Plutarch
<p>http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Lives/Lycurgus*.html</p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" ><a href="http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Lives/Lycurgus*.html" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1417629210809_3473">Plutarch • Life of Lycurgus</a>
An English translation. All of Plutarch's Lives are onsite; in turn part of a very large site on classical Antiquity.</p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Lives/Lycurgus*.html" target="_blank" >View on <b>penelope.uchicago.edu</b></a></p>
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<a id="4" name="4">4</a> <a name="4.1" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1417629210809_3361">1</a> With this purpose, he set sail, and came first to Crete. Here he studied the various forms of government and made the acquaintance of their most distinguished men. Of some things he heartily approved, and adopted some of their laws, that he might carry them home with him and put them in use; for some things he had only contempt. One of the men regarded there as wise statesmen was Thales, whom Lycurgus persuaded, out of favour and friendship, to go on a mission to Sparta. Now Thales passed as a lyric poet, and screened himself behind this art, but in reality he did the work of one of the mightiest lawgivers. <a id="4.2" name="4.2">2</a> For his odes were so many exhortations to obedience and harmony, and their measured rhythms were permeated with ordered tranquillity, so that those who listened to them were insensibly softened in their dispositions, insomuch that they renounced the mutual hatreds which were so rife at that time, and dwelt together in a common pursuit of what was high and noble. Thales, therefore, after a fashion, was a forerunner in Sparta of Lycurgus and his discipline.</p>