Public-domain ebook
by Jacob Abbott
Language: en4,924 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: Biographies·History - Ancient
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #27802.
The work is a nineteenth‑century historical narrative that treats the rise and reign of Darius I within a broader survey of the Persian empire. It begins with a preface that explains the author’s deliberate restraint from moralizing, arguing that a calm, impartial tone, modeled on biblical histories, will better awaken the reader’s conscience than harsh denunciation. The opening pages then lay out a detailed contents list, followed by an extensive introductory chapter on Cyrus, Cambyses, and the early events that set the stage for Darius’s accession. The author weaves together mythic dreams, diplomatic intrigue, and vivid descriptions of battles and court politics, all presented as a continuous chronicle rather than a novelistic plot.
Written in a formal, didactic style characteristic of Victorian scholarship, the text employs elaborate sentences, extensive footnote‑like asides, and a tone that seeks to educate as much as to entertain. Readers who appreciate exhaustive, source‑driven histories of ancient Near Eastern empires, particularly those interested in the interplay of power, succession, and cultural encounters, will find this measured, richly detailed account rewarding.
The opening · free to read
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New York.
Copyright, 1878, by JACOB ABBOTT.
PREFACE.
In describing the character and the action of the personages whose histories form the subjects of this series, the writer makes no attempt to darken the colors in which he depicts their deeds of violence and wrong, or to increase, by indignant denunciations, the obloquy which heroes and conquerors have so often brought upon themselves, in the estimation of mankind, by their ambition, their tyranny, or their desperate and reckless crimes. In fact, it seems desirable to diminish, rather than to increase, the spirit of censoriousness which often leads men so harshly to condemn the errors and sins of others, committed in circumstances of temptation to which they themselves were never exposed. Besides, to denounce or vituperate guilt, in a narrative of the transactions in which it was displayed, has little influence in awakening a healthy sensitiveness in the conscience of the reader. We observe, accordingly, that in the narratives of the sacred Scriptures, such denunciations are seldom found. The story of Absalom's undutifulness and rebellion, of David's adultery and murder, of Herod's tyranny, and all other narratives of crime, are related in a calm, simple, impartial, and forbearing spirit, which leads us to condemn the sins, but not to feel a pharisaical resentment and wrath against the sinner.
This example, so obviously proper and right, the writer of this series has made it his endeavor in all respects to follow.
CONTENTS.
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