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books, only three, and those not entire, have been preserved. The early part of it is occupied with an inquiry into the nature of law the latter section contains the outline of a model legislation, founded on the Roman laws, of which the portion extant relates to religion and magistrates. Though there may be little originality in the political philosophy of Cicero, yet he writes on political subjects with the authority derived from his practical experience as a Roman statesman, (69) and he avoids the extravagances of many speculators upon the best government, by adhering closely to a real model.

It appears, therefore, that the entire political speculation of the ancient philosophers substantially took the form of inquiries after the best form of government. Their problem was purely ideal; but, however general their language, and however complete their apparent emancipation from the data of any actual case, they nevertheless, in fact, circumscribed their idea by the conditions of an Hellenic or Italian city community. While they professed to treat their hypothesis in vacuo, they in truth immersed it in matter. While they assumed to range through all space, they in truth only took a walk before their own doors. Even Xenophon, in recounting the actions of Cyrus the Great, and painting a supposed historical picture of his empire, cannot avoid representing his Oriental subjects, in part, under the image of the free citizens of a Grecian republic. (70) Plato visibly assumes an Hellenic community as the substratum of his perfect state. Even the views of the scientific and far-sighted Aristotle are bounded by the same horizon; and Cicero, in his political treatises, designedly holds up the Roman state as a model, instead of resorting to pure ideals.(7)

(69) On his advantages over the Greek writers in this respect, see De Rep. i. 8: De Leg. iii. 6; Epist. ad Quint. Frat. iii. 5.

(70) Thus, in Cyrop. i. 3, § 17, he speaks of the Median judge giving his vote-transferring to Asia the Greek usage.

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(71) La débile portée de notre intelligence, et la brieveté de la vie individuelle, comparée à la lenteur du developpement social, retiennent notre imagination, surtout à l'égard des idées politiques, vu leur complication supérieure, sous la plus étroite dependance du milieu effectif dans lequel nous vivons actuellement. Même les plus chimériques Utopistes,

§ 14 Besides the philosophers who avowedly constructed an ideal state, there was, in antiquity, a class of writers who attained the same end by the description of a fictitious people, supposed to have a real geographical existence. The invention of imaginary communities dates from the commencement of Greek fiction. The Æthiopes, the Lotophagi, the Phæacians, the Læstrygones, the Cyclopes, the Cimmerians of the Odyssey, are all poetical nations, without any place in positive geography.(7) The Hyperboreans and the Amazons, and some of the remote tribes of Herodotus, as the Issedones and the Arimaspians, belong to the same category. These fictions formed a part of the poetical and popular mythology of Greece, and were devoid of any doctrinal purpose, like the kingdom of Prester John, imagined by the early travellers. (73) When, however, the primitive faith of the Greeks in their legendary lore had been shaken by the progress of intelligence, a demand arose for moral tales, under the garb of reality. Hence, Hecatæus of Abdera, a contemporary of Alexander the Great, wrote a description of the innocent and sacred nation of the Hyperboreans, who passed a life of uninterrupted bliss, without toil and without war, in a mild region, situated beyond the cold blasts of the north wind. (74) About

qui croient s'être entièrement affranchis de toute condition de réalité, subissent, à leur insu, cette insurmontable nécessité, en réflétant toujours fidèlement, par leurs rêveries, l'état social contemporain. A plus forte raison, la conception d'un véritable systême politique, radicalement différent de celui qui nous entoure, doit-elle excéder les bornes fondamentales de notre faible intelligence.'-Comte, Cours de Philosophie Positive, tom. iv. p. 37.

(72( On these imaginary communities, see Nitzsch, Anmerkungen zur Odyssee, vol. iii. pref. p. xxvii. xxxiii. Speaking of the countries related to have been visited by Ulysses, Mr. Payne Knight says: Neque serioris ævi geographi, qui eas gentes et regiones inter freta Sicula, Tyrrhena, &c., perquirebant, aliter mihi errasse videntur, quam siquis inter insulas Oceani Australis Gulliverianus istas Lilliput, Blefuscue, &c., perquirere susceperit.' Prol. ad Hom. § 49; compare Grote, Hist. of Gr. vol. i. p. 334.

