Robert Filmer on Democracy

If we will listen to the judgment of those who should best know the nature of popular government, we shall find no reason for good men to desire or choose it. Xenophon, that brave scholar and soldier, disallowed the Athenian commonweal for that they followed that form of government wherein the wicked are always in greatest credit, and virtuous men kept under. They expelled Aristides the Just; Themistocles died in banishment; Miltiades in prison; Phocion, the most virtuous and just man of his age, though he had been chosen forty-five times to be their general, yet he was put to death with all his friends, kindred, and servants, by the fury of the people, without sentence, accusation, or any cause at all. Nor were the people of Rome much more favourable to their worthies. They banished Rutilius, Metellus, Coriolanus, the two Scipios, and Tully. The worst men sped best; for as Xenophon saith of Athens, so Rome was a sanctuary for all turbulent, discontented, and seditious spirits. The impunity of wicked men was such that upon pain of death it was forbidden all magistrates to condemn to death or banish any citizen, or to deprive him of his liberty, or so much as to whip him, for what offence soever he had committed, either against the gods or men.

The Athenians sold justice as they did other merchandise, which made Plato call a popular estate a fair, where everything is to be sold. The officers, when they entered upon their charge, would brag they went to a golden harvest. The corruption of Rome was such that Marius and Pompey durst carry bushels of silver into the assemblies to purchase the voices of the people. Many citizens under their grave gowns came armed into their public meetings, as if they went to war. Often contrary factions fell to blows, sometimes with stones, and sometimes with swords. The blood hath been sucked up in the market places with sponges; the river Tiber hath been filled with the dead bodies of the citizens, and the common privies stuffed full with them.

If any man think these disorders in popular states were but casual, or such as might happen under any kind of government, he must know that such mischiefs are unavoidable and of necessity do follow all democratical regimens; and the reason is given, because the nature of all people is to desire liberty without restraint, which cannot be but where the wicked bear rule; and if the people should be so indiscreet as to advance virtuous men, they lose their power; for that good men would favour none but the good, which are always the fewer in number, and the wicked and vicious — which is still the greatest part of the people — should be excluded from all preferment, and in the end, by little and little, wise men should seize upon the state and take it from the people.

I know not how to give a better character of the people than can be gathered from such authors as lived amongst or near the popular states. Thucydides, Xenophon, Livy, Tacitus, Cicero, and Sallust have set them out in their colours. I will borrow some of their sentences:

There is nothing more uncertain than the people; their opinions are as variable and sudden as tempests; there is neither truth nor judgment in them; they are not led by wisdom to judge of anything, but by violence and rashness; nor put they any difference between things true and false. After the manner of cattle, they follow the herd that goes before; they have a custom always to favour the worst and the weakest; they are most prone to suspicions, and use to condemn men for guilty upon any false suggestion; they are apt to believe all news, especially if it be sorrowful; and, like Fame, they make it more in the believing; when there is no author, they fear those evils which themselves have feigned; they are most desirous of new stirs and changes, and are enemies to quiet and rest; whatsoever is giddy or headstrong, they account manlike and courageous; but whatsoever is modest or provident seems sluggish; each man hath a care of his particular, and thinks basely of the common good; they look upon approaching mischiefs as they do upon thunder, only every man wisheth it may not touch his own person; it is the nature of them, they must serve basely or domineer proudly; for they know no mean.

Thus do they paint to the life this beast with many heads. Let me give you the cipher of their form of government: as it is begot by sedition, so it is nourished by arms; it can never stand without wars, either with an enemy abroad or with friends at home. The only means to preserve it is to have some powerful enemies near who may serve instead of a king to govern it, that so, though they have not a king amongst them, yet they may have as good as a king over them; for the common danger of an enemy keeps them in better unity than the laws they make themselves.

~~Sir Robert Filmer. Patriarcha (1680) (HT to Craptocracy)