The Historians' History of the World 03

It must not be forgotten, that the body to which the terms oligarchy and democracy refer formed a comparatively small part of the population in most Greek states, since it did not include either slaves or resident free foreigners. The sovereign power resided wholly in the native freemen; and whether it was exercised by a part or by all of them, was the question which determined the nature of the government. When the barrier had been thrown down, by which all political rights were made the inheritance of certain families,—since every freeman, even when actually excluded from them by the want of sufficient property, was by law capable of acquiring them,—democracy might be said to have begun. It was advancing, as the legal condition of their enjoyment was brought within the reach of a more numerous class; but it could not be considered as complete, so long as any freeman was debarred from them by poverty. Since, however, the sovereignty included several attributes which might be separated, the character of the constitution depended on the way in which these were distributed. It was considered as partaking more of democracy than of oligarchy, when the most important of them were shared by all freemen without distinction, though a part was still appropriated to a number limited either by birth or fortune. Thus where the legislative, or, as it was anciently termed, the deliberative, branch of the sovereignty was lodged in an assembly open to every freeman, and where no other qualification than free birth was required for judicial functions, and for the election of magistrates, there the government was called democratical, though the highest offices of the state might be reserved to a privileged class. But a finished democracy, that which fully satisfied the Greek notion, was one in which every attribute of sovereignty might be shared, without respect to rank or property, by every freeman.

More than this was not implied in democracy; and little less than this was required, according to the views of the philosophers, to constitute the character of a citizen, which, in the opinion of Aristotle, could not exist without a voice in the legislative assembly, and such a share in the administration of justice as was necessary to secure the responsibility of the magistrates. But this equality of rights left room for a great diversity in the modes of exercising them, which determined the real nature of a democratical constitution. There were, indeed, certain rights, those which Aristotle considers as essential to a citizen, which, according to the received Greek notions, could, in a democracy, only be exercised in person. The thought of delegating them to accountable representatives seems never to have occurred either to practical or speculative statesmen, except in the formation of confederacies, which rendered such an expedient necessary.

But the principle of legal equality, which was the basis of democracy, was gradually construed in a manner which inverted the wholesome order of nature, and led to a long train of pernicious consequences. The administration of the commonwealth came to be regarded, not as a service, in which all were interested, but for which some might be qualified better than others, but as a property, in which each was entitled to an equal share. The practical application of this view was the introduction of an expedient for levelling, as far as possible, the inequality of nature, by enabling the poorest to devote his time, without loss, or even with profit, to public affairs. This was done by giving him wages for his attendance on all occasions of exercising his franchise; and, as the sum which could be afforded for this purpose was necessarily small, it attracted precisely the persons whose presence was least desirable.