trembling under the rod of the Eupatrid archons, and utterly inexperienced in collective business—­should have been found suddenly competent to fulfil these ascendant functions, such as the citizens of conquering Athens in the days of Pericles, full of the sentiment of force and actively identifying themselves with the dignity of their community, became gradually competent, and not more than competent, to exercise with effect.  To suppose that Solon contemplated and provided for the periodical revision of his laws by establishing a nomothetic jury or dicastery, such as that which we find in operation during the time of Demosthenes, would be at variance (in my judgment) with any reasonable estimate either of the man or of the age.  Herodotus says that Solon, having exacted from the Athenians solemn oaths that they would not rescind any of his laws for ten years, quitted Athens for that period, in order that he might not be compelled to rescind them himself.  Plutarch informs us that he gave to his laws force for a century.  Solon himself, and Draco before him, had been lawgivers evoked and empowered by the special emergency of the times:  the idea of a frequent revision of laws, by a body of lot-selected dicasts, belongs to a far more advanced age, and could not well have been present to the minds of either.  The wooden rollers of Solon, like the tables of the Roman decemvirs, were doubtless intended as a permanent “fons omnis publici privatique juris”.

If we examine the facts of the case, we shall see that nothing more than the bare foundation of the democracy of Athens as it stood in the time of Pericles can reasonably be ascribed to Solon.  “I gave to the people (Solon says in one of his short remaining fragments) as much strength as sufficed for their needs, without either enlarging or diminishing their dignity:  for those too, who possessed power and were noted for wealth, I took care that no unworthy treatment should be reserved.  I stood with the strong shield cast over both parties so as not to allow an unjust triumph to either.”  Again, Aristotle tells us that Solon bestowed upon the people as much power as was indispensable, but no more:  the power to elect their magistrates and hold them to accountability:  if the people had had less than this, they could not have been expected to remain tranquil—­they would have been in slavery and hostile to the constitution.  Not less distinctly does Herodotus speak, when he describes the revolution subsequently operated by Clisthenes—­the latter (he tells us) found “the Athenian people excluded from everything.”  These passages seem positively to contradict the supposition, in itself sufficiently improbable, that Solon is the author of the peculiar democratical institutions of Athens, such as the constant and numerous dicasts for judicial trials and revision of laws.  The genuine and forward democratical movement of Athens begins only with Clisthenes, from the moment when that distinguished