first birth and formation of the first
family, and define over and over again what there is in words, and in
how many manners each thing is stated. For, as I am speaking to men of
prudence, who have acted with the greatest glory in the Commonwealth,
both in peace and war, I will take care not to allow the subject of the
discussion itself to be clearer than my explanation of it. Nor have I
undertaken this task with the design of examining all its minuter
points, like a school-master; nor will I promise you in the following
discourse not to omit any single particular.

Then Laelius said: For my part, I am impatient for exactly that kind of
disquisition which you promise us.

XXV. Well, then, said Africanus, a commonwealth is a constitution of
the entire people. But the people is not every association of men,
however congregated, but the association of the entire number, bound
together by the compact of justice, and the communication of utility.
The first cause of this association is not so much the weakness of man
as a certain spirit of congregation which naturally belongs to him. For
the human race is not a race of isolated individuals, wandering and
solitary; but it is so constituted that even in the affluence of all
things [and without any need of reciprocal assistance, it spontaneously
seeks society].

XXVI. [It is necessary to presuppose] these original seeds, as it were,
since we cannot discover any primary establishment of the other
virtues, or even of a commonwealth itself. These unions, then, formed
by the principle which I have mentioned, established their headquarters
originally in certain central positions, for the convenience of the
whole population; and having fortified them by natural and artificial
means, they called this collection of houses a city or town,
distinguished by temples and public squares. Every people, therefore,
which consists of such an association of the entire multitude as I have
described, every city which consists of an assemblage of the people,
and every commonwealth which embraces every member of these
associations, must be regulated by a certain authority, in order to be
permanent.

This intelligent authority should always refer itself to that grand
first principle which established the Commonwealth. It must be
deposited in the hands of one supreme person, or intrusted to the
administration of certain delegated rulers, or undertaken by the whole
multitude. When the direction of