wanting to enable him to speak in
public and in the forum, confidence and voice.

XXXI. * * * This justice, continued Scipio, is the very foundation of
lawful government in political constitutions. Can we call the State of
Agrigentum a commonwealth, where all men are oppressed by the cruelty
of a single tyrant--where there is no universal bond of right, nor
social consent and fellowship, which should belong to every people,
properly so named? It is the same in Syracuse--that illustrious city
which Timaeus calls the greatest of the Grecian towns. It was indeed a
most beautiful city; and its admirable citadel, its canals distributed
through all its districts, its broad streets, its porticoes, its
temples, and its walls, gave Syracuse the appearance of a most
flourishing state. But while Dionysius its tyrant reigned there,
nothing of all its wealth belonged to the people, and the people were
nothing better than the slaves of one master. Thus, wherever I behold a
tyrant, I know that the social constitution must be not merely vicious
and corrupt, as I stated yesterday, but in strict truth no social
constitution at all.

XXXII. _Laelius._ You have spoken admirably, my Scipio, and I see the
point of your observations.

_Scipio._ You grant, then, that a state which is entirely in the power
of a faction cannot justly be entitled a political community?

_Laelius._ That is evident.

_Scipio._ You judge most correctly. For what was the State of Athens
when, during the great Peloponnesian war, she fell under the unjust
domination of the thirty tyrants? The antique glory of that city, the
imposing aspect of its edifices, its theatre, its gymnasium, its
porticoes, its temples, its citadel, the admirable sculptures of
Phidias, and the magnificent harbor of Piraeus--did they constitute it a
commonwealth?

_Laelius._ Certainly not, because these did not constitute the real
welfare of the community.

_Scipio._ And at Rome, when the decemvirs ruled without appeal from
their decisions, in the third year of their power, had not liberty lost
all its securities and all its blessings?

_Laelius._ Yes; the welfare of the community was no longer consulted,
and the people soon roused themselves, and recovered their appropriate
rights.

XXXIII. _Scipio._ I now come to the third, or democratical, form of
government, in which a considerable difficulty presents itself, because
all things are there said to lie at the disposition of th