not restored, from the
continued enmity of the Thracian cities. Both parties were full of
intrigues, and new combinations were constantly being formed. Argos became
the centre of a new Peloponnesian alliance. A change of ephors at Sparta
favored hostile measures, and an alliance was made between the Boeotians
and Lacedaemonians. The Athenians, on their side, captured Scione, and put
to death the prisoners.

(M528) It was in this unsettled state of things, when all the late
contending States were insincere and vacillating, that Alcibiades stood
forth as a party leader. He was thirty-one years of age, belonged to an
ancient and powerful family, possessed vast wealth, had great personal
beauty and attractive manners, but above all, was unboundedly ambitious,
and grossly immoral--the most insolent, unprincipled, licentious, and
selfish man that had thus far scandalized and adorned Athenian society.
The only redeeming feature in his character was his friendship for
Socrates, who, it seems, fascinated him by his talk, and sought to improve
his morals. He had those brilliant qualities, and luxurious habits, and
ostentatious prodigality, which so often dazzle superficial people,
especially young men of fashion and wealth, but more even than they, the
idolatrous rabble. So great was his popularity and social prestige, that
no injured person ever dared to bring him to trial, and he even rescued
his own wife from the hands of the law when she sought to procure a
divorce--a proof that even in democratic Athens all bowed down to the
insolence of wealth and high social position.

(M529) Alcibiades, though luxurious and profligate, saw that a severe
intellectual training was necessary to him if he would take rank as a
politician, for a politician who can not make a speech stands a poor
chance of popular favor. So he sought the instructions of Socrates,
Prodicus, Protagoras, and others--not for love of learning, but as means of
success, although it may be supposed that the intellectual excitement,
which the discourse, cross-examination, and ironical sallies of Socrates
produced, was not without its force on so bright a mind.

(M530) Alcibiades commenced his public life with a sullied reputation, and
with numerous enemies created by his unbearable insolence, but with a
flexibility of character which enabled him to adapt himself to whatever
habits circumstances required. He inspired no confidence, and his
extravagant mode of life was s