Appendix A: Extract from Review of Mitchell's Acharnenses of Aristophanes

We have already intimated our conviction that the editor’s admiration of the Spartan character and iuBtitutions is extravagantly great, and we find this error to be completely pervasive of the notes of his present performance. If he is indeed an adopted son of Athens, he seems to be an ungrateful offspring of so venerable a parent; and although he is well acquainted with her ancient progeny who sang her praise — although he has drawn much delight from the fresh fountains of her immortal literature, he loses no opportunity of expressing his dislike of her institutions and inhabitants. Yet, so far as this kind of poetical ingratitude is concerned, we could easily forgive the crime; but we cannot so easily understand the force of prejudice, or the obliquity of intellectual vision on this one subject, which has led so accomplished a scholar to evince such a thorough-going preference of Sparta to Athens.

Mr Mitford has been termed, with equal point and justice, by Mr Patterson, in his Essay on the Character of the Athenians (p. 177), a Philippizing historian: Mr Mitchell certainly merits the analogous title of a Laeonizing critic. In his introduction, in particular, he presses to a preposterous length his notions of Lacedaemonian superiority. It were but Uttle to assign to the Dorians the paUn of ancient descent and traditionary fame, or to denominate the Spartans a nation of gentlemen; it were well even to give a temperate and restricted preference to their form of government; but it is too much to make their policy the subject of such unqualified praise, to sanction — by an expressive silence — the ideas (we had almost said the whims) of MiUler on the subject of the Spartan literature, and to d52

leftTe neulj mmotioed the daims niiich Athena had on the gntitade of Greece, and on the admiring rememfaiaiiee of all posterity. We do not mean to deny that there were p<»nta in the Spartan duuacter, which tended greailjr to inBore the stabiUty of Laoedsemon’s goTemmenty and the extension of her empire; there were certainly a dedsion in fixing on measures, aqd an indomitable perseveraooe in pursuing them, which, as opposed to the fickleness and nameless inconsistency of the Athenians, proved the very pillars of Spartan pre-eminence. But what else was there which could make the Lacedsemonians proper subjects ai such lofty enlogium! Was it the cultivation of the arts of civil and domestic comfort! In these the Athiians are acknowledged, by the unanimous voice of a not too indulgent antiquity, to have taken precedence of all other lUiropean natiftuw. Was it the uniform direction towards war, which was given to all the mgies of Spartan citixens? This is certainly, in many — and these the highest — points of view, a very questionable excellence; nor will the resUesB ambition of Attica, to which the histcwian most refer her downfiUl, and which the philanthro^Hst mioBt bewail as having proved for many years the scourge of Greece, form any apology for the cold-blooded and hard-hearted ferocity which too often marked the Laoedsemonian warfare. And where, after all, is the boasted superiority of the Dorians in the art of war f Few indeed were the great captains that arose among thn, — not one for ten who shine in the annals of Athens; their best generals were often mere pigmies, when compared with those mai of genius and renown who led her armies to victory; the craSby Pausanius, and the cunning Lysander, perhaps even the chivalrous Brasidas, the heroic Ageailaus, and the devoted Lieonidas, make but a tiny figure in the page of history, beside the bold Miltiades and the subtle Themistocles, the versatile Alcibiades, the patriotic Thrasybulus, and the philosophic Xenophon.

