Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/89

DIONYSIUS H. 63 JU Consent and acclamation were of course not wanting, to the new master of the troops, treasures, magazines, and fortifications in Ortygia ; those " adamantine chains " which were well known to dispense with the necessity of any real popular good- will. Dionysius II. (or the younger), then about twenty-five years of age, was a young man of considerable natural capacity, and of quick and lively impulses ; l but weak and vain in his character, given to transitory caprices, and eager in his appetite for praise without being capable of any industrious or resolute efforts to earn it. As yet he was wholly unpractised in serious business of any kind. He had neither seen military service nor mingled in the discussion of political measures ; having been studiously kept back from both, by the extreme jealousy of his father. His life had been passed in the palace or acropolis of Ortygia, amidst all the indulgences and luxuries belonging to a princely station, di- versified with amateur carpenter's work and turnery. However, the tastes of the father introduced among the guests at the palace a certain number of poets, reciters, musicians, etc., so that the younger Dionysius had contracted a relish for poetical literature, which opened his mind to generous sentiments, and large concep- tions of excellence, more than any portion of his very confined experience. To philosophy, to instructive conversation, to the exercise of reason, he was a stranger. 2 But the very feebleness and indecision of his character presented him as impressible, per- haps improvable, by a strong will and influence brought to bear upon him from that quarter, at least as well as from any other. Such was the novice who suddenly stept into the place of the most energetic and powerful despot of the Grecian world. Dion being as he was of mature age, known service and experience, and full enjoyment of the confidence of the elder Dionysius, might have probably raised material opposition to the younger. But he attempted no such thing. He acknowledged and supported 1 Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 338 E. 'O 6e OVTE u/l/lwf tarlv uQvrjf Trpof TTJV roS uav&uveiv 6vva.fj.iv, <j>Mrt.fiof Je dav/iaaruf, etc. Compare p. 330 A. p. 328 B.; also Epist. iii. p. 316 C. p. 317 E. Plutarch, Dion, c. 7-9. 2 Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 332 E. ^etdr) TU -napa rov irarpbf avru |t>re/?- SrjKEi ovruc uvofiiXr/TU fiev nai^etaf, uvop.i'kTjTif) 6e truvcvaiuv T&V Trpoai)Ko~ ffuv, yeyovevat, etc.