age of thirty; before which, they were not permitted to mar ry, to go into the troops, or to bear any office in the state

With regard to the females, their discipline was equally strict with the former. They were inured to a constant course of labour and industry, until they were twenty years old; before which time, they were not considered marriageable. They had also their peculiar exercises. They ran, wrestled, pitched the bar, and performed all these feats naked, before the whole body of the citizens.

An education, so manlike, did not fail to produce in the Spartan women corresponding sentiments. They were bold, frugal, and patriotic, and filled with a love of military glory. Some foreign women, in conversation with the wife of Leoni das, saying that the Spartan women alone knew how to govern the men, she boldly replied, "the Spartan women alone bring forth men.”

A mother was known to give her son, who was going to battle, his shield, with this remarkable advice: Return with it, or return upon it. Implying, that, rather than throw it from him in flight, he should be borne upon it, dead, to his friends in Sparta. Another, hearing that her son was killed in fighting for his country, answered, without any emotion, "It is for that, I brought him into the world." After the battle of Leuctra, the parents of those who died in the action, went to the temples, to thank the gods, that their sons had done their duty, while those whose children survived that dreadful day, seemed inconsolable.

Yet, it must not be concealed, that, in a city where the women were inspired with such a passion for military glory, they were not equally remarkable for connubial fidelity. There was no law against adultery; and an exchange of husbands was often actually practised among them. This was always by the mutual consent of parties, which removed the tedious ceremonies of a divorce. One reason assigned for allowing this mutual liberty, was, not so much to gratify licentious desire, as to improve the breed of citizens, by matching such as were possessed of mutual inclination. In many of the laws of Lycurgus, he seems to admit, that private vices may become public benefits, and this among the number.

Besides these constitutional regulations, there were many other general maxims laid down, that obtained amongst them the force of laws. They were forbid to exercise any mechanic art. The chief occupations of the Spartans, were bodily exercises, or hunting. The Helotes, who had lost their liberty some centuries before, and who had been condemned to

perpetual slavery, tilled their lands for them, receiving for their labour a bare subsistence.

The citizens, thus possessed of competence and leisure were mostly in company, in large common halls, where they met and conversed together. They passed little of their time alone; being accustomed to live like bees, always together, always attentive to their chiefs and leaders. The love of their country and the public good, was their predominant passion and all self-interest was lost, in the general wish for the welfare of the community. Pedaratus, having missed the honour of being chosen of the three hundred who had a certain rank in the city, converted his disappointment into joy, that there were three hundred better men in Sparta, than he.

Among the maxims of their legislator, it was forbidden them to make frequent war upon the same enemies. By this inhibition, they were restrained from lasting and immoderate resentment; they were in no danger of teaching their discipline to those upon whom they made war; and all their alliances were thus more frequently renewed.

When they had broken and routed their enemies, they never pursued them farther than was necessary to make themselves sure of victory. They thought it sufficiently glorious to overcome, and were ashamed of destroying an enemy that yielded or fled. Nor was this without answering some good purpose: an enemy, conscious that all who resisted were put to the sword, often fled; as they were convinced that such a conduct was the surest means of obtaining safety. Thus, valour and generosity seemed the ruling motives of this new institution. Arms were their only exercise, and their life was much less austere in the camp, than in the city. The Spartans were the only people in the world, to whom the time of war was a time of ease and refreshment: because the severity of their manners was then relaxed, and the men were indulged in greater liberties. With them, the first and most inviolable law of war, was, never to turn their backs on the enemy, however disproportioned in force, nor to deliver up their arms, until they resigned them with life. When the poet Archilochus came to Sparta, he was obliged to quit the city, for having asserted, in one of his poems, that it was better for a man to lose his arms, than his life. Thus resolved upon conquest or death, they went calmly forward, with all the confidence of success; sure of meeting a glorious victo ry, or, what they valued equally, a noble death.

Thus, depending upon their valour alone for safety, their legislator forbade walling the city. It was his maxim, that a wall of men was preferable to a wall of bricks; and that

confined valour was scarcely preferable to cowardice. Indeed, a city, in which were thirty thousand fighting men, stood in little need of walls, to protect it; and we have scarcely an instance in history, of their suffering themselves to be driven to their last retreats.

War and its honours was their employment and ambition Their Helotes, or slaves, tilled their grounds, and did all their servile drudgery. These unhappy men were, in a manner, bound to the soil; it was not lawful to sell them to strangers. or to make them free. If, at any time, their increase became inconvenient, or created a suspicion in their fierce masters, there was a diabolical cryptia, or secret act, by which they were permitted to destroy them. From this barbarous severity, however, Lycurgus is acquitted by Plutarch; but, it is plain, that his institutions were not sufficient to restrain the people from such baseness and cruelty. It was, by this abominable act, allowed, for several companies of young men to go out of the city, by day, and, concealing themselves in the thickets, to rush out, in the night, upon their slaves, and kill all they could find in their way. Thucydides relates, that two thousand of these slaves disappeared, at once, without ever after being heard of.

