and
fortified as a refuge in case of
[[62]]
another barbarian invasion (93). The tyranny of Pausanias drives the
allies to prefer the supremacy of Athens (95), who takes tribute of them, under
colour of intended reprisals upon Persia, though they remain autonomous and
meet for deliberation in a common assembly (97). Naxos was the first to revolt
and the first to be `enslaved contrary to the convention' (98); the turn of
others came later. The fault lay partly with the Athenians' severity in
exaction, partly with the negligence of the allies (99). Various Athenian
successes are recorded (100). The revolted Thasians induce the Spartans
secretly to promise an invasion of Attica, which is prevented only by the great
Helot rising (101). Kimon is sent to help the Lacedaemonians in crushing the
rebels at Ithome, but he is received with suspicion and sent back with
insulting discourtesy. `This was the first open difference' between the two
states. Athens renounces the Lacedaemonian alliance (102), and `being now at
feud with Sparta' settles the banished Messenians at Naupactus, and allies
herself with Megara. Her occupation of this city and of its ports, Nisaea and
Pegae, is `the beginning of the Corinthians' intense hatred of Athens'
(103).Then follow the Egyptian Expedition and the war with
Corinth, and later with Sparta; the battles of Tanagra and Oenophyta; the
reduction of Aegina; the failure of the Egyptian Expedition (104-110). After
some minor operations a five years' truce is concluded between the
Peloponnesians and Athens. Kimon (the last representative of the anti-Persian
ideal) falls, in an `Hellenic' war against Asiatics, at Cyprus (112). Then
intestine strife breaks out again in Greece; Athens is worsted and restores
the places she has held in the Peloponnese (115). The revolt of Samos and
Byzantium is crushed (117).
Thucydides returns to his main narrative in these words: (note 1) `And now, a
few years later, occurred the affairs at Corcyra and Potidaea above narrated,
and all that came to be a pretext for this war.' The transactions mentioned in
the digression occupied fifty years, `in which, while the Athenians established
more firmly their mastery over their empire and
[1. i.
118.]
[[63]]
themselves advanced greatly in power, the Lacedaemonians, perceiving it,
only made slight attempts to prevent them, and for the most part of the time
remained inactive; for they had never been quick to go to war, if they were
not compelled; and in part they were hindered by wars at home; until at last
the power of Athens was clearly rising high and they were laying hands on the
Peloponnesian league. Now the Lacedaemonians could bear it no longer; they
decided that they must set to their hands with energy and pull down the
strength of Athens, if they could, by embarking on this war.'
In so far as this digression is more than a mere chronicle intended to correct
the current dating of the events, it is clearly an account of how the
`difference' arose between Athens and Sparta and the breach widened into an
irreparable feud. In the Persian wars the two states had stood together
against the Eastern invader; but no sooner was the danger past than anger and
suspicion broke out through the deceitful policy of Themistocles. So the feud
began, and its course is traced through the `first open difference', and the
wars that followed, down to the latest `grievances' which occupy the rest of
the book. The phase of this process which especially interests Thucydides is
the change that came over the character of the Athenian league. He belonged by
family tradition to the old school which took for its motto, Unity in Hellas
and War to the death with the barbarian, and in the transition from an
`alliance' to an `empire' and from an empire to a `tyranny' he read the
defection of Athens from this ideal, which Kimon, his kinsman and hero, had
championed to the end. Thinking on these lines, his attention was fixed on the
nominal heads of the two leagues, Athens and Sparta. The first Book might have
been very different if he had studied rather the Piraeus and Corinth, and
sought causes instead of grounds of quarrel.
We must now recur to the point of agreement we noted between Thucydides and
Polybius. (note 1) Thucydides has told us
[1. See above, p.
61.]
