are mistaken, while they suppose that
each of these differ in the numbers to whom their power extends, but
not in their constitution: so that with them a herile government is one
composed of a very few, a domestic of more, a civil and a regal of still
more, as if there was no difference between a large family and a small
city, or that a regal government and a political one are the same, only
that in the one a single person is continually at the head of public
affairs; in the other, that each member of the state has in his turn a
share in the government, and is at one time a magistrate, at another
a private person, according to the rules of political science. But now
this is not true, as will be evident to any one who will consider this
question in the most approved method. As, in an inquiry into every other
subject, it is necessary to separate the different parts of which it is
compounded, till we arrive at their first elements, which are the most
minute parts thereof; so by the same proceeding we shall acquire a
knowledge of the primary parts of a city and see wherein they differ
from each other, and whether the rules of art will give us any
assistance in examining into each of these things which are mentioned.

CHAPTER II

Now if in this particular science any one would attend to its original
seeds, and their first shoot, he would then as in others have the
subject perfectly before him; and perceive, in the first place, that it
is requisite that those should be joined together whose species cannot
exist without each other, as the male and the female, for the business
of propagation; and this not through choice, but by that natural impulse
which acts both upon plants and animals also, for the purpose of their
leaving behind them others like themselves. It is also from natural
causes that some beings command and others obey, that each may obtain
their mutual safety; for a being who is endowed with a mind capable
of reflection and forethought is by nature the superior and governor,
whereas he whose excellence is merely corporeal is formect to be a
slave; whence it follows that the different state of master [1252b] and
slave is equally advantageous to both. But there is a natural difference
between a female and a slave: for nature is not like the artists
who make the Delphic swords for the use of the poor, but for every
particular purpose she has her separate instruments, and thus her ends
are most complete, f