[1291a]
[1]
and
second is what is called the mechanic class (and this is the group
engaged in the arts without which it is impossible for a city to be inhabited,
and some of these arts are indispensably necessary, while others contribute to
luxury or noble living), and third is a commercial class (by
which I mean the class that is engaged in selling and buying and in wholesale
and retail trade), and fourth is the class of manual laborers, and the
fifth class is the one to defend the state in war, which is no less
indispensable than the others if the people are not to become the slaves of
those who come against them; for surely it is quite out of the question that it
should be proper to give the name of state to a community that is by nature a
slave, for a state is self-sufficient, but that which is a slave is not
self-sufficient. Therefore the
statement made in the Republic1 is witty but not adequate. For Socrates says that the most necessary
elements of which a state is composed are four, and he specifies these as a
weaver, a farmer, a shoemaker and a builder; and then again he adds, on the
ground that these are not self-sufficient, a copper-smith and the people to look
after the necessary live-stock, and in addition a merchant and a retail trader.
These elements together constitute the full complement of his first city,2 implying that every city is formed for the sake of the
necessaries of life and not rather for the sake of what is noble, and that it
has equal need of both shoemakers and farmers; but the warrior class
[20]
he does not assign to it until as the territory is increased
and comes into contact with that of the neighbors they are brought into war. But
yet even among the four partners or whatever their number be there must
necessarily be somebody to assign justice and to judge their claims; inasmuch
therefore as one would count the soul of an animal to be more a part of it than
the body, so also the factors in states corresponding to the soul must be deemed
to be parts of them more than those factors which contribute to necessary
utility,—the former being the military class and the class that plays
a part in judicial justice, and in addition to these the deliberative class,
deliberation being a function of political intelligence. And it makes no
difference to the argument whether these functions are held by special classes
separately or by the same persons; for it often happens for the same men to be both soldiers and farmers. Hence
inasmuch as both groups3 of classes must be counted parts of the state, it
is clear that the heavy-armed soldiery at any rate4 must be a part of the state. And a seventh class is the
one that serves the community by means of its property, the class that we call
the rich. And an eighth is the class of public servants, that is, those who
serve in the magistracies, inasmuch as without rulers it is impossible for a
city to exist; it is therefore necessary that there should be some men who are
able to govern and who render this service to the state either continuously or
in turn. And there remain the classes which we happen to have defined just
before, the deliberative class and the one that judges the claims of litigants.
If therefore it is proper for the states to have these functions performed, and
well and justly performed,
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