Chapter 28. The King’s Duty Is to Surpass His Subjects in Virtue and Wisdom

¹ Above all else, keep this in view for me. I say that the man who is to rule over other men must possess a virtue above the merely human. For just as the one who rules over sheep is not himself a sheep, but a man, and the one who rules over oxen is not an ox, but a rational overseer, far superior in nature to the creatures he leads—so also must the ruler of men stand as far above his subjects as the shepherd stands above his sheep, and the herdsman above his oxen.