Books: Works, V3

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21

_So_. The whole thing can hardly be so shortly disposed of,
friend. You must take the different departments, one by one, and
find out our views upon the Gods, then upon parents, upon marriage,
and so for the rest. But I will let you know at once what we think
about the young, and how we treat them when higher things begin to
dawn upon their intelligence, when their frames begin to set and to
be capable of endurance. Then you will grasp our purpose in
imposing these exercises upon them and insisting on physical
effort; our view is not bounded by the contests, and directed to
their carrying off prizes there--of course only a small proportion
of them ever reach that point; no; the indirect benefit that we
secure for their city and themselves is of more importance. There
is another contest in which all good citizens get prizes, and its
wreaths are not of pine or wild olive or parsley, but of complete
human happiness, including individual freedom and political
independence, wealth and repute, enjoyment of our ancient ritual,
security of our dear ones, and all the choicest boons a man might
ask of Heaven. It is of these materials that the wreath I tell you
of is woven; and they are provided by that contest for which this
training and these toils are the preparation.

_An_. You strange man! you had all these grand prizes up your
sleeve, and you told me a tale of apples and parsley and tufts of
wild olive and pine.

_So_. Ah, you will not think those such trifles either, when
you take my meaning. They are manifestations of the same spirit,
all small parts of that greater contest, and of the wreath of
happiness I told you of. But it is true that instead of beginning
at the beginning I was carried away to the meetings at the Isthmus
and Olympia and Nemea. However, we have plenty of time, and you
profess curiosity; it is a simple matter to go back to the
beginning, to that many-prized contest which I tell you is the real
end of all.

_An_. That will be better; we are more likely to prosper on
the high road; perhaps I shall even be cured of my inclination to
laugh at any one I see priding himself on his olive or parsley
wreath. But I propose that we go into the shade over there and sit
down on the benches, not to be interrupted by these rounds of
cheering. And indeed I must confess I have had enough of this sun;
how it scorches one's bare head! I did not want to look like a
foreigner, so I left my hat at home. But the year is at its
hottest; the dog-star, as you call it, is burning everything up,
and not leaving a drop of moisture in the air; and the noonday sun
right overhead gives an absolutely intolerable heat. I cannot make
out how you at your age, so far from dripping like me, never turn a
hair; instead of looking about for some hospitable shade, you take
your sunning quite kindly.

_So_. Ah, Anacharsis, these useless toils, these perpetual
clay-baths, these miseries in the sand and the open air, are
prophylactics against the sun's rays; _we_ need no hats to
ward off his shafts. But come along.

And you are not to regard me as an authority whose statements are
to be accepted as matter of faith; wherever you think I have not
made out my case, you are to contradict me at once and get the
thing straight. So we shall stand to win; either you, after
relieving your mind of all objections that strike you, will reach a
firm conviction, or, failing that, I shall have found out my
mistake. And in the latter case, Athens will owe you a debt that
she cannot be too quick to acknowledge; for your instructions and
corrections of my ideas will redound to her advantage. I shall keep
nothing back; I shall produce it all in public, stand up in the
assembly and say: _Men of Athens, I drew up for you such laws as
I thought would most advantage you; but this stranger_--and at
that word I point to you, Anacharsis--_this stranger from Scythia
has been wise enough to show me my mistake and teach me better
ways. Let his name be inscribed as your benefactor's; set him up in
bronze beside your name-Gods, or by Athene on the citadel_. And
be assured that Athens will not be ashamed to learn what is for her
good from a barbarian and an alien.

_An_. Ah, now I have a specimen of that Attic irony which I
have so often heard of. I am an unsettled wanderer who lives on his
cart and goes from land to land, who has never dwelt in a city, nor
even seen one till now; how should I lay down a constitution, or
give lessons to a people that is one with the soil it lives on
[Footnote: See _Athenians_ in Notes.], and for all these ages
has enjoyed the blessings of perfect order in this ancient city?
How, above all, instruct that Solon whose native gift all men say
it is to know how a state may best be governed, and what laws will
bring it happiness? Nevertheless, you shall be my legislator too; I
will contradict you, where I think you wrong, for my own better
instruction. And here we are, safely covered from the sun's
pursuit, and this cool stone invites us to take our ease. Start now
and give me your reasons. Why seize upon the rising generation so
young, and subject them to such toils? How do you develop perfect
virtue out of clay and training? What is the exact contribution to
it of dust and summersaults? That and that only is my first
curiosity. All the rest you shall give me by degrees as occasion
rises later. But, Solon, one thing you must bear in mind: you are
talking to a barbarian. What I mean is, you must be simple, and
brief; I am afraid I shall forget the beginning, if a very abundant
flow follows.

