i 3 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



vanced nations of our century have come to the conclusion that the old 

 Hellenic form of government by representatives of the people was the 

 most sensible, after all ; that armed citizens can fight as well as, if not 

 better than, standing armies, and that the ancient method of appointing 

 and removing public functionaries by a majority of votes was far supe- 

 rior to the par ordre du mufti system of Mohammedan and Christian 

 sultans. Religious toleration, which the fearful experience of the mid- 

 dle ages has made the watchword of all liberals and reformers, was 

 practised among the Greeks and republican Romans to an extent which 

 we are as far yet from having reattained as their freedom of speech, of 

 commercial affairs, and of domestic life. Popular education, the national 

 stage, and all the fine arts, have to be emancipated from innumerable 

 prejudices and paralyzing restrictions before they can be restored to 

 their pristine prime, not to speak of the science of health nor of the 

 science of happiness, which will, perhaps, never recover from their long- 

 neglect. 



But, of all the national institutions of ancient Greece which we have 

 abolished or altered to our disadvantage, there is none whose reintro- 

 duction would be attended with greater benefits than that system of 

 physical education which so influenced the national spirit and reacted 

 upon the character of the representative Grecian heroes, statesmen, 

 and philosophers, that it may be considered as the distinguishing 

 feature of their age. At a very early period the Greeks of South- 

 ern Europe and Asia Minor had recognized the truth that, with the 

 advance of civilization and civilized modes of life, a regular system 

 of bodily training must be substituted for the lost opportunities of 

 physical exercise which Nature affords so abundantly to her children 

 in the daily functions of their wild life. "It is impossible to repress 

 luxury by legislation," says Solon, in Lucian's " Dialogues of Anachar- 

 sis," "but its influence may be counteracted by athletic games, which 

 invigorate the body and give a martial character to the amusements of 

 our young men." 



The nature of ancient weapons and the use of heavy defensive armor 

 made the development of physical force a subject of national importance, 

 but military efficiency was by no means the exclusive object of gymnas- 

 tic exercises. The law of Lycurgus provides free training-schools for the 

 thorough physical education of both sexes, and cautions parents against 

 giving their daughters in marriage before they had attained the pre- 

 scribed degree of proficiency in certain exercises, which were less orna- 

 mental and probably less popular than what we call callisthenics. Greek 

 physicians, too, prescribed a course of athletic sports against various 

 complaints, and had invented a special curriculum of gymnastics, which, 

 as ^Elian assures us, never failed to cure obesity. When the increase of 

 wealth and culture threatened to affect the manly spirit of the Hellenic 

 race, physical education was taken in hand by the public authorities in 

 almost every Grecian city; and the ablest statesmen at Athens, Thebes, 



