oath I have now taken, whether private person, city, or people, may that person, city, or people, be deemed accursed; and, as such, experience the whole vengeance of Apollo, Latona, Diana, and Minerva the fore-knower. May their country produce none of the fruits of the earth, and their women, instead of generating children resembling their fathers, bring forth nothing but monsters; and may their animals share in the same curse. May those sacrilegious men lose all their suits at law; may they be conquered in war, have their houses demolished, and be themselves and their children put to the sword.' I am not astonished that after such terrible engagements, the holy war, undertaken by the order of the Amphictyons, should be carried on with so much rancour and fury. The religion of an oath was of great force with the ancients : and how much more regard ought to be had to it in the Christian world, which professes to believe that the violation of it shall be punished with eternal torments; and yet how many are there amongst us who make a jest of breaking through the most solemn oaths?

The authority of the Amphictyons had always been of great weight in Greece, but it began to decline exceedingly from the moment they condescended to admit Philip of Macedon into their body. For that prince, enjoying by this means all their rights and privileges, soon knew how to set himself above all law, and to abuse his power so far as to preside by proxy both in this illustrious assembly and in the Pythian games; of which games the Amphictyons were judges and agonothetæ in virtue of their office. With this Demosthenes reproaches him in his third Philippic: When he does not deign,' says he, to honour us with his presence, he sends his slaves to preside over us.' An odious, but emphatical term, and highly characteristic of Grecian liberty, by which the Athenian orator designates the base and abject subjection of the greatest lords in Philip's court.

If the reader desires a more intimate knowledge of what relates to the Amphictyons, the dissertations of Monsieur Valois may be consulted, in the * Memoirs of the Academy of

k

* Vol. iii.

Belles Lettres, wherein this subject is treated with great extent and erudition.

SECT. IX. OF THE REVENUES OF ATHENS.-The revenues,* according to the passage of Aristophanes which I have cited above, and consequently as they stood in the time of the Peloponnesian war, amounted to two thousand talents; that is to say, to six millions of livres. They are generally classed "under four heads.

1. The first relates to the revenues arising from agriculture, the sale of woods, the produce of the silver mines, and other funds of a like nature, appertaining to the public. Amongst these may be included the duties upon the import and export of merchandise, and the taxes levied upon the inhabitants of the city, as well natives as strangers.

In the history of Athens mention is often made of the silver mines of Laurium, which was a mountain situate between the Piræus and Cape Sunium; and those of Thrace, from whence many persons drew immense riches. Xenophon, in a treatise wherein he considers this subject at large, demonstrates how much the public might gain by industriously working these mines, from the example of many individuals who had been enriched by them. Hipponicus let his mines and six hundred slaves to an undertaker, who paid him an ‡ obolus a day for each slave, clear of all charges, which amounted to a mina per day, about two pounds five shillings. Nicias, who was killed in Sicily, farmed out his mines and a thousand slaves in the same manner, and with the same profit in proportion to that number.

2. The second species of revenue were the contributions paid to the Athenians by the allies for the common expenses of the war. At first, under Aristides, they amounted to only four hundred and sixty talents.§ Pericles augmented them almost a third, and raised them to six hundred, and some time

1 Page 925.

* Τέλη.

+ De ration, redituum.

Six oboli made a drachma, one hundred drachmas a mina, and sixty mineæ a talent.

A talent was worth a thousand crowns.

after they were run up to thirteen hundred. Taxes, which in the beginning were moderate and necessary, became thus in a little time excessive and exorbitant, notwithstanding all the protestations to the contrary made to the allies, and the most solemn engagements entered into with them.

3. A third sort of revenue were the extraordinary capitation taxes, levied upon the inhabitants of the country, as well natives as strangers, in pressing occasions and emergencies of the state.

4. The fines laid upon persons by the judges for different misdemeanours, were applied to the uses of the public, and laid up in the treasury; with the exception of the tenth part of them, which was consecrated to Minerva, and a fiftieth to the other divinities.

The most natural and legitimate application of these different revenues of the republic, was in paying the troops both by sea and land, building and fitting out fleets, keeping up and repairing the public buildings, temples, walls, ports, and citadels. But the greatest part of them, especially after Pericles's time, was misapplied to unnecessary uses, and often consumed in frivolous expenses, games, feasts, and shows, which cost immense sums, and were of no manner of utility to the state.

SECT. X. OF THE EDUCATION OF THE YOUTH.-I place this article under the head of government, because all the most celebrated legislators have with reason believed that the education of youth was an essential part of it.

