Book of the Magistrates of the Athenians

They preserved such names with the memory of letters until the names of factions were born, for which there came a division between the populace and the Republic that lasted until the time when Draco, the legislator, ordered the Magistrates, and when they governed themselves by Oligarchy—that is, by the few. These were their names: Pediaei, Diacrii, Parali, and Eteobutadae. The first favored the Oligarchy (that is, the power of the few) as being more stable with their wealth. The Diacrii were opposed to the popular administration, bearing with an ill mind that the most powerful held the first place in the Republic. The Parali, now favoring this side, now the other, aligned themselves where they saw fit, taking the path of liberty away from themselves and others. Those men of little means were so called because every year they were forced to give the sixth part of their goods to the tyranny of the more powerful. And for this it happened (which often happens in such things) that the highest justice became the highest injury (just as ill-purged humors usually bring forth infinite pains in the body) to the miserable citizens. And so that one might better know the people of Athens, and how much care and ingenuity the magistrate had to retain them in office, I have thought to depict his character, drawing it from the sixth book of Polybius. He said, "The people of Athens were like a helmsman of some abandoned and scattered ship." For just as the helmsman commands his ships once they have agreed together, having previously been thrown into disorder by the fierceness of the weather or the fear of enemies, and they, obeying, use great diligence. And just as they,