things human. To these facts we must attribute mainly their efficacy and their durability.

It must not be denied, of course, that much credit is due to Lycurgus. But his great merit consisted in this, that he rightly interpreted the character and destiny of the Spartans. Lycurgus did something, compared with what ordinary met do, in fact, a great deal, as do the great ones of humanity generally-all, in short, or nearly all, that bumanity does at all. Man, like his great original, the unseen God, is, in his little sphere, to some extent, a creator, or rather a modifier. But all that he can do, either as a lawgiver or otherwise, is as nothing compared with what he

cannot do.

As for the saying, which has been upon the lips of men for now upwards of twenty centuries, that Lycurgus, by the mere force of his ipse dixit, banished all money from Sparta except iron, it must appear to the well-read social philosopher, nay, to the mere political economist, like some nursery story, as if one should say, the king of Siam passed a law that water should not freeze in all, his kingdom, and after that day ice was never seen in all the country of the king of Siam.

Doubtless, the laws of Lycurgus, concurring with the natural traits of the Spartans, and their surrounding circumstances, to isolate the community, and to keep them in such a rude condition that iron money would suffice for the very few exchanges which would naturally take place in such an economical condition, no other than iron money may have circulated generally in Sparta for many years, for Adam Smith tells us, in his great work on the "Wealth of Nations," that even in his time there were some villages in secluded parts of Scotland in which common nails answered all the purposes of the few exchanges which took place among the inhabitants. But when, in course of time, the Spartans had acquired, by foreign conquests and other influences, other aims and other desires, than were consonant with the laws of Lycurgus, either in respect to money or other things, and when those laws were no longer a true reflex of the real character of Spartans, away went the laws of Lycurgus, and away went his iron money, affording another demonstration among many of the impotence of all attempts, either in human affairs or any other, to turn or to stem those mighty currents of eternal destiny upon which all things drift.

The main difference between the constitution of Athens and that of Sparta, as, indeed, between the constitutions of most nations, consisted in, or resulted from, the difference between the habits and character of the two people, which latter difference itself resulted partly from fundamental difference of race, and partly from difference of occupation or leading pursuit-the leading pursuit of the Spartans being war, and that of the Athenians trade. Hence it happened that, with very nearly the same forms of government, the one was practically an extreme democracy, the other a decided aristocracy--another proof how little depends upon mere law, that is, political law, since everything is according to law of some kind. The law-making power in Sparta, as well as at Athens, resided with the people; for though the Spartan Senate could propose laws, they had to be submitted to the assembly of the people, and by them ratified before they could take effect, just as was the case at Athens when the council of 500, or 400, as Solon ordained it, proposed laws, and the popular assembly adopted or rejected them. Yet while such was the

case in point of law, in point of fact the popular assembly was scarcely anything at Sparta, and almost everything at Athens.

One cause of a political nature for this difference between the Spartan and Athenian States, may have been that at Athens they had no special magistracy to represent the popular power of the State, like the Ephoralty of Sparta, which may have rendered the Spartan people generally so secure as to their political rights that they were much more indifferent about the popular assemblies than the Athenians.

The fact that the kings of Sparta were hereditary, and the Archons of Athens elective, constitutes but a small point of difference, where such a small amount of political power was wielded as by these functionaries respectively. But while, in this respect, Athens was more democratical than Sparta, in another it was decidedly less so. For at Sparta all the elective magistrates were chosen from the great body of the people, with this qualification only, that the Senate must be chosen from among those over sixty years of age, whereas at Athens the whole magistracy of the State were to be chosen from those only of a certain rank as to fortune, a large portion of the people being totally inelligible to office.

And this brings us to the most noteworthy feature in the Athenian constitution, the more noteworthy because it seems almost exactly to reflect the political ideas of Aristotle on that point. The Athenian constitution, as modified by Solon, practically ordained what Aristotle theoretically recommended-that the magistracy of the State should be chosen only from a limited class, or limited number of classes, while to the whole body of the people should be confided the all-absorbing power, not only of making laws, but of electing the magistracy. This stupendous error Solon committed, according to nearly all the historians, from constraint, deeming it impracticable, under the circumstances, to obtain the popular consent to the surrender of this vast power which they already possessed. But what excuse can be framed for Aristotle, the idol of Mr. Gillies and others, as a political philosopher, who deliberately indorsed and approved the monstrous error, and theoretically recommended it?

