IV.  The rest of their laws for the training and marriage of maidens agree with one another, although Lykurgus put off the time of marriage till they were full-grown, in order that their intercourse, demanded as it was by nature, might produce love and friendship in the married pair rather than the dislike often experienced by an immature child towards her husband, and also that their bodies might be better able to support the trials of child-bearing, which he regarded as the sole object of marriage; whereas the Romans gave their daughters in marriage at the age of twelve years or even younger, thinking thus to hand over a girl to her husband pure and uncorrupt both in body and mind.  It is clear that the former system is best for the mere production of children, and the latter for moulding consorts for life.  But by his superintendence of the young, his collecting them into companies, his training and drill, with the table and exercises common to all, Lykurgus showed that he was immensely superior to Numa, who, like any commonplace lawgiver, left the whole training of the young in the hands of their fathers, regulated only by their caprice or needs; so that whoever chose might bring up his son as a shipwright, a coppersmith, or a musician, as though the citizens ought not from the very outset to direct their attention to one object, but were like people who have embarked in the same ship for various causes, who only in time of danger act together for the common advantage of all, and at other times pursue each his own private ends.  Allowance must be made for ordinary lawgivers, who fail through want of power or of knowledge in establishing such a system; but no such excuse can be made for Numa, who was a wise man, and who was made king of a newly-created state which would not have opposed any of his designs.  What could be of greater importance than to regulate the education of the young and so to train them that they might all become alike in their lives and all bear the same impress of virtue?  It was to this that Lykurgus owed the permanence of his laws; for he could not have trusted to the oaths which he made them take, if he had not by education and training so steeped the minds of the young in the spirit of his laws, and by his method of bringing them up implanted in them such a love for the state, that the most important of his enactments remained in force for more than five hundred years; for the lives of all Spartans seem to have been coloured by these laws.  That which was the aim and end of Numa’s policy, that Rome should be at peace and friendly with her neighbours, ceased immediately upon his death; at once the double-gated temple, which he kept closed as if he really kept war locked up in it, had both its gates thrown open and filled Italy with slaughter.  His excellent and righteous policy did not last for a moment, for the people were not educated to support it, and therefore it could not be lasting.  But, it may be asked, did not Rome flourish by her wars?  It is hard