Political Precepts (17-18)

The politician therefore is by nature always the prince of the city, as the king among the bees; and in consideration of this, he ought always to have the helm of public affairs in his hand. But as for those dignities and offices to which persons are nominated and chosen by the suffrages of the people, he should neither too eagerly nor too often pursue them,—the seeking after offices being neither venerable nor popular,—nor yet should he reject them, when the people legally confer them on him and invite him to them, but even though they are below his reputation, he should accept them and willingly employ himself in them; for it is but just that they who have been honored by offices of greater dignity should in return grace those of inferior rank. And in those more weighty and superior employs, such as are the commanding of the armies in Athens, the Prytania in Rhodes, and the Boeotarchy amongst us, he should carry himself with such moderation as to remit and abate something of their grandeur, adding somewhat of dignity and venerableness to those that are meaner and less esteemed, that he may be neither despised for these nor envied for those.

Now it behooves him that enters upon any office, not only to have at hand those arguments of which Pericles put himself in mind when he first received the robe of state: Bethink thyself, Pericles, thou govern’st freemen, thou govern’st Grecians, yea, citizens of Athens; but farther also, he ought to say thus with himself: Thou,

being a subject, govern’st a city which is under the obedience of Caesar’s proconsul or lieutenant. Here is no fight in a fair field, this is not the ancient Sardis, nor is this the puissance of the Lydians. Thou must make thy robe scantier, look from the pavilion to the tribunal, and not place too great confidence in thy crown, since thou see’st the Roman’s shoes over thy head. But in this the stage-players are to be imitated, who add indeed to the play their own passionate transports, behavior, and countenance, suitable to the person they represent, but yet give ear to the prompter, and transgress not the rhyme and measures of the faculty granted them by their masters. For an error in government brings not, as in the acting of a tragedy, only hissing and derision; but many have by this means subjected themselves to that

Severe chastiser, the neck-cutting axe.

As it befell your countryman Pardalas, when he forgot the limits of his power. Another, being banished from home and confined to a little island, as Solon has it,

Became at last from an Athenian

A Pholegandrian or Sicinitan.

For we laugh indeed, when we see little children endeavoring to fasten their father’s shoes on their own feet, or setting their crowns on their own heads in sport. But the governors of cities, foolishly exhorting the people to imitate those works, achievements, and actions of their ancestors which are not suitable to the present times and affairs, elevate the multitude, and although they do things that are ridiculous, they yet meet with a fate which is not fit to be laughed at, unless they are men altogether despised. For there are many other facts of the ancient Greeks, the recital of which to those who are now living may serve to form and moderate their manners; as would be the relating at Athens, not the warlike exploits of their progenitors, but (for example) the decree of amnesty after the expulsion of the Thirty Tyrants; the fining of Phrynicus, who represented in a tragedy the taking of Miletus; how they wore garlands on their heads when Cassander rebuilt Thebes; how, having intelligence of the Scytalism (or slaughter) at Argos in which the Argives put to death fifteen hundred of their own citizens, they commanded a lustration (or expiatory sacrifice) to be carried about in a full assembly; and how, when they were searching of houses for those that were confederated with Harpalus, they passed by only one, which was inhabited by a man newly married. For by the imitating of such things as these, they may even now resemble their ancestors; but the fights at Marathon, Eurymedon, and Plataea, and whatever examples vainly puff up and heighten the multitude, should be left to the schools of the sophisters.