civilization into much of the Ancient East, which needed it badly and
profited by it. But the influence of their Hellenism was potent and
durable only in those newly founded, or newly organized, urban
communities and their immediate neighbourhood. Where these clustered
thickly, as along the Lower Orontes and on the Syrian coast-line, or
where Greek farmers had settled in the interspaces, as in Cyrrhestica
(i.e. roughly, central North Syria), Hellenism went far to make whole
districts acquire a civic spirit, which, though implying much less sense
of personal freedom and responsibility than in Attica or Laconia, would
have been recognized by an Athenian or a Spartan as kin to his own
patriotism. But where the cities were strung on single lines of
communication at considerable intervals, as in central Asia Minor and in
Mesopotamia, they exerted little political influence outside their own
walls. For Hellenism was and remained essentially a property of
communities small enough for each individual to exert his own personal
influence on political and social practice. So soon as a community
became, in numbers or distribution, such as to call for centralized, or
even representative, administration, patriotism of the Hellenic type
languished and died. It was quite incapable of permeating whole peoples
or of making a nation, whether in the East or anywhere else. Yet in the
East peoples have always mattered more than cities, by whomsoever
founded and maintained.

Hellenism, however, had, by this time, not only a political implication
but also moral and intellectual implications which were partly effects,
partly causes, of its political energy. As has been well said by a
modern historian of the Seleucid house, Hellenism meant, besides a
politico-social creed, also a certain attitude of mind. The
characteristic feature of this attitude was what has been called
Humanism, this word being used in a special sense to signify