Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/356

 340 HISTORY OF GREECE. this alludes to the Lykurgean discipline and constitution, vhicli Thucydides must thus have conceived as introduced about B. c. 830-820, coinciding with something near the commencement of the reign of king Teleklus. In so far as it is possible to form an opinion, amidst evidence at once so scanty and so discordant, J incline to adopt the opinion of Thucydides as to the time at which the Lykurgean constitution was introduced at Sparta. The state of " eunomy " and good order which that constitution brought about, combined with the healing of great previous internal sedition, which had tended much to enfeeble them, is represented (and with great plausibility) as the grand cause of the victorious career beginning with king Teleklus, the conqueror of Amykloe, Pharis, and Geronthrac. Therefore it would seem, in the absence of better evidence, that a date, connecting the fresh stimulus of the new discipline with the reign of Teleklus, is more probable than any epoch either later or earlier. 1 1 Mr. Clinton fixes the legislation of Lykurgus, " in conformity with Thu cydides," at about 817 B. c., and his regency at 852 B. c., about thirty-five years previous (Fasti Hellen. v. i. c. 7, p. 141) : he also places the Olympiad of Iphitus B. c. 828 (F. H. vol. ii. p. 410 ; App. c. 22). In that chapter, Mr. Clinton collects and discusses the various statements respecting the date of Lykurgus : compare, also, Larchcr ad Hcroclot. i. 67, and Chronologic, pp. 486-492. The differences in these statements must, after all, be taken as they stand, for they cannot be reconciled except by the help of arbitrary suppositions. which only mislead us by producing a show of agreement where there is none in reality. I agree with Mr. Clinton, in thinking that the assertion of Thucydides is here to be taken as the best authority. But I altogether dis- sent from the proceeding which he (in common with Larcher, Wcsseling, Sir John Marsham, and others) employs with regard to the passage of Herodotus, where that author calls Lykurgus the guardian and uncle of Labotas (of the Eurystheneid line). Mr. Clinton says: "From the notoriety of the fact that Lycurgus was ascribed to the other house (the Prokleids), it is manifest thet the passage must be corrupted'" (p. 144); and he then goes on to correct the text of Herodotus, agreeably to the proposition of Sir J. Marsham. This proceeding seems to me inadmissible. The text of Herodotus reads perfectly well, and is not contradicted by anything to be found elsewhere i Herodotus himself: moreover, we have here a positive guarantee of its accuracy, for Mr. Clinton himself admits that it stood in the days of Pausa- nias just as we now read it (Pausan. iii. 2, 3). By what right, then, do wa niter it ? or what do we gain by doing so ? Our only right to do so, is, th assumption that there must have been uniformity of belief and means of