The Spirit of Athens: George Grote and John Stuart Mill on Classical Republicanism

In 1821 George Grote wrote a lengthy manuscript essay entitled “On the Athenian Government,” in which he asserted that the short treatise On the Athenian Constitution (which he attributes to Xenophon) “proves incontestably that the Athenian Government was the best at that time existing in Greece.”1 Grote quite ingeniously tried to deduce from a hostile witness evidence in favour of Athenian democracy as compared to the constitution the author of this treatise would have preferred to see operating.2 At that time Grote was 27 years old, that is only two years after he met James Mill who changed his political convictions and his philosophical outlook forever. From that year onwards Grote was devoted to writing a pamphlet on “Parliamentary Reform” (1821), an “Essay on Magick,”3 an essay on “Natural Religion” (1822),4 and an article entitled “Institutions of Ancient Greece” for the Westminster Review (1826) - his formal debut in Greek historiography.5 The elder Mill had a profound influence on Grote, directing the powers of this admirable polymath in the service of the utilitarian cause for political reform and moral enlightenment along with a large group of enthusiasts and activists who addressed an inveterate scepticism towards all the institutions, norms and practices of organized society.