The exercises that served to form either the bodies or minds of the young Athenians (and as much may be said of almost all the people of Greece) were dancing, music, hunting, fencing, riding, polite learning, and philosophy. It is clear, that I only skim over, and treat very slightly, these several articles.

1. Dancing. Music.-Dancing is one of those bodily exercises which was cultivated by the Greeks with great attention. It made a part of what the ancients called the Gymnastic, divided, according to * Plato, into two kinds, the Orchestic, which takes its name from dancing, and the Palæstric, † so

Ορχιῖσθαι, saltare. † Πάλη.

called from a Greek word which signifies wrestling. The exercises of the latter kind principally conduced to form the body for the fatigues of war, navigation, agriculture, and the other uses of society.

Dancing had another end, and taught such rules of motion as were most proper to render the shape free and easy; to give the body a just proportion, and the whole person an unconstrained, noble, and graceful air; in a word, an external politeness, if we may be allowed to use that expression, which never fails to prepossess people in favour of those who have been formed to it early.

m

Music was cultivated with no less application and success. The ancients ascribed wonderful effects to it They believed it well calculated to calm the passions, soften the manners, and even humanize nations naturally savage and barbarous. Polybius, a grave and serious historian, and who is certainly worthy of belief, attributes the extreme difference between two nations of Arcadia, the one infinitely beloved and esteemed for the elegance of their manners, their benevolent inclinations, humanity to strangers, and piety to the gods; the other, on the contrary, generally reproached and hated for their malignity, brutality, and irreligion: Polybius, I say, ascribes this difference to the study of music, (I mean, says he, the true and genuine music,) industriously cultivated by the one, and absolutely neglected by the other nation.

After this it is not surprising that the Greeks should have considered music as an essential part in the education of youth. * Socrates himself, in a very advanced age, was not ashamed of learning to play upon musical instruments. Themistocles, however otherwise esteemed, † was thought deficient in polite accomplishments, because at an entertainment he could not touch the lyre like the rest of the company. Ignorance in this respect was deemed a defect of education; on the contrary, skill did honour to the greatest men. § Epaminondas was

Polyb. 1. iv. p. 288-291.

Socrates, jam senex, institui lyrâ non erubescebat. Quintil. 1. i. c. 10. Themistocles, cùm in epulis recusâsset lyram, habitus est indoctior. Tusc. Quæst. I. i. n. 4.

Cic.

Summam eruditionem Græci sitam censebant in nervorum vocumque cantibus-dicebantque id omnes; nec qui nesciebat, satis excultus doctrina putabatur. Ibid. § In Epaminonda virtutibus commemoratum est saltâsse eum commodè, scien

praised for dancing and playing well upon the flute. We may observe in this place the different tastes and genius of nations. The Romans were far from having the same opinion with the Greeks in regard to music and dancing, and set no value upon them. It is very likely that the wisest and most sensible amongst the latter did not apply to them with any great industry; and Philip's expression to his son Alexander, who had shown too much skill in music at a feast, induces me to be of this opinion: Are you not ashamed,' said he, ' to sing so well ?'

In other respects, there were some grounds for this esteem for dancing and music. Both the one and the other were employed in the most august feasts and ceremonies of religion, to express with greater force and dignity their acknowledgment to the gods for the favours they had vouchsafed to confer upon them. They formed generally the greatest and most agreeable part of their feasts and entertainments, which seldom or ever began or ended without some odes being sung, like those in honour of the victors in the Olympic games, and on other similar subjects. They had a part also in war; and we know that the Lacedæmonians marched to battle dancing, and to the sound of flutes. n Plato, the most grave philosopher of antiquity, considered both these arts, not as simple amusements, but as having a great share in the ceremonies of religion, and military exercises. Hence we see him very intent, in his books of laws, to prescribe judicious regulations with respect to dancing and music, in order to keep them within the bounds of utility and decorum.

They did not continue long within these restrictions. The licentiousness of the Grecian stage, on which dancing was in the highest vogue, and in a manner prostituted to buffoons and the most contemptible people, who made no other use of it than to awaken or cherish the most vicious passions; this licentiousness, I say, soon corrupted an art which might have been of some advantage, had it been regulated by Plato's opinion. Music had a like destiny; and perhaps the corrup

terque tibiis cantàsse-Scilicet non eadem omnibus honesta sunt atque turpia, sed omnia majorum institutis judicantur Corn. Nep. in præfat. vit. Epam.

De leg. 1. vii.