Politics: A Treatise on Government
sojourners and slaves are upon an equality with him; nor will it be
sufficient for this purpose, that you have the privilege of the laws,
and may plead or be impleaded, for this all those of different nations,
between whom there is a mutual agreement for that purpose, are allowed;
although it very often happens, that sojourners have not a perfect right
therein without the protection of a patron, to whom they are obliged to
apply, which shows that their share in the community is incomplete. In
like manner, with respect to boys who are not yet enrolled, or old men
who are past war, we admit that they are in some respects citizens,
but not completely so, but with some exceptions, for these are not yet
arrived to years of maturity, and those are past service; nor is
there any difference between them. But what we mean is sufficiently
intelligible and clear, we want a complete citizen, one in whom there
is no deficiency to be corrected to make him so. As to those who are
banished, or infamous, there may be the same objections made and the
same answer given. There is nothing that more characterises a complete
citizen than having a share in the judicial and executive part of the
government.
With respect to offices, some are fixed to a particular time, so that
no person is, on any account, permitted to fill them twice; or else
not till some certain period has intervened; others are not fixed, as a
juryman's, and a member of the general assembly: but probably some one
may say these are not offices, nor have the citizens in these capacities
any share in the government; though surely it is ridiculous to say that
those who have the principal power in the state bear no office in it.
But this objection is of no weight, for it is only a dispute about
words; as there is no general term which can be applied both to the
office of a juryman and a member of the assembly. For the sake of
distinction, suppose we call it an indeterminate office: but I lay it
down as a maxim, that those are citizens who could exercise it. Such
then is the description of a citizen who comes nearest to what all those
who are called citizens are. Every one also should know, that of the
component parts of those things which differ from each other in species,
after the first or second remove, those which follow have either nothing
at all or very little common to each.
Now we see that governments differ from each other in their form,
and that some of them are defective, others [1275b] as excellent as
possible: for it is evident, that those which have many deficiencies
and degeneracies in them must be far inferior to those which are without
such faults. What I mean by degeneracies will be hereafter explained.
Hence it is clear that the office of a citizen must differ as
governments do from each other: for which reason he who is called
a citizen has, in a democracy, every privilege which that station
supposes. In other forms of government he may enjoy them; but not
necessarily: for in some states the people have no power; nor have they
any general assembly, but a few select men.
The trial also of different causes is allotted to different persons; as
at Lacedaemon all disputes concerning contracts are brought before some
of the ephori: the senate are the judges in cases of murder, and so on;
some being to be heard by one magistrate, others by another: and thus
at Carthage certain magistrates determine all causes. But our former
description of a citizen will admit of correction; for in some
governments the office of a juryman and a member of the general assembly
is not an indeterminate one; but there are particular persons appointed
for these purposes, some or all of the citizens being appointed jurymen
or members of the general assembly, and this either for all causes and
all public business whatsoever, or else for some particular one: and
this may be sufficient to show what a citizen is; for he who has a right
to a share in the judicial and executive part of government in any
city, him we call a citizen of that place; and a city, in one word, is
a collective body of such persons sufficient in themselves to all the
purposes of life.
CHAPTER II
In common use they define a citizen to be one who is sprung from
citizens on both sides, not on the father's or the mother's only. Others
carry the matter still further, and inquire how many of his ancestors
have been citizens, as his grandfather, great-grandfather, etc., but
some persons have questioned how the first of the family could prove
themselves citizens, according to this popular and careless definition.
Gorgias of Leontium, partly entertaining the same doubt, and partly in
jest, says, that as a mortar is made by a mortar-maker, so a citizen is
made by a citizen-maker, and a Larisssean by a Larisssean-maker. This
is indeed a very simple account of the matter; for if citizens are so,
according to this definition, it will be impossible to apply it to the
first founders or first inhabitants of states, who cannot possibly claim
in right either of their father or mother. It is probably a matter of
still more difficulty to determine their rights as citizens who are
admitted to their freedom after any revolution in the state. As, for
instance, at Athens, after the expulsion of the tyrants, when Clisthenes
enrolled many foreigners and city-slaves amongst the tribes; and the
doubt with respect to them was, not whether they were citizens or no,
but whether they were legally so or not. Though indeed some persons may
have this further [1276a] doubt, whether a citizen can be a citizen
when he is illegally made; as if an illegal citizen, and one who is
no citizen at all, were in the same predicament: but since we see some
persons govern unjustly, whom yet we admit to govern, though not justly,
and the definition of a citizen is one who exercises certain offices,
for such a one we have defined a citizen to be, it is evident, that a
citizen illegally created yet continues to be a citizen, but whether
justly or unjustly so belongs to the former inquiry.
