Men come together in cities in order to live: they remain together in order to live the good life
To let them share in the highest offices is to take a risk; inevitably, their unjust standards will cause them to commit injustice, and their lack of judgement will lead them into error. On the other hand there is a risk in not giving them a share, and in their non participation, for when there are many who have no property and no honours they inevitably constitute a huge hostile element in the state. But it can still remain open to them to participate in deliberating and judging.
Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms.
The only stable state is the one in which all men are equal before the law.
It is not easy for a person to do any great harm when his tenure of office is short, whereas long possession begets tyranny.
When there is no middle class, and the poor greatly exceed in number, troubles arise, and the state soon comes to an end.
A constitution is the arrangement of magistracies in a state, especially of the highest of all. The government is everywhere sovereign in the state, and the constitution is in fact the government.
There are still two forms besides democracy and oligarchy; one of them is universally recognized and included among the four principal forms of government, which are said to be (1) monarchy, (2) oligarchy, (3) democracy, and (4) the so-called aristocracy or government of the best. But there is also a fifth, which retains the generic name of polity or constitutional government.
Man perfected by society is the best of all animals; he is the most terrible of all when he lives without law, and without justice.
Democracy is when the poor, not the wealthy, are the rulers.
