r the fewer powers the kings have, the longer time the office in its
entirety must last, for they themselves become less despotic and more equal to
their subjects in temper, and their subjects envy them less. For this was the
cause of the long persistence of the Molossian royalty, and that of Sparta has continued because the office was
from the beginning divided into two halves, and because it was again limited in
various ways by Theopompus,King of
Sparta circa 770-720 B.C. in particular by
his instituting the office of the ephors to keep a check upon it; for by taking
away some of the kings' power he increased the permanence of the royal office,
so that in a manner he did not make it less but greater. This indeed as the
story goes is what he said in reply to his wife, when she asked if he felt no
shame in bequeathing the royal power to his sons smaller than he had inherited
it from his father: “Indeed I do not,” he is said