The citizens will not tolerate a settlement in which they are deprived of gold and silver, and have the number of their families regulated, and the sites of their houses fixed by law.

It will be said that our city is a mere image of wax.

And the legislator will answer: 'I know it, but I maintain that we ought to set forth an ideal which is as perfect as possible.

If difficulties arise in the execution of the plan, we must avoid them and carry out the remainder.

But the legislator must first be allowed to complete his idea without interruption.' The number twelve, which we have chosen for the number of division, must run through all parts of the state,--phratries, villages, ranks of soldiers, coins, and measures wet and dry, which are all to be made commensurable with one another.