This was immediately done. He divided the lands of Laconia into thirty thousand parts, which he distributed amongst the people of the country; and made nine thousand parts of the territory of Sparta, which he distributed among so many citizens. It is said, that some years after, as Lycurgus was returning from a long journey, and crossing the lands of Laconia, which had just been reaped, observing the heaps of the sheaves to be perfectly equal, he turned towards those that followed him, and said to them smiling, Is not Laconia like the inheritance of several brethren, who have just divided it among them?

After he had thus divided their immoveable estates, he endeavoured to make them also divide their other wealth, that there may be no kind of inequality among them. But finding he should meet with more difficulty in this, if he attempted it openly, he went another way to work, by sapping the very foundations of avarice. For, first of all he prohibited all gold and silver money, and ordered that only iron money should be in use; and this he made so heavy, and of so little value, that a man must have a cart with two oxen to carry the sum of ten [d] mine, and a whole chamber to lock it up in.

Further, he drove all useless and superfluous arts from Sparta, which indeed, if he had not done, most of them must have dropt of themselves, and been lost with the old money; for the artificers would not have known what to have done with their work; and this iron money was not current in the other parts of Greece, where instead of setting a value upon it, they only laughed at it, and made it the subject of thei raillery.

THE THIRD INSTITUTION.

Public Meals.

Lycurgus, resolving to make a still more vigorous war upon softness and luxury, and entirely to root up the love of riches, made a third institution, relating to

[d] Five hundred livres.

meals

By this institution of common meals, and a frugal simplicity in diet; we may say that he changed in a manner the nature of riches, [e] by leaving nothing in them to make them desirable, or likely to be stolen, or even capable of enriching those who possessed them; for there was no longer any opportunity of using or enjoying their wealth, nor even of making a shew of it, since the poor and rich were to eat together in the same place; and no one was allowed to come into the common halls, after having satisfied his hunger with other food; for whoever refused to eat and drink, was carefully marked out, and reproached with his intemperance or too great delicacy, which induced him to despise these public meals.

The rich were extremely incensed at this institution, and it was on this occasion, in a popular insurrection, that a young man named Alcander, struck out one of Lycurgus's eyes with a cudgel. The people enraged at such a violence, gave up the young man into Lycurgus's hand, who well knew how to be revenged of him, for he treated him with so much mildness and good-nature, that from being very hot and passionate, he soon brought him to be very calm and discreet.

The tables contained each about fifteen persons, and before any one could be admitted, he must be agreeable to the rest of the company. Every one sent in monthly a bushel of meal, eight measures of wine, five pounds of cheese, two pounds and a half of figs, and some small matter of their money for the dressing and seasoning of the provisions. Every one was obliged to be present at the public meal, and king Agis a long while after, returning from a glorious ex

ξε] Τὸν πλοῦτον ἄσυλον, μᾶλλον δὲ ἄζηλον, καὶ ἄπλετον ἀπειργάσατο. Plut.

pedition, and dispensing with himself from doing so, that he might dine with the queen his wife, was reprimanded and punished. Children were allowed also to be present at these meals, and were brought thither as to a school of wisdom and temperance. There they heard grave discourses upon government, and saw nothing but what was instructive. The conversation was often enlivened by refined wit and raillery, but such as was never low or shocking; and as soon as any one was perceived to grow uneasy at it, they always left off. Here also they learned to keep a secret; and when a young man entered the hall, the eldest would say to him, pointing to the door, Nothing of what is said here, goes out there.

The most elegant part of their food was what they called the black broth, and the old men preferred it to whatever else was served up at table. [f] Dyonysius the tyrant, being invited to one of these entertainments, seemed to think quite otherwise of it, and thought it a very insipid ragoo. I do not wonder at that, says the person who made it, for there wanted the seasoning. What seasoning? replies the tyrant. The chace, sweat, fatigue, hunger, and thirst. For with these, adds the cook, we season our provisions.

