LAWS by Plato - Complete text

Part 1 Page 68

Ath. The next step will be that these persons who have met together, will select some arbiters, who will review the laws of all of them, and will publicly present such as they approve to the chiefs who lead the tribes, and who are in a manner their kings, allowing them to choose those which they think best. These persons will themselves be called legislators, and will appoint the magistrates, framing some sort of aristocracy, or perhaps monarchy, out of the dynasties or lordships, and in this altered state of the government they will live.

Cle. Yes, that would be the natural order of things.

Ath. Then, now let us speak of a third form of government, in which all other forms and conditions of polities and cities concur.

Cle. What is that?

Ath. The form which in fact Homer indicates as following the second. This third form arose when, as he says, Dardanus founded Dardania: -

For not as yet had the holy Ilium been built on the plain to be a city of speaking men; but they were still dwelling at the foot of many - fountained Ida. - For indeed, in these verses, and in what he said of the Cyclopes, he speaks the words of God and nature; for poets are a divine race and often in their strains, by the aid of the Muses and the Graces, they attain truth.

Cle. Yes.

Ath. Then now let us proceed with the rest of our tale, which will probably be found to illustrate in some degree our proposed design: - Shall we do so?

Cle. By all means.

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