The Stoics, Epicureans and Sceptics - College of Stoic Philosophers

DECLINE OF GliEECE. 13
that no remedies were forthcominsr to heal the ills Chap.
. . . 1
from which the country was suffering. Discord, their '_
old hereditary failing, rendered it impossible for
Greeks to be independent in foreign relations, or to /
be united and settled at home. Their best resources j
were wasted in perpetual struggles between Achaeans,
^tolians, and Spartans. The very individual who
led the Achaeans against the Macedonians in the
cause of independence, called the Macedonians back
to the Peloponnesus to gain their Sparta. When the supremacy of
support against
Macedonia was
broken by the arms of Rome, a more avowed dependence
on Italian allies succeeded. And when, in the
year 146 B.C., the province of Achaia was incorporated
into the Roman empire, even the shadow of freedom
which up to that time had been assured departed for
ever.
Sad as were the external affairs of Greece at this
period, and marked as was the decline of its intellectual
power, its mental horizon, nevertheless, ex-
tended and its culture became more generally diffused.
The Macedonian ascendency, which gave the deathblow
to the independence of Greece, also broke down
the barriers which had hitherto separated Greeks
from foreigners. A new world was opened out before
them, and a vast territory offered for their energies
to explore. Greece was brought into manifold con-
tact with the Eastern nations belonging to the
Macedonian monarchy, whereby it secured for its
culture the place of honour among them, but at the
same time became subject to a slow, but, in the long