Areopagiticus

The Athenians of that day were not watched over by many preceptors[*](See Plato (Plat. Prot. 325c ff.) for a picture of the education of Athenian boys.) during their boyhood only to be allowed to do what they liked when they attained to manhood;[*](In early times, the Council, according to Aristotle (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 3), not only had the duty of guarding the laws, but was the main factor in the government of the city, and punished at its discretion “all who misbehaved themselves.” It even selected the magistrates for the several offices (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 8). Under Solon the Council kept its most important powers: it superintended the laws and guarded the constitution, exercised a censorship over the citizens “in the most important matters,” and corrected offenders, having plenary authority to inflict punishment (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 8). Under Cleisthenes its powers declined, but because of its wise and patriotic initiative in the Persian Wars it became again the supreme influence of the state (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 23), and remained so until, under the leadership of Ephialtes, its important powers of supervision and censorship were taken from it and distributed to the Senate of the Five Hundred, the General Assembly, and the Heliastic juries (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 25).) on the contrary, they were subjected to greater supervision in the very prime of their vigor than when they were boys. For our forefathers placed such strong emphasis upon sobriety that they put the supervision of decorum in charge of the Council of the Areopagus—a body which was composed exclusively of men who were of noble birth[*](The Council was made up of ex-archons, who, after successfully passing an examination at the end of their terms of office to determine their fitness, became members of the Areopagus for life. The archons were at first “selected under qualifications of birth and of wealth.” See Aristot. Ath. Pol. 3. After the “reforms” of Ephialtes, the property qualification was dropped, the only requirement being that of genuine citizenship. See Plut. Arist.) and had exemplified in their lives exceptional virtue and sobriety, and which, therefore, naturally excelled all the other councils of Hellas.

And we may judge what this institution was at that time even by what happens at the present day; for even now, when everything connected with the election and the examination of magistrates[*](With special reference to the archons, who became members of the Areopagus. He means that they were no longer taken necessarily from the best class of citizens. They did, however, have to undergo an examination ( eu)/quna) on their conduct in office at the end of their term, and a further examination ( dokimasi/a) before the Council of the Areopagus to determine their worthiness to become members of that body. See Gilbert, Greek Constitutional Antiquities p. 282. What such an examination was like is described by Aristot. Ath. Pol. 55. Perhaps such examinations became largely perfunctory, and this may be the ground of Isocrates' complaint.) has fallen into neglect, we shall find that those who in all else that they do are insufferable, yet when they enter the Areopagus hesitate to indulge their true nature, being governed rather by its traditions than by their own evil instincts. So great was the fear which its members inspired in the depraved and such was the memorial of their own virtue and sobriety which they left behind them in the place of their assembly.

Such, then, as I have described, was the nature of the Council which our forefathers charged with the supervision of moral discipline—a council which considered that those who believed that the best citizens are produced in a state where the laws are prescribed with the greatest exactness[*](Cf. Isoc. 4.78; Isoc. 12.144.) were blind to the truth; for in that case there would be no reason why all of the Hellenes should not be on the same level, at any rate in so far as it is easy to borrow written codes from each other.

But in fact, they thought, virtue is not advanced by written laws but by the habits of every-day life; for the majority of men tend to assimilate the manners and morals amid which they have been reared. Furthermore, they held that where there is a multitude of specific laws, it is a sign that the state is badly governed;[*](For this idea that the multiplication of laws is a symptom of degeneracy see Tacit. Ann. 3.27: corruptissima republica plurimae leges.) for it is in the attempt to build up dikes against the spread of crime that men in such a state feel constrained to multiply the laws.