[[64]]
why a certain `pretext' was `the most genuine', and this pretext, we
notice, is a feeling of fear attributed to a nation as a whole; just as the
`reason' which Polybius finds for the war of Antiochus is the anger of the
Aetolians. Polybius, moreover, expressly limits the term afit[[currency]]a, in
connexion with the history of a war, solely to psychological
`reasons'--to feelings and other states of mind which immediately precede
action, `whatever brings us to make a decision or form a purpose.' With this
limitation Thucydides seems tacitly to agree, when he finds the genuine pretext
in the fear of the Spartans, and attributes their inaction (in so far as
it was not due to accidental hindrances) to the slowness of their national
temperament. It appears to us to be characteristic of ancient historians in
general, that in so far as they look for causes of human events, they look,
apart from supernatural agencies, solely to psychological causes--the
motives and characters of individuals and of cities.In the
present instance, we ought not to overlook the fact that Thucydides is biting
from the Athenian side, and consequently tends to regard `the Peloponnesians'
or at least the several states (Sparta, Corinth, &c.) as units..
Thus, he tells us of the `fear of the Lacedaemonians', and `the intense
hatred of the Corinthians'; but Archidamus and Brasidas are the only two
individuals on the Peloponnesian side whose motives are even dimly apprehended.
He evidently knew nothing about the state of politics and the prominent
personalities at Corinth. On the other hand, in his own city he takes account
of two elements: the national character of `the Athenians' as a whole,
and the character and motives of leading men, Pericles, Cleon,
Alcibiades, Nikias, and so on. This is perfectly natural. The Athenian people
met as a body in the ecclesia, and its character could be observed there
directly, as well as traced in its collective action; but its motives become
articulate only in the `demagogue', the `spokesman of the people', or in the
representative sent on a mission to a foreign state. When they are formulated
in the `pretexts' of individual leaders, they are inevitably associated with
their personalities and private ambitions. The disinterested ideal of Athens'
glory is
[[65]]
impersonated in Pericles; her restless covetousness
(pleonej[[currency]]a) in Cleon; her ambition of conquest in Alcibiades. Now
all these peculiarities of Thucydides' narrative are psychological accidents
which ought to be discounted in criticizing his evidence. With respect to the
origin of the war, in particular, we see how the unconscious preoccupations
they involve would prevent Thucydides from seeing that Pericles and his
majority were not at one, that the motives which actuated the men who voted for
his proposals were not necessarily identical with the motives which were
expressed in his `pretexts', or with his own private motives. The secret was
not to be found in Pericles' speeches, nor yet in the national character of
`the Athenians'.The exclusive concentration of the ancient
historians on the motives and characters of men and of states is the key to the
divergence we noticed between their histories and ours. We are not content
with `causes' of this sort only; we were not satisfied, for instance, to
attribute the prosperity of Megara to virtuous moderation. When Solon
(according to Plutarch (note 1)) observed that merchants are not
accustomed to bring their wares to places where they can get nothing in
exchange, he was stating a truth not as we should state it. We look for a
different sort of explanations and we express them in different terms.
Thus, in constructing our hypothesis about the origin of the war, instead of
looking for states of mind such as fear, ambition, virtuous moderation, we
sought for the causes alike of the Peloponnesian war, of the Sicilian
expedition, and of the prosperity of Megara in what we call an economic and
topological situation. We did not look, primarily, into the breasts of
Pericles, Cleon, and Alcibiades and study their characters and personal
motives, but we consulted population statistics and the map of Greece. When we
had observed the rise of a commercial population in the Piraeus, and noted that
Corinth was well situated to control the stream of trade from Sicily across the
isthmus, it occurred to us that Megara was on the same isthmus and presented
the
[1. See above, p. 19.]
