Book IV.
Chap. 7.Besides they cannot take place but in a small state[1], in which there is a possibility of a general education, and of training up the body of the people like a single family.
The laws of Minos, of Lycurgus, and of Plato, suppose a particular attention and care, which the citizens ought to have over one another's conduct. But an attention of this kind cannot be expected in the confusion, and multitude of affairs in which a large nation is intangled.
In institutions of this kind, money, as we have above observed, must be banished. But in great societies, the multiplicity, variety, embarrassment, and importance of affairs, as well as the facility of purchasing, and the slowness of exchange, require a common measure. In order to extend or support our power, we must be possessed of the means to which, by the unanimous consent of mankind, this power is annexed.
CHAP. VIII.
Explication of a Paradox of the Ancients, in respect to Manners.
THAT judicious writer Polybius informs us, that music was necessary to soften the manners of the Arcadians, who lived in a cold gloomy country; that the inhabitants of Cynete who slighted music were the cruellest of all the Greeks, and that no other town was so immersed in luxury and debauch. Plato is not afraid to affirm that there is no possibility of
- ↑ Such as were formerly the cities of Greece.
