They possessed a piety toward themselves as well as toward the gods.  Timoleon, who was attended by the good-fortune that waits on noble character, erected in the house which the Syracusans bestowed upon him an altar to [Greek:  Automatia], which, as Mr. Clough well remarks, in a note, “is almost equivalent to Spontaneousness.  His successes had come, as it were, of themselves.”  The act was an acknowledgment of divine favor, and an assertion at the same time of his individual independence of action.  This spirit of self-dependence was the grandest feature of Greek and Roman heathenism; and it is in this, if in anything, that a superiority of character is manifest in the men of ancient times.  The famous passage in Seneca’s tragedy, in which Medea asserts herself as sufficient to stand alone against the universe, contains its essence and is its complete expression.

  Nutr. Spes nulla monstrat rebus adflictis viam.

  Med. Qui nil potest sperare, desperet nihil.

  Nutr. Abiere Colchi; conjugis nulla est fides;
  Nihilque superest opibus e tantis tibi.

  Med. Medea superest; hic mare et terras vides,
  Ferrumque, et ignes, et deos, et fulmina.
  Medea, Act ii. 162-167.

Here is self-reliance at its highest point; the strength of resolute will measuring itself singly and undauntedly against all forces, human and divine.

But, as a necessary consequent of this spirit, as its implied complement in the balance of human nature, we find, as a distinct trait in the lives of many of the manliest ancients, an occasional prevalence of a spirit of despondency, a recognition of the ultimate weakness of man when brought by himself face to face with the wall of opposing circumstance and the resistless force of Fate.  Will is strong, but the powers outside the will are stronger.  Manliness may not fail, but man himself may be broken.  Neither the teachings of natural religion, nor the doctrines of philosophy, nor the support of a sound heart are sufficient for man in the crisis of uttermost trial.  Without something beyond these, higher than these, without a conscious dependence on Omnipotence, man must sink at last under the buffets of adverse fortune.  Take the instances of these great men in Plutarch, and look at the end of their lives.  How many of them are simple confessions of defeat!  Themistocles sacrifices to the gods, drinks poison, and dies.  Demosthenes takes poison to save himself from falling into the hands of his enemies.  Cicero proposes to slay himself in the house of Caesar, and is murdered only through want of resolution to kill himself.  Brutus says to the friend who urges him to fly,—­“Yes, we must fly; yet not with our feet, but with our hands,” and falls upon his sword.  Cato lies down calmly at night, reads Plato on the Soul, and then kills himself; while, after his death, the people of Utica cry out with one voice that he is “the only free, the only undefeated man.”  It may be said that even in suicide these men displayed the manliness of their tempers.  True, but it was the manliness of the deserter who runs the risk of being shot for the sake of avoiding the risks and fatigues of service in war.[O]