There still, however, remains a certain doubt concerning a citizen; whether a true citizen is one who is permitted to have a share in the government, or whether those who are engaged in sordid occupations are also to be considered as citizens? For if those are to be ranked among citizens who have no share in the government, it is not possible that every citizen should have a virtue of this kind, viz. the virtue of governing; since these also are citizens. But if no one of this description is a citizen, in what part is each of these to be ranked? For they are neither inhabitants nor strangers. Or shall we say, that, according to this reasoning, no absurdity will happen? For none of those that have been mentioned, are either slaves or freedmen. For this is true, that all those are not to be considered as citizens, without whom the city cannot subsist; since neither are children after the same manner citizens as men; but the latter are simply so, and the former from hypothesis. For they are indeed citizens, but imperfect. In ancient times, therefore, among some nations, those that were engaged in sordid occupations, were either slaves or foreigners; on which account many of them are so even now. The best city, however, will not make a sordid mechanic a citizen. But if a person of this description is also a citizen, and the virtue of a citizen is that which we have said it is, we cannot then attribute it to every citizen, nor to a free man, but to those only who are disengaged from necessary employments, i.e. from servile offices. Of necessary employments, however, those who perform them for one person, are slaves; but those who perform them in common, are dirty mechanics and bellows-blowers (βαναυσοι), and mercenaries. Hence it is evident from the least consideration, what is their situation; for appearances render what has been said manifest. For since polities are numerous, it is also necessary that there should be many species of citizens, and especially of citizens that are governed by others. Hence in a certain polity it is necessary that the sordid mechanic and the mercenary should be citizens; but in others this is impossible. Thus, for instance, it is impossible in what is called an aristocracy, and in that polity in which honours are conferred according to virtue and desert. For it is not possible for him to apply himself to the study and practice of virtue, who lives the life of a sordid mechanic or hireling. But in oligarchies it is not possible for hirelings to be citizens; for a share in the government is, in these polities, obtained through large possessions. Sordid mechanics, however, may be citizens in oligarchies; for many artificers are rich. But in Thebes there was a law, that no one should have a share in the government, who had not abstained from trade for ten years. In many polities, however, the law invites strangers to accept the freedom of the city; and in some democracies, the son of a free woman is himself free. In many others, also, the same thing is observed with respect to bastards. It is, however, through the want of genuine citizens that such persons are made citizens; for the laws are thus used in consequence of a scarcity of inhabitants. But when the multitude abound, they gradually deprive the children of a male or female slave of this privilege; afterwards the children of free women; and, last of all, they will only admit those to be citizens whose fathers and mothers were both free. That there are, therefore, many species of a citizen is evident from these things, and also that he may especially be said to be a citizen, who partakes of the honours of the polity. Conformably to this, likewise, Achilles, in Homer, complains of Agamemnon treating him like an unhonoured stranger. For he who does not partake of the honours of the state, is, as it were, a stranger or sojourner. And where a thing of this kind is concealed, it is for the sake of deceiving the inhabitants. From what has been said, therefore, it is evident whether it must be admitted that it is a different or the same virtue according to which a man is a good man, and a citizen a worthy citizen; and in some cities we find the virtue is the same, but in others different. It is also evident that this is not true of every citizen, but of him who is a politician, and has a principal authority in the state, or is capable of taking the lead in public affairs, either by himself, or in conjunction with others.
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