Next best to an agricultural, and in many respects similar, are a
pastoral people, who live by their flocks; they are the best trained
of any for war, robust in body and able to camp out. The people of
whom other democracies consist are far inferior to them, for their
life is inferior; there is no room for moral excellence in any of
their employments, whether they be mechanics or traders or laborers.
Besides, people of this class can readily come to the assembly,
because they are continually moving about in the city and in the
agora; whereas husbandmen are scattered over the country and do not
meet, or equally feel the want of assembling together. Where the
territory also happens to extend to a distance from the city, there is
no difficulty in making an excellent democracy or constitutional
government; for the people are compelled to settle in the country, and
even if there is a town population the assembly ought not to meet,
in democracies, when the country people cannot come. We have thus
explained how the first and best form of democracy should be
constituted; it is clear that the other or inferior sorts will deviate
in a regular order, and the population which is excluded will at
each stage be of a lower kind.
The last form of democracy, that in which all share alike, is one
which cannot be borne by all states, and will not last long unless
well regulated by laws and customs.
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