_So_. Why, you had better work the sluice yourself, whenever
the word-stream is either turbid or diverging into a wrong
channel. As for mere continuance, you can cut that up by questions.
However, so long as what I have to say is not irrelevant, I do not
know that length matters. There is an ancient procedure in the
Areopagus, our murder court. When the members have ascended the
hill, and taken their seats to decide a case of murder or
deliberate maiming or arson, each side is allowed to address the
court in turn, prosecution and defence being conducted either by
the principals or by counsel. As long as they speak to the matter
in hand, the court listens silently and patiently. But if either
prefaces his speech with an appeal to its benevolence, or attempts
to stir its compassion or indignation by irrelevant considerations
--and the legal profession have numberless ways of playing upon
juries--, the usher at once comes up and silences him. The court is
not to be trifled with or have its food disguised with condiments,
but to be shown the bare facts. Now, Anacharsis, I hereby create
you a temporary Areopagite; you shall hear me according to that
court's practice, and silence me if you find me cajoling you; but
as long as I keep to the point, I may speak at large. For there is
no sun here to make length a burden to you; we have plenty of shade
and plenty of time.

_An_. That sounds reasonable. And I take it very kindly that
you should have given me this incidental view of the proceedings on
the Areopagus; they are very remarkable, quite a pattern of the way
a judicial decision should be arrived at. Let your speech be
regulated accordingly, and the Areopagite of your appointment shall
listen as his office requires.

_So_. Well, I must start with a brief preliminary statement of
our views upon city and citizens. A city in our conception is not
the buildings--walls, temples, docks, and so forth; these are no
more than the local habitation that provides the members of the
community with shelter and safety; it is in the citizens that we
find the root of the matter; they it is that replenish and organize
and achieve and guard, corresponding in the city to the soul in
man. Holding this view, we are not indifferent, as you see, to our
city's body; that we adorn with all the beauty we can impart to it;
it is provided with internal buildings, and fenced as securely as
may be with external walls. But our first, our engrossing
preoccupation is to make our citizens noble of spirit and strong of
body. So they will in peace time make the most of themselves and
their political unity, while in war they will bring their city
through safe with its freedom and well-being unimpaired. Their
early breeding we leave to their mothers, nurses, and tutors, who
are to rear them in the elements of a liberal education. But as
soon as they attain to a knowledge of good and evil, when reverence
and shame and fear and ambition spring up in them, when their
bodies begin to set and strengthen and be equal to toil, then we
take them over, and appoint them both a course of mental
instruction and discipline, and one of bodily endurance. We are not
satisfied with mere spontaneous development either for body or
soul; we think that the addition of systematic teaching will
improve the gifted and reform the inferior. We conform our practice
to that of the farmer, who shelters and fences his plants while
they are yet small and tender, to protect them from the winds, but,
as soon as the shoot has gathered substance, prunes it and lets the
winds beat upon it and knock it about, and makes it thereby the
more fruitful.

We first kindle their minds with music and arithmetic, teach them
to write and to read with expression. Then, as they get on, we
versify, for the better impressing their memories, the sayings of
wise men, the deeds of old time, or moral tales. And as they hear
of worship won and works that live in song, they yearn ever more,
and are fired to emulation, that they too may be sung and marvelled
at by them that come after, and have their Hesiod and their Homer.
And when they attain their civil rights, and it is time for them to
take their share in governing--but all this, it may be, is
irrelevant. My subject was not how we train their souls, but why we
think fit to subject them to the toils we do. I will silence myself
without waiting for the usher, or for you, my Areopagite, who have
been too considerate, methinks, in letting me maunder on out of
bounds all this way.

_An_. Another point of Areopagite procedure, please, Solon.
When a speaker passes over essential matters in silence, has the
court no penalty for him?

