The federal system of government combined many advantages. It enabled the Greeks to continue to live as members of small self-governing communities--a way of living to which the physical features of their country naturally led them, and to which they were deeply attached: it gave them, through their union, much greater security than they could have enjoyed without it: and it formed a large part of them into a community that more resembled a nation than anything else that had yet arisen in Greece. The system was tried not only by the Achæans but also by several other divisions of the Hellenic race: by the Phocians, the Acarnanians, the Epirots, the Arcadians, and the Ætolians[274]: and among the Ætolians and Acarnanians it attained such a measure of success that in the later period of the Macedonian supremacy these two peoples were, after the Achæans, the most important of the Hellenic powers. [274] See Professor Freeman's _History of Federal Government_. * * * * * Transcriber's Notes Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation have been standardised, but other variations in spelling, accents and punctuation are as in the original. Italics are represented thus _italic_ and gesperrt thus =gesperrt=. The "ERRATUM. Page 14, line 21, _for_ empires _read_ empire." has been implemented. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Political Institutions of the Ancient Greeks, by Basil Edward Hammond