[[66]]
only weak point which the Piraeus, with designs of expansion westward,
could attack. The result was that, whereas there was no possible connexion
between such isolated psychological facts as the alarm of the Spartans, the
personal ambitions of Cleon and Alcibiades, and the virtuous moderation of the
Megarian people, the connexion between the elements and factors in the
`situation' we considered was obvious. Hence we could perceive that the whole
war, the Sicilian enterprise, and the attack on Megara, could all be traced to
one and the same set of causes, which governed the entire train of events. The
personal motives of individuals only came in as a secondary factor, modifying
the details of what seemed in itself an almost inevitable
process.Similarly we are inclined to go beyond Solon's acute
observation of the habits of merchants. Solon's way of putting it was that
merchants are not accustomed to give anything for nothing; he remarks it
as a fact of human nature. Our language is different because we tend to
abstract from the psychological aspect, and to formulate, instead, a general
law, which says nothing about the natural preferences of merchants, but speaks
of a necessity that exports should balance imports. So long as the preference
of merchants was alone considered, the foundation of economic science could not
be laid. Thus we find Plato still ignorant of a law which Solon, a practical
man, was on the verge of discovering. (note 1)
The great contrast, in fact, between ancient and modern history is this: that
whereas the moderns instinctively and incessantly seek for the operation of
social conditions, of economic and topological factors, and of political forces
and processes of evolution,--all of which elements they try to bring under
laws, as general and abstract as possible; the ancients looked simply and
solely to the feelings, motives, characters of individuals or of cities.
These, and (apart from supernatural agencies) these only, appeared to them to
shape the course of human history.
[1. Socrates, in the
Alcibiades (i. 122 E), argues that the Lacedaemonians must be
exceedingly rich, because silver and gold come into the country from all
quarters of Greece and never go out again (industry and export trade being
forbidden by Lycurgus' constitution).]
[[67]]
The contrast reveals a profound divergence of ultimate views as to the
position of man in the universe, and here at last we reach the central point of
the position. No historian can be completely criticized until we have taken
account of his philosophical attitude. For an ancient historian, whose
standpoint is so remote that we cannot safely assume any common ground, the
inquiry is imperative. Our previous discussion furnishes the point of
departure: we have to consider what philosophic doctrine is tacitly and
unconsciously implied, when it is tacitly and unconsciously assumed that the
only `causes' which it is relevant to discuss in the history of a war are the
immediate motives and passions of individuals or of personified states.
When we have brought the question to this issue, the answer is not far to seek.
The latent implication is that every motive is a first cause, or is
determined solely by character. (note 1)
If we would understand Thucydides, we must not regard a human action as partly
caused by innumerable influences
[1. This doctrine is implicit in
rationalist Greek thought till the fourth century, when it first becomes
explicit in the Aristotelian doctrine of free will. We cannot go at length
into this question; but briefly the doctrine is as follows. A man's action is
caused by his desire of some end. That, of course. is true; but the next step
is false. This step is the assertion that the end in question--the object of
desire--is the cause of the desire. A man thinks of some result he
wishes to attain: how can he bring it about? He thinks of the means to it;
beginning from the `end'--the last effect to be caused--he traces the chain of
means backwards till he reaches the first means--some action which it is
immediately within his power to perform. This last link in his chain of
thought is the first link in the chain of execution. He performs the action;
it is a beginning (érxÆ) which starts the series of means
leading back again to the desired result. The two processes of reflection and
execution form a closed circle, which ends where it began, in the object or
`end' desired. The `end' is called a `final cause'; the action and the desire
which prompts it are the `beginning of motion' (érxÆ
kinÆseaw) Man is the original source and parent of his acts,
érxØn...gennhtØn t<<n prãjevn ka< tdeg.knvn,
Ar. Eth. Nic. g iii 15 and v. 5. To which may add, with Aristotle, that the
activity is conditioned (not caused) by character, and the account is then
complete. We are here following Aristotle's statement of the point which
concerns us without taking account of any justifications first introduced by
Aristotle. We are only considering what is assumed by men who might have been
his grandfathers.]