IV. OTHER INSTITUTIONS.

Lycurgus looked upon the education of children as the most important concern of a legislator. It was his great principle that they belonged more properly to the state than their parents; and for this reason he would not suffer them to be brought up as they pleased, but obliged the public to take care of their education, that they might be formed upon constan and uniform principles, and early inspired with the love of virtue and their country.

[ƒ] Ubi cùm tyrannus cenavif set, Dionysius, negavit se jure illo nigro, quod cena caput erat, delectatum. Tum is, qui illa coxerat, minimè mirum, inquit ; condimenta enim defuerunt. Quæ tan

dem, inquit ille? Labor in venatu sudor, cursus ab Eurota, fames sitis. His enim rebus, Lacedæmo niorum epulæ condiuntur. Tuscul Quæst. 5. n. 98.

A

ill-shaped, tender and weakly, and judged it to wan health and strength, they condemned it to perish, and caused it to be exposed.

Children were early accustomed not to be difficul or nice about their victuals; not to be afraid in the dark; not to be frightened at their being left alone not to be peevish, brawling, or crying; to walk barefoot; to enure themselves to fatigue; [g] to lie upor the bare ground; to wear the same clothes in winter as in summer, to harden themselves against heat and cold.

At seven years old they were distributed into classes where they were all brought up together under the same discipline. [h] Their education properly speaking was no more than an apprenticeship to obedience their legislator being thoroughly convinced, that the surest means of forming citizens submissive to the laws and magistrates, in which the good order and happiness of a state consists, was to teach children from their infancy to be perfectly obedient to their masters

Whilst they were at table, the master proposed questions to the boys. As for instance, Who is the best man in the city? What say you to such an action? Their answer was expected to be ready, and attended with a reason and proof conceived in a few words for they early accustomed them to the laconic style i. e. to a short and concise one. Lycurgus required that the money should be very heavy and of small value; and that their discourse on the contrary should express a great deal in a little compass.

As to letters, they learned no more than was abso lutely necessary. All the sciences were banished their country. Their study was only how to obey, to endure [g] Xenophon, de Lacedæm. [3] Ὥσε την παιδείαν εἶναι με republic. λέτην εὐπειθείας.

name.

which properly speaking had no more of it but the I shall explain in my reflections the reasons. and views of Lycurgus in allowing it. They crept the most dextrously and cunningly they could into the gardens and public halls, and carried off what herbs or victuals they were able; if they were discovered, they were punished for want of skill. It is said, that one of them having stole a young fox, hid it under his clothes, and let it tear into his belly with its teeth and claws, without crying out, till he fell down dead upon the spot.

The patience and resolution of the Lacedæmonian youth were put to the severest trial upon the celebration of a feast in honour of Diana, surnamed Orthia, [i] when the children, in the sight of their parents, and in presence of the whole city, suffered themselves to be lashed till the blood ran down upon the altar of that human goddess, and sometimes expired under the blows, without crying out, or so much as uttering a groan. [k] And their own fathers, who stood by and saw them all covered over with blood and wounds, were the persons who exhorted them to hold out constantly to the end. Plutarch assures us, that he saw several children with his own eyes lose their lives in this cruel diversion. Hence [1] Horace gives the epithet of patient to the city of Lacedæmon, patiens Lacedæmon; and another author makes a man who

[] Sparte pueri ad aram sic verberibus accipiuntur, ut multus è visceribus sanguis exeat, nonnunquam etiam, ut cùm ibi essem audiebam, ad necem; quorum non modò nemo exclamavit unquam, sed ne ingemuit quidem. Cic. lib,

2. Tusc. Quæst. n. 34.

[k] Ipsi illos patres adhortantur, ut ictus flagellorum fortiter perferant, & laceros ac semianimes rógant, perseverent vulnera præbere vulneribus. Senec. de Provid. cap.4. [] Od. 7. lib. 1.

had.