Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/444

 438 THB REVOLUTIOXS. BOOK IV if they had been able to found what Thueydides calls iliyaqyju la6vouo:, — that is to say, the government for a few, and liberty for all. But the Greeks had not a clear idea of liberty; individual liberty never had any guarantee among them. We learn from Thueydides, who certainly is not suspected of too much zeal for dem- ocratic government, that under the rule of the oligarchy the people were subjected to many vexatious, arbitrary condemnations, and violent executions. We read in this historian "that democratic government was needed to give the poor a refuge and the rich a check." The Greeks never knew how to reconcile civil with politi- cal equality. That the poor might be protected in their personal interests, it seemed necessary to them that they should have the right of suffrage, that they should be judges in the tribunal, and that they might be elected as magistrates. If we also call to mind that among the Greeks the state was an absolute power, and that no individual right was of any value against it, we can understand what an immense interest every man had, even the most humble, in possessing political rights, — that is to say, in making a part of the govern- ment; the collective sovereign being so omnipotent that a man could be nothing unless he was a part of this sovereign. His security and his dignity depended upon this. He wished to possess political rights, not in order to enjoy true liberty, but to have at least what might take its place.