OF this piece, being the greater half of the whole work, I shall be able at this time to give no further account, than very briefly to show at what it aims.
My Lord Archon, in opening the Council of legislators, made it appear how unsafe a thing it is to follow fancy in the fabric of a commonwealth; and how necessary that the archives of ancient prudence should be ransacked before any councillor should presume to offer any other matter in order to the work in hand, or toward the consideration to be had by the Council upon a model of government. Wherefore he caused an urn to be brought, and every one of the councillors to draw a lot. By the lots as they were drawn, The Commonwealth of Fell to Israel...... Phosphorus de Auge Athens..... Navarchus de Paralo Lacedaemon..... Laco de Scytale Carthage.. Mago de Syrtibus The Achaeans, AEtolians, and Lycians....Aratus de Isthmo The Switz Alpester de Fulmine Holland and the United Provinces Glaucus de Ulna Rome...... Dolabella de Enyo Venice..... Lynceus de Stella These contained in them all those excellencies whereof a commonwealth is capable; so that to have added more had been to no purpose. Upon time given to the councillors, by their own studies and those of their friends, to prepare themselves, they were opened in the order, and by the persons mentioned at the Council of legislators, and afterward by order of the same were repeated at the council of the prytans to the people; for in drawing of the lots, there were about a dozen of them inscribed with the letter P, whereby the councillors that drew them became prytans.