When a Thessalian was asked which of his countrymen were the gentlest in manner, his answer was a good one: _Those who are giving up war._ But it is useless to multiply instances. Character is long-standing habit, and it would scarcely be beside [Sidenote: 3] the mark to speak of the virtues of the mind as the virtues ‘of minding’.[56] One more illustration, and we will dispense with further elaboration of the subject. The Spartan legislator Lycurgus once took two puppies belonging to the same parents and brought them up in entirely different ways. The one he turned into a gluttonous good-for-nothing, the other into a keen and capable hunting-dog. Subsequently he got the Lacedaemonians together and said to them: ‘A great factor [Sidenote: B] in engendering virtue consists of habit and education—of instruction in the conduct of life—as I am about to prove to you here and now.’ He then brought forward the two young dogs, put down directly in front of them a plate of food and a hare, and let the dogs loose; whereupon the one darted after the hare, while the other made for the plate. The Lacedaemonians, who were not yet in the secret, failed to perceive the meaning of his demonstration, until he told them: ‘Both these dogs come from the same parents, but the difference in their education has turned the one into a glutton and the other into a hunter.’ No more need be said of habit and conduct of life. We may [Sidenote: C] proceed to the question of nurture. In my opinion mothers should nurse their own children and offer them the breast; for their nursing will be of a more sympathetic and painstaking kind, since their love is from the heart, or, as the saying goes, ‘down to the finger-tips,’ whereas the affection of professional nurses and foster-mothers—who are paid for it—can only be spurious and factitious. That it is the duty of the mother herself to suckle and nurse her offspring is evident from the arrangement of nature, which has supplied every animal after parturition with the necessary provision of milk. Here Providence further shows its wisdom, inasmuch as it has furnished a woman with a pair of breasts, [Sidenote: D] so that, even if she bears twins, there may be a double source for them to draw upon. Moreover she will by so acting become more tender and affectionate to her child. It can, indeed, scarcely be otherwise; the connexion of nurse and nursling is the means of raising affection to its highest pitch. One can see how even a brute beast will yearn for its nursling, if you tear them apart.