The Basic Works of Aristotle (Modern Library Classics)

by Mckeon, Richard

  The best man, then, must legislate, and laws must be passed, but these laws will have no authority when they miss the mark, (25) though in all other cases retaining their authority. But when the law cannot determine a point at all, or not well, should the one best man or should all decide? According to our present practice assemblies meet, sit in judgement, deliberate, and decide, and their judgements all relate to individual cases. Now any member of the assembly, taken separately, is certainly inferior to the wise man. But the state is made up of many individuals. And as a feast to which all the guests contribute is better than a banquet furnished by a single man,61 so a multitude is a better judge of many things than any individual. (30)

  Again, the many are more incorruptible than the few; they are like the greater quantity of water which is less easily corrupted than a little. The individual is liable to be overcome by anger or by some other passion, (35) and then his judgement is necessarily perverted; but it is hardly to be supposed that a great number of persons would all get into a passion and go wrong at the same moment. Let us assume that they are the freemen, and that they never act in violation of the law, but fill up the gaps which the law is obliged to leave. Or, if such virtue is scarcely attainable by the multitude, we need only suppose that the majority are good men and good citizens, (40) and ask which will be the more incorruptible, the one good ruler, or the many who are all good? Will not the many? But, you will say, there may be parties among them, whereas the one man is not divided against himself. [1286b] To which we may answer that their character is as good as his. (5) If we call the rule of many men, who are all of them good, aristocracy, and the rule of one man royalty, then aristocracy will be better for states than royalty, whether the government is supported by force or not,62 provided only that a number of men equal in virtue can be found.

  The first governments were kingships, probably for this reason, because of old, when cities were small, men of eminent virtue were few. (10) Further, they were made kings because they were benefactors,63 and benefits can only be bestowed by good men. But when many persons equal in merit arose, no longer enduring the pre-eminence of one, they desired to have a commonwealth, and set up a constitution. The ruling class soon deteriorated and enriched themselves out of the public treasury; riches became the path to honour, and so oligarchies naturally grew up. (15) These passed into tyrannies and tyrannies into democracies; for love of gain in the ruling classes was always tending to diminish their number, and so to strengthen the masses, who in the end set upon their masters and established democracies. (20) Since cities have increased in size, no other form of government appears to be any longer even easy to establish.64

  Even supposing the principle to be maintained that kingly power is the best thing for states, how about the family of the king? Are his children to succeed him? If they are no better than anybody else, that will be mischievous. But, says the lover of royalty, the king, (25) though he might, will not hand on his power to his children. That, however, is hardly to be expected, and is too much to ask of human nature. There is also a difficulty about the force which he is to employ; should a king have guards about him by whose aid he may be able to coerce the refractory? if not, how will he administer his kingdom? Even if he be the lawful sovereign who does nothing arbitrarily or contrary to law, (30) still he must have some force wherewith to maintain the law. In the case of a limited monarchy there is not much difficulty in answering this question; the king must have such force as will be more than a match for one or more individuals, (35) but not so great as that of the people. The ancients observe this principle when they have guards to any one whom they appointed dictator or tyrant. Thus, when Dionysius asked the Syracusans to allow him guards, somebody advised that they should give him only such a number. (40)

