e people, and
are carried into execution just as they please. Here the populace
inflict punishments at their pleasure, and act, and seize, and keep
possession, and distribute property, without let or hinderance. Can you
deny, my Laelius, that this is a fair definition of a democracy, where
the people are all in all, and where the people constitute the State?

_Laelius._ There is no political constitution to which I more absolutely
deny the name of a _commonwealth_ than that in which all things lie in
the power of the multitude. If a commonwealth, which implies the
welfare of the entire community, could not exist in Agrigentum,
Syracuse, or Athens when tyrants reigned over them--if it could not
exist in Rome when under the oligarchy of the decemvirs--neither do I
see how this sacred name of commonwealth can be applied to a democracy
and the sway of the mob; because, in the first place, my Scipio, I
build on your own admirable definition, that there can be no community,
properly so called, unless it be regulated by a combination of rights.
And, by this definition, it appears that a multitude of men may be just
as tyrannical as a single despot; and it is so much the worse, since no
monster can be more barbarous than the mob, which assumes the name and
appearance of the people. Nor is it at all reasonable, since the laws
place the property of madmen in the hands of their sane relations, that
we should do the [very reverse in politics, and throw the property of
the sane into the hands of the mad multitude][346] * * *

XXXIV. * * * [It is far more rational] to assert that a wise and
virtuous aristocratical government deserves the title of a
commonwealth, as it approaches to the nature of a kingdom.

And much more so in my opinion, said Mummius. For the unity of power
often exposes a king to become a despot; but when an aristocracy,
consisting of many virtuous men, exercise power, that is the most
fortunate circumstance possible for any state. However this be, I much
prefer royalty to democracy; for that is the third kind of government
which you have remaining, and a most vicious one it is.

XXXV. Scipio replied: I am well acquainted, my Mummius, with your
decided antipathy to the democratical system. And, although, we may
speak of it with rather more indulgence than you are accustomed to
accord it, I must certainly agree with you, that of all the three
particular forms of government, none is less commendable than
democrac