lf friends. These he obtains by
means honourable in appearance, either by supplying them with money or
protecting them against the powerful. And because such conduct seems
praiseworthy, every one is readily deceived by it, and consequently no
remedy is applied. Pursuing these methods without hindrance, this man
presently comes to be so powerful that private citizens begin to fear
him, and the magistrates to treat him with respect. But when he has
advanced thus far on the road to power without encountering opposition,
he has reached a point at which it is most dangerous to cope with him;
it being dangerous, as I have before explained, to contend with a
disorder which has already made progress in a city. Nevertheless, when
he has brought things to this pass, you must either endeavour to crush
him, at the risk of immediate ruin, or else, unless death or some like
accident interpose, you incur inevitable slavery by letting him alone.
For when, as I have said, it has come to this that the citizens and
even the magistrates fear to offend him and his friends, little further
effort will afterwards be needed to enable him to proscribe and ruin
whom he pleases.

A republic ought, therefore, to provide by its ordinances that none of
its citizens shall, under colour of doing good, have it in their power
to do evil, but shall be suffered to acquire such influence only as may
aid and not injure freedom. How this may be done, shall presently be
explained.

[Footnote 1: Quod omnia mala exempla ex bonis initiis orta sunt. (Sall.
Cat. 51.)]

CHAPTER XLVII.--_That though Men deceive themselves in Generalities, in
Particulars they judge truly._

The commons of Rome having, as I have said, grown disgusted with the
consular name, and desiring either that men of plebeian birth should be
admitted to the office or its authority be restricted, the nobles, to
prevent its degradation in either of these two ways, proposed a middle
course, whereby four tribunes, who might either be plebeians or nobles,
were to be created with consular authority. This compromise satisfied
the commons, who thought they would thus get rid of the consulship, and
secure the highest offices of the State for their own order. But here a
circumstance happened worth noting. When the four tribunes came to be
chosen, the people, who had it in their power to choose all from the
commons, chose all from the nobles. With respect to which election Titus
Livius observes, t