numberless Greek cities except Athens. Corinth was always
the most influential of the Peloponnesian allies of Sparta, by
true sympathy of Dorian race, though most contrasted in
manners and pursuits; she was very soon to be the most
active of the agitators against the power of Athens--to a
very great extent in consequence of points of agreement
unfortunately diverted to irritating contact and collision.
A gleam of light is flashed for a moment by Pindar into
the deep obscurity of a busy, energetic, and luxurious social
system, and we are bound to make the most of its revelations
in the interests of history. In his two poems for the same
victories at different celebrations, two sides of Corinthian life
are presented to our view--two aspects that are in more than
Doric and Ionic contrast.

Corinth was still at this time, as of yore, aristocratic, and
in the enjoyment of the prolonged tranquillity which Pindar
was ever disposed to associate with the predominance of 'the
Best.' Justice, Order, and Peace are the characteristics that
he asserts for her under presidency of the Seasons, the Horae,
which are personified by him, as they had already been by
Hesiod, under ethical titles--Dike, Eunomia, Eirene--though
still without forfeiting their epithet of the 'many-flowered.'
To the influence of these goddesses are due the wealth of the
city, the virtues that triumph in the games, and the ingenuity
that originates novelty alike in the aesthetic and the useful
arts. The poet cites as examples of Corinthian inventiveness,
such as her citizens assert the value of in their taunts to
the stationary ¹ Spartans, the dithyramb which Arion had
commenced when in favour at the Court of Periander; im-
provements in the harness of horses, and the decoration of the
expanded wing-like pediment--the Aëtoma--of the temples
of the Gods. Thucydides credits them with the invention of
the ² trireme. Intellectual, poetical, warlike, gymnic distinc-

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