are armed.  The runner should enter the lists in armour, and in the races which our heralds proclaim, no prize is to be given except to armed warriors.  Let there be six courses—­first, the stadium; secondly, the diaulos or double course; thirdly, the horse course; fourthly, the long course; fifthly, races (1) between heavy-armed soldiers who shall pass over sixty stadia and finish at a temple of Ares, and (2) between still more heavily-armed competitors who run over smoother ground; sixthly, a race for archers, who shall run over hill and dale a distance of a hundred stadia, and their goal shall be a temple of Apollo and Artemis.  There shall be three contests of each kind—­one for boys, another for youths, a third for men; the course for the boys we will fix at half, and that for the youths at two-thirds of the entire length.  Women shall join in the races:  young girls who are not grown up shall run naked; but after thirteen they shall be suitably dressed; from thirteen to eighteen they shall be obliged to share in these contests, and from eighteen to twenty they may if they please and if they are unmarried.  As to trials of strength, single combats in armour, or battles between two and two, or of any number up to ten, shall take the place of wrestling and the heavy exercises.  And there must be umpires, as there are now in wrestling, to determine what is a fair hit and who is conqueror.  Instead of the pancratium, let there be contests in which the combatants carry bows and wear light shields and hurl javelins and throw stones.  The next provision of the law will relate to horses, which, as we are in Crete, need be rarely used by us, and chariots never; our horse-racing prizes will only be given to single horses, whether colts, half-grown, or full-grown.  Their riders are to wear armour, and there shall be a competition between mounted archers.  Women, if they have a mind, may join in the exercises of men.

But enough of gymnastics, and nearly enough of music.  All musical contests will take place at festivals, whether every third or every fifth year, which are to be fixed by the guardians of the law, the judges of the games, and the director of education, who for this purpose shall become legislators and arrange times and conditions.  The principles on which such contests are to be ordered have been often repeated by the first legislator; no more need be said of them, nor are the details of them important.  But there is another subject of the highest importance, which, if possible, should be determined by the laws, not of man, but of God; or, if a direct revelation is impossible, there is need of some bold man who, alone against the world, will speak plainly of the corruption of human nature, and go to war with the passions of mankind.  ’We do not understand you.’  I will try to make my meaning plainer.  In speaking of education, I seemed to see young men and maidens in friendly intercourse with one another; and there arose in my mind a natural fear about a state, in which