16. To these we may add Croton, since this city, founded under the authority of Sparta by a Heraclide, and therefore revering Hercules himself as its founder,[827] must be considered as belonging to the Doric race, although at a later period the more numerous Achæan portion of the population appears to have preponderated. Croton was the soil upon which Pythagoras endeavoured to realise his notions of a true aristocracy, an endeavour in which he succeeded. This, however, we cannot comprehend, unless we consider his ideal state as no airy project or phantom of the brain, but rather as founded upon national feelings, and as being even the foundation of the governments of Sparta, Crete, and the cities of Lower Italy, in which Pythagoras first appeared: and for this reason he is described as in part merely to have restored and renewed; for example, to have destroyed tyrannies, quieted the claims of the people, and re-established ancient rights,[828] &c. Croton, however, he selected as the centre of his operations, as being under the protection of Apollo, his household god;[829] and, secondly, as being the “city of the healthy,” an advantage [pg 185] which it owed to its climate, to gymnastic exercises, and to purer morals than were prevalent at least in the neighbouring cities of Tarentum and Sybaris. The government of this city was, when the philosopher came forward, in the hands of the senate of a thousand,[830] which formed a synedrion; the Crotoniats are reported to have offered to Pythagoras the presidency of this senate,[831] probably as prytanis.[832] A similar senate of a thousand existed at Agrigentum in the time of Empedocles; the same number of persons, elected according to their property, were sole governors at Rhegium.[833] This council of a thousand members also existed at Locri.[834] From this we may infer that the thousand of Croton were the most wealthy citizens: who in states of which the power is derived from the possession of land are, before the government is disturbed by revolutions, generally identical with the noble families. At Croton they had power to decide in most affairs without the ratification of the popular assembly,[835] and also possessed a judicial authority.[836] Now the council instituted by Pythagoras (which appears not to have been formed of members elected according to property, but to have been chosen on purely aristocratical principles) only contained three hundred members,[837] a number which frequently occurs under similar circumstances;[838] at the head of this council was Pythagoras himself. One of the most remarkable phenomena in the political history [pg 186] of the Greeks is, that the philosophy of order, of unison, of κόσμος, expressing, and consequently enlisting on its side, the combined endeavours of the better part of the people, obtained the management of public affairs, and held possession of it for a considerable time; so that the nature and destination of the political elements in existence being understood, and each having assigned to it its proper place, those who were qualified both by their rank and talents were placed at the head of the state; a strict self-education having in the first place been made one of their chief obligations (as it was of the φύλακες of Plato), in order by this means to prepare the way for the education of the other members of the community. At present it is generally acknowledged that the Pythagorean league was in great part of a political nature, that its object was to obtain a formal share in the administration of states, and that its influence upon them was of the most beneficial kind, which continued for many generations in Magna Græcia after the dissolution of the league itself.[839] This dissolution was caused by the natural opposers of an aristocracy of this description, the popular party and its leaders; for in this character alone could Cylon have been the author of the catastrophe which he occasioned; it is recorded, that the opposition of this order to an agrarian law, which referred to the division of the territory of the conquered Sybaris among the people, served to inflame [pg 187] their minds.[840] The opposite party demanded that the whole people should have admittance to the public assemblies and to public offices, that all magistrates at the expiration of their offices should render an account to a tribunal composed of members elected by lot,[841] that all existing debts should be cancelled, and that the lands should be newly divided:[842] from which we must infer, that the highest officers of the Pythagoreans were, according to the Spartan and Cretan principle, irresponsible, and that they considered election by vote as necessary for all such situations. How fatal to the quiet of Lower Italy were the convulsions which followed the destruction of this league (about 500 B.C.), is proved by the large share which the whole of Greece took in their pacification. This was at length effected by the Italian cities entirely giving up the Doric customs, and adopting an Achæan government and institutions;[843] which they were afterwards, first by the power of Dionysius of Syracuse, and then of the neighbouring Barbarians, compelled to surrender. Now the Achæan constitution, according to Polybius,[844] had become a democracy immediately after the overthrow of the last king Ogyges; and retained the same general character, though some subordinate parts experienced very great alterations: we also know that it was very unlike the Spartan government.