Solon divided the Athenians, not slaves, into four classes, according to fortune, from the first three of which alone could any of the magistracy be chosen, but all had an equal voice and right in the popular assembly -the wise idea which the Romans afterwards adopted, of giving all a vote, indeed, in the popular assembly, but a vote assayed according to fortune, duly weighed and assorted, seems never to have occurred to Solon, nor to Aristotle, as it seems, indeed, to have passed out entirely from the wisdom of the present age.

As some check to the far too great power of the popular assembly, Solon devised the feeble institution of the council of 400, afterwards enlarged to 500, a sort of elective Senate, whose only prerogative was to frame all laws before they could be submitted to the assembly of the people. The Senate, in short, was to debate matters, but the populace were to decide them. It was this provision of Solon's constitution which provoked from Anacharsis, the Scythian, who has been already referred to, the tremendous criticism, "I wonder, Solon, that you empower the wise men only to deliberate and debate upon affairs of State, and leave the decision of them to fools."

From this withering criticism of the Scythian sage we are enabled more thoroughly to appreciate the great superiority, in some important

respects at least, of the modern nations to those of antiquity in political science. For while, in the most approved modern States, the rights of the people are guarantied and protected to an extent unknown to the most democratical of the ancient nations, such a monstrosity as a popular assembly exercising either legislative or judicial authority, especially as a finality, is utterly unknown among them. For, be it known, that the popular assemblies of Greece, and even of Rome, exercised not only legislative, but in some important cases judicial authority also, so that, if we are correctly advised as to the jurisprudence of Athens, a decision of the high and world-renowned court of the Arcopagus might, in some instances, have been reviewed and reversed by a popular assembly of the Athenians. What would be thought, at the present day, of submitting an act of Parliament of the British empire to the London populace for ratification? Nay, what would be thought of a "Tammany Hall gathering," or a "grand mass meeting" before the east front of the capitol at Washington, to review a decision of the august tribunal of the Supreme Court of the United States, and to adjudge whether it should be law? Such monstrosities the ancient democracies, nay, their gravest philosophers, beheld without astonishment.

This, perhaps already too extended, review of Grecian Sociology will be concluded with this general remark, which may be safely deduced therefrom-that the average level of humanity, and more particularly of its lower strata, was considerably lower in the Grecian age than in the present; for we find that not only was slavery universal throughout the States of Greece, the most enlightened and advanced people of their age, whereas it has almost entirely disappeared from modern society, but the condition of the great artisan or mechanical class seems to have been very much inferior to what it is in modern times. The great contempt with which this class is habitually spoken of by Plato and Aristotle is incompatible with any other or different conclusion. To what causes this upheaval of humanity is referable, it is not among the specific objects of the present inquiry to consider. But some of those causes will be incidentally noticed in subsequent parts of this review.

Art. II. REMARKS ON LANDED CREDIT.

IN January, 1807, Sir Samuel Romilly moved, in the British House of Commons, for leave to bring in a bill "for making the freehold estates of persons dying indebted, assets for the payment of their simple contract debts." His bill, for the ten succeeding years, was always thrown out by the Lords. All he succeeded in obtaining was an act passed with the same object in view, but confined to persons in trade. But after the passing of the Reform Bill, his son, the Master of the Rolls, succeeded in getting all his father desired. Sir Samuel reasoned that a person owning a freehold estate should be liable for all his just debts of all kinds to the full value of that estate. The then existing law provided "that a man seized of a freehold estate may contract debts to any amount without subjecting the fee of such property to any responsibility for their discharge, provided he has not entered into any bond or security under seal."

He

argues that this person may go on in a system of profusion more generous than just, and incur debts, and at last leave that estate, which had been the source of the creditor's confidence, to an entire stranger, and thus defeat the just claims of the creditors. But Sir Samuel Romilly overlooked the important fact that that estate, if exonerated by law, could not be involved in any just claims, for the lenders must surely have known the law, or ought to have known it. And the risk of lending was accordingly taken. The law, as it stood, was a good law. It simply declared that the ground-the soil-should not be liable for these debts. And has a government not the deepest interest in the permanent preservation, to their just owners, of all soil rights? The whole argument of Sir Samuel Romilly was in favor of the lenders-to give usury further powers and further chances of eating up the country. The effectual and hereditary preservation of the soil rights lie at the foundation of all good and permanent government. Debt, either in a social or moral point of view, is never a good thing. The law, that the soil shall not be mortgaged, was a warning to all, that if they lent, they must do it on other securities; and a just declaration of the rights of the people, and of the determination of the law to preserve to them the comforts of home, the security of title, and all those numerous and highly important advantages, individual and social, local and general, which flow from the uninterrupted and undisturbed rights of the freeholders. This law, which Sir Samuel Romilly labored so ardently to overthrow, was a warning to usurers that whatever other interests their cupidity might lead them to destroy, the vitals of the country should at least remain untouched.*

The principles of the laws of entail and of primogeniture are coeval with the existence of man, and are the chief pillars of the agrarian system. There is no insolent prerogative in the one, as Gibbon so unjustly remarks; neither is there in the other anything but what is eminently fitted to secure the chief agricultural interests of a nation. And surely no Legislature can look with indifference upon any measures calculated to secure the uninterrupted descent, from sire to son, of homestead rights and privileges.

