It was well enough for Lycurgus, whose city was free from swarms of strangers, and whose country was, in the words of Euripides, For many large, for twice as many more than large, Euripides, unknown; Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. (2) , p. 680 and because, above all, that country was flooded with a multitude of Helots, whom it was better not to leave in idleness, but to keep down by continual hardships and toil,—it was well enough for him to set his citizens free from laborious and mechanical occupations and confine their thoughts to arms, giving them this one trade to learn and practice. But Solon, adapting his laws to the situation, rather than the situation to his laws, and observing that the land could give but a mere subsistence to those who tilled it, and was incapable of supporting an unoccupied and leisured multitude, gave dignity to all the trades, and ordered the council of the Areiopagus to examine into every man’s means of livelihood, and chastise those who had no occupation.