that they can do
to recommend themselves to others, it could not be expected that they
would be so well provided for, nor so tenderly used as they must
otherwise be. If any man should reproach another for his being misshaped
or imperfect in any part of his body, it would not at all be thought a
reflection on the person so treated, but it would be accounted
scandalous in him that had upbraided another with what he could not
help. It is thought a sign of a sluggish and sordid mind not to preserve
carefully one's natural beauty; but it is likewise infamous among them
to use paint. They all see that no beauty recommends a wife so much to
her husband as the probity of her life, and her obedience: for as some
few are catched and held only by beauty, so all are attracted by the
other excellences which charm all the world.

As they fright men from committing crimes by punishments, so they invite
them to the love of virtue by public honours: therefore they erect
statues to the memories of such worthy men as have deserved well of
their country, and set these in their market-places, both to perpetuate
the remembrance of their actions, and to be an incitement to their
posterity to follow their example.

If any man aspires to any office, he is sure never to compass it: they
all live easily together, for none of the magistrates are either
insolent or cruel to the people: they affect rather to be called
fathers, and by being really so, they well deserve the name; and the
people pay them all the marks of honour the more freely, because none
are exacted from them. The Prince himself has no distinction, either of
garments, or of a crown; but is only distinguished by a sheaf of corn
carried before him; as the high priest is also known by his being
preceded by a person carrying a wax light.

They have but few laws, and such is their constitution that they need
not many. They very much condemn other nations, whose laws, together
with the commentaries on them, swell up to so many volumes; for they
think it an unreasonable thing to oblige men to obey a body of laws that
are both of such a bulk, and so dark as not to be read and understood by
every one of the subjects.

They have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of
people whose profession it is to disguise matters, and to wrest the
laws; and therefore they think it is much better that every man should
plead his own cause, and trust it to the judge, as in other places