124 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



But ambition never rifes except at the expenfc 

 of another. Give it whatever fpecious name you 

 pleafe, it is ever the fworn enemy of all virtue. It 

 is the fource of vices the moft dangerous and de- 

 teftable ; of jealoufy, of hatred, of intolerance, 

 and cruelty ; for every one is difpofed to gratify 

 it in his own way. It is forbidden to all men by 

 Nature and Religion, and to the greateft part of 

 fubjefts by Government. In our colleges, a lad 

 is brought up to empire, who muft be doomed, 

 for life, to fell pepper. The young people, the 

 hope of a great Nation, are there employed, for, 

 at leaft, feven years, in learning to be the firft in 

 the art of declamation, of verfification, of prat- 



miferable ftate of the country which gave it birth, and where 

 it has been reduced into pradice. 



Children, at Sparta, were taught only to obey, to love virtue, 

 to love their country, and to live in the moft intimate union, 

 till they were divided in their fchools into two claffes, of Lovers 

 and Belonged. Among the other Nations of Greece, education 

 was arbitrary ; it confifted of a great variety of exercifes, of 

 eloquence, of wreftling, of running, of pythian, of Olympic, 

 of ifthmian prizes, &c. Thefe frivolities foftered undue par- 

 tialities. Lacedemon gave Law to them all : and while the 

 fii-ft, on going to engage in the battles of their country, needed 

 the ftimulus of pay, of harangues, of trumpets, of clarions, to 

 excite their courage, it was neceflary, on the contrary, to reprefs 

 the ardor of the Lacedemonians. They Went to battle, unfti- 

 mulated by mercenary confiderations, by eloquent addrefles, to 

 the found of the flute, and finging in one grand concert, the 

 hymn of the two twin brothers, CaJIor and Pollux. 



tllng. 



