ty
is provided by the State as to conclusions.

The citizens of Greece in the time of Pericles were given over to two
things which were enough to damn any individual and any nation--idleness
and superstition. The drudgery was done by slaves; the idea that a free
citizen should work was preposterous; to be useful was a disgrace. For a
time Pericles dissipated their foolish thought, but it kept cropping
out. To speak disrespectfully of the gods was to invite death, and the
philosophers who dared discuss the powers of Nature or refer to a
natural religion were safe only through the fact that their language
was usually so garlanded with the flowers of poesy that the people did
not comprehend its import.

Very early in the reign of Pericles a present of forty thousand bushels
of wheat had been sent from the King of Egypt; at least it was called a
present--probably it was an exacted tribute. This wheat was to be
distributed among the free citizens of Athens, and accordingly when the
cargo arrived there was a fine scramble among the people to show that
they were free. Everybody produced a certificate and demanded wheat.

Some time before this Pericles had caused a law to be passed providing
that in order to be a citizen a man must be descended from a father and
a mother who were both Athenians. This law was aimed directly at
Themistocles, the predecessor of Pericles, whose mother was an alien. It
is true the mother of Themistocles was an alien, but her son was
Themistocles. The law worked and Themistocles was declared a bastardicus
and banished.

Before unloading our triremes of wheat, let the fact be stated that laws
aimed at individuals are apt to prove boomerangs. "Thee should build no
dark cells," said Elizabeth Fry to the King of France, "for thy children
may occupy them." Some years after Pericles had caused this law to be
passed defining citizenship, he loved a woman who had the misfortune to
be born at Miletus. According to his own law the marriage of Pericles
to this woman was not legal--she was only his slave, not his wife. So
finally Pericles had to go before the people and ask for the repeal of
the law that he had made, in order that his own children might be made
legitimate. Little men in shovel hats and knee-breeches who hotly fume
against the sin of a man marrying his deceased wife's sister are usually
men whose wives are not deceased, and have no sisters.

The wheat arrived at the Piraeus, and the citizens