SOCRATES AND ALCIBIADES.

During the period of the Peloponnesian war two
men became strikingly prominent in Athens, a states-
man and a philosopher, as unlike each other in char-
acter, appearance, aims, and methods as two persons
could well be, yet the most intimate of friends, and
long dividing between them the admiration of the
Athenians. These were the historically famous
Alcibiades and Socrates. Alcibiades was a leader
in action, Socrates a leader in thought; thus they
controlled the two great dominions of human affairs.

Of these two, Socrates was vastly the nobler and
higher; Alcibiades much the most specious and pop-
ular. Democratic Athens was never long without
its aristocratic leader. For many years it had been
Pericles. It now became Alcibiades, a man whose
career and character were much more like those of
Themistocles of old than of the sedate and patriotic
Pericles.

Alcibiades was the Adonis of Athens, noted for
his. beauty, the charm of his manner, his winning
personality, qualities which made all men his willing
prisoners. He was of high birth, great wealth, and
luxurious and pleasure-loving disposition, yet with a
remarkable power of accommodating himself to cir-

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