What in our opinion is the right
arrangement will have to be explained hereafter.
There is another omission in the Laws: Socrates does not tell us how
the rulers differ from their subjects; he only says that they should
be related as the warp and the woof, which are made out of different
wools. He allows that a man's whole property may be increased
fivefold, but why should not his land also increase to a certain
extent? Again, will the good management of a household be promoted
by his arrangement of homesteads? For he assigns to each individual
two homesteads in separate places, and it is difficult to live in
two houses.
The whole system of government tends to be neither democracy nor
oligarchy, but something in a mean between them, which is usually
called a polity, and is composed of the heavy-armed soldiers. Now,
if he intended to frame a constitution which would suit the greatest
number of states, he was very likely right, but not if he meant to say
that this constitutional form came nearest to his first or ideal
state; for many would prefer the Lacedaemonian, or, possibly, some
other more aristocratic government. Some, indeed, say that the best
constitution is a combination of all existing forms, and they praise
the Lacedaemonian because it is made up of oligarchy, monarchy, and
democracy, the king forming the monarchy, and the council of elders
the oligarchy while the democratic element is represented by the
Ephors; for the Ephors are selected from the people.
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