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EABLIEST CONDITION OF THE NATION.g5and dance. Their soft dialect brings to mind the languagesof the South Sea ;but in both cases the remark is found tobe true, that a soft language is by no means a proof ofdeficiency in warlike spirit.In the constitutions of theirstates, hereditary privileges were either rejected at once, orborne with only for a short time. The supreme authorityrested with the people, and althoughit was limited by manyinstitutions, the stillpeople decided the character of thegovernment. Any thing coulcl be expected of these states,rather than domestic tranquillity. Nothing was so greatthat they did not believe they could attain it and for thatvery reason they often attainedgreatness.These differences in the natural character of the most important tribes, needed to be mentioned at the beginning.There are few subjectsin history which have been so littleillustrated, especially with reference to their consequences,as the characters of nations and their branches. And yetitis these peculiarities, which, in a certain degree, form theguiding thread in the web of the history of nations. Fromwhatever they may proceed, whether from original descent,or the earliest institutions, or from both, experience teachesthat theyare almost indelible. The difference between theDoric and Ionic tribes, runs through the whole of Grecianhistory. This produced the deep-rooted hatred betweenSparta and Athens, though that hatred may have beennourished by other causes ;and who needs to be told, thatthe history of all Greece is connected with the history ofthose leading states.The difference of tribes and their dispositions was alsoone of the chief causes of the subsequent political partitionsof the soil There probably was never a land of similar extent, in which so large a number of states subsisted together.They lived, both the large and the small ones, (ifindeed wemay call these large, which were only proportionally so,)each after its own customs; and hence Greece was savedfrom the torpor of large empires, and was able to preserveso much life and activity within itself.Of the earliest history of th6 nation, we can expect onlyfragments. We leave it to the historian to collect themand to 1judge of their value. But we must direct attention1On this subjectI refer to the work of Professor 0, 0, Muller: