But all this is a mistake; for governments differ in kind, as will
be evident to any one who considers the matter according to the method
which has hitherto guided us. As in other departments of science, so
in politics, the compound should always be resolved into the simple
elements or least parts of the whole. We must therefore look at the
elements of which the state is composed, in order that we may see in
what the different kinds of rule differ from one another, and
whether any scientific result can be attained about each one of them.
II
He who thus considers things in their first growth and origin,
whether a state or anything else, will obtain the clearest view of
them. In the first place there must be a union of those who cannot
exist without each other; namely, of male and female, that the race
may continue (and this is a union which is formed, not of deliberate
purpose, but because, in common with other animals and with plants,
mankind have a natural desire to leave behind them an image of
themselves), and of natural ruler and subject, that both may be
preserved. For that which can foresee by the exercise of mind is by
nature intended to be lord and master, and that which can with its
body give effect to such foresight is a subject, and by nature a
slave; hence master and slave have the same interest.
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