(73) Concerning Prester, or Presbyter, John, a supposed Christian king in Central Asia, see Ritter's Asien, vol. i. p. 283-99; Gibbon, Decl, and Fall, c. 47.

(74) See the fragments of this work of Hecateus of Abdera, in Fragm. Hist. Gr. vol. ii. p. 386; ed. Didot, with the remark of the editor, C. Müller, upon the character of the work. The notion of the Hyperboreans as a sacred people is embodied in the passage of Pindar, Pyth. x. 56. See, generally, Ukert, Geogr. der Gr. und Römer, iii. 2, p. 393.

the same time, likewise, another writer, calling himself Iambulus, published an account of an imaginary state of happiness and virtue to be found in an island of the Southern Ocean, four months' sail from the land of the Ethiopians. (") These islanders were four cubits in height, and lived 150 years: the climate was mild throughout the year, and the soil produced spontaneously the means of subsistence. They were free from diseases, and at a fixed age they put themselves to death, by sleeping upon a narcotic plant. They had no marriages, but the women were common; the children were brought up as the offspring of the community; hence, all incentive to discord was removed, and the people lived in perfect harmony.(76) Euhemerus, likewise, who belonged to the age of Alexander, invented an imaginary island of Panchaia in the far east, the supposed seat of the monuments which, according to his system of interpretation, proved the gods of Greece to have been ancient kings and military leaders. (7) Theopompus, the writer of the history of Philip, also described

(75) A summary of his account is given by Diodorus, ii. 55-60. Compare Lucian, Ver. Hist. i. 3. Iambulus ('Iáußovλos) appears to be a fictitious name. It does not occur elsewhere as the name of any real person. -See Pape, Wörterbuch der Griech. Eigennamen, in v. It is, moreover, formed according to a false analogy. The law of composition in such proper names as Εὔβουλος, Κλεόβουλος, Νικόβουλος, Αριστόβουλος, Νεοβούλη, is different. Voss (De Hist. Gr. lib. iii. p. 178) inserts Iambulus in his list of Greek historians; with equal justice Jacques Sadeur, Capt. Siden, or Lemuel Gulliver, might be inserted in a list of French or English historians.

(76) The idea of social harmony as the result of community is probably borrowed from Plato's Republic. Compare Aristot. Pol. ii. 5. There is a curious coincidence between a passage in the description of the Australians of Iambulus, and a passage in Gulliver, which is probably accidental. The mode of writing among the Australian islanders is thus described : γράφουσι δὲ τοὺς στίχους οὐκ εἰς τὸ πλάγιον ἐκτείνοντες, ὥσπερ ἡμεῖς, ἀλλ ̓ ἄνωθεν KάTW KATAYρápovтes eis opeóv.-Diod. ii. 57. Swift, on the other hand, thus describes the mode of writing at Lilliput: 'Their manner of writing is very peculiar, being neither from the left to the right, like the Europeans, nor from the right to the left, like the Arabians, nor from up to down, like the Chinese, but aslant, from one corner of the paper to the other, like ladies in England.'

(77) Plutarch speaks of these records: ἐν Πάγχοντι γράμμασι χρυσοῖς ἀναγεγραμμένων, οἷς οὔτε βάρβαρος οὐδεὶς οὔτε Ελλην, ἀλλὰ μόνος Ενήμερος, ὡς ἔοικε, πλεύσας εἰς τοὺς μηδαμόθι γῆς γεγονότας, μηδὲ ὄντας Παγχώους καὶ Τριφύλλους, ἐντετυχήκει. De Is. et Os. c. 23.

The fabulous island in the Erythræan sea, where the monument of king Erythras was said to exist, may perhaps have been the origin of the island Panchaia.-Sec Curt. x. i.

two imaginary communities of saints and warriors, in a conversation supposed to have been held by Midas and Silenus. The former of these nations lived in peace and plenty; the earth produced them everything without labour, and they were exempt from diseases. (79) The Nephelococcygia of Aristophanes, and the islands described in the True History of Lucian, are in a burlesque vein, and are the prototypes of the satirical imaginary states, which modern literature has produced.