[845] I cannot, however, refrain from doubting whether it could properly be termed democracy at so early a period, since Xenophon states, that in Sicyon, in 368-365 B.C., timocracy was the [pg 188] prevailing form of government, “according to the laws of the Achæans,”[846] which words cannot be referred to a mere transitory condition of that race. There also was always among the Achæans an equestrian order (ἱππεῖς), of greater consideration and influence on the government than can be reconciled with complete democracy.[847] So also at Croton, in the year of the city 637 (117 B.C.), there was a complete democracy; but (as in all the cities of the Italian Greeks at this period) a senate of nobles existed, which was frequently at open war with the people.[848]
17. Lastly, it is proper to mention the constitution of Delphi, if our supposition is admitted to be correct, that the most distinguished Delphian families were of Doric origin.[849] It was also shown that these families composed at an early period a close aristocracy; the priests were chosen from among the nobles, to whom the management of the oracle belonged; from their body was taken the Pythian court of justice (which may be compared with the Spartan gerusia, and the Athenian court of the ephetæ), as well as the chief magistrates, among whom in early times a king,[850] and afterwards a prytanis, was supreme.[851] At a later period we find mention of archons who gave their name to the year.[852] At the same time a popular party was formed (perhaps from the subjects of the temple), which in a later age at least exercised its authority in [pg 189] a public assembly.[853] The senate (βουλὴ) of Delphi was at this period, as in Gela and Rhodes (according to the hypothesis before advanced), renewed every half year; but it appears to have consisted of very few members, for only one senator (βουλεύων), or at most a few, in addition to the archon, are named in the donatory decrees of Delphi.[854] Many particulars which belong to a later date we pass over, as our only object is to point out the characteristic points of the ancient constitution.
18. From these various accounts it follows, that although there was no one form of government common to the Doric race in historic times, yet in many of these states we find a constitution of nearly the same character, which preceded and caused the subsequent changes and developments; and was of unequal duration in different states. This constitution, which we, with Pindar, consider as most strongly marked in the Spartan form of government, was of a strictly aristocratic character;[855] hence Sparta was the basis and corner-stone of the Greek aristocracies, and in this country alone the nobility ever retained their original dignity and power. Hence also Sparta, during the flourishing period of her history, never had a large number of exiles on political grounds, while in the other Grecian states the constant revolutions to which they were subject generally kept one party or other of the citizens in banishment; nor did she ever experience [pg 190] any violent disturbances or changes in her constitution,[856] until the number of the genuine Spartans had nearly become extinct, and the conditions necessary for the permanence of the ancient government had in part been removed. Now I call the Spartan constitution an aristocracy, without the least hesitation, on account of its continued and predominant tendency towards governing the community by a few, who were presumed to be the best, and as it inculcated in the citizens far less independent confidence than obedience and fear of those persons whose worth was guaranteed by their family, their education, and the public voice which had called them to the offices of state. The ancients,[857] however, remark, that it might also be called a democracy, since the supreme power was always considered as residing in the people, and an entire equality of manners prevailed; that it might be called a monarchy on account of the kings;[858] and that in the power of the ephors there was even an appearance of tyranny: so that in this one constitution all forms of government were united.[859] But the animating soul of all these forms was the Doric spirit of fear and respect for ancient and established laws, and the judgment of older men, the spirit of implicit [pg 191] obedience towards the state and the constituted authorities (πειθαρχία);[860] and, lastly, the conviction that strict discipline and a wise restriction of actions are surer guides to safety, than a superabundance of strength and activity directed to no certain end.
