is again some idea of what is base and
what is noble and of what constitutes the difference is likely to arise
among the people; and noble conduct will be admired and imitated because
advantageous, while base conduct will be avoided. Now when the leading
and most powerful man among people always throws the weight of his
authority the side of the notions on such matters which generally
prevail, and when in the opinion of his subjects he apportions rewards
and penalties according to desert, they yield obedience to him no longer
because they fear his force, but rather because their judgment approves
him; and they join in maintaining his rule even if he is quite enfeebled
by age, defending him with one consent and battling against those who
conspire to overthrow his rule. Thus by insensible degrees the monarch
becomes a king, ferocity and force having yielded the supremacy to
reason.

7. Thus is formed naturally among men the first notion of goodness and
justice, and their opposites; this is the beginning and birth of true
kingship. For the people maintain the supreme power not only in the
hands of these men themselves, but in those of their descendants, from
the conviction that those born from and reared by such men will also
have principles like to theirs. And if they ever are displeased with the
descendants, they now choose their kings and rulers no longer for their
bodily strength and brute courage, but for the excellency of their
judgment and reasoning powers, as they have gained experience from
actual facts of the difference between the one class of qualities and
the other. In old times, then, those who had once been chosen to the
royal office continued to hold it until they grew old, fortifying and
enclosing fine strongholds with walls and acquiring lands, in the one
case for the sake of the security of their subjects and in the other
to provide them with abundance of the necessities of life. And while
pursuing these aims, they were exempt from all vituperation or jealousy,
as neither in their dress nor in their food and drink did they make any
great distinction, but lived very much like everyone else, not keeping
apart from the people. But when they received the office by hereditary
succession and found their safety now provided for, and more than
sufficient provision of food, they gave way to their appetites owing
to this superabundance, and came to think that the rulers must be
distinguished from their subjects by