The disposition and talents of Anacreon recommended him to the monarch of
Samos, and he was formed to be the friend of such a prince as Polycrates.
Susceptible only to the pleasures, he felt not the corruptions, of the
court; and while Pythagoras fled from the tyrant, Anacreon was celebrating
his praises oh the lyre. We are told, too, by Maximus Tyrius, that, by the
influence of his amatory songs, he softened the mind of Polycrates into a
spirit of benevolence towards his subjects.
The amours of the poet, and the rivalship of the tyrant, I shall pass
over in silence; and there are few, I presume, who will regret the
omission of most of those anecdotes, which the industry of some editors
has not only promulged, but discussed. Whatever is repugnant to modesty
and virtue is considered, in ethical science, by a supposition very
favorable to humanity, as impossible; and this amiable persuasion should
be much more strongly entertained where the transgression wars with nature
as well as virtue. But why are we not allowed to indulge in the
presumption? Why are we officiously reminded that there have been really
such instances of depravity?
Hipparchus, who now maintained at Athens the power which his father
Pisistratus had usurped, was one of those princes who may be said to have
polished the fetters of their subjects.
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