In the Edinburg Review, for October, 1857, there is an article on Landed Credit. One of the reasons urged by the reviewer for the establishment of land banks is, that in Britain, "by reason of entail, large tracts of land are almost permanently locked up in such a manner that, from want of capital, they remain in their unimproved state." This reason cannot apply to America, where the land is neither held in entail, nor subjected to the evils of extensive proprietorship. But the above quotation contains really no argument at all. For the owners of these entailed estates must either be indebted or clear of debt. If indebted, it surely cannot be any relief to have that indebtedness still further increased. If

Since the period of the last commercial crisis, a reaction seems, in some measure, to have set in. Last spring it was proposed by the press in Western Canada to put an arrest on the legal power of collecting small debts. The Lord Chief Baron Pollock, of England, has recently proposed to abrogate that power, and the New York Tribune, and other papers in the United States, have reechoed the sentiment. We have long been of the opinion that this is the radical cure for the evils of usury-at least it is the only one within our reach. It would obviously tend to destroy the present system of credit, by making cash the rule, and credit the exception. It would be a warning to all, that if they lend on interest, or sell on credit, they must do so on their own responsibility. But we shall hardly see such a measure passed in our days. What, for example, would be the effect of such a measure upon the legal profession, the avarice of whose followers has been a proverb since the world began? Would it not undergo the fate of Samson when he was shorn of his locks?

they are not in debt, then are they in that very position which leaves heart, and head, and hand, free to increase wealth. A borrowing of capital would perhaps, in some instances, serve to draw forth sanguine efforts for a season, but the end of all these ways, it is too well known, is such a thing as an Encumbered Estates Court, or a sale "in virtue of a bond and disposition in security."

Everywhere, and at all times, has the rapid accumulation of debt falsified all hopes held out as to the advantage of borrowing, either to the lender or borrower. Let me point, for example, to the case of Ireland, a country enjoying a most fertile soil and delightful climate; only some two or three millions of pounds have been received from the commissioners of the encumbered estates by those who held mortgages upon properties burdened to the extent of twenty-eight or thirty millions. Let me point to Chicago, the "mushroom" city; the assessed value of its taxable property is about $30,000,000-the amount secured therein is over $100,000,000. Let me point to Canada-this fair province is already irretrievably involved in debt, and the startling fact is announced to me in a letter from the Hon. George Alexander, a member of the Legislative Council, that every cleared 100 acres of land is mortgaged to the extent of $600.* Let me point to ancient history-the vice of usury occasioned the ruin of most of the cities and smaller States where it was toleratedit gave birth to the greatest calamities in all the provinces of the Roman empire-it introduced disorders which contributed very much to subvert the constitution of the Roman Commonwealth. Let me point to sacred history. In the days of Nehemiah this very system of land credit resulted in the most deplorable evils, alienating the hereditary rights of the freemen of Israel, and selling into bondage their sons and daughters.

It is reasoned that capital, so abundant in England, is to a great extent excluded from the soil by artificial means, or, in other words, by the want of facilities in borrowing and lending. Capital, or rather the ability to employ labor, may be, in the hands of its owner, a good enough thing. Borrowed capital, applied to the soil, whilst fostering idleness on the part of the lender, actually enhances those prices which it is intended should be cheapened, and encourages the existence of a host of new producers.

The reviewer further says "more capital would produce more food;" and "a population consuming more than the soil now produces, but by no means more than it could produce, have, it would seem, a sort of inherent right to expect that any obstacle which interferes with the natural flow of capital to the land, should be removed." Now, these two statements are not only exceedingly ambiguous, but proceed upon false data, and manifest great ignorance of the first principles of economy. Here we again see "capital," as it is called, raised to an undue prominenceeverything made to depend upon the existence of "capital." More

*For the information of Canadian readers, I give Mr. Alexander's statistics, according to last

Putting the provincial debt at $60,000,000, gives us ₹600 on every 100 acres of cleared land. This of course does not include wild, or bush land, but only that which is productive, and consequently responsible for the debt.