But will it be urged that there was something in the constitution of Lacedaemon, and in the habits of the peojde, which produced among them a more sterling morality, and gave assurance to the other states, that by them they might reasonably expect to be left masters of their own, and to be treated on general occasions with courtesy and kindness?’ (Introd,, p. 9.) It will be hard, at least, to draw this inference from Grecian history. From the great historian of the Feloponnesian war, spoken of by Mitford (Hist vol. iii. p. 9), whom Mr Mitchell will consider a most competent authority, as possessed ‘of uncommon abilities, and still more uncommon impartiality’ we could only deduce, regarding the character of the Spartans, that it was one of almost unredeemed selfishness, — cool, calculating, grasping, revengeful. It is absolutely laughable to find Mr Mitchell ranking among the virtues which prevailed in Sparta, ‘a sense of what belonged to others,’ when we reflect, that stealing was there a polite accomplishment, sanctioned by the state, and most sedulously and conscientiously cultivated by the subjects. And nearly as great was our amusement, when we read his glowing invectives against the oppression which Athens practised upon her foreign dependencies and tributary states, and reflected, at the same time, that his much-loved and much-praised Lacedsemon, was not less arbitrary and severe towards her Perioeci, whom she uniformly treated with as lanoh haughtiness as ever William the Conqueror and his Norman aristocracy dilayed towards the Saxon serfs, on whom they trampled. The land which the members of this degraded caste held, was taxed by the state (t. e,, the Spartan chiefs), and thus applied to confirm the dominion of their masters; they were bereft of all the rights of citizenship; they had no vote in the legislative assembly; and iatermarrifige between them and the Dorian conquerors of Laoonia was a thing unlawful and unknown. The state of society, therefore, resembled that which pervaded Europe during the middle liges, — a feudal aristocracy I’uling proudly over the subject tillers of the soil, and concerting all their measures for the secure maintenance of a jealous and insolent domination.’ It is hardly necessary to add, that, if the Spartans treated the Periceci ill, much more harsh was their treatment of the Helots. The comin<^ story about their exhibition of the intoxicated Helot, &B a warning to their children, while it does honour to ^eir temperance, affixes an indelible blot on their huma- *>ity. So cruelly and tyrannically was their power in general employed, that the Helots were always on the watch for the misfortunes of their lord6; and such, accordingly, was the danger which naturally and most deservedly ensued to the Spartans themselves, that, when an alliance was made with Athens, after the battles of Delium and Amphipolis, one express condition was, that the Athenians should assist them in the event of a revolt of their slaves (Tkuofd V. 23), a condition which, in consequence of the oniMOAlly mild Blave-flystem of Athensy needed not to be made reciprocaL

Athens has been often upbraided on account of ber cruelty in war; and these upbraidings she certainly did much to deserve. Bnt the fault was one rather of the age than of the individual nation; the spirit of the times was prone to military severity; and the blame, in the cases where Athens erred, is by no means imputable to her form of government; for the stem oligarchy of Lacedsemon -waa not guiltless of similar enormities. Witness the g;rataitons and wanton punishment inflicted on those brave bat unfortunate men, who had been compelled, by the vicissitudes of warfare, to lay down their arms, and who, after languishing long in the prisons of Attica, had returned, full of new hopes and aspirations, to the land of their fothers. That land received them; but it was only to bbist their h<^>es, by decreeing, on the much-abused plan of state necessity, that they should be degraded finom the rank — in many cases of high eminence — which they had formerly held, rendered incapable of office in the Lacedaemonian government, and deprived of the right of traffic, — a right which was not denied even to the despised Perioeci. {Thucyd,, V. 34.) And witness also, in still more melancholy confirmation of the truth of our remark, the conduct of the Spartans, when Brasidas required an addition to his forces, in order to foment and strengthen rebellion among the Thradan dependencies of Athens. Afraid to weaken their internal defenbes, and unwilling to abandon a design which the bravery and address of Brasidas might be expected admirably to accomplish, they fell upon an expedient of state policy, for the atrocity of its deceit perhaps unmatched in history. They proclaimed to the Helots, that as many of them as thought themselves able for the duties, and worthy of the dignity of Spartan citizens, should come forward, and submit themselves to a trial for this proud distinction. Two thousand being selected, they were adorned with chaplets, and went round the temples, in solemn procession, in the guise of freemen. But their imaginary freedom was of short duration. It was from men of courage and enterprise that danger was apprehended; to find out the most elastic and aspiring minds among the Helots the lying proclamation had been made; and very speedily, therefore, the chosen two thousand mysteriously disappeared. {Thueyd,y iv. 80.)

