4.7
What, then! some one will say, was not Rome advanced and bettered by her wars? That is a question which will need a long answer, if I am to satisfy men who hold that betterment consists in wealth, luxury and empire, rather than in safety, gentleness, and that independence which is attended by righteousness. However, it will be thought, I suppose, to favour the superior claims of Lycurgus, that, whereas the Romans increased in power as they did after abandoning the institutions of Numa’s time,
4.8
the Lacedaemonians, on the other hand, just as soon as they forsook the precepts of Lycurgus, sank from the highest to the lowest place, lost their supremacy over the Greeks, and were in danger of utter destruction. Nevertheless, this remains a great feature in Numa’s career, and one really divine, that he was a stranger, and yet was summoned to the throne, where he changed the whole nature of the state by force of persuasion alone, and mastered a city which was not yet in sympathy with his views; and that he accomplished this without appeal to arms or any violence (unlike Lycurgus, who led the nobles in arms against the commons), but by his wisdom and justice won the hearts of all the citizens and brought them into harmony.
