those who run to the Altars, they were murdered; they only
escaped who sued to their wives, whence being called impious
they were accounted odious: those that remained of the Cylo∣nians
were grown very rich, and had perpetuall enmity with
the family of Megacles; at what time this di••••ention was highest,
and the people thereby divided into factions, Solon being of
much authority amongst them, taking with him the chiefest of
the City interposed betwixt them, and with intreatles and ad∣vice
perswaded those who were called impious to submit to
the judgment of three hundred of the chief Citizens: Miro was
their accuser, they were condemned, the living to be banished,
the bones of the dead to be digged up, and thrown beyond the
confines of the country.
During these commotions, the Megarenses took Nysaea, and
recovered 〈◊〉〈◊〉 from the Athenians; the City was full of su∣perstitious
terrors and apparitions; the Priests declared, that
the entralls of the sacrificed beasts imported great crimes and
impieties, which required exp••ation. There was also a great
plague; the Oracle advis'd them to lustrate the City; to this
end they sent ( Nicias, son of Niceratus with a ship) to fetch Epi∣menides
out of Creet, who comming to Athens, was ••ntertained
by Solon as a guest, ••onversed with him as a friend, instructed
him in many things, and set him in the way of making Lawes.
This lustration of the Citty Eusebius under-reckons, placing it in the
second year of the fortie seventh Olympiad, whereas Solons being Ar∣chon,
which certainly happened after this, was in the third of the ••ortie
sixt. Suidas seems to over-reckon, ranking it in the fortie fourth: the
opinion of Laertius agrees best with the circumstances of the story, that
it was in the fortie sixt.
The commotions of the Cylonei, being thus appeased, and
the offendors extirpated, the people fell into their old diffe∣rence
about the government of the commonwealth, whereby
they were divided into as many factions, as the Province con∣tained
distinctions of people; the Citizens were Democraticall,
the countrymen affected Olygarchy, the maritimes stood for a
mixt kind of government, and hindred both the other parties
from having the rule; at the same time the City was in a dange∣rous
condition, by reason of a dissension betwixt the rich and
the poor, arising from their inequality, the businesse seemed
impossible to be composed, but by a Monarchy; the commons
were generally oppressed by the mony which they had borrow∣ed
of the rich, and either had tilled their land, paying to them
the sixth part of the crop, whence they were called Hectemoru,
and Thetes, or ingaged their bodies to their creditors, whereof
some served at home, others were sold abroad, many also (there
being no law to the contrary) were necessitated to sell their
children, and leave the City, through the cruelty of these usu∣rers,