_So_. Why? I do not take you.

_An_. Why, you propose to pass by the question of the soul,
which is the noblest and the most attractive to me, and discuss the
less essential matters of gymnasiums and physical exercise.

_So_. You see, my dear sir, I have my eye on our original
conditions; I do not want to divert the word-stream; it might
confuse your memory with its irregular flow. However, I will do
what I can in the way of a mere summary for this branch of the
subject; as for a detailed examination of it, that must be
deferred.

Well, we regulate their sentiments partly by teaching them the laws
of the land, which are inscribed in large letters and exposed at
the public expense for all to read, enjoining certain acts and
forbidding others, and partly by making them attend good men, who
teach them to speak with propriety, act with justice, content
themselves with political equality, eschew evil, ensue good, and
abstain from violence; sophist and philosopher are the names by
which these teachers are known. Moreover, we pay for their
admission to the theatre, where the contemplation of ancient heroes
and villains in tragedy or comedy has its educational effect of
warning or encouragement. To the comic writers we further give the
licence of mockery and invective against any of their fellow
citizens whose conduct they find discreditable; such exposure may
act both directly upon the culprits, and upon others by way of
example.

_An_. Ah, I have seen the tragedians and comedians you speak
of, at least if the former are men in heavy stilted shoes, and
clothes all picked out with gold bands; they have absurd head-
pieces with vast open mouths, from inside which comes an enormous
voice, while they take great strides which it seems to me must be
dangerous in those shoes. I think there was a festival to Dionysus
going on at the time. Then the comedians are shorter, go on their
own feet, are more human, and smaller-voiced; but their head-pieces
are still more ridiculous, so much so that the audience was
laughing at them like one man. But to the others, the tall ones,
every one listened with a dismal face; I suppose they were sorry
for them, having to drag about those great clogs.

_So_. Oh no, it was not for the actors that they were sorry.
The poet was probably setting forth some sad tale of long ago, with
fine speeches that appealed to the audience's feelings and drew
tears from them. I dare say you observed also some flute-players,
with other persons who stood in a circle and sang in chorus. These
too are things that have their uses. Well, our youths' souls are
made susceptible and developed by these and similar influences.

Then their bodily training, to which your curiosity was especially
directed, is as follows. When their first pithless tenderness is
past, we strip them and aim at hardening them to the temperature of
the various seasons, till heat does not incommode nor frost
paralyse them. Then we anoint them with oil by way of softening
them into suppleness. It would be absurd that leather, dead stuff
as it is, should be made tougher and more lasting by being softened
with oil, and the living body get no advantage from the same
process. Accordingly we devise elaborate gymnastic exercises,
appoint instructors of each variety, and teach one boxing, another
the pancratium. They are to be habituated to endurance, to meet
blows half way, and never shrink from a wound. This method works
two admirable effects in them: makes them spirited and heedless of
bodily danger, and at the same time strong and enduring. Those whom
you saw lowering their heads and wrestling learn to fall safely and
pick themselves up lightly, to shove and grapple and twist, to
endure throttling, and to heave an adversary off his legs.
_Their_ acquirements are not unserviceable either; the one
great thing they gain is beyond dispute; their bodies are hardened
and strengthened by this rough treatment. Add another advantage of
some importance: it is all so much practice against the day of
battle. Obviously a man thus trained, when he meets a real enemy,
will grapple and throw him the quicker, or if he falls will know
better how to get up again. All through we are reckoning with that
real test in arms; we expect much better results from our material
if we supple and exercise their bodies before the armour goes on,
so increasing their strength and efficiency, making them light and
wiry in themselves (though the enemy will rather be impressed with
their weight).

You see how it will act. Something may surely be expected from
those in arms who even without them would be considered awkward
customers; they show no inert pasty masses of flesh, no cadaverous
skinniness, they are not shade-blighted women; they do not quiver
and run with sweat at the least exertion, and pant under their
helmets as soon as a midday sun like this adds to the burden. What
would be the use of creatures who should be overpowered by thirst
and dust, unnerved at sight of blood, and as good as dead before
they came within bow-shot or spear-thrust of the enemy? But our
fellows are ruddy and sunburnt and steady-eyed, there is spirit
and fire and virility in their looks, they are in prime condition,
neither shrunken and withered nor running to corpulence, but well
and truly proportioned; the waste superfluity of their tissues they
have sweated out; the stuff that gives strength and activity,
purged from all inferior admixture, remains part of their
substance. The winnowing fan has its counterpart in our gymnastics,
which blow away chaff and husks, and sift and collect the clean
grain.

