If in any state, as Plato says in the Statesman, it is easier to find fifty good draught-players than fifty good rulers, the greater part of the 360 who compose the council must be unfitted to rule.

The unfitness would be increased by the short period during which they held office.

There would be no traditions of government among them, as in a Greek or Italian oligarchy, and no individual would be responsible for any of their acts.

Everything seems to have been sacrificed to a false notion of equality, according to which all have a turn of ruling and being ruled.

In the constitution of the Magnesian state Plato has not emancipated himself from the limitations of ancient politics.