§ 15 After the revival of literature, speculators on politics generally followed the treatise of Aristotle, and delivered their doctrines in a positive form. Machiavel and Bodin were acquainted with this work through the medium of Latin translations, and not only borrowed many of its conclusions, but imitated its method. Sir Thomas More, however, in the early part of the sixteenth century, collected his political ideas into the framework of an ideal state, to which he gave the name of Utopia, so called from its not existing in any real place. (79) This work, from the peculiarity of its plan, acquired so much celebrity, that an Utopia has become a common appellative for any imaginary state.(0) Its opinions are humane and mild, as compared with those of the age, and, being written with reference to the then existing state of Europe, it was read with more interest than Plato's Republic, which assumed a different condition of the

(78) Ap. Ælian. V. H. iii. 18; Fragm. Hist. Gr. vol. i. p. 289; ed. Didot. The conversation of Midas and Silenus was placed in Macedonia, Herod. viii. 138. Hence its introduction into the Philippica of Theopompus. Silenus was conceived, not merely as one of the retinue of Bacchus, but also as a prophet and a sage. Aristotle, in his dialogue entitled Eudemus, or repi Vuxns, represented him as imparting lessons of wisdom to Midas.—Plut. Consol. ad Apollon. c. 27; Cic. Tusc. Disp. i. 48. Compare Virg. Ecl. vi.

(79) See Hallam, Lit. of Europe, vol. i. p. 387. The first edition appeared in 1515-Dunlop's History of Fiction, vol. iii. p. 132.

(80) Respecting the European celebrity of the Utopia soon after its publication, see Cresacre More's Life of Sir T. More, p. 49-53. Ortensio Landi, an Italian, who wrote upon inventions about the middle of the sixteenth century (1548), published anonymously, under the appellation of a citizen of Utopia.-See Beckmann, Hist. of Inv. art. Bibliography of the Hist. of Inventions,' vol. i. p. 514. A colony of Utopians are introduced in Rabelais, liv. iii. c. i.

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civilized world. Being composed in Latin, moreover, it was accessible to the entire European republic of letters. Now, however, it probably meets with few readers; and of the many who speak of an Utopia, but a small proportion have had the curiosity to acquaint themselves with Sir T. More's romance.

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Utopia, or the best form of government, (1) is in the form of a narration by a Portuguese gentleman, named Raphael Hythlodæus, whom Sir Thomas More meets at Antwerp. This Raphael had accompanied Americus Vespucius in three of his voyages, but had been left by him in the most distant place where they touched, whence he was enabled to visit the island of Utopia. The work was printed in 1515, and the fiction was doubtless suggested by the recent discovery of America.

The island is described as 200 miles in diameter in its broadest part, and adjoining the American continent. Its name was derived from Utopus, who conquered it, and reclaimed the inhabitants from barbarism. It contains fifty-four cities, the principal of which is Amaurotus, upon the river Anydrus.(*) The form of the Utopian government is thus described. Thirty families chuse every year a magistrate, who was anciently called the syphogrant, but is now called the phylarch; and over every ten syphogrants there is another magistrate, who was anciently called the tranibor, but of late the archphylarch. All the syphogrants, who are in number two hundred, chuse the prince out of four names, which are selected by the people of the four divisions of the city. The prince holds his office for life, but the

(81) The title of the work is De Optimo Reipublicæ Statu, deque Nová Insula Utopiâ.

(82) The principal names in this romance are, as Sir James Mackintosh has remarked (Works, vol. i. p. 417), Greek derivatives, suggestive of the unreal character of the narration. Thus, Utopia, like Outis in the Odyssey, is the place which exists nowhere. The Achorians, Ademians, and Alaopolitæ, are similar negations of country and people. Amaurotus, the capital city, is invisible. Anydrus, its river, is waterless. The Nephelogetæ, a neighbouring nation, like Nephelococcygia, are also mentioned; also the Anemolians. Hythlodæus is a learner of trifles. It is true, as Scaliger has observed, that the name Utopus, or Utopia, is not correctly formed, according to the rules of Greek composition. It ought to be Atopia; but as this word had a meaning in Greek, More was forced to make the barbarous compound Οὐτοπία.

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