The greatest reproach of Athens unquestionably ii that, while she was the most wealthy and powerful, she ‘was also the most dissolute of Grecian cities; and much, on the other hand, has been said of Lacedsemonian virtue. What the public virtue of the Spartans sometimes was, we have ab-eady partially shown. Of their private life less by &r is known than of that of the Athenians; and perhaps to this, if we may draw any inference from the disclosures which are made with regard to other nations, by unrolling the records of domestic Ufe, they may be indebted for their escape from similar — although, we doubt not, gentler — censure. Enough, however, appears in the scattered hints of ancient history to assure us, that, about the dose of the Peloponnesian war, the austerity of Spartan morals suffered a grievous declension, insomuch that Xenophon, or the anonymous author of the treatise on the IJaconian constitution (cap. xiv. § 3), declares, that those -who had formerly feared to be seen with money in their possession, now openly plumed themselves on their riches and grandeur. Wealth attended upon conquest; luxury and still increasing avarice grew with the growth of their resources; and these, superinduced upon the hard and griping selfishness of Sparta, formed a character scarcely less unlovely than that of the now degenerate Athenians. And what must have been the state of morality in Lacedsemon, when (almost as the direct consequence of those laws of feudal heritage, which made the Doric lords of the soil * a nation of gentlemen’) we find it recorded by Polybius as an ancient and prevailing practice, for two or three brothers to marry one wife, and to rear her offspring as their common family?

But, although the Spartans seem not greatly to have excelled the Athenians in morals, perhaps their religion may have been less exceptionable. So at least thinks Mr Mitchell, and edifies his readers with a long discussion of the simplicity and purity of Lacedaemonian idolatry. Indeed, were it not for the uniform and strongly marked veneration which he evinces for the Scriptures, whenever he has occasion to mention them, his introduction would almost have led us to suspect, that, in reference at least to the worship of that Apollo, whose companions were the graces, he could sympathize with Mr Gibbon’s encomiums on the ’ elegant mythology ’ of the ancients. But, while we are bound completely to exonerate him from the sus-> picion of any such perverse sympathy, we cannot but express our wonder at even the comparatite praises which he lavishes on the religion of LacediBmon. Wherein consisted the superiority of that superstition which revered Jnpiter Hellanius, or him who was the coryphaeus of the muses, to that which bowed before the bounteous’Ceres, or Jove*s quick-eyed daughter, the guardian power of, Athens t Was it in its deeper solemnity f Let this be proved, otherwise than by an apocryphal response of the Ammonian Jupiter. Was it in the more frequent celebration of its rites? Let Xenophon bear witness, that Athens surpassed every other Grecian city in the number of her religious festivals. Was it in the amount of instruction which was communicated to its votaries! Listen to the solemn disclosures of Eleusis, so far as they have escaped the safeguard of the golden key, and you will find every reason to believe that they consisted of a dark embodying of the doctrine of a future retribution, which is indeed the sum of Nature’s religion. Was it in the supposed attributes and excellencies of the imaginary beings who were the objects of such deluded adoration f If so, let us be told where lies, and whence is drawn, the difference between the moral effects — produced on the one hand, by worshipping a personification of brightness, and healing, and defence, and avenging justice, such as was the god of the silver bow — and, on the other, by paying religious veneration to a character, comprising those notions of virgin purity, and wisdom, and strength, and sure deliverance, which entered into the idea of the Panathenaic goddess. Surely the one series of qualities does not greatly excel the other; and hence, if it be remembered, that the same inadequacy of conception adheres to both these ideal divinities, that Apollo is no more a perfect impersonation of the one aggregate abstraction than Minerva of the other, — the difficulty of making out in this way a feasible “rindication of Mr Mitchell’s expressed preference, will appear sufficiently manifest. In truth, while we would vnah to steer clear of the nnphilosophic error of contenting ourselves with including all the superstitions of antiquity under the vague generality of polytheistic systems, of imagining that the results of all of them must be precisdy identical, and of neglecting to inquire into the specific traits which distinguish the opinions of different tribes, — and while we not only admit, but strenuously assert, the important influence which their respective sentiments in regard to the nature of higher power, and of man’s connection with another world, must of necessity have exerted in moulding their national dispositionsi — we yet very much fear that too little is known of the interior mechanism of their religious mysteries, to enable us to form a comparative estimate of their demerits, with any rational hope of arriving at a definite and well-ascertained conclusion. Ruinous and debasing as all idolatry must ever be, we do not think that there is enough of evidence to justify the af&rmation, that the form of it which prevailed at Athens was more potent than that which the Spartans most approved, in putting forth its poisonous energies.

