Civil and Savage Life Compared. 



and to bear manfully the blows and wounds he 

 might receive at the gymnastic exercises, or in 

 battle. He was also taught to sing the laws, 

 which were written in verse. . . . When he 

 reached the seventeenth year he retired from the 

 society of the adults and became a member of 

 that of the young men. Here his education was 

 still carried on. He exercised himself in hunt- 

 ing, wrestling, and figuring with his com- 

 panions. . . . 



" When the youth had finished their exercises, 

 and attained the legal age, they became 

 members of the class of adults ; were permitted 

 to vote in the National Assemblies, and were 

 permitted to stand as candidates for any public 

 office. They were then obliged to marry, but 

 did not take home their wives till they 

 were capable of managing their domestic 

 concerns 



" Under these wise regulations, the Republic 

 rose to glory, opulence and power, and was 

 honoured with the panegyrics of the most 

 celebrated philosophers of Greece 



" Since the conquest of Crete by the Romans, 

 the Cretans have no longer formed a separate 

 nation, nor made any figure among the states 

 and kingdoms of the world ; their noble and 

 ingenuous manners, their arts and sciences, their 

 valour and their virtues, are no more." 



The separation of the sexes seems to have been 

 an important point in the training of youth in 

 Greece, as well as the limit of age for marriage. 



The Spartans, also, were not allowed to take 

 their wives home until some time after marriage, 



