ONE:That an Athenian, or, indeed, any Greek gentleman, should regard the common people with contempt and aversion was nothing strange. A generation earlier such feelings would have led Plato to look on the overthrow of democracy and the establishment of an aristocratic government as the remedy for every evil. The upper classes, accustomed to decorate themselves with complimentary titles, had actually come to believe that all who belonged to them were paragons of wisdom and goodness. With the rule of the Thirty came a terrible awakening. In a few months more atrocities were perpetrated by the oligarchs than the D��mos had been guilty of in as many generations. It was shown that accomplished gentlemen like Critias were only distinguished from the common herd by their greater impatience of opposition and by the more destructive fury of their appetites. With Plato, at least, all allusions on this head came to an end. He now ��smiled at the claims of long descent,�� considering that ��every man has had thousands and thousands of progenitors, and among them have been rich and poor, kings and slaves, Hellenes and barbarians, many times over;�� and even the possession of a large landed property ceased to inspire him with any respect when he compared it with the surface of the whole earth.K