BOOK VI - CHAPTER VII

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_ As the greater part of the community are divided into four sorts of
people; husbandmen, mechanics, traders, and hired servants; and as
those who are employed in war may likewise be divided into four; the
horsemen, the heavy-armed soldier, the light-armed, and the sailor,
where the nature of the country can admit a great number of horse;
there a powerful oligarchy may be easily established: for the safety
of the inhabitants depends upon a force of that sort; but those who
can support the expense of horsemen must be persons of some
considerable fortune. Where the troops are chiefly heavy-armed, there
an oligarchy, inferior in power to the other, may be established; for
the heavy-armed are rather made up of men of substance than the poor:
but the light-armed and the sailors always contribute to support a
democracy: but where the number of these is very great and a sedition
arises, the other parts of the community fight at a disadvantage; but
a remedy for this evil is to be learned from skilful generals, who
always mix a proper number of light-armed soldiers with their horse
and heavy-armed: for it is with those that the populace get the better
of the men of fortune in an insurrection; for these being lighter are
easily a match for the horse and the heavy-armed: so that for an
oligarchy to form a body of troops from these is to form it against
itself: but as a city is composed of persons of different ages, some
young and some old, the fathers should teach their sons, while they
were very young, a light and easy exercise; but, when they are grown
up, they should be perfect in every warlike exercise. Now, the
admission of the people to any share in the government should either
be (as I said before) regulated by a census, or else, as at Thebes,
allowed to those who for a certain time have ceased from any mechanic
employment, or as at Massalia, where they are chosen according to
their worth, whether citizens or foreigners. With respect to the
magistrates of the highest rank which it may be necessary to have in a
state, the services they are bound to do the public should be
expressly laid down, to prevent the common people from being desirous
of accepting their employments, and also to induce them to regard
their magistrates with favour when they know what a price they pay for
their honours. It is also necessary that the magistrates, upon
entering into their offices, should make magnificent sacrifices and
erect some public structure, that the people partaking of the
entertainment, and seeing the city ornamented with votive gifts in
their temples and public structures, may see with pleasure the
stability of the government: add to this also, that the nobles will
have their generosity recorded: but now this is not the conduct which
those who are at present at the head of an oligarchy pursue, but the
contrary; for they are not more desirous of honour than of gain; for
which reason such oligarchies may more properly be called little
democracies. Thus [1321b] we have explained on what principles a
democracy and an oligarchy ought to be established. _

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