Eumenes, in the mean time, was engaged in war against Pharnaces, king of Pontus. The latter took Sinope, a very strong city of Pontus, of which his successors remained possessors ever afterwards. Several cities made complaints against this at Rome. Ariarathes, king of Cappadocia, who was united in interest with Eumenes, sent also ambassadors thither. The Romans several times employed their mediation and authority, to put an end to their differences; but, Pharnaces was insincere on these occasions, and always broke his engagements. Contrary to the faith of treaties, he took the field, and was opposed by the confederate kings. Several enterprises ensued; and, after some years had been spent in this manner, a peace was concluded.

" Never were more embassies sent, than at the time we are now speaking of. Ambassadors were seen in all places, either coming from the provinces to Rome, or going from Rome to the provinces; or, from the allies and nations to one another. The Acheans deputed, in this quality, to Ptolemy Epiphanes, king of Egypt, Lycortas, Polybius his son, and the young Aratus, to return that monarch thanks for the presents he had already bestowed on their republic, and the new offers he had made them. However, these ambassadors did not leave Achaia; because, when they were preparing to set out, advice came that Ptolemy was dead.

This prince, after having overcome the rebels within his kingdom, as has been already mentioned,

A. M. 3822 Ant. J. C. 182. Polyb. in Leg. c. 51—53—55—59.

? A. M. 3824. Ant. J. C. 180. Hieron. in Daniel.

resolved to attack Seleucus, king of Syria. When he began to form the plan for carrying on this war, one of his principal officers asked, by what methods he would raise money for the execution of it. He replied, that his friends were his treasure. The principal courtiers concluded, from this answer, that, as he considered their purses as the only fund he had to carry on this war, they were upon the point of being ruined by it. To prevent, therefore, that consequence, which had more weight with them than the allegiance they owed their sovereign, they caused him to be poisoned. This monarch was thus despatched, in his twenty ninth year, after he had sat twenty four years on the throne. Ptolemy Philometor, his son, who was but six years of age, succeeded him; and, Cleopatra, his mother, was declared regent.

CHAPTER II.

space of twenty

THIS second chapter includes the years, from the year of the world 3821, till 3840. In this interval are contained; the first twenty years of Ptolemy Philometer's reign over Egypt, which amounted, in the whole, to thirty four years; the five last years of Philip, who reigned forty years in Macedonia, and was succeeded by Perseus, who reigned eleven; the eight or nine last years of Seleucus Philopator, in Syria; and, the eleven years of Antiochus Epiphanes, his successor, who exercised the most horrid cruelties against the Jews. I shall reserve

VOL. 7.

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the eleven years of Perseus's reign over Macedonia, for the following book, though they coincide with part of the history related in this chapter.

SECTION I.

PERSEUS CONSPIRES AGAINST DEMETRIUS. THE LATTER IS INNOPUT TO DEATH, AND PERSEUS SUCCEEDS TO THZ

CENTLY

THRONE.

FROM the spreading of a report among the states contiguous to Macedonia, that such as went to Rome, to complain against Philip, were heard there, and many of them very favourably; a great number of cities, and even private persons, made their complaints in that city against a prince, who was a very troublesome neighbour to them all, with the hopes, either of having the injuries redressed, which they pretended to have received; or, at least, to console themselves, in some measure for them, by being allowed the liberty to deplore them. King Eumenes, among the rest, to whom, by order of the Roman commissioners and senate, the fortresses in Thrace were to be given up, sent ambassadors, at whose head was Atheneus, his brother, to inform the senate, that Philip did not evacuate the garrisons in Thrace, as he had promised; and, to complain of his sending succours into Bithynia, to Prusias, who was then at war with Eumenes.

Demetrius, the son of Philip, king of Macedon, was, at that time, in Rome; whither, as has been already mentioned, he had been sent by his father, in order to

A. M. 3821. Ant. J. C. 183. Liv. 1. xxxix. n. 46, 47.

superintend his affairs in that city. It was properly his business to answer the several accusations brought against his father; but, the senate, imagining that this would be a very difficult task for so young a prince, who was not accustomed to speak in public; to spare him that trouble, they sent certain persons to him, to inquire, whether the king, his father, had not given him some memorials, and contented themselves with his reading them. Philip therein justified himself to the best of his power, with respect to most of the articles which were exhibited against him; but he especially showed great disgust at the decrees which the Roman commissioners had enacted against him, and at the treatment he had met with from them. The senate saw plainly what all this tended to; and, as the young prince endeavoured to apologize for certain particulars, and assured them, that every thing should be done agreeably to the will of the Romans, the senate replied, that his father Philip could not have done more wisely, or what was more agreeable to them, than in sending his son Demetrius to make his excuses. That, as to past transactions, the senate might dissemble, forget, and bear with a great many things; that, as to the future, they relied on the promise which Demetrius gave; that, although he was going to leave Rome, in order to return to Macedon, he left there, as the hostage of his inclinations, his own good heart and attachment for Rome, which he might retain inviolably, without infringing, in any manner, the duty he owed his father; that, out of regard to him, ambassadors should be sent to Macedon, to rectify, peaceably, and without noise, whatever might have been hitherto

amiss; and that, as to the rest, the senate was well pleased to let Philip know, that he was obliged to his son Demetrius for the tenderness with which the Romans behaved towards him. These marks of dis. tinction, which the senate gave him, with the view of exalting his credit in his father's court, only animated envy against him; and, at length, occasioned his destruction.

The return of Demetrius to Macedon, and the arrival of the ambassadors, produced different effects, according to the various dispositions of men's minds. The people, who extremely feared the consequences of a rupture with the Romans, and the war that was preparing, were highly pleased with Demetrius, from the hopes that he would be the mediator and author of a peace; not to mention, that they considered him as the successor to the throne of Macedon, after the demise of his father. For, though he was the younger son, he had one great advantage of his brother, and that was, his being born of a mother, who was Philip's lawful wife; whereas, Perseus was the son of a concubine, and even reputed supposititious. Besides, it was not doubted but that the Romans would place Demetrius on his father's throne, Perseus not having any credit with them. And these were the common reports.

On one side, also, Perseus was greatly uneasy; as he feared, that the advantage of being elder brother would be but a very feeble title against a brother superior to him in all other respects; and, on the other, Philip, imagining that it would not be in his power to

b Liv. l. xxxix, n. 53.