[[68]]
of environment, and by events that happened before the agent was born,
right back into an immeasurable past; nor must we think of it as a single
point in the total state of the world at a given moment, which state can be
completely accounted for only by the total state at the previous moment, and so
on. We must think of it as springing then and there out of the man's passions
and character, and rid our minds, moreover, of the notion of law as
applying to human actions and events. The fundamental conception which all our
thought about the world implies must be banished--the conception, namely, that
the whole course of events of every kind, human or non-human, is one enormous
concatenation of causes and effects stretching forward and back into infinite
time, and spreading outwards over immeasurable space, a concatenation in which
every link is necessarily connected with all the rest, however remote. The
world upon which the Greek looked out presented no such spectacle as this.
Human affairs--the subject-matter of history--were not to him a single strand
in the illimitable web of natural evolution; their cornise was shaped solely by
one or both of two factors: immediate human motives, and the will of gods and
spirits, of Fortune, or of Fate. The rationalist who rejected the second class
was left with the first alone--the original and uncaused acts of human will.
That is why Polybius expressly limits the term `cause' (afit[[currency]]a) in
relation to history to one class of things motives. Thucydides takes the
limitation for granted.
On this all-important point we part company with many recognized authorities.
We will quote a typical statement from Professor Gomperz' brilliant review of
Greek thought:--
`There is hardly any pair of contemporaries who offer a more glaring contrast
than Herodotus and Thucydides. Barely a score of years divided their works
from one another, but a gulf of centuries seems to yawn between their temper
and inspiration. Herodotus creates throughout an entirely old-fashioned
impression; Thucydides is a modern of the moderns. He made a clean sweep of
the political and religious bias, the legendary and novelistic sympathies, and
[[69]]
the primitive beliefs, rarely mitigated by the light of criticism, which
marked the elder historian. The gaze of Thucydides is primarily fixed on the
political factors, on the actual relations of forces, on the natural
foundation, so to speak, of historical phenomena He looks for their springs,
not in the dispensations of supernatural beings, nor yet, except in a moderate
degree, in the caprices and passions of individual men. Behind those he always
sought for the universal forces that animated them, for the conditions of the
peoples, and the interests of the states.... It was his constant endeavour to
describe the course of human affairs as though it were a process of nature
informed by the light of inexorable causality.' (note 1)This
passage is perhaps unguarded in expression, and it seems somewhat ungracious to
fasten upon details; we take it only as a typical instance of what seems to us
a fallacy very prevalent in modern histories of ancient thought. What lies
behind the positive statements in Professor Gomperz' paragraph is the very
different and merely negative proposition that Thucydides records nothing which
is not consistent with a scientific conception of the world--that he tacitly
rejects supernatural causes. Let us admit, for the present, that this is true.
The fallacy consists in passing from this negative statement to the assertion,
implied throughout the paragraph, that the void left by the rejection of
supernaturalism was filled by modern science.
The chief point in which we differ from Professor Gomperz arises over his last
statement, that Thucydides endeavoured to describe the course of human affairs
as though it were a process of nature informed by inexorable causality. This
is precisely what we have seen reason to deny. Human affairs have, for
Thucydides, not even an analogy with processes of nature; much less are they
identified with one of the processes of nature; much less, again, is their
course informed by inexorable causality. Man, isolated from, and opposed to,
Nature, moves along a narrow path, unrelated
[1. Gomperz, Greek
Thinkers, (E.T.), i. 503. We are sorry to quote this interesting cork only to
express disagreement.]
