s and the nobles for their friends; because in the former
case their authority has the stronger support. For with such support a
ruler can maintain himself by the internal strength of his State, as did
Nabis, tyrant of Sparta, when attacked by the Romans and by the whole of
Greece; for making sure work with the nobles, who were few in number,
and having the people on his side, he was able with their assistance to
defend himself; which he could not have done had they been against him.
But in the case of a city, wherein the tyrant has few friends, its
internal strength will not avail him for its defence, and he will have
to seek aid from without in one of three shapes. For either he must hire
foreign guards to defend his person; or he must arm the peasantry, so
that they may play the part which ought to be played by the citizens; or
he must league with powerful neighbours for his defence. He who follows
these methods and observes them well, may contrive to save himself,
though he has the people for his enemy. But Appius could not follow the
plan of gaining over the peasantry, since in Rome they and the people
were one. And what he might have done he knew not how to do, and so was
ruined at the very outset.

In creating the decemvirate, therefore, both the senate and the people
made grave mistakes. For although, as already explained, when speaking
of the dictatorship, it is those magistrates who make themselves, and
not those made by the votes of the people, that are hurtful to freedom;
nevertheless the people, in creating magistrates ought to take such
precautions as will make it difficult for these to become bad. But the
Romans when they ought to have set a check on the decemvirs in order to
keep them good, dispensed with it, making them the sole magistrates of
Rome, and setting aside all others; and this from the excessive desire
of the senate to get rid of the tribunes, and of the commons to get rid
of the consuls; by which objects both were so blinded as to fall into
all the disorders which ensued. For, as King Ferrando was wont to say,
men often behave like certain of the smaller birds, which are so intent
on the prey to which nature incites them, that they discern not the
eagle hovering overhead for their destruction.

In this Discourse then the mistakes made by the Roman people in their
efforts to preserve their freedom and the mistakes made by Appius in his
endeavour to obtain the tyranny, have, as I proposed at t