In that system, if it may be so called, by which the various members of the Greek nation were in some degree held together, we find a strange mixture of undefined, and sometimes repugnant claims, more or less generally admitted. While the Lacedæmonians presided, with authority far too little defined, over the political and military affairs of Greece, the Eleans asserted a prescriptive right to a kind of religious supremacy; also too little defined; universally allowed nevertheless, in a certain degree, but, like the Lacedæmonian supremacy, not always to the extent to which the claimants pretended. In the schism of Peloponnesus, which occurred during the Peloponnesian War, we have seen the imperial state of Lacedæmon summoned to the Elean tribunal, as a British corporation might be summoned to the courts at Westminster; a fine imposed, its citizens interdicted the common games and sacrifices of the nation, an opprobrious punishment publicly inflicted upon an aged and respectable Spartan, who, but by implication, offended against the Elean decrees; and, finally, these measures supported by avowed hostilities, and alliance with the enemies of Sparta. The necessity of the times induced the Lacedæmonians to make peace with these affronts unrevenged; but their smothered resentment had been revived and increased by what they esteemed a new indignity. Before the conclusion of the Peloponnesian War, Agis, king of Lacedæmon, had been sent, in pursuance of a supposed prophetical direction, to perform a sacrifice to Jupiter at Olympia. The Eleans forbade the ceremony, alleging that, according to ancient law, no oracle should be consulted for success in wars between Greeks and Greeks, and they would allow no prayer for victory in such a war. There is a beneficence, a liberal and extended patriotism in this idea, so consonant to the spirit with which Iphitus is said to have founded the Olympian festival, and so opposite to the tenets afterwards generally prevailing in Greece, that they seem to mark the law for ancient and genuine. The Lacedæmonians however were not the less offended with the Eleans for bringing forward, upon such an occasion, what, if those maxims only were considered which had prevailed through succeeding ages, would carry much the appearance of a complete novelty. [Illustration: GREEK VASE]