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POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE GREEKS. 127The father of Demosthenes, a rich and respectable man, leftat his death a manufactory of swords; which was kept upby his son 1andj examples could be easily multiplied, fromthe orators and the comedian. When this circumstance iskept in view, the -blame attached to the Grecian constitutionsis in a great measure, though not entirely removed. Theimpediments which public opinion put in the way of industry,did not so much injure those concerned in any largeenterprise, as those engaged in the smaller occupations.The latter did reallyfeel the evil, and we are not disposedto representit as inconsiderable.But we must return once more to the remark which explains the true cause of this regulationthat in the Grecian;states, public life was placed above private life. "All agree,"says Aristotle, 2 "that in every well-regulated state, sufficientleisure must be preservedfrom the wants of life for thepublic business but a difference of;opinion exists as to themanner in which this can be done. It is effected by meansof slaves ;who are not, however, treated in all places alike."Here we have the pointof view, from which the politicianshould consider slaveryin Greece. It served to raise the classpf citizens to a sort of nobility, especially where they consistedalmost entirely of landed It proprietors. is true, that thisclass lived by the labours of the other and; every thing,which in modern times has been said respecting and againstslavery, may therefore so far be appliedto the Grecians.But their fame does not rest on the circumstance of theirobtaining that leisure at the expense of the lower order but;in the application which the noblest of them made of thatleisure. No one will deny, that without their slaves, thecharacter of the culture of the upperclass in Greece couldin no respects have become what it did ;and if the fruitswhich were borne possessa value for every cultivated mind,we mayat least be permittedto doubt, whether they were3too dearly purchased by the introduction of slavery.1Demosth. adv. Aphob. Op. ii. p. 816. 2 Aristotle ii. 9.3 This may be the more safely asserted, because it is hardly to possible sayany thing in general on the condition of slaves in Greece so different was it;at different times ;in different countries ;and even in the same country. Onthis subject I would refer to the following instructive work; Geschichte undZustand der Sclaverey und Leibeigenschaft in Griechenland, von J. F. Reitemeyer.Berlin, 1789. History and Condition of Slavery and Vilknage inGreece, by J. P. Reitemeyer.