HKB
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Often appears with: forms of government · constitutions and founding law · women and civic discipline · treaties, truces, and peacemaking · the position of women · spartan constitution · sparta vs crete · political legitimacy and consent · pisistratus · natural corruption of regimes · mixed constitution · military discipline and training
Usually: argument (4) · exhortation (2) · narrative (1) · betrayal (1) · injustice endured (1) · the fall of the great (1) · the test or trial (1) · censure (1) · detachment (1) · skepticism (1)
“So in each constitution there is naturally engendered a particular vice inseparable from it: in kingship it is absolutism; aristocracy it is oligarchy; in democracy lawless ferocity and violence;” Polybius, The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 1 (of 2) · insight
“For where we have a monarchy, an aristocracy, and a democracy existing together in the same city, each of the three serves as a check upon the other.” Niccolò Machiavelli, Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius · precept
“When again, in a time of great danger, the people were very harsh upon him, demanding a strict account how the public money had been employed, and the like, he bade them, "First, good friends, make sure you are safe.” Plutarch, Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans · precept
Phocion repeatedly refuses popular pressure, offers blunt parables and warnings to the Athenians, settles disputes with the Boeotians by urging negotiation, and sparrs verbally with speakers like Demosthenes and Lycurgus.
old system, more complete in itself, and more harmonious and uniform, which prevailed in the times of Pericles, Aristides, and Solon; when statesmen showed themselves, to use Archilochus's words, -- Mars' and the Muses' friends alike designed, To arts and arms indifferently inclined, and the presiding goddess of his country was, he did not fail to see, the patroness and protectress of both civil and military wisdom…
Machiavelli argues that all six government forms are pernicious—good ones short-lived and bad ones inherently flawed—and recommends a mixed constitution where monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy mutually check each other, citing Sparta and Athens.
respect to civil rights what had been a government of the best into a government of the few; and so very soon met with the same fate as the tyrant. For the multitude loathing its rulers, lent itself to any who ventured, in whatever way, to attack them; when some one man speedily arose who with the aid of the people overthrew them. But the recollection of the tyrant and of the wrongs suffered at his hands being still…
He compares Sparta and Crete, arguing that managing non-citizen labor is crucial; he describes Helot revolts, contends that lax regulation of women undermines cities, and explains Spartan women’s liberties by long absences of men.
There are two considerations which offer themselves with respect to the government established at Lacedaemon and Crete, and indeed in almost all other states whatsoever; one is whether their laws do or do not promote the best establishment possible? the other is whether there is anything, if we consider either the principles upon which it is founded or the executive part of it, which prevents the form of government t…
Polybius says Lycurgus recognized that unmixed governments naturally develop matching “vices,” so he balanced powers in Sparta so no one part dominates and the polity stays stable for a long time.
[Sidenote: Lycurgus recognized these truths, and legislated accordingly.] +10.+ For the present I will make a brief reference to the legislation of Lycurgus: for such a discussion is not at all alien to my subject. That statesman was fully aware that all those changes which I have enumerated come about by an undeviating law of nature; and reflected that every form of government that was unmixed, and rested on one sp…
On statecraft and punishment, Epictetus urges building cities with Greek discipline rather than walls, praises Lycurgus’s virtue-based order, and insists rulers should govern reasoning beings by guidance, not threats.
ON STATECRAFT. 1. Not with the stones of Euboea and Sparta let the structure of your city walls be variegated; but let the discipline and teaching that comes from Greece penetrate with order the minds of citizens and statesmen. For with the thoughts of men are cities well established, and not with wood and stone. 2. If thou wouldst have a household well established, then follow the example of the Spartan Lycurgus. …