On the other hand, in order to guard against a too great pinch of starvation, though he did not actually allow the boys to help themselves without further trouble to what they needed more, he did give them permission to steal (15) this thing or that in the effort to alleviate their hunger. It was not of course from any real difficulty how else to supply them with nutriment that he left it to them to provide themselves by this crafty method. Nor can I conceive that any one will so misinterpret the custom. Clearly its explanation lies in the fact that he who would live the life of a robber must forgo sleep by night, and in the daytime he must employ shifts and lie in ambuscade; he must prepare and make ready his scouts, and so forth, if he is to succeed in capturing the quarry. (16)
(15) See "Anab." IV. vi. 14.
(16) For the institution named the {krupteia}, see Plut. "Lycurg." 28
(Clough, i. 120); Plato, "Laws," i. 633 B; for the {klopeia}, ib.
vii. 823 E; Isocr. "Panathen." 277 B.
It is obvious, I say, that the whole of this education tended, and was intended, to make the boys craftier and more inventive in getting in supplies, whilst at the same time it cultivated their warlike instincts. An objector may retort: "But if he thought it so fine a feat to steal, why did he inflict all those blows on the unfortunate who was caught?" My answer is: for the self-same reason which induces people, in other matters which are taught, to punish the mal-performance of a service. So they, the Lacedaemonians, visit penalties on the boy who is detected thieving as being but a sorry bungler in the art. So to steal as many cheeses as possible (off the shrine of Orthia (17)) was a feat to be encouraged; but, at the same moment, others were enjoined to scourge the thief, which would point a moral not obscurely, that by pain endured for a brief season a man may earn the joyous reward of lasting glory. (18) Herein, too, it is plainly shown that where speed is requisite the sluggard will win for himself much trouble and scant good.
(17) I.e. "Artemis of the Steep"—a title connecting the goddess with
Mount Orthion or Orthosion. See Pausan. VIII. xxiii. 1; and for
the custom, see Themistius, "Or." 21, p. 250 A. The words have
perhaps got out of their right place. See Schneider's Index, s.v.
(18) See Plut. "Lycurg." 18; "Morals," 239 C; "Aristid." 17; Cic.
"Tusc." ii. 14.
Furthermore, and in order that the boys should not want a ruler, even in case the pastor (19) himself were absent, he gave to any citizen who chanced to be present authority to lay upon them injunctions for their good, and to chastise them for any trespass committed. By so doing he created in the boys of Sparta a most rare modesty and reverence. And indeed there is nothing which, whether as boys or men, they respect more highly than the ruler. Lastly, and with the same intention, that the boys must never be reft of a ruler, even if by chance there were no grown man present, he laid down the rule that in such a case the most active of the Leaders or Prefects (20) was to become ruler for the nonce, each of his own division. The conclusion being that under no circumstances whatever are the boys of Sparta destitute of one to rule them.
(19) Lit. "Paidonomos."
(20) Lit. "Eirens."
I ought, as it seems to me, not to omit some remark on the subject of boy attachments, (21) it being a topic in close connection with that of boyhood and the training of boys.
(21) See Plut. "Lycurg." 17 (Clough, i. 109).
We know that the rest of the Hellenes deal with this relationship in different ways, either after the manner of the Boeotians, (22) where man and boy are intimately united by a bond like that of wedlock, or after the manner of the Eleians, where the fruition of beauty is an act of grace; whilst there are others who would absolutely debar the lover from all conversation (23) and discourse with the beloved.
(22) See Xen. "Symp." viii. 34; Plato, "Symp." 182 B (Jowett, II. p.
33).
(23) {dialegesthai} came to mean philosophic discussion and debate. Is
the author thinking of Socrates? See "Mem." I. ii. 35; IV. v. 12.