It is truly amazing, how a people like the Spartans, renowned for lenity to the conquered, for submission to their superiors, for reverence to old age, and friendship for each other, should yet be so horribly brutal, to those beneath them, to men who ought to be considered, in every respect, as their equals, as their countrymen, and only degraded by an unjust usurpation. Yet nothing is more certain, than their cruel treatment: they were not only condemned to the most servile occupations, but often destroyed, without reason. They were frequently made drunk, and exposed before the children, in order to deter them from so brutal a species of debauchery. Such, was the general purport of the institutions of Lycurgus; which, from their tendency, gained the esteem and admiration of all the surrounding nations. The Greeks were ever apt to be dazzled, rather with splendid, than useful virtues and praised the laws of Lycurgus, which, at best, were calculated to make men more warlike than happy, and to substitute insensibility for enjoyment.

If, considered in a political light, the city of Lacedæmon was but a military garrison, supported by the labour of a nu merous peasantry, who were slaves. The laws, therefore, by which they were governed, were not much more rigorous than are many of the military institutions of modern princes. The same labour, the same discipline, the same poverty, and

the same subordination, are found in many of the garrisoned towns of Europe, that prevailed for so many centuries in Sparta. The only difference that appears to me, between a soldier of Lacedæmon, and a soldier in garrison at Graveiines, is, that the one was permitted to marry at thirty, and the other is obliged to continue single all his life: the one lives in the midst of a civilized country, which he is supposed to protect; the other lived in the midst of a number of civil ized states, which he had no inclination to offend. War is equally the trade of both: and a campaign is frequently a relaxation from the more rigorous confinement of garrison duty.

When Lycurgus had thus completed his military institution, and when the form of government he had established, seemed strong and vigorous enough to support itself, his next care was to give it all the permanence in his power. He, therefore, signified to the people, that something still remained for the completion of his plan, and that he was under the necessity of going to consult the oracle at Delphos, for its advice. In the mean time, he persuaded them to take an oath for the strict observance of all his laws, till his return, and then departed, with a full resolution of never seeing Sparta

more.

When he had arrived at Delphos, he consulted the oracle, to know whether the laws he had made, were sufficient to render the Lacedæmonians happy: and, being answered, that nothing was wanting to their perfection, he sent his answer to Sparta, and then voluntarily starved himself to death. Others say, that he died in Crete, having ordered his body to be burned, and his ashes to be thrown into the sea. The death of this great lawgiver, gave a sanction and authority to his laws, which his life was unable to confer. The Spartans regarded his end as the most glorious of all his actions, a noble finishing of all his former services: they considered them selves as bound, by every tie of gratitude and religion, to a strict observance of all his institutions; and the long con tinuance of the Spartan government, is a proof of their persevering resolution.

The Lacedæmonians, thus constituted, seemed desirous only of an opportunity of displaying the superiority of their power, among the neighbouring states, their rivals. The war between them and the Messenians, soon taught them the ad vantages of their military institutions; but, as I am hasten ing to more important events, I will touch upon this as con cisely as I can.

There was a temple of Diana, common to the Messenians and Lacedænionians, standing on the borders of both king

doms. It was there, that the Messenians were accused of of fering violence to some Spartan females; and of killing Te leculus, one of the Spartan kings, who interposed in their de fence. The Messenians, on the other hand, denied the charge; and averred that these supposed females, were young men, thus dressed up, with daggers under their clothes, and placed there, by Teleculus, with an intent to surprise them.

To the mutual resentment occasioned by this, another cause of animosity was soon afterwards added. Polychares, a enian, who had won the prize in the Olympic games, let some cows to pasture to Euphænus, a Lacedæmonian, who was to pay himself for their keeping with a share of the increase. Euphænus sold the cows, and pretended they were stolen from him. Polychares sent his son, to demand the money: but the Lacedæmonian, to aggravate his crime, killed the young man, and persuaded his countrymen to give no redress. Polychares, therefore, undertook to do himself jus tice, and killed all the Lacedæmonians that came in his way Expostulations passed between both kingdoms, till at last the affair came to a general war, which was carried on for many years, with doubtful success.

In this situation, the Messenians sent to consult the oracle of Delphos; which required the sacrifice of a virgin, of the family of Epytus. Upon casting lots among the descendants of this prince, the chance fell upon the daughter of Lycisus: but, her paternity being doubtful, Aristodemus offered his daughter, whom all allowed to be his own. Her lover, however, attempted to avert the blow, by asserting that she was pregnant by him; but her father was so enraged, that he ripped her up, with his own hand, publicly, to vindicate her in

nocence.

The enthusiasm which this sacrifice produced, served, for a while, to give the Messenians the advantage; but, being at last overthrown and besieged in the city of Ithoe, Aristodemus, finding all things desperate, slew himself, upon his daughter's grave. With him, fell the kingdom of Messenia; not without a most obstinate resistance, and many a defeat of the Spartan army, which they held thus engaged for above twenty years.

After a rigorous subjection of thirty-nine years, the Messenians, once more, made a vigorous struggle for freedom; headed by Aristomenes, a young man of great courage and capacity. The success of the first engagement, was doubtful; and the Lacedæmonians being advised by the oracle to send for a general from among the Athenians, this politic state sent them Tyrtæus, a poet and schoolmaster, whose