Stanley Baldwin on Sparta

“I like to think of the earth being stirred over grim Sparta. To all boys—and I am speaking of my own recollections—she had a peculiar appeal. I think most boys prefer her to Athens and prefer Leonidas to Alcibiades in spite of the fact that Alcibiades is a much more successful character in the modern world than Leonidas. But there is something in Spartan discipline and mode of life that appeals to strenuous youth, and it may be the cherished recollections of far distant days that make me feel a thrill at the thought of the investigations of the School in Sparta.”

“There are, at any rate, two or three things in Spartan life that I think ought to appeal to all sections of this generation. The example that the Spartans made of the drunken Helots would find some to applaud it to-day. The alacrity with which some of our modern womanhood are striving now to overtake the modes and the fashions of those girls who took part in the festivals of Greece shows that their practices in this respect command emulation in some quarters. There is much also in the Spartan regime that would appeal to the modern Fascisti. The Spartans had another rule which one has often heard Britons blamed for following—never to trust the foreigner. I do not think that there would have been much chance for a Soviet Delegation in Sparta.”