We may be quite sure of one thing, that the Grecian states never could have stopped the advance of Persia if it had not been for the marvellous courage and discipline of the Spartans, and that the Spartans never could have had this marvellous courage and discipline if it had not been for the remarkable character of their institutions and their government. Their great idea was that the individual man or woman did not matter at all. What mattered was the state—that the state should be powerful, should have good soldiers to defend it and to attack its enemies. It was with that purpose in view that all its laws were made. The Spartans lived not for themselves but for the state. Hardihood, therefore, and courage were what they aimed at in themselves and their children, so that the state might be well served. The Spartan punishments for offences against the laws were fearfully severe. So were the punishments of children by their parents, and for a child to cry or utter a sound under such punishment was regarded as a dreadful disgrace to it. "Spartan fortitude" is a proverbial saying even amongst us to-day. It was training of this kind which made the Spartan troops so steadfast in battle and which gave the Spartans on the whole the leadership over the other states.

It was a very noble idea, very self-sacrificing—this of each citizen living not for himself alone but for the state; but these people were not large-minded enough to carry the idea a little farther and see that it would be for the advantage of all Greece if each state could sacrifice its own interests and good for the sake of the whole. They could sacrifice themselves as individuals for Sparta, but they had no idea of sacrificing Sparta for Greece. On the contrary, they were terribly eager to build up the power of Sparta at the cost of Athens or of any other state. They would even ally themselves with the enemy of all Greece, with Persia, in order to do so.

The other states were equally selfish about their own state interests, but their individuals had not the same idea of self-sacrifice for the good of the state; and therefore their states were not so powerful as Sparta, nor their soldiers so brave and well disciplined.

The Athenians, however, were far more cultivated, better artists, musicians, orators, writers and so on, than the Spartans.

The most glorious days of Greece, we may say, reached from 500 B.C. to 350 B.C. I have made it a rule in this story to bother you as little as possible with names, either of places or persons, and only now and then with dates, because too many names and figures always seem to me to confuse a story; but I am going to name now a few of the greatest persons in these glorious days of Greece because they are the persons who have been makers of the world's very best thoughts and best artistic products.

Greek literature

Homer, that great singer, sang—it is much to be doubted whether he ever wrote—-long before this period. There were also Sappho, the poetess, and Alcæus, who wrote in those metres from which we have named our Sapphics and Alcaics. These did not come within the most glorious days. But in that splendid time, and inspired no doubt by its splendour, came Sophocles and Æschylus, writers of the finest tragedies; there was Euripides, who was a tragic writer for the stage too, yet has imagined some of his scenes in a lighter and livelier way than those older and fearfully grim writers of the drama. Later came Aristophanes, the comic dramatist, who brings on birds and frogs as actors in his plays. There was the mighty orator, Demosthenes. Oratory and speech-making were very much studied and practised. Probably there were a large number of speakers whom even to-day we would think extraordinarily fine. There were a host of painters and musicians; but we cannot hear their music and the pictures have perished.

Then there was Socrates, the great philosopher, and Plato, who wrote the dialogues in which Socrates, who was his master, was the chief speaker. Socrates was not a writer. I suppose we can never know how much in the dialogues is Plato's and how much Socrates'. We may suspect that very much is due to Plato, though he gives Socrates nearly all the credit. Later came Aristotle, who wrote about everything—about philosophy, about science, about morality, about natural history, about government. Plato, before him, or Socrates speaking to us by Plato's pen, had been very much interested in the art of government—in discussing the best form of government. But the government which they all discussed was the government of those small city states which we have seen in Greece. They did not concern themselves with government of large nations and empires.

Sculpture

But almost more glorious than any of these were the sculptors, of whom the greatest were Phidias and Praxiteles. The work of the sculptors was employed chiefly in connection with the work of the architects, of the builders of the temples and the public buildings. The temples were splendidly ornamented with the most perfect statues and cuttings in marble that man has ever produced. The architecture of the Greeks was more perfect than that of any nation before or since. We may suppose, as we have seen, that it owed much to the example of that very fine Minoan art which was produced in Crete very long before, and which was carried to the mainland of Greece, and is especially seen in excavations at Mycenæ.