be as shapely as possible; which being their calling, they are held in
great honour. And when the young prince is seven years old he is put
upon a horse and taken to the riding-masters, and begins to go out
hunting. And at fourteen years of age he is handed over to the royal
schoolmasters, as they are termed: these are four chosen men, reputed to
be the best among the Persians of a certain age; and one of them is the
wisest, another the justest, a third the most temperate, and a fourth
the most valiant. The first instructs him in the magianism of Zoroaster,
the son of Oromasus, which is the worship of the Gods, and teaches him
also the duties of his royal office; the second, who is the justest,
teaches him always to speak the truth; the third, or most temperate,
forbids him to allow any pleasure to be lord over him, that he may be
accustomed to be a freeman and king indeed,--lord of himself first,
and not a slave; the most valiant trains him to be bold and fearless,
telling him that if he fears he is to deem himself a slave; whereas
Pericles gave you, Alcibiades, for a tutor Zopyrus the Thracian, a slave
of his who was past all other work. I might enlarge on the nurture and
education of your rivals, but that would be tedious; and what I have
said is a sufficient sample of what remains to be said. I have only
to remark, by way of contrast, that no one cares about your birth or
nurture or education, or, I may say, about that of any other Athenian,
unless he has a lover who looks after him. And if you cast an eye on
the wealth, the luxury, the garments with their flowing trains, the
anointings with myrrh, the multitudes of attendants, and all the other
bravery of the Persians, you will be ashamed when you discern your own
inferiority; or if you look at the temperance and orderliness and ease
and grace and magnanimity and courage and endurance and love of toil
and desire of glory and ambition of the Lacedaemonians--in all these
respects you will see that you are but a child in comparison of them.
Even in the matter of wealth, if you value yourself upon that, I must
reveal to you how you stand; for if you form an estimate of the wealth
of the Lacedaemonians, you will see that our possessions fall far short
of theirs. For no one here can compete with them either in the extent
and fertility of their own and the Messenian territory, or in the number
of their slaves, and especially of the Helots, or of their horses, or of
the an