The manner how the Comitia curiata, centuriata or tributa were called, during the time of the commonwealth, to the suffrage, was by lot: the curia, century, or tribe, whereon the first lot fell, being styled principium, or the prerogative; and the other curioe, centuries or tribes, whereon the second, third, and fourth lots, etc., fell, the jure vocatoe. From henceforth not the first classes, as in the times of Servius, but the prerogative, whether curia, century, or tribe, came first to the suffrage, whose vote was called omen proerogativum, and seldom failed to be leading to the rest of the tribes. The jure vocatoe, in the order of their lots, came next: the manner of giving suffrage was, by casting wooden tablets, marked for the affirmative or the negative, into certain urns standing upon a scaffold, as they marched over it in files, which for the resemblance it bore was called the bridge. The candidate, or competitor, who had most suffrages in a curia, century, or tribe, was said to have that curia, century, or tribe; and he who had most of the curioe, centuries, or tribes, carried the magistracy.
These three places being premised, as such upon which there will be frequent reflection, I come to the narrative, divided into two parts, the first containing the institution, the second the constitution of the commonwealth, in each whereof I shall distinguish the orders, as those which contain the whole model, from the rest of the discourse, which tends only to the explanation or proof of them.
In the institution or building of a commonwealth, the first work, as that of builders, can be no other than fitting and distributing the materials.
The materials of a commonwealth are the people, and the people of Oceana were distributed by casting them into certain divisions, regarding their quality, their age, their wealth, and the places of their residence or habitation, which was done by the ensuing orders.
The first order "distributes the people into freemen or citizens and servants, while such; for if they attain to liberty, that is, to live of themselves, they are freemen or citizens."
This order needs no proof, in regard of the nature of servitude, which is inconsistent with freedom, or participation of government in a commonwealth.
The second order "distributes citizens into youth and elders (such as are from eighteen years of age to thirty, being accounted youth; and such as are of thirty and upward, elders), and establishes that the youth shall be the marching armies, and the elders the standing garrisons of this nation."
A commonwealth, whose arms are in the hands of her servants, had need be situated, as is elegantly said of Venice by Contarini, out of the reach of their clutches; witness the danger run by that of Carthage in the rebellion of Spendius and Matho.
But though a city, if one swallow makes a summer, may thus chance to be safe, yet shall it never be great; for if Carthage or Venice acquired any fame in their arms, it is known to have happened through the mere virtue of their captains, and not of their orders; wherefore Israel, Lacedaemon, and Rome entailed their arms upon the prime of their citizens, divided, at least in Lacedaemon and Rome, into youth and elders: the youth for the field, and the elders for defence of the territory.
The third order "distributes the citizens into horse and foot, by the sense or valuation of their estates; they who have above ?00 a year in lands, goods, or moneys, being obliged to be of the horse, and they who have under that sum to be of the foot.
But if a man has prodigally wasted and spent his patrimony, he is neither capable of magistracy, office, or suffrage in the commonwealth."
Citizens are not only to defend the commonwealth, but according to their abilities, as the Romans under Servius Tullius (regard had to their estates), were some enrolled in the horse centuries, and others of the foot, with arms enjoined accordingly, nor could it be otherwise in the rest of the commonwealths, though out of historical remains, that are so much darker, it be not so clearly probable. And the necessary prerogative to be given by a commonwealth to estates, is in some measure in the nature of industry, and the use of it to the public. "The Roman people," says Julius Exuperantius, "were divided into classes, and taxed according to the value of their estates. All that were worth the sums appointed were employed in the wars; for they most eagerly contend for the victory; who fight for liberty in defence of their country and possessions.