Need we prosecute this inquiry farther, and contrast the literature of Athens, which has enshrined her name in the grateful affection of all posterity, with that ’ vox et praterea nihil,* which proceeds from Müller, and is re-echoed by Mr Mitchell, on the subject of the Spartan ’ intelligence? ‘That, up to the Persian war, mental excellence existed in Sparta in the utmost perfection * {Introd p. viii.), is the bold and novel asseveration which the one of these writers conceives to be fully borne out by the proofs adduced in the work of the other. But to pass over the fact, that in scarcely any instance is more known than the names of these heroes of Spartan literature, and that a thoughtless and ungrateful posterity has unaccountably neglected to preserve their works as an imperishable monument of their fame, — may we be permitted to ask how the total eclipse of the intellect of Sparta came to be so precisely coincident with her arrival at her loftiest eminence among the states of Greece? Such is not at least a conunon phenomenon in the history of nations. The literature of Rome reached its highest pitch of refinement, when, under the sway of Augustus, her brick houses were exchanged for palaces of marble; that of Athens attained its acm, when Pericles ruled and aggrandized and adorned his country; — what, then, became of the historians and poets of Lacedsemon, when, after a protracted struggle, she took political precedence of Attica? What shall we think of its former perfection, when, at the time of her greatest glory — a time which, in other nations, has been marked by the most vigorous developement of mind — it was so sickly, that scarce a name remains to rescue it from the charge of utter extinction! What must we infer regarding the previous luxuriance of this tender plant, when we find it all leafless and withered, at the very time when it might have been expected to bud and blossom most brightly f

It is singular enough, that almost every thing we know

«3j8 appendix. of the institniioiis, and the policy, and even the literature of Sparta, we learn from the writings of that remarkable people, between whose literature and that of their political rivals, we are so much surprised at meeting with even an insinuated comparison. Bnt the fact is, tlt the Lacedaemonians, a nation of warriors, for the most part regarded literature as unmanly; ’ their whole system of life and government was rigid, monotonous, unexpansive, and inherently adverse to mental developement. They thus voluntarily abandoned man’s noblest distinction; and in the comparative neglect with which posterity has treated them, they have reaped a just reward. Athenian manners and pohcy, on the other hand, were so framed as to encourage and foster the bold and uncramped evolution of intellectual power. Their cultivation of feeling and impressibility was sometimes, indeed, carried so far, as to terminate in a captious and nervous feverishness of taste; but this was only the abuse of the system by which their literary character was trained; and its general residts may be seen in the admiration which they earned from all the states of Greece, and the renown which in more modern times has been felt to be the rightful prerogative of Athens. The single example of the works of that author, on whom Mr Mitchell has so happily bestowed his labours, will show the remarkable pitch of mental cultivation to which Athens had attained. When we reflect, that, in those stupendous structures, where all the free-bom males of Attica met from time to time in festive convocation to decide the palm of comic rivalry, the poet could, with a reasonable hope of being generally understood and appreciated (and such must have been his hope, if he wished to strike the fancy and elicit the acclamations of his audience), parody the strains of iEschylus and Pindar, Sophocles and Euripides; and when we consider how few auditors in a British theatre could possibly recognise or value a burlesque of Shakspeare or Collins, Home or Addison, we have matter enough for amazement in the acute perception and correct knowledge on literary subjects which must have pervaded Athenian society to its very basis; and we may well believe that the archives of the Doric tribes will need to be more carefully examined than they have yet been, ere they can afford to this exhibition of intellect, so frequent at the Athenian Dionysia, even the faintest semblance of a parallel.