ALEXANDER THE GREAT. I

Mataura Ensign, Volume V, Issue 224, 26 January 1883, Page 5

ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

The character of Alexander the Great cannot be portrayed by any of the stock phrases either of adulation or reproof. He was a man of a mixed nature, whose impulses were sometimes generous and noble, but who could not be relied on for common justice where his passion stood in the way. Despotic by birth and breeding, he rapidly acquired, in the congenial atmosphere of the East, both the disposition and tbe manners of an Asiatic [sovereign. Yet his Hellenic ancestry and education were never forgotten, and in all his enterprises one seeß the predominance of an intellect which nad Europe for its parent No such soldier bad, appeared before, because no great captain (so for, at least, as our information goes) had ever exhibited so methodical and scientific* a spirit in the operations of war. His vigilance,"* endless resource, and perfect adaptability to changing circumstances, were equal to his courage, and gave him tbe true character of a commander, as distinguished from the mere chieftain. He was undoubtedly the greatest man of action in the ancient world, and it may v perhaps be doubted whether any one has equalled him in the totality of his genius and achievements. If the conquest of the whole earth was ever possible to any one, Alexander was the leader most fitted to effect it, and he would certainly have made the attempt, to the utmost limits of existing knowledge, had he lived. But he yrm »^ only & conqueror j he had alfiO the constructive genius which shows itself in the founding of cities, the navigation of unknown waters, and the opening of new fields of commerce. Having regard simply to tbe violence of Alexander's career, his indifference to the rights of others, his freqnent cruelties, and the rivers of blood which he spilt, oue might say that here indeed was a curse to the world. But we must also consider the good which resulted from that mingling of the East and the West which was commenced by his sword. A large part of Asia was to some extent Hellenised by him and his successors, and the world became more conscious of its unity from that time. The gigantic proportions of Alexander are acknowledged as much by Asiatics as by Europeans. Iskander is to this day. one of, the great legendary heroes of thp^urksjthe, Persians, the! Afghans, and the people of the central deserts.