There is no meanness in requiring that the smallest vessels should have a common measure; for the divisions of number are useful in measuring height and depth, as well as sounds and motions, upwards or downwards, or round and round.

The legislator should impress on his citizens the value of arithmetic.

No instrument of education has so much power; nothing more tends to sharpen and inspire the dull intellect.

But the legislator must be careful to instil a noble and generous spirit into the students, or they will tend to become cunning rather than wise.

This may be proved by the example of the Egyptians and Phoenicians, who, notwithstanding their knowledge of arithmetic, are degraded in their general character; whether this defect in them is due to some natural cause or to a bad legislator.