. The history of
Florence is little else, for several ages, than an account of
conspiracies against the State. In my youth I myself suffered much by
the dissensions which then embroiled the Republic. I was imprisoned and
banished, but after the course of some years my enemies, in their turn,
were driven into exile. I was brought back in triumph, and from that
time till my death, which was above thirty years, I governed the
Florentines, not by arms or evil arts of tyrannical power, but with a
legal authority, which I exercised so discreetly as to gain the esteem of
all the neighbouring potentates, and such a constant affection of all my
fellow-citizens that an inscription, which gave me the title of Father of
my Country, was engraved on my monument by an unanimous decree of the
whole Commonwealth.

_Pericles_.--Your end was incomparably more happy than mine. For you
died rather of age than any violent illness, and left the Florentines in
a state of peace and prosperity procured for them by your counsels. But
I died of the plague, after having seen it almost depopulate Athens, and
left my country engaged in a most dangerous war, to which my advice and
the power of my eloquence had excited the people. The misfortune of the
pestilence, with the inconveniences they suffered on account of the war,
so irritated their minds, that not long before my death they condemned me
to a fine.

_Cosmo_.--It is wonderful that, when once their anger was raised, it went
no further against you! A favourite of the people, when disgraced, is in
still greater danger than a favourite of a king.

_Pericles_.--Your surprise will increase at hearing that very soon
afterwards they chose me their general, and conferred on me again the
principal direction of all their affairs. Had I lived I should have so
conducted the war as to have ended it with advantage and honour to my
country. For, having secured to her the sovereignty of the sea by the
defeat of the Samians, before I let her engage with the power of Sparta,
I knew that our enemies would be at length wearied out and compelled to
sue for a peace, because the city, from the strength of its
fortifications and the great army within it, being on the land side
impregnable to the Spartans, and drawing continual supplies from the sea,
suffered not much by their ravages of the country about it, from whence I
had before removed all the inhabitants; whereas their allies were undone
by the desce