Politics   

contracts. The free claim under the same tide as the noble; for they
are nearly akin. For the noble are citizens in a truer sense than the
ignoble, and good birth is always valued in a man's own home and
country. Another reason is, that those who are sprung from better
ancestors are likely to be better men, for nobility is excellence of
race. Virtue, too, may be truly said to have a claim, for justice has
been acknowledged by us to be a social virtue, and it implies all
others. Again, the many may urge their claim against the few; for,
when taken collectively, and compared with the few, they are stronger
and richer and better. But, what if the good, the rich, the noble, and
the other classes who make up a state, are all living together in the
same city, Will there, or will there not, be any doubt who shall rule?
No doubt at all in determining who ought to rule in each of the
above-mentioned forms of government. For states are characterized by
differences in their governing bodies-one of them has a government of
the rich, another of the virtuous, and so on. But a difficulty arises
when all these elements co-exist. How are we to decide? Suppose the
virtuous to be very few in number: may we consider their numbers in
relation to their duties, and ask whether they are enough to
administer the state, or so many as will make up a state? Objections
may be urged against all the aspirants to political power. For those
who found their claims on wealth or family might be thought to have no
basis of justice; on this principle, if any one person were richer
than all the rest, it is clear that he ought to be ruler of them. In
like manner he who is very distinguished by his birth ought to have
the superiority over all those who claim on the ground that they are
freeborn. In an aristocracy, or government of the best, a like
difficulty occurs about virtue; for if one citizen be better than the
other members of the government, however good they may be, he too,
upon the same principle of justice, should rule over them. And if the
people are to be supreme because they are stronger than the few, then
if one man, or more than one, but not a majority, is stronger than the
many, they ought to rule, and not the many.
All these considerations appear to show that none of the principles on
which men claim to rule and to hold all other men in subjection to
them are strictly right. To those who claim to be masters of the
government on the ground of their virtue or their wealth, the many
might fairly answer that they themselves are often better and richer
than the few- I do not say individually, but collectively. And another
ingenious objection which is sometimes put forward may be met in a
similar manner. Some persons doubt whether the legislator who desires
to make the justest laws ought to legislate with a view to the good of
the higher classes or of the many, when the case which we have
mentioned occurs. Now what is just or right is to be interpreted in
the sense of 'what is equal'; and that which is right in the sense of
being equal is to be considered with reference to the advantage of the
state, and the common good of the citizens. And a citizen is one who
shares in governing and being governed. He differs under different
forms of government, but in the best state he is one who is able and
willing to be governed and to govern with a view to the life of
virtue.
If, however, there be some one person, or more than one, although not
enough to make up the full complement of a state, whose virtue is so
pre-eminent that the virtues or the political capacity of all the rest
admit of no comparison with his or theirs, he or they can be no longer
regarded as part of a state; for justice will not be done to the
superior, if he is reckoned only as the equal of those who are so far
inferior to him in virtue and in political capacity. Such an one may
truly be deemed a God among men. Hence we see that legislation is
necessarily concerned only with those who are equal in birth and in
capacity; and that for men of pre-eminent virtue there is no law- they
are themselves a law. Any would be ridiculous who attempted to make
laws for them: they would probably retort what, in the fable of
Antisthenes, the lions said to the hares, when in the council of the