In these times of slighting of the ancient world it is well to reflect how many of the commonest allusions of literature, and even of political editorials, depend for their meaning upon some knowledge of the Greek stories. We speak of “hundred-handed” (Briareus) or “hundred-headed” (Hydra) evils of municipal mismanagement; we talk of “cleansing the Augean stables”; Cyclops, Siren, Gorgon, Chimæra, are household words. We owe it to the children not to let them escape into life without some ability to grasp the content of such daily allusions. Early Politics. Mention has already been made of the petty size of the typical Greek State. The marvel is that the Greeks did so much while so divided. We shall speak of “city states.” Some child will run away with a notion of something like New York or Boston with its suburbs. Make them feel that all Greece never had as many people as New York City. It was the intense Greek individualism which kept the States apart. The difference between Greek individualism and that of the Englishman or American should be indicated. The latter is personal. The Greek was swallowed up in his State, that was his unit and his love. The progress through monarchy, oligarchy and tyranny to democracy is rightly made much of in the books. (Compare the “tyrant” with our “boss.”) When we come to the development and the glories of the Greek democracy a large degree of caution is needed. In the writer’s opinion there is a good deal of glamour about this so-called democracy. The best Greek never dreamed of manhood suffrage, or the rights of man as man. In his view never were “all men created free and equal.” Athens in her best days had but 30,000 voters, and refused citizenship to all outsiders, even fellow-Greeks from across the nearest border line. Slavery was one of the corner-stones of society. So far as it went, the democracy of Athens was of the pure type. That should be made plain when reached. While our modern democracy, save for minor phases, is representative and not pure, the fact remains that the nineteenth century has brought to birth the only real democracy. And that is one point of our superiority over the Greeks and of more importance than our mechanical and scientific advantages. West, in his “Ancient World,” gives an excellent summary of the bonds which made the Greek world one against all “barbarians” in spite of rivalries among their petty States. He cites (pp. 95-97) the common language and literature; the belief in racial kinship; the Olympian religion, with its games, oracles and amphictyonies, as such forceful bonds of union.