and power, they softened insensibly the manners of the audience, drew
them off from the animosities which then prevailed, and united them in
zeal for excellence and virtue. So that, in some measure, he prepared
the way for Lycurgus towards the instruction of the Spartans. From Crete
Lycurgus passed to Asia, desirous, as is said, to compare the Ionian
expense and luxury with the Cretan frugality and hard diet, so as to
judge what effect each had on their several manners and governments;
just as physicians compare bodies that are weak and sickly with the
healthy and robust. There also, probably, he met with Homer's poems,
which were preserved by the posterity of Cleophylus. Observing that many
moral sentences and much political knowledge were intermixed with his
stories, which had an irresistible charm, he collected them into one
body, and transcribed them with pleasure, in order to take them home
with him. For his glorious poetry was not yet fully known in Greece;
only some particular pieces were in a few hands, as they happened to be
dispersed. Lycurgus was the first that made them generally known. The
Egyptians likewise suppose that he visited them; and as of all their
institutions he was most pleased with their distinguishing the military
men from the rest of the people, he took the same method at Sparta, and,
by separating from these the mechanics and artificers, he rendered the
constitution more noble and more of a piece. This assertion of the
Egyptians is confirmed by some of the Greek writers. But we know of no
one, except Aristocrates, son of Hipparchus, and a Spartan, who has
affirmed that he went to Libya and Spain, and in his Indian excursions
conversed with the Gymnosophists.

The Lacedaemonians found the want of Lycurgus when absent, and sent many
embassies to entreat him to return. For they perceived that their kings
had barely the title and outward appendages of royalty, but in nothing
else differed from the multitude; whereas Lycurgus had abilities from
nature to guide the measures of government, and powers of persuasion,
that drew the hearts of men to him. The kings, however, where consulted
about his return, and they hoped that in his presence they should
experience less insolence amongst the people. Returning then to a city
thus disposed, he immediately applied himself to alter the whole frame
of the constitution; sensible that a partial change, and the introducing
of some new laws, would be of no sort