Ideal Commonwealths | Page 9

door, and said, "Not a word spoken in this company goes out there." The admitting of any man to a particular table was under the following regulation. Each member of that small society took a little ball of soft bread in his hand. This he was to drop, without saying a word, into a vessel called caddos, which the waiter carried upon his head. In case he approved of the candidate, he did it without altering the figure, if not, he first pressed it flat in his hand; for a flatted ball was considered as a negative. And if but one such was found, the person was not admitted, as they thought it proper that the whole company should be satisfied with each other. He who thus rejected, was said to have no luck in the caddos. The dish that was in the highest esteem amongst them was the black broth. The old men were so fond of it that they ranged themselves on one side and eat it, leaving the meat to the young people. It is related of a king of Pontus, that he purchased a Laced?monian cook, for the sake of this broth. But when he came to taste it he strongly expressed his dislike; and the cook made answer, "Sir, to make this broth relish, it is necessary first to bathe in the Eurotas." After they had drank moderately, they went home without lights. Indeed, they were forbidden to walk with a light either on this or any other occasion, that they might accustom themselves to march in the darkest night boldly and resolutely. Such was the order of their public repasts.
Lycurgus left none of his laws in writing; it was ordered in one of the Rhetr? that none should be written. For what he thought most conducive to the virtue and happiness of a city, was principles interwoven with the manners and breeding of the people. These would remain immovable, as founded in inclination, and be the strongest and most lasting tie; and the habits which education produced in the youth, would answer in each the purpose of a lawgiver. As for smaller matters, contracts about property, and whatever occasionally varied, it was better not to reduce these to a written form and unalterable method, but to suffer them to change with the times, and to admit of additions or retrenchments at the pleasure of persons so well educated. For he resolved the whole business of legislation into the bringing up of youth. And this, as we have observed, was the reason why one of his ordinances forbad them to have any written laws.
Another ordinance levelled against magnificence and expense, directed that the ceilings of houses should be wrought with no tool but the axe and the doors with nothing but the saw. For, as Epaminondas is reported to have said afterwards, of his table, "Treason lurks not under such a dinner," so Lycurgus perceived before him, that such a house admits of no luxury and needless splendour. Indeed, no man could be so absurd as to bring into a dwelling so homely and simple, bedsteads with silver feet, purple coverlets, golden cups, and a train of expense that follows these: but all would necessarily have the bed suitable to the room, the coverlet of the bed and the rest of their utensils and furniture to that. From this plain sort of dwellings, proceeded the question of Leotychidas the elder to his host, when he supped at Corinth, and saw the ceiling of the room very splendid and curiously wrought, "Whether trees grew square in his country."
A third ordinance of Lycurgus was, that they should not often make war against the same enemy, lest, by being frequently put upon defending themselves, they too should become able warriors in their turn. And this they most blamed king Agesilaus for afterwards, that by frequent and continued incursions into Boeotia, he taught the Thebans to make head against the Laced?monians. This made Antalcidas say, when he saw him wounded, "The Thebans pay you well for making them good soldiers who neither were willing nor able to fight you before." These ordinances he called Rhetr?, as if they had been oracles and decrees of the Deity himself.
As for the education of youth, which he looked upon as the greatest and most glorious work of a lawgiver, he began with it at the very source, taking into consideration their conception and birth, by regulating the marriages. For he did not (as Aristotle says) desist from his attempt to bring the women under sober rules. They had, indeed, assumed great liberty and power on account of the frequent expeditions of their husbands, during which they were left sole mistresses at home, and so gained an undue deference and improper titles; but