CHAPTER III
It has also been doubted what was and what was not the act of the city;
as, for instance, when a democracy arises out of an aristocracy or a
tyranny; for some persons then refuse to fulfil their contracts; as if
the right to receive the money was in the tyrant and not in the state,
and many other things of the same nature; as if any covenant was founded
for violence and not for the common good. So in like manner, if anything
is done by those who have the management of public affairs where a
democracy is established, their actions are to be considered as the
actions of the state, as well as in the oligarchy or tyranny.
And here it seems very proper to consider this question, When shall we
say that a city is the same, and when shall we say that it is different?
It is but a superficial mode of examining into this question to begin
with the place and the people; for it may happen that these may be
divided from that, or that some one of them may live in one place, and
some in another (but this question may be regarded as no very knotty
one; for, as a city may acquire that appellation on many accounts,
it may be solved many ways); and in like manner, when men inhabit one
common place, when shall we say that they inhabit the same city, or that
the city is the same? for it does not depend upon the walls; for I can
suppose Peloponnesus itself surrounded with a wall, as Babylon was, and
every other place, which rather encircles many nations than one city,
and that they say was taken three days when some of the inhabitants
knew nothing of it: but we shall find a proper time to determine this
question; for the extent of a city, how large it should be, and whether
it should consist of more than one people, these are particulars that
the politician should by no means be unacquainted with. This, too, is a
matter of inquiry, whether we shall say that a city is the same while
it is inhabited by the same race of men, though some of them are
perpetually dying, others coming into the world, as we say that a river
or a fountain is the same, though the waters are continually changing;
or when a revolution takes place shall we [1276b] say the men are the
same, but the city is different: for if a city is a community, it is a
community of citizens; but if the mode of government should alter, and
become of another sort, it would seem a necessary consequence that the
city is not the same; as we regard the tragic chorus as different from
the comic, though it may probably consist of the same performers: thus
every other community or composition is said to be different if the
species of composition is different; as in music the same hands produce
different harmony, as the Doric and Phrygian. If this is true, it is
evident, that when we speak of a city as being the same we refer to the
government there established; and this, whether it is called by the
same name or any other, or inhabited by the same men or different.
But whether or no it is right to dissolve the community when the
constitution is altered is another question.
CHAPTER IV
What has been said, it follows that we should consider whether the
same virtues which constitute a good man make a valuable citizen, or
different; and if a particular inquiry is necessary for this matter we
must first give a general description of the virtues of a good citizen;
for as a sailor is one of those who make up a community, so is a
citizen, although the province of one sailor may be different from
another's (for one is a rower, another a steersman, a third a boatswain,
and so on, each having their several appointments), it is evident that
the most accurate description of any one good sailor must refer to
his peculiar abilities, yet there are some things in which the same
description may be applied to the whole crew, as the safety of the ship
is the common business of all of them, for this is the general centre of
all their cares: so also with respect to citizens, although they may
in a few particulars be very different, yet there is one care common to
them all, the safety of the community, for the community of the citizens
composes the state; for which reason the virtue of a citizen has
necessarily a reference to the state. But if there are different sorts
of governments, it is evident that those actions which constitute the
virtue of an excellent citizen in one community will not constitute it
in another; wherefore the virtue of such a one cannot be perfect: but we
say, a man is good when his virtues are perfect; from whence it follows,
that an excellent citizen does not possess that virtue which constitutes
a good man. Those who are any ways doubtful concerning this question
may be convinced of the truth of it by examining into the best formed
states: for, if it is impossible that a city should consist entirely of
excellent citizens (while it is necessary that every one should do well
in his calling, in which consists his excellence, as it is impossible
that all the citizens should have the same [1277a] qualifications) it
is impossible that the virtue of a citizen and a good man should be the
same; for all should possess the virtue of an excellent citizen: for
from hence necessarily arise the perfection of the city: but that every
one should possess the virtue of a good man is impossible without
all the citizens in a well-regulated state were necessarily virtuous.
Besides, as a city is composed of dissimilar parts, as an animal is of
life and body; the soul of reason and appetite; a family of a man and
his wife--property of a master and a slave; in the same manner, as a
city is composed of all these and many other very different parts, it