The Samnites had a custom which in so small a republic, and
especially in their situation, must have been productive of admirable
effects. The young people were all convened in one place, and their
conduct was examined. He that was declared the best of the whole
assembly had leave given him to take which girl he pleased for his wife;
the second best chose after him; and so on.
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Admirable institution! The only recommendation that young men could have on this occasion was
their virtue and the services done their country. He who had the
greatest share of these endowments chose which girl he liked out of the
whole nation. Love, beauty, chastity, virtue, birth, and even wealth
itself, were all, in some measure, the dowry of virtue. A nobler and
grander recompense, less chargeable to a petty state, and more capable
of influencing both sexes, could scarcely be imagined.
The Samnites were descended from the Lacedmonians; and Plato, whose
institutes are only an improvement of those of Lycurgus, enacted nearly
the same law.
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