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Such were the sentiments of Otanes. Megabyzus spoke next, and
advised the setting up of an oligarchy: "In all that Otanes has said
to persuade you to put down monarchy," he observed, "I fully
concur; but his recommendation that we should call the people to power
seems to me not the best advice. For there is nothing so void of
understanding, nothing so full of wantonness, as the unwieldy rabble.
It were folly not to be borne, for men, while seeking to escape the
wantonness of a tyrant, to give themselves up to the wantonness of a
rude unbridled mob. The tyrant, in all his doings, at least knows
what is he about, but a mob is altogether devoid of knowledge; for how
should there be any knowledge in a rabble, untaught, and with no
natural sense of what is right and fit? It rushes wildly into state
affairs with all the fury of a stream swollen in the winter, and
confuses everything. Let the enemies of the Persians be ruled by
democracies; but let us choose out from the citizens a certain number
of the worthiest, and put the government into their hands. For thus
both we ourselves shall be among the governors, and power being
entrusted to the best men, it is likely that the best counsels will
prevail in the state."
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