[-8-] “Then again there are many, apart from any criminals, some priding themselves on birth, others on wealth, others on something different, in general not bad men, who are by nature opposed to the conception of monarchy.  If a ruler allows them to become strong, he cannot live in safety, and if he undertakes to impose a check on them, he cannot do so justly.  What then shall he do with them?  How shall he treat them?  If you root out their families, diminish their wealth, humble their pride, you will lose the good-will of your subjects.  How can it be otherwise, if no one is permitted to be born nobly or to grow rich honestly or to become strong, brave, or learned?  But if you allow all the separate classes to grow strong, you will not be able to deal with them easily.  If you alone were sufficient for carrying on politics and war well and opportunely, and needed no assistant for any of them, it would be a different story.  As the case stands, however, it is quite essential for you to have many helpers, since they must govern so large a world:  and they all ought to be both brave and prudent.  Now if you hand over the legions and the offices to such men, there will be danger that both you and your government will be overthrown.  It is not possible for a valuable man to be produced without good sense, and he cannot acquire any great good sense from servile practices.  But again, if he becomes a man of sense, he cannot fail to desire liberty and to hate all masters.  If, on the other hand, you entrust nothing to these men, but put affairs in charge of the worthless and chance comers, you will very quickly incur the anger of the first class, who think themselves distrusted, and you will very quickly fail in the greatest enterprises.  What good could an ignorant or low-born person accomplish?  What enemy would not hold him in contempt?  What allies would obey him?  Who, even of the soldiers themselves, would not disdain to be ruled by such a man?  What evils are wont to result from such a condition I do not need to describe to you, for you know them thoroughly.  I feel obliged to say only this, that if such an assistant did nothing right, he would injure you far more than the enemy:  if he did anything satisfactorily, his lack of education would cause him to lose his head, and he would be a terror to you.

[-9-] “Such a question does not arise in democracies.  The more men there are who are wealthy and brave, so much the more do they vie with one another and up-build the city.  The latter uses them and is glad, unless any one of them wishes to found a tyranny:  him the citizens punish severely.  That this is so and that democracies are far superior to monarchies the experience of Greece makes clear.  As long as the people had the monarchical government, they effected nothing of importance:  but when they began to live under the democratic system, they became most renowned.  It is shown also by the experience of other branches of mankind.  Those who are still conducting their governments under tyrannies are always in slavery and always plotting against their rulers.  But those who have presidents for a year or some longer period continue to be both free and independent.