The relation which, according to these Doric principles, existed between an inferior and a superior, between the private citizen and the magistrate, also extended to the Spartans and other states, as the former were for a long time considered as aristocrats when compared with the other Greeks. This superiority was not caused by external preponderance and compulsion, but by the internal acknowledgment that strict laws and a well-ordered discipline belonged to them above all. It is often curious to remark how great was the power of a Lacedæmonian cloak and stick (σκυτάλη καὶ τρίβων, as Plutarch says) among the other races of the Greeks:[861] how, as it were by magic, the single Gylippus, although by no means the best of his nation, brings union and stability into the people at Syracuse, and first gives all their undertakings force and effect; on more than one occasion a single Spartan was enough to unite squadrons of Æolians and Ionians of Asia, and make them act in common; and even at the times of the dissolution of the Grecian name, we see Spartans acting as the generals of mercenaries [pg 192] bound by no other law than the firm and decided will of their leaders.
Many of the noblest and best of the Athenians always considered the Spartan state nearly as an ideal theory realised in practice; and, like Cimon and Xenophon (whose decided preference for Sparta, though perhaps sometimes prejudicial to his own country, must not be called folly), joined themselves to this state with zeal and eagerness, even to the prejudice of their own interests. The preference of all the followers of Socrates for Sparta is well known;[862] and Lycurgus, the most just of financiers, united to an aristocratical disposition an admiration for the laws of Lacedæmon.[863] It is singular that men of such eminence, both in a practical and theoretical view, should express their admiration of a state,[864] which modern writers[865] have often represented to us as a horde of half savages. Nor must the judgment of the persons above mentioned, who were without doubt sufficiently acquainted with the object of it, be attributed to a morbid craving after a state of nature which the Athenians had for ever lost.
We moderns, on the other hand, on account of our preconceived notions with respect to the advancement of civilization, do not read without partiality the lessons which history affords us; we refuse to recognise the [pg 193] most profound political wisdom in an age which we believe to have been occupied in rude attempts after the formation of a settled form of government. Far otherwise the political speculators of antiquity, such as the Pythagoreans and Plato, who considered the Spartan and Cretan form of government, i.e., the ancient Dorian, as a general model of all governments; and, in fact, the ideal constitution which was realized in Sparta approaches most nearly to that which Pythagoras attempted to establish in Lower Italy, and which Plato brought forward as capable of being put in practice, viz., a close communion, nearly similar to that of a family, having for its object mutual instruction. For the regulations of Pythagoras have many things besides their aristocratic spirit in common with the Spartan form of government, such as the public tables, and in general the perpetual living in public, with the number of laws for the maintenance of public morality (disciplina morum); and the community of goods, which existed among the Pythagoreans, is nearly allied to the Doric system of equalizing the landed estates. And Plato, although he at times criticises the Spartan and Cretan constitution in a somewhat unfair manner, has evidently derived his political notions, mediately or immediately, from the consideration of that form of government:[866] for it is hardly possible that any person should speculate upon government, without proceeding upon some chosen historical basis, however he may endeavour to conceal it. But the Athenian and Ionic democracy he altogether despises, because that appeared on his principles to be an annihilation of government rather than a [pg 194] government, in which every person, striving to act as much as possible for himself, destroyed that unison and harmony in which each individual exists only as a part of the whole.
It would be interesting to know what were the opinions and judgments of Spartans of the better time concerning these relaxed forms of government. We may well suppose that they did not view them in a favourable light. The people of Athens must indeed have appeared to them in general, as a Lacedæmonian in Aristophanes[867] expresses himself, as a lawless and turbulent rabble. For this reason they refused in the Peloponnesian war to negociate with the whole community; and would only treat with a few selected individuals.[868] Upon the whole, the state of Sparta, being, in comparison with the general mutability of the Greeks after the Persian war, like the magnet, which always pointed to the pole of ancient national customs, became dissimilar, both in political and domestic usages, to the rest of Greece;[869] and for this reason the Spartans who were sent into foreign parts either gave affront by their strangeness and peculiarity, or, by their want of consistency and firmness, forfeited that confidence with which they were everywhere met.