The inevitable result is sound health and great capacity of
enduring fatigue. A man like this does not sweat for a trifle, and
seldom shows signs of distress. Returning to my winnowing simile--
if you were to set fire on the one hand to pure wheat grain, and on
the other to its chaff and straw, the latter would surely blaze up
much the quicker; the grain would burn only gradually, without a
blaze and not all at once; it would smoulder slowly and take much
longer to consume. Well, disease or fatigue being similarly applied
to this sort of body will not easily find weak spots, nor get the
mastery of it lightly. Its interior is in good order, its exterior
strongly fortified against such assaults, so that it gives neither
admission nor entertainment to the destroying agencies of sun or
frost. To any place that begins to weaken under toil comes an
accession from the abundant internal heat collected and stored up
against the day of need; it fills the vacancy, restores the vital
force, and lengthens endurance to the utmost. Past exertion means
not dissipation but increase of force, which can be fanned into
fresh life.

Further, we accustom them to running, both of the long distance and
of the sprinting kind. And they have to run not on hard ground with
a good footing, but in deep sand on which you can neither tread
firmly nor get a good push off, the foot sinking in. Then, to fit
them to leap a trench or other obstacle, we make them practise with
leaden dumb-bells in their hands. And again there are distance
matches with the javelin. Yes, and you saw in the gymnasium a
bronze disk like a small buckler, but without handle or straps; you
tried it as it lay there, and found it heavy and, owing to its
smooth surface, hard to handle. Well, that they hurl upwards and
forwards, trying who can get furthest and outdo his competitors--an
exercise that strengthens the shoulders and braces the fingers and
toes.

As to the clay and dust that first moved your laughter, I will tell
you now why they are provided. In the first place, that a fall may
be not on a hard surface, but soft and safe. Secondly, greater
slipperiness is secured by sweat and clay combined (you compared
them to eels, you remember); now this is neither useless nor
absurd, but contributes appreciably to strength and activity. An
adversary in that condition must be gripped tightly enough to
baffle his attempts at escape. To lift up a man who is all over
clay, sweat, and oil, and who is doing his very best to get away
and slip through your fingers, is no light task, I assure you. And
I repeat that all these things have their military uses too: you
may want to take up a wounded friend and convey him out of danger;
you may want to heave an enemy over your head and make off with
him. So we give them still harder tasks in training, that they may
be abundantly equal to the less.

The function we assign to dust is just the reverse, to prevent one
who is gripped from getting loose. After learning in the clay to
retain their hold on the elusive, they are accustomed in turn to
escape themselves even from a firm grasp. Also, we believe the dust
forms a plaster that keeps in excessive sweat, prevents waste of
power, and obviates the ill effects of the wind playing upon a body
when its pores are all relaxed and open. Besides which, it cleanses
the skin and makes it glossy. I should like to put side by side one
of the white creatures who live sheltered lives and, after washing
off his dust and clay, any of the Lyceum frequenters you should
select, and then ask you which you would rather resemble. I know
you would make your choice at the first glance, without waiting to
see what they could do; you would rather be solid and well-knit
than delicate and soft and white for want of the blood that had
hidden itself away out of sight.

Such are the exercises we prescribe to our young men, Anacharsis;
we look to find them good guardians of their country and bulwarks
of our freedom; thus we defeat our enemies if they invade us, and
so far overawe our immediate neighbours that they mostly
acknowledge our supremacy and pay us tribute. During peace also we
find our account in their being free from vulgar ambitions and from
the insolence generated by idleness; they have these things to fill
their lives and occupy their leisure. I told you of a prize that
all may win and of a supreme political happiness; these are
attained when we find our youth in the highest condition alike for
peace and war, intent upon all that is noblest.

