Sparta incorporated, under the name of freedom, the worst complexities, the most grievous and the most frivolous vexations, of slavery.

And therefore was it that Lacedaemon flourished and decayed, bequeathing to fame men only noted for hardy valour, fanatical patriotism, and profound but dishonourable craft-- attracting, indeed, the wonder of the world, but advancing no claim to its gratitude, and contributing no single addition to its intellectual stores.

But in Athens the true blessing of freedom was rightly placed--in the opinions and the soul.

Thought was the common heritage which every man might cultivate at his will.

This unshackled liberty had its convulsions and its excesses, but producing unceasing emulation and unbounded competition, an incentive to every effort, a tribunal to every claim, it broke into philosophy with the one--into poetry with the other--into the energy and splendour of unexampled intelligence with all.