  16 [1287a] At this place in the discussion there impends the inquiry respecting the king who acts solely according to his own will; he has now to be considered. The so-called limited monarchy, or kingship according to law, as I have already remarked,65 is not a distinct form of government, for under all governments, as, for example, (5) in a democracy or aristocracy, there may be a general holding office for life, and one person is often made supreme over the administration of a state. A magistracy of this kind exists at Epidamnus,66 and also at Opus, but in the latter city has a more limited power. Now, (10) absolute monarchy, or the arbitrary rule of a sovereign over all the citizens, in a city which consists of equals, is thought by some to be quite contrary to nature; it is argued that those who are by nature equals must have the same natural right and worth, and that for unequals to have an equal share, or for equals to have an unequal share, (15) in the offices of state, is as bad as for different bodily constitutions to have the same food and clothing. Wherefore it is thought to be just that among equals every one be ruled as well as rule, and therefore that all should have their turn. We thus arrive at law; for an order of succession implies law. And the rule of the law, (20) it is argued, is preferable to that of any individual. On the same principle, even if it be better for certain individuals to govern, they should be made only guardians and ministers of the law. For magistrates there must be—this is admitted; but then men say that to give authority to any one man when all are equal is unjust. Nay, there may indeed be cases which the law seems unable to determine, (25) but in such cases can a man? Nay, it will be replied, the law trains officers for this express purpose, and appoints them to determine matters which are left undecided by it, to the best of their judgement. Further, it permits them to make any amendment of the existing laws which experience suggests. Therefore he who bids the law rule may be deemed to bid God and Reason alone rule, (30) but he who bids man rule adds an element of the beast; for desire is a wild beast, and passion perverts the minds of rulers, even when they are the best of men. The law is reason unaffected by desire. We are told67 that a patient should call in a physician; he will not get better if he is doctored out of a book. But the parallel of the arts is clearly not in point; for the physician does nothing contrary to rule from motives of friendship; he only cures a patient and takes a fee; whereas magistrates do many things from spite and partiality. (35) And, indeed, if a man suspected the physician of being in league with his enemies to destroy him for a bribe, (40) he would rather have recourse to the book. But certainly physicians, when they are sick, call in other physicians, and training-masters, when they are in training, other training-masters, as if they could not judge truly about their own case and might be influenced by their feelings. [1287b] Hence it is evident that in seeking for justice men seek for the mean or neutral,68 for the law is the mean. (5) Again, customary laws have more weight, and relate to more important matters, than written laws, and a man may be a safer ruler than the written law, but not safer than the customary law.

  Again, it is by no means easy for one man to superintend many things; he will have to appoint a number of subordinates, and what difference does it make whether these subordinates always existed or were appointed by him because he needed them? If, (10) as I said before,69 the good man has a right to rule because he is better, still two good men are better than one: this is the old saying—

  ‘two going together’70

  and the prayer of Agamemnon—

  ‘would that I had ten such counsellors!’71

  And at this day there are magistrates, for example judges, (15) who have authority to decide some matters which the law is unable to determine, since no one doubts that the law would command and decide in the best manner whatever it could. But some things can, and other things cannot, be comprehended under the law, and this is the origin of the vexed question whether the best law or the best man should rule. (20) For matters of detail about which men deliberate cannot be included in legislation. Nor does any one deny that the decision of such matters must be left to man, but it is argued that there should be many judges, and not one only. For every ruler who has been trained by the law judges well; and it would surely seem strange that a person should see better with t
wo eyes, (25) or hear better with two ears, or act better with two hands or feet, than many with many; indeed, it is already the practice of kings to make to themselves many eyes and ears and hands and feet. For they make colleagues of those who are the friends of themselves and their governments. (30) They must be friends of the monarch and of his government; if not his friends, they will not do what he wants; but friendship implies likeness and equality; and, therefore, if he thinks that his friends ought to rule, he must think that those who are equal to himself and like himself ought to rule equally with himself. (35) These are the principal controversies relating to monarchy.

  17 But may not all this be true in some cases and not in others? for there is by nature both a justice and an advantage appropriate to the rule of a master, another to kingly rule, another to constitutional rule; but there is none naturally appropriate to tyranny, or to any other perverted form of government; for these come into being contrary to nature. Now, to judge at least from what has been said, it is manifest that, (40) where men are alike and equal, it is neither expedient nor just that one man should be lord of all, whether there are laws, or whether there are no laws, but he himself is in the place of law. [1288a] Neither should a good man be lord over good men, nor a bad man over bad; nor, even if he excels in virtue, should he have a right to rule, unless in a particular case, at which I have already hinted, and to which I will once more recur.72 (5) But first of all, I must determine what natures are suited for government by a king, and what for an aristocracy, and what for a constitutional government.

