Note 219 — Chapter XI · SOLONIAN LAWS AND CONSTITUTION.
Reading edition
Kratinus ap. Plutarch. Solon. 25.—
Πρὸς τοῦ Σόλωνος καὶ Δράκοντος, οἷσι νῦν Φρύγουσιν ἤδη τὰς κάχρυς τοῖς κύρβεσιν.
Isokratês praises the moderate democracy in early Athens, as compared with that under which he lived; but in the Orat. vii (Areopagitic.) he connects the former with the names of Solon and Kleisthenês, while in the Orat. xii (Panathenaic.), he considers the former to have lasted from the days of Theseus to those of Solon and Peisistratus. In this latter oration he describes pretty exactly the power which the people possessed under the Solonian constitution,—τοῦ τὰς ἀρχὰς καταστῆσαι καὶ λαβεῖν δίκην παρὰ τῶν ἐξαμαρτανόντων, which coincides with the phrase of Aristotle—τὰς ἀρχὰς αἱρεῖσθαι καὶ εὐθύνειν,—supposing ἀρχόντων to be understood as the substantive of ἐξαμαρτανόντων.
Compare Isokratês, Or. vii, p. 143 (p. 192 Bek.) and p. 150 (202 Bek.) and Orat. xii, pp. 260-264 (351-356 Bek.).