unapprehenfive of any danger from the Spartans, with whom they had lately concluded a peace, were celebrating a public religious feftival. Leontidas, now fole governor, gave an immediate loofe to his paffions. He feized his colleague Ifmenias, and, by the affiftance of the Spartans, procured him to be tried, condemned, and executed, for caballiug against the State. A › pretence however ftale, yet conftantly urged by every iniquitous administration against all who have the refolution to oppofe their measures. The party of Ifmenias, upon the first news of the imprisonment of their chief, fled the city, and were afterwards banished by a public decree. A ftrong proof of the fatal lengths a faction will run, which is compofed of thofe profligate wretches whofe fole aim is their own private emolument? Yet fuch a faction, in all free States, when once luxury and corruption are introduced, is generally the most numerous and most prevalent. Athens, not long before, had been betrayed to the Spartans in the fame manner, and on the fame infamous terms by a deteftable faction, compofed of the most abandoned of her citizens, and groaned under the fame fpecies of tyranny, till the was freed by the great Thrafybulus. And, I believe, we have not yet forgot, the strong apprehenfions we were lately under that a certain free State, upon the continent, was on the point of being fold to a powerful neighbour by a fimilar faction, and by a like iniquitous contract We must remember too

after what manner that scheme was defeated by the glorious efforts of patriotism and public fpirit. I shall make no apology for this digression, because I thought the remark too appofite to be omitted.

7

The honeft citizens, who had fled to Athens, enraged to fee their country thus tricked out of her liberty, and groaning under the most ignominious fervitude, determined to fet her free, or perifh in fo glorious an attempt. The scheme was well concerted, and as boldly executed by Pelopidas, who entering the city with a fmall number of the most refolute of his party in difguife, deftroyed Leontidas, and his colleague Archias, with the most dangerous of his faction; and, by the affiftance of Epaminondas and his friends, with the additional aid of a large body of Athenians, recovered the citadel. The Spartans, at the first news of this surprising event, entered the Theban territories with a powerful army to take vengeance of the authors of this rebellion, as they termed it, and to reduce Thebes to its former fubjection. The Athenians, conscious of their own weakness, and the mighty power of Sparta, which they were by no means able to cope with, not only renounced all friendship with the Thebans, but proceeded with the utmost severity against fuch of their citizens as favored that people. Thus the Thebans, deserted by their allies, and deftitute of

'Diodor. Sicul. lib. 15. p. 470.

Plut. in Vit. Polop. p. 284. & fequent.

friends, appeared to the reft of Greece as devoted to inevitable deftruction. In this defperate fituation of affairs, the virtue and abilities of those two great men fhone forth with greater luftre.. They begun by training their countrymen to the use of arms as well as the fhortnefs of the time would permit, and infpiring them with a hatred of fervitude, and the generous refolution of dying in defence of the liberty, and glory of their country. As they judged it imprudent to hazard a decifive battle against the best troops in the world, with their new-raised militia, they haraffed the Spartans with daily fkirmishes to inftruct their men in military difcipline, and the trade of war. By this method they animated the minds of their people with the love of glory, and inured their bodies to the fatigues of war by exercise and labor, whilft they acquired experience and courage by thofe frequent encounters. Thus, as Plutarch remarks, when these able generals, by never engaging rafhly, but watching every favorable opportunity, had flefhed he Thebans, like young ftag-hounds, upon their enemies, and rendered them ftaunch by tafting the sweets of victory, and bringing them off in fafety, they made them fond of the sport, and eager after the most arduous enterprises. By this. able management they defeated the Spartans at Platea and Thespia, where they killed Phæbidas, who had before so treacherously surprised their

Plut, in Vit. Pelop. p. 285.

9

citadel, and again routed them at Tenagra, the Spartan general himself falling by the hand of Pelopidas. Flushed with this fuccefs, the Thebans feared no enemy, however fuperior in number; and the battle of Tegyra foon after raised the reputation of their arms to a degree unknown before. In this action the brave Pelopidas, with a small body of horse, and no more than three hundred foot, broke through, and difperfed a body of Spartans, confifting of above three times that number, made a terrible flaughter of the enemy, killed both their generals upon the spot, took the spoils of the dead, raised a trophy on the field of battle, and brought his little army home in triumph. Here the astonished Greeks firft faw the Spartans defeated by a much inferior number, and by an enemy too whom they had always held in the greatest contempt. They had never, till that time, been beaten by equal, and rarely by much fuperior numbers, and, till that fatal day, were justly reputed invincible. But this action was only the prelude to that decifive ftroke at Leuctra, which gave a fatal turn to the Spartan affairs, and ftripped them of that dominion which they had fo long exercised over the rest of Greece, For this series of success, though it greatly elated the Thebans, yet rather enraged than difcouraged the Spartans. The Athenians, jealous of the growing power of Thebes, struck up a peace

Plut. in Vit. Pelop. p. 286, 287,

with their ancient rivals, in which all the Grecian States were included, except the Thebans, who were given up a facrifice to the Spartan vengeance. Cleombrotus, joint King with Agefilaus, entered Bocotia with the largest and finest army the Spartans had ever fent into the field. The great Epaminondas engaged them at Leuctra with a body of fix thousand Thebans, which fcarce equalled a third part of their enemies; but the admirable difpofition he made, joined to the skill and dexterity of Pelopidas, and the bravery of their troops fupplied the defect of numbers. Cleombrotus was flain on the spot, his army totally routed, and the greatest slaughter made of the native Spartans that had ever happened till that day, with the lofs only of three hundred Thebans. Diodorus Siculus gives a concife account of this action in these remarkable words, "That Epaminondas, being reduced to the "neceffity of engaging the whole confederate "force of the Lacedemonians, and their allies, "with only a handful of his city-militia, gained "fo complete a victory over thofe hitherto invin«cible warriors, that he flew their King Cleombro"tus, and cut off the Spartan divifion, which was " oppofed to him, almoft to a man.

2

This victory gave fo happy a turn to the affairs

· Διὸ καὶ συναναγκαθεὶς ὀλίγοις πολιτικοῖς, &c. Diodor. Sicul lib. 15. p. 477. Edit. Henr. Stephani.