Many revolutions also have been
brought about in oligarchies by those who could not brook the
despotism which those persons assumed who were in power, as at Cnidus
and Chios. Changes also may happen by accident in what we call a free
state and in an oligarchy; wheresoever the senators, judges, and
magistrates are chosen according to a certain census; for it often
happens that the highest census is fixed at first; so that a few only
could have a share in the government, in an oligarchy, or in a free
state those of moderate fortunes only; when the city grows rich,
through peace or some other happy cause, it becomes so little that
every one's fortune is equal to the census, so that the whole
community may partake of all the honours of government; and this
change sometimes happens by little and little, and insensible
approaches, sometimes quicker. These are the revolutions and seditions
that arise in oligarchies, and the causes to which they are owing: and
indeed both democracies and oligarchies sometimes alter, not into
governments of a contrary form, but into those of the same government;
as, for instance, from having the supreme power in the law to vest it
in the ruling party, or the contrariwise.
CHAPTER VII
Commotions also arise in aristocracies, from there being so few
persons in power (as we have already observed they do in oligarchies,
for in this particular an aristocracy is most near an oligarchy, for
in both these states the administration of public affairs is in the
hands of a few; not that this arises from the same cause in both,
though herein they chiefly seem alike): and these will necessarily be
most likely to happen when the generality of the people are
high-spirited and think themselves equal to each other in merit; such
were those at Lacedasmon, called the Partheniae (for these were, as
well as others, descendants of citizens), who being detected in a
conspiracy against the state, were sent to found Tarentum.
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