[[70]]
to what lies beyond, and lighted only by a few dim rays of human
`foresight' (gn~mh), or by the false, wandering fires of Hope. He bears within
him, self-contained, his destiny in his own character (note 1); and this, with
the purposes which arise out of it, shapes his course. That is all, in
Thucydides' view, that we can say; except that, now and again, out of the
surrounding darkness come the blinding strokes of Fortune, unaccountable and
unforeseen. We shall try to prove later, in detail, that Thucydides' history
can only be understood when we start from some such conception as this. If we
presuppose the very modern view--it is not yet a century old--that human
affairs are a process of nature indissolubly woven into one world-process by
causal law, we shall be misled at every turn.And, besides
rejecting this general conception, we must beware of saying that Thucydides
looked for such entities as `political factors', relations of forces', `the
natural foundation of historical phenomena,' `universal forces which animate
men.' We are not merely objecting to forms of words; we are protesting
against the attribution to Thucydides of the whole class of categories and
conceptions and modes of thought of which these and similar phrases are the
expression. It is precisely in respect of these conceptions that modern
history differs from ancient. They have been imported, but yesterday, from
Darwinian biology and from branches of mathematical and physical science which
in fifth-century Athens ware undiscovered, and which, if they had been
discovered, no one would have dreamed of bringing into connexion with human
history. Perhaps the importation has not been all to the good. A combination
of political forces is a bloodless and inhuman entity, and in the manipulation
of these mechanical categories we seem to lose touch of the realities they
conceal --the pulse and only of warm, live passions, the beating hearts of men
who suffer and aspire. We are sometimes put off with phrases instead of
explanations; and the language of cogs and pulleys fails, sometimes, to
illuminate the workings of the spirit.
[1. äHyow
ényr~p[[florin]] da[[currency]]mvn, Heracleitus, frag, 119
(Diels.).]
[[71]]
Further, not only has History proper been invaded by these abstract
sciences, but also--and partly as a consequence a number of ancillary sciences,
fast growing up round the old method of narrating human actions, are parcelling
out the field occupied by the ancient descriptive science of Politics.
Collectively, they may be called Sociology. The best established of them is
Economics, which studies the phenomenon known to the Greeks by the moral term,
pleonej[[currency]]a, `covetousness,' that vice of human character which makes
a man want to `have more' than his neighbour. It was in ancient days the topic
for a chapter in Ethics or for a character sketch, like those of Theophrastus,
of `the covetous man'. Now it is studied in almost complete abstraction from
anything psychological. The fluctuations of the money market are traced in
columns of figures and in curves on a diagram.
The laws which Economics attempts to establish, the categories of its ideal
constructions, the abstract methods of this science and of others like it, find
their way into History. The modern historian deals in vague entities, in groups
and tendencies and the balance of forces. Further, he is always aware of a vast
accumulation of ordered knowledge in the background. The comparative method and
the survey of evidence drawn from remote lands and from unnumbered centuries
have taught him to take nothing for granted, and to seek for connexions between
phenomena which his ancestors never dreamed of correlating.
The course of human events, then, is to be thought of as shaped by the wills
and passions of individual men or of cities, not as a part of what lies around
it and beyond. And what does lie beyond? For Thucydides, the answer is: the
Unknown. This was the only answer possible to a man of his temperament, a man
whose spirit needed, above all, what was clear and definite. (note 1) Like a
few other enlightened men of his time, he had rejected every systematic
explanation of the world that he could think of. Supernatural causes--the
will
[1. `Klarheit und Bestimmtheit ist das Bedürfnis seines
Geistes,' Claasen, Thuc. i, Einl. p. xlvi.]
[[72]]
of personal gods and spirits--these men denied. Thucydides ought not,
perhaps, to be described as a sceptic; the word has come to suggest a certain
hardness of intellect and a degree of positive antagonism which are not, we
think, characteristic of his mind. It is better to call him an agnostic, not
of the dogmatic sort who know so much about the unknown that they confidently
assert it to be unknowable; but of the sober, unprejudiced kind, whose single
desire is to reach, and to observe religiously, the limits of what is known.