  A people who are by nature capable of producing a race superior in the virtue needed for political rule are fitted for kingly government; and a people submitting to be ruled as freemen by men whose virtue renders them capable of political command are adapted for an aristocracy: (10) while the people who are suited for constitutional freedom are those among whom there naturally exists a warlike multitude73 able to rule and to obey in turn by a law which gives office to the well-to-do according to their desert. (15) But when a whole family, or some individual, happens to be so pre-eminent in virtue as to surpass all others, then it is just that they should be the royal family and supreme over all, or that this one citizen should be king of the whole nation. (20) For, as I said before,74 to give them authority is not only agreeable to that ground of right which the founders of all states, whether aristocratical, or oligarchical, or again democratical, are accustomed to put forward (for these all recognize the claim of excellence, (25) although not the same excellence), but accords with the principle already laid down. For surely it would not be right to kill, or ostracize, or exile such a person, or require that he should take his turn in being governed. The whole is naturally superior to the part, and he who has this pre-eminence is in the relation of a whole to a part. But if so, the only alternative is that he should have the supreme power, (30) and that mankind should obey him, not in turn, but always. These are the conclusions at which we arrive respecting royalty and its various forms, and this is the answer to the question, whether it is or is not advantageous to states, and to which, and how.

  18 We maintain75 that the true forms of government are three, (35) and that the best must be that which is administered by the best, and in which there is one man, or a whole family, or many persons, excelling all the others together in virtue, and both rulers and subjects are fitted, the one to rule, the others to be ruled, in such a manner as to attain the most eligible life. We showed at the commencement of our inquiry76 that the virtue of the good man is necessarily the same as the virtue of the citizen of the perfect state. Clearly then in the same manner, and by the same means through which a man becomes truly good, (40) he will frame a state that is to be ruled by an aristocracy or by a king, and the same education and the same habits will be found to make a good man and a man fit to be a statesman or king. [1288b]

  Having arrived at these conclusions, we must proceed to speak of the perfect state, and describe how it comes into being and is established. (5)

  * * *

  1 Cp. 1276a 8.

  2 ‘Dicast’ = juryman and judge in one: ‘ecclesiast’ = member of the ecclesia or assembly of the citizens.

  3 Cp. 1279a 19.

  4 Cp. ii. 1273a 19.

  5 An untranslatable play upon the word demiourgos, which means either ‘a magistrate’ or ‘an artisan’.

  6 1275a 22 sqq.

  7 Cp. 1274b 34.

  8 i. e. Polls means both ‘state’ and ‘city’.

  9 Cp. ii. 1265a 14.

  10 The size of the state is discussed in vii. 1326a 8–1327a 3; the question whether it should consist of more than one nation is barely touched upon, in V. 1303a 25–b 3.

  11 Cp. N. Eth. V. 1130b 28.

  12 Cp. i. 1255b 20–37.

  13 Cp. viii. 1337b 15.

  14 Cp. i. 1260a 20.

  15 Cp. Rep. iv. 428.

  16 Cp. Rep. X. 601 D, E.

  17 Cp. 1278a 40, 1288a 39, iv. 1293b 5, vii. 1333a II.

  18 sc. that they grow up to be men.

  19 1275a 38 sqq.

  20 Cp. vi. 1321a 28.

  21 Achilles complains of Agamemnon’s so treating him, Il. ix. 648, xvi. 59.

  22 Cp. 1274b 38, iv. 1289a 15.

  23 Cp. i. 1253a 2.

  24 Cp. Pl. Rep. i. 341 D.

  25 Cp. ii. 1261a 37–b 6.

  26 Cp. N. Eth. viii. 10.

  27 V. 1131a 15.

  28 Cp. 1275a 10.

  29 Cp. Protag. 322 B.

  30 Cp. i. 1252b 27; N. Eth. i. 1097b 6.

  31 Cp. 1282b 6.

  32 Cp. Il. 11–34.

  33 cc. 12–17, iv., vi.

  34 c. 10.

  35 Cp. ii. 1274a 15.

  36 1281a 40–b 21.

  37 1281b 32.

  38 C. 10.

  39 Cp. N. Eth. V. 1137b 19.

  40 Cp. 1281a 36.

  41 Cp. i. 1252a 2; N. Eth. i. 1094a 1.

  42 Cp. 1280a 9.

  43 Cp. N. Eth. v. 3.

  44 Cp. iv. 1291a 19–33.

  45 Cp. 1281a 4.

  46 1280a 9 sqq.

  47 Cp. i. 1255a 32.

  48 Cp. i. 1253a 37.

  49 Cp. N. Eth. v. 1129b 25.

  50 i. e. when the many collectively are better than the few.

