ver we
meet.

_Cosmo_.--Solon has reason to do so; for tell me, Pericles, what opinion
would you have of the architect you employed in your buildings if he had
made them to last no longer than during the term of your life?

_Pericles_.--The answer to your question will turn to your own
condemnation. Your excessive liberalities to the indigent citizens, and
the great sums you lent to all the noble families, did in reality buy the
Republic of Florence, and gave your family such a power as enabled them
to convert it from a popular State into an absolute monarchy.

_Cosmo_.--The Florentines were so infested with discord and faction, and
their commonwealth was so void of military virtue, that they could not
have long been exempt from a more ignominious subjection to some foreign
Power if those internal dissensions, with the confusion and anarchy they
produced, had continued. But the Athenians had performed very glorious
exploits, had obtained a great empire, and were become one of the noblest
States in the world, before you altered the balance of their government.
And after that alteration they declined very fast, till they lost all
their greatness.

_Pericles_.--Their constitution had originally a foul blemish in it--I
mean, the ban of ostracism, which alone would have been sufficient to
undo any State. For there is nothing of such important use to a nation
as that men who most excel in wisdom and virtue should be encouraged to
undertake the business of government. But this detestable custom
deterred such men from serving the public, or, if they ventured to do so,
turned even their own wisdom and virtue against them; so that in Athens
it was safer to be infamous than renowned. We are told indeed, by the
advocates for this strange institution, that it was not a punishment, but
meant as a guard to the equality and liberty of the State; for which
reason they deem it an honour done to the persons against whom it was
used; as if words could change the real nature of things, and make a
banishment of ten years, inflicted on a good citizen by the suffrages of
his countrymen, no evil to him, or no offence against justice and the
natural right every freeman may claim--that he shall not be expelled from
any society of which he is a member without having first been proved
guilty of some criminal action.

_Cosmo_.--The ostracism was indeed a most unpardonable fault in the
Athenian constitution. It placed envy in the seat of j