Vulgar superstition is nothing to him, except at the few points where it stands
in the path of knowledge; there he can treat it with cool irony. He could
respect the piety of Nikias and love the man, while gravely condemning his
credulity in one fatal matter where it blinded him to a definitely ascertained
fact. He will note with grave severity how, in time of stress, men who profess
religion fall short of their ideals; but for his own part he seems to stand
aside, rejecting, we may imagine, with more scorn than ignorant faith would
deserve the philosophizing compromises and senile allegorizings of an age too
sceptical, and not quite sceptical enough, to be at ease with itself. In his
attitude towards religion (which must not be confounded with the quackeries of
strolling oracle-vendors) there is never a trace of lightness or
irreverence.
The men of the enlightenment were agreed in rejecting religion; but Thucydides
had gone yet further in agnosticism than most of them, and rejected also the
`philosophical' schemes of the universe. With his strong and steady desire for
literal, certain truth, knowing by experience how hard it is to get a
consistent account of things actually seen and done from the men who saw and
did them, he had not much respect for philosophies which, when science was
still a blind and babbling infant, professed to reveal how the universe came
into being.
Well-meaning efforts have been made to furnish him with a belief in some
providential government of the world. But there is not a shadow of proof that
he recognized the
[[73]]
`Mind' of Anaxagoras any more than the Zeus of Aeschylus. Indeed, his
avoidance of the word noËw (to which he prefers gn~mh) may indicate a
definite wish to renounce the philosophic theory associated in his day with the
term. From Anaxagoras and other `philosophers' he accepted a few results of
scientific observation--about eclipses, earthquakes and the like--all that had
yet been won from the vast field of the unknown by the first inroads of
knowledge. That is the extent of his debt to `philosophy', in the way of
positive results; all it had done for him otherwise was of a negative sort.
Since Parmenides had declared the sensible world to be an illusion, agnosticism
in one form or another had taken possession of many thoughtful minds. It is
only in this way that Thucydides owed to philosophy his marvellous sense of the
limits of certain knowledge.If we would put ourselves at the
point where Thucydides stood when he began his task, we must perform an almost
impossible feat. To rid our minds of religious and metaphysical beliefs which
are not identical with our own is comparatively easy. What is exceedingly
difficult but equally necessary, is to throw off the inheritance to which we
are born, of concepts distinguished and defined by a vast and subtle
terminology, logical, metaphysical, scientific, created by Aristotle, refined
by the schoolmen, and enlarged by centuries of discovery. Thucydides lived at
the one moment in recorded history which has seen a brilliantly intellectual
society, nearly emancipated from a dying religion, and at the same time unaided
by science, as yet-hardly born. Nowhere but in a few men of that generation
shall we find so much independence of thought combined with such destitute
poverty in the apparatus and machinery of thinking. (note 1) The want
of
[1. It is not easy for us to realize how impossible it was to
think clearly in a language which did not supply, as modern languages do, a
refined and distinct terminology. When Thucydides' contemporary, Democritus,
wrote: `By convention sweet, by convention, sour; in truth atoms and void,' he
meant, we say, something of this sort: that the primary qualities of
matter are objectively real, while the secondary are only subjective. But to
offer this proposition, or anything like it, as a paraphrase of the Greek is
utterly uncritical. It is to disguise the fact that the Greek word
(nÒm[[florin]]) rendered `subjective', is deplorably ambiguous, and
means `legal', `conventional,' `artificial,' `unnatural,' `arbitrary,' and a
number of other things. Enough remains of the controversies of the time to
show that this ambiguity lay, not in language only, but in thought. These
ideas, all covered by one word in the only tongue known to the Greeks, were
simply not distinguished, and to import a distinction by assigning one meaning
to the word to the exclusion of the rest is to commit the fallacy into which
Professor Gomperz seems to us to have fallen.]
[[74]]
scientific categories, and above all of the cardinal conception of law
as applying to human actions, makes a gulf between Thucydides and ourselves
immensely greater than any which his want of superstitious beliefs makes
between him and Herodotus. We must rid our minds of scientific terminology, as
well as of religion and philosophy, if we are to appreciate the unique
detachment of Thucydides' mind, moving in the rarest of atmospheres between the
old age and the new. Descartes, for all his efforts, was immeasurably less free
from metaphysical preoccupation; Socrates appears, in comparison,
superstitious.
