everything else was sacrificed to success in war, and Sparta ceased to have any part whatever in
what Greece contributed to the civilization of the world. To us, the Spartan state appears as a
model, in miniature, of the state that the Nazis would establish if victorious. To the Greeks it
seemed otherwise. As Bury says:
A stranger from Athens or Miletus in the fifth century visiting the straggling villages which
formed her unwalled unpretentious city must have had a feeling of being transported into an age
long past, when men were braver, better and simpler, unspoiled by wealth, undisturbed by
ideas. To a philosopher, like Plato, speculating in political science, the Spartan State seemed the
nearest approach to the ideal. The ordinary Greek looked upon it as a structure of severe and
simple beauty, a Dorian city stately as a Dorian temple, far nobler than his own abode but not so
comfortable to dwell in. *
One reason for the admiration felt for Sparta by other Greeks was its stability. All other Greek
cities had revolutions, but the Spartan constitution remained unchanged for centuries, except for
a gradual increase in the powers of the ephors, which occurred by legal means, without
violence.
It cannot be denied that, for a long period, the Spartans were successful in their main purpose,
the creation of a race of invincible warriors. The battle of Thermopylae ( 480 B.C.), though
technically a defeat, is perhaps the best example of their valour. Thermopylae was a narrow
pass through the mountains, where it was hoped that the Persian army could be held. Three
hundred Spartans, with auxiliaries, repulsed all frontal attacks. But at last the Persians
discovered a detour through the hills, and succeeded in attacking the Greeks on both sides at
once. Every single Spartan was killed at his post. Two men had been absent on sick leave,
suffering from a disease of the eyes amounting almost to temporary blindness. One of them
insisted on being led by his helot to the battle, where he perished; the other, Aristodemus,
decided that he was too ill to fight, and remained absent. When he returned to Sparta, no one
would speak to him; he was called "the coward Aristodemus." A year later, he wiped out his
disgrace by dying bravely at the battle of Plataea, where the Spartans were victorious.
* History of Greece, Vol. I, p. 141.