_An_. I see, Solon; when an enemy invades, you anoint yourselves
with oil, dust yourselves over, and go forth sparring at them; then
they of course cower before you and run away, afraid of getting a
handful of your sand in their open mouths, or of your dancing round
to get behind them, twining your legs tight round their bellies,
and throttling them with your elbows rammed well in under their
chin-pieces. It is true they will try the effect of arrows and
javelins; but you are so sunburnt and full-blooded, the missiles
will hurt you no more than if you were statues; you are not chaff
and husks; you will not be readily disposed of by the blows you
get; much time and attention will be required before you at last,
cut to pieces with deep wounds, have a few drops of blood extracted
from you. Have I misunderstood your figure, or is this a fair
deduction from it?

But perhaps you will take the equipment of your tragedians and
comedians, and when you get your marching orders put on those wide-
mouthed headpieces, to scare the foe with their appalling terrors;
of course, and you can put the stilted things on your feet; they
will be light for running away (if that should be advisable), or,
if you are in pursuit, the strides they lend themselves to will
make your enemy's escape impossible. Seriously now, are not these
refinements of yours all child's play--something for your idle,
slack youngsters to do? If you really want to be free and happy,
you must have other exercises than these; your training must be a
genuine martial one; no toy contests with friends, but real ones
with enemies; danger must be an element in your character-
development. Never mind dust and oil; teach them to use bow and
javelin; and none of your light darts diverted by a puff of wind;
let it be a ponderous spear that whistles as it flies; to which add
stones, a handful each, the axe, the shield, the breastplate, and
the helmet.

On your present system, I cannot help thinking you should be very
grateful to some God for not having allowed you to perish under the
attack of any half-armed band. Why, if I were to draw this little
dagger at my girdle and run amuck at your collective youth, I could
take the gymnasium without more ado; they would all run away and
not dare face the cold steel; they would skip round the statues,
hide behind pillars, and whimper and quake till I laughed again. We
should have no more of the ruddy frames they now display; they
would be another colour then, all white with terror. That is the
temper that deep peace has infused into you; you could not endure
the sight of a single plume on an enemy's crest.

_So_. Ah, Anacharsis, the Thracians who invaded us with
Eumolpus told another tale; so did your women who assailed Athens
with Hippolyta; so every one who has met us in the field. My dear
sir, it does not follow from our exercising our youths without arms
that we expose them in the same condition to the real thing; the
independent bodily development once complete, training in arms
follows; and to this they come much the fitter for their previous
work.

_An_. Where is your military gymnasium, then? I have been all
over Athens, and seen no sign of it.

_So_. But if you stay longer you will find that every man has
arms enough, for use at the proper time; you will see our plumes
and horse-trappings, our horses and horsemen; these last amounting
to a quarter of our citizens. But to carry arms and be girded with
scimetars we consider unnecessary in peace time; indeed there is a
fine for going armed in town without due cause, or producing
weapons in public. _You_ of course may be pardoned for living
in arms. The want of walls gives conspiracy its chance; you have
many enemies; you never know when somebody may come upon you in
your sleep, pull you out of your cart, and dispatch you. And then,
in the mutual distrust inseparable from an independence that
recognizes no law or constitution, the sword must be always at hand
to repel violence.

_An_. Oho, you think the wearing of arms, except on occasion,
unnecessary; you are careful of your weapons, avoid wear and tear
for them, and put them away for use when the time comes; but the
bodies of your youth you keep at work even when no danger presses;
you knock them about and dissolve them in sweat; instead of
husbanding their strength for the day of need, you expend it idly
on clay and dust. How is that?

_So_. I fancy you conceive of force as something similar to
wine or water or liquid of some sort. You are afraid of its
dribbling away in exercise as those might from an earthenware jar,
and by its disappearance leaving the body, which is supposed to
have no internal reserves, empty and dry. That is not the case; the
greater the drain upon it in the course of exercise, the greater
the supply; did you ever hear a story about the Hydra? cut off one
of its heads, and two immediately sprang up in its place. No, it is
the unexercised and fibreless, in whom no adequate store of
material has ever been laid up, that will peak and pine under toil.
There is a similar difference between a fire and a lamp; the same
breath that kindles the former and soon excites it to greater heat
will put out the latter, which is but ill provided to resist the
blast; it has a precarious tenure, you see.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21