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Both are monarchies,
but there is a very wide difference between them: a tyrant studies his own advantage, a
king that of his subjects. For a monarch is not a king1 if he does not possess independent resources, and is
not better supplied with goods of every kind than his subjects; but a ruler so situated
lacks nothing, and therefore will not study his own interests but those of his subjects.
(A king who is not independent of his subjects will be merely a sort of titular
king.2) Tyranny is the exact opposite in
this respect, for the tyrant pursues his own good. The inferiority of Tyranny among the
perversions is more evident than that of Timocracy among the constitutions, for the
opposite of the best must be the worst.
[3]
When a change of constitution takes place, Kingship passes into Tyranny, because Tyranny
is the bad form of monarchy, so that a bad king becomes a tyrant. Aristocracy passes into
Oligarchy owing to badness in the rulers, who do not distribute what the State has to
offer according to desert, but give all or most of its benefits to themselves, and always
assign the offices to the same persons, because they set supreme value upon riches; thus
power is in the hands of a few bad men, instead of being in the hands of the best men.
Timocracy passes into Democracy, there being an affinity between them, inasmuch as the
ideal of Timocracy also is government by the mass of the citizens, and within the property
qualification all are equal. Democracy is the least bad of the perversions, for it is only a very small deviation from the
constitutional form of government.3 These are the commonest ways in which revolutions occur in states,
since they involve the smallest change, and come about most easily.
[4]
One may find likenesses and so to speak models of these various forms of constitution in
the household. The relationship of father to sons is regal in type, since a father's first
care is for his children's welfare. This is why Homer styles Zeus
‘father,’ for the ideal of kingship is paternal government. Among the
Persians paternal rule is tyrannical, for the Persians use their sons as slaves. The
relation of master to slaves is also tyrannic, since in it the master's interest is aimed
at. The autocracy of a master appears to be right, that of the Persian father wrong; for
different subjects should be under different forms of rule.
[5]
The relation of husband to wife seems to be in the nature of an
aristocracy: the husband rules in virtue of fitness, and in matters that belong to a man's
sphere; matters suited to a woman he hands over to his wife. When the husband controls
everything, he transforms the relationship into an oligarchy, for he governs in violation
of fitness, and not in virtue of superiority.