When we have made all these deductions, and swept away as much as we can of our
furniture of thought, we are left in presence of a reflective and very
observant mind, whose interest is concentrated on human acts and motives. Its
peculiar note is a feeling for truth which, exalted as it is, has less of
passion in it than of austere regard. All the character of the man is in the
famous passage where he rebukes, without condescending to name him, the
inaccuracy of Herodotus. `There are many facts, not falling into oblivion
through lapse of time but belonging to our own day, about which the Hellenes in
general are misinformed. They believe, for instance, that the Lacedaemonian
kings have not one vote each but two, and that they have a "Pitanate regiment",
which in fact never existed. So little pains do most men take in the inquiry
for the truth; they will sooner turn to the first story that comes to hand.'
(note 1)
Of all the indictments of Herodotus this is the most grim and the most just. We
could defend him from the accusation
[1. Thuc. i. 20; Hdt. vi.
57; ix. 53.]
[[75]]
of `malignity'; we could palliate his superstitions and romancings; but
we cannot deny that in respect of these two irreducible little facts, which may
possibly be of some use to a modern antiquary, but were then utterly
insignificant, he was careless. The kings of Lacedaemon had only one vote; the
Spartan regiments were not territorial. He might have ascertained the truth,
and he did not.
Deeply interested in human character, punctitiously accurate, an agnostic not
of the militant order but by way of patient, rational conviction, Thucydides
found a congenial field only in the history of a contemporary war waged between
the states he knew by men whom he had seen and heard. Here were facts which
could be found out, and laboriously sifted, and set down for the instruction of
posterity. Just how much can be found out and set down he is careful to define
in the passage from which we started in this chapter; we can now see why the
field it limits is so restricted, the renunciation so austere. If the creative
faculties of man could be severed from the receptive, if science could first
banish art and next cast out of herself all hypothesis and generalization, then
the historian might reduce himself to the compass of Thucydides' programme:
`the accounts given of themselves by the several states in speeches, when
they were on the eve of war or later when they were engaged'; and `the
events--what was actually done in the war'.
The events are matter of observation: the only difficulty is to get an accurate
account from eyewitnesses. Besides `what was done', nothing seems relevant
except the immediate motives of the agents. These can be ascertained only in
two ways. We may infer from a man's behaviour what his feelings are; but such
inferences are a leap into the dark, and although Thucydides of course could
not avoid making them, he openly states them as rarely as possible. Safer, to
his mind, was the method of keeping, here also, to observed facts: namely, the
reasons publicly alleged, the `accounts' given of their actions by the agents
themselves. If these can be faithfully and literally reported, posterity may
perhaps
[[76]]
see more light through the words than Thucydides could be sure of
seeing. It is to this magnificent sense of the historian's duty to truth that
we owe those indications, inexplicable to the man who recorded them,
significant only to a modern observer, on which we can base our hypothesis
about the origin of the war.The time for investigating causes,
and making hypothetical constructions was not yet. We must constantly remind
ourselves that Thucydides seemed to himself to stand on the very threshold of
history. Behind him lay a past which, in comparison with ours, was
unimaginably meagre. From beyond the Grecian seas had come nothing but
travellers' tales of the Eastern wonderland. Within the tiny Hellenic world
itself, the slender current of history flashed only here and there a broken
gleam through the tangled overgrowth of legend and gorgeous flowers of poetry,
whose shoots and pushing tendrils had gained even upon the great Persian
war-time of fifty years before, so that the figure of Xerxes was fading already
to join the shades of Priam and Agamemnon in the world of dreams. The creator
of history would set himself no more ambitious task than to save from the
dissolving fabric of human fact a few hard stones, unhewn, and fit only to
serve for a foundation.