  51 i. e. ‘where are your claws and teeth?’

  52 Cp. v. 1311a 20.

  53 Cp. v. 1302b 18.

  54 Cp. v. 1302b 34, 1309b 21; vii. 1326a 35; Rep. iv. 420.

  55 Il. ii. 391–393. The last clause is not found in our Homer.

  56 Cp. i, 1252b 7.

  57 Cp. v, 1311a 7.

  58 Cp. v, 1310b 10.

  59 It is not discussed later.

  60 Cp. Plato, Polit. 294 A–295 C.

  61 Cp. 1281a 42.

  62 Cp. 1. 27.

  63 Cp. 1285b 6.

  64 Cp. iv. 1293a 1, 1297b 22.

  65 1286a 2.

  66 Cp. v. 1301b 21.

  67 Cp. 1286a 12–14, Polit. 296 B.

  68 Cp. N. Eth. v. 1132a 22.

  69 1283b 21, 1284b 32.

  70 Il. x. 224.

  71 Il. ii. 372.

  72 1284a 3, and 1288a 15.

  73 Cp. 1279b 2.

  74 1283b 20, 1284a 3–17, b25.

  75 Cp. 1279b 22–b 4.

  76 CC. 4, 5.

  BOOK IV

  1 In all arts and sciences which embrace the whole of any subject, (10) and do not come into being in a fragmentary way, it is the province of a single art or science to consider all that appertains to a single subject. For example, the art of gymnastic considers not only the suitableness of different modes of training to different bodies (2), but what sort is absolutely the best (1); (for the absolutely best must suit that which is by nature best and best furnished with the means of life), and also what common form of training is adapted to the great majority of men (4). (15) And if a man does not desire the best habit of body, or the greatest skill in gymnastics, which might be attained by him, still the trainer or the teacher of
gymnastic should be able to impart any lower degree of either (3). The same principle equally holds in medicine and ship-building, and the making of clothes, and in the arts generally.1

  Hence it is obvious that government too is the subject of a single science, (20) which has to consider what government is best and of what sort it must be, to be most in accordance with our aspirations, if there were no external impediment, and also what kind of government is adapted to particular states. For the best is often unattainable, (25) and therefore the true legislator and statesman ought to be acquainted, not only with (1) that which is best in the abstract, but also with (2) that which is best relatively to circumstances. We should be able further to say how a state may be constituted under any given conditions (3); both how it is originally formed and, when formed, how it may be longest preserved; the supposed state being so far from having the best constitution that it is unprovided even with the conditions necessary for the best; neither is it the best under the circumstances, (30) but of an inferior type.

  He ought, moreover, to know (4) the form of government which is best suited to states in general; for political writers, (35) although they have excellent ideas, are often unpractical. We should consider, not only what form of government is best, but also what is possible and what is easily attainable by all. There are some who would have none but the most perfect; for this many natural advantages are required. (40) Others, again, speak of a more attainable form, and, although they reject the constitution under which they are living, they extol some one in particular, for example the Lacedaemonian.2 Any change of government which has to be introduced should be one which men, starting from their existing constitutions, will be both willing and able to adopt, since there is quite as much trouble in the reformation of an old constitution as in the establishment of a new one, (5) just as to unlearn is as hard as to learn. [1289a] And therefore, in addition to the qualifications of the statesman already mentioned, he should be able to find remedies for the defects of existing constitutions, as has been said before.3 This he cannot do unless he knows how many forms of government there are. It is often supposed that there is only one kind of democracy and one of oligarchy. (10) But this is a mistake; and, in order to avoid such mistakes, we must ascertain what differences there are in the constitutions of states, and in how many ways they are combined. The same political insight will enable a man to know which laws are the best, and which are suited to different constitutions; for the laws are, and ought to be, relative to the constitution, (15) and not the constitution to the laws. A constitution is the organization of offices in a state, and determines what is to be the governing body, and what is the end of each community. But laws are not to be confounded with the principles of the constitution; they are the rules according to which the magistrates should administer the state, and proceed against offenders. (20) So that we must know the varieties, and the number of varieties, of each form of government, if only with a view to making laws. For the same laws cannot be equally suited to all oligarchies or to all democracies, since there is certainly more than one form both of democracy and of oligarchy. (25)