of their counsels. I will not take upon me to relate the debates which arose in the venerable assembly; but it is by no means difficult to find out the result of them. They perceived there was little occasion for any thing new, towards forming a community, besides the circumstance of living together. It was agreed that the fathers of families should retain the same authority over, and concern for, the whole, which each had before in his respective family; that the younger men should continue to be active and obedient in executing the commands of the elder, whether in peace or war; and that the education of children should now be their joint care, which hitherto had employed them separately. Their children were ready to enter into society, upon the advice of their parents; for they thought their welfare could not be more safely lodged than in such hands. The ties of their obedience immediately became different. It was gratitude and filial duty (the bonds of nature) which before obliged them; but the obligations they then submitted to, were more than nature had enjoined, and therefore they rightly expected terms for their submission. The authority of the natural parent was unlimited, because his affection for his issue was imagined so likewise; but the artificial parent being more likely to deviate from justice, mutual conditions were settled, and laws obligatory on both sides. Here you see the great marks and outlines of our ancient government in a very small compass; and all subsequent and future regulations were no more than methods used for the better establishing of this form.

Though I ascribe much to the wisdom of our ancestors, I will not deny that there was another cause which greatly contributed to the peace and continuation of our empire; for the Persians, not having then corrupted the traditions they had received from a distant but unknown origin, believed that OROMASDES was a lover of peace

and

and order through all his works, which in awe of him they industriously cultivated and maintained. They knew that commotions and tumult were the delight of ARIMANIUS; and abhorred being the instruments of his will, who had introduced discord into paradise itself, and deformed the creation; a work of such excellency, that the Almighty did not produce it instantaneously, but in six successive parts, that the everlasting genii, the satraps of his heavenly court, might contemplate its rising beauty, and adore the Author! These religious sentiments, which dawned upon us at the coming of KEYOMAR, that ancient prophet, were more clearly opened by the divine instructions of ZERVAN, and the eternal wisdom of OUSHANG,*, till ZURDUSHT's irresistible beams dispersed all remains of darknesst.

H.

* A book of the highest authority among the followers of the Magi.

+ The reader will find, that in this and the other letters where the Persian religion is

⚫ treated of, the sentiments are exactly agreeable to Dr. Hyde's account of it.

LETTER CXII.

GOBRYAS to CLEANDER. From Ecbatana.

IT T is natural for any one whose reputation is attacked by injurious calumnies, and whose warmth is heightened by a consciousness of innocence, to lie under a perpetual uneasiness of mind, till his honour is cleared, and his conduct justified. This makes me less surprised at those expressions of despondency and resentment, which have occurred in thy late dispatches. From the first intimation I received of the ill humour fomented against thee by the artifices of some. men, and the weakness of others, I used my utmost endeavours to trace it to the source; and after discovering the causes, to remove the effects of it. I found the treasurer greviously offended that thou hast made no application to him in the course of thy employment; and for that reason transmitting thy appointments with a sparing hand. His enterprising genius, which had uniformly declared itself for immediately embarking in the war, was of course opposed to the calmer and more considerate measures of MEGABYZUS and myself. As he observed thy letters afforded no grounds for his extavagant projects, he fell in the more readily with the informations of TIMOCLES, the Euboean. Pleased with the flattering discourses of that vain rhetorician, and elated by the applause which he heard was given to his counsels by the younger satraps and officers of the army, he procured that letter which sent thee to Thebes, whilst I was employed in settling the affairs of my deceased friend, MEGABYZUS. At the same time, so certain was he of the success of his Theban alliance, or perhaps so bent on thy ruin, if it miscarried, that he proposed to remove thee from Athens, asserting there were

unanswer

unanswerable objections to thy behaviour there; and that TIMOCLES should be ordered to supply thy place. The king absolutely refused to consent to this alteration, and took frequent opportunities to commend thy services publickly. Soon after arrived thy letter, which gave a very clear and ingenuous relation of the state of Thebes, confirmed by the dispatches we received at the same time from CRATIPPUS. TERIBAZUS was then obliged, though with reluctance, to confess he had been mistaken in the advice which occasioned the king's letter; and, in order to cast the blame from himself, accused TIMOCLES of deceiving him, who, he said, ought to be well acquainted with those parts of Greece. The Euboean was summoned before the council of seven; but he found means to make his escape; and it is strongly suspected, that the accusation and escape had their rise from the same quarter. Thou hast reason to be satisfied with the shame which overwhelms thy enemies, after the defeat of all their schemes; and thy credit with the king and ministry is more established by this fruitless attack, than if it had never been put to a trial. How far I engaged in your support, I leave others to inform you; but it would be injustice to the generous friendship of HYDASPES and INTAPHERNES, not to assure you, that, had their own honour or safety been concerned, they could not have exerted themselves with more zeal and assiduity than they did. The king himself told me, when I obtained his leave for your Delphick journey, that no disgust of any of his ministers should lessen his regard for your merit; that the punctual payment of your appointments should be his particular care: " and (continued our gracious master) I do not "wonder this Theban business has given CLEANDER uneasiness. I "too easily believed what carried a specious appearance; but though my servants have sometimes deceived me, they never yet had "the art to make me persist in my error, in order to screen their " own."

APOLLO

APOLLONIDES, the physician, was condemned to the cross, and executed just before we left Susa. Thou knowest that his crime, for the sake of the person concerned, must be lightly touched. ZoPYRUS, the youngest son of MEGABYZUS, has left the court by night; and it is not yet known whither he is gone. He desired to be made governor of Damascus; which being refused him, on account of his youth and inexperience, though with a promise of future favour, he said with great warmth, that this disappointment, and his mother's guilt, rendered it impossible for him to appear at court with honour.

OXYATHRES, the Mede, after having been obliged to leave Scythia by the king who at present sits upon that throne, as I gave thee an account in my dispatches last year*, has since wandered in disguise through the provinces; and though we had frequent traces of him, he made so short a stay in every place he came to, and took such precautions to conceal himself, that we could never lay hold of his person till very lately, when he was seized in passing through the Upper Ægypt by PHARNACES, the governor of Thebes. From several informations which I have received concerning him, there are grounds to believe that he was going to join AMYRTEUS in the fens, and was projecting great designs of bringing the Lybians a second time into Egypt. He found means to destroy what papers he had about him, before he was secured; but very large sums of money were seized in his baggage, which were distributed amongst those who were instrumental in apprehending him.

Soon after he was taken, he wrote a letter to the king, offering, if his life might be spared, to make an exact and sincere discovery of

* Vide Letter xcv.

all