The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

must be upon his
guard against anything which is likely to inspire either courage or
confidence among his subjects; he must prohibit literary assemblies
or other meetings for discussion, and he must take every means to
prevent people from knowing one another (for acquaintance begets
mutual confidence). Further, he must compel all persons staying in
the city to appear in public and live at his gates; then he will
know what they are doing: if they are always kept under, they will
learn to be humble. In short, he should practice these and the like
Persian and barbaric arts, which all have the same object. A tyrant
should also endeavor to know what each of his subjects says or
does, and should employ spies, like the ‘female detectives’ at
Syracuse, and the eavesdroppers whom Hiero was in the habit of
sending to any place of resort or meeting; for the fear of
informers prevents people from speaking their minds, and if they
do, they are more easily found out. Another art of the tyrant is to
sow quarrels among the citizens; friends should be embroiled with
friends, the people with the notables, and the rich with one
another. Also he should impoverish his subjects; he thus provides
against the maintenance of a guard by the citizen and the people,
having to keep hard at work, are prevented from conspiring. The
Pyramids of Egypt afford an example of this policy; also the
offerings of the family of Cypselus, and the building of the temple
of Olympian Zeus by the Peisistratidae, and the great Polycratean
monuments at Samos; all these works were alike intended to occupy
the people and keep them poor. Another practice of tyrants is to
multiply taxes, after the manner of Dionysius at Syracuse, who
contrived that within five years his subjects should bring into the
treasury their whole property. The tyrant is also fond of making
war in order that his subjects may have something to do and be
always in want of a leader. And whereas the power of a king is
preserved by his friends, the characteristic of a tyrant is to
distrust his friends, because he knows that all men want to
overthrow him, and they above all have the power.
    Again, the evil practices of the last and worst form of
democracy are all found in tyrannies. Such are the power given to
women in their families in the hope that they will inform against
their husbands, and the license which is allowed to slaves in order
that they may betray their masters; for slaves and women do not
conspire against tyrants; and they are of course friendly to
tyrannies and also to democracies, since under them they have a
good time. For the people too would fain be a monarch, and
therefore by them, as well as by the tyrant, the flatterer is held
in honor; in democracies he is the demagogue; and the tyrant also
has those who associate with him in a humble spirit, which is a
work of flattery.
    Hence tyrants are always fond of bad men, because they love to
be flattered, but no man who has the spirit of a freeman in him
will lower himself by flattery; good men love others, or at any
rate do not flatter them. Moreover, the bad are useful for bad
purposes; ‘nail knocks out nail,’ as the proverb says. It is
characteristic of a tyrant to dislike every one who has dignity or
independence; he wants to be alone in his glory, but any one who
claims a like dignity or asserts his independence encroaches upon
his prerogative, and is hated by him as an enemy to his power.
Another mark of a tyrant is that he likes foreigners better than
citizens, and lives with them and invites them to his table; for
the one are enemies, but the Others enter into no rivalry with
him.
    Such are the notes of the tyrant and the arts by which he
preserves his power; there is no wickedness too great for him. All
that we have said may be summed up under three heads, which answer
to the three aims of the tyrant. These are, (1) the humiliation of
his subjects; he knows that a mean-spirited man will not conspire
against anybody; (2) the creation of mistrust among them; for a
tyrant is not overthrown until men begin to have confidence in one
another; and this is the reason why tyrants are at war with the
good; they are under the idea that their power is endangered by
them, not only because they would not be ruled despotically but
also because they are loyal to one another, and to other men, and
do not inform against one another or against other men; (3) the
tyrant desires that his subjects shall be incapable of action, for
no one