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Greek text: Usener edition 6 ἕνεκα τοῦ θαρρεῖν ἐξ ανθρώπων ἦν κατὰ φύσιν ἀρχῆς καὶ βασιλείας ἀγαθόν, ἐξ ὧν ἄν ποτε τοῦτο οἷός τʼᾖ παρασκευάζεσθαι. Ἕνεκαἕνεκᾰ (with genitive)on account of, for the sake of, because ofwith regard to, as far as regards, as forτοῦ θαρρεῖνθαρσέω to be of good courage, take courage; confidence, audacityθαρρεῖν present active infinitiveC. inf. to believe confidently that, Soph.; also, to make bold or venture to do, Xen.ἀρχῆς καὶ βασιλείαςhttps://www.perseus.tufts.edu/…1…

(Quote from Cassius) I typically defer to Wiktionary or directly to Liddell and Scott on Perseus. PS. Perseus does something similar with its clickable words in texts but not exactly like nodictionaries. I was unaware on that site.

I don't see anything about kingship or politics in the Greek. Am I missing something? EDIT: See below for where those words comes from in the manuscripts. I dug into them after posting this post.

(Quote from Cassius) Disputes as to correct translation of PD6 - Should it refer to "sovereignty" and "kingship"?

(Quote from Nate) Do we know which manuscript Arrigheti says this is from?

Ah! Bailey's commentary...

(Quote from Cassius) I'll have to check those later. Stay tuned....

Okay, here we go... Plut.69.35 - written 1101-1200 CE (12 century CE) this one clearly has (2nd line φυσιν αρχησ και βασιλειασ... codex Parisinus gr. 1759 (14th c.) known as P Well, would you look at at that... in the middle of the second line...φυσιν αρχησ και βασιλειασ... Grec. 1758 AND three's a charm!! at the end of the first line... φυσιν αρχησ και βασιλειασ αγαθον So, I suppose you can editorialize and comment as much as one wants... but the phrase is *consistently* there in the manuscript…

(Quote from Cassius) Usener's Epicurea is on Internet Archive.... https://archive.org/details/HermannUsenerEpicurea1887 LOL! Granted in *Latin* but it's freely available to peruse.

By Zeus, this one took forever to track down... This one is Plut.69.13, also known as F, one of the three best manuscripts (BPF of which we have P and F digitized and available)... And once again we clearly see αρχησ και βασιλειασ αγαθον starting at the end of the first line... .... ἕνεκα τοῦ θα ρρεῖν ἐξ ανθρώπων ἦν κατὰ φύσιν ἀρχῆς καὶ βασιλείας ἀγαθόν, ἐξ ὧν ἄν ποτε τοῦτο οἷός τʼᾖ παρασκευάζεσθαι. and then the rest of that line. Seems to me there is no doubt that the manuscript tradition clear…

To me, the first part to this could be paraphrased, in the **broadest** terms, as "For the sake of having no fear from other people, it was a natural good to institute authority and to be ruled by a government..." Still working on literal translations and the second part.

(Quote from Cassius) Good call! Done!

(Quote from Cassius) https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/…ook%3D3%3Asection%3D1285a And https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/…ook%3D2%3Asection%3D1273a

(Quote from Don) The second part, again paraphrased in the widest sense, seems to be: From this (ie, instituting authority and government), at one time, procured for oneself the confidence to have no fear of other people. To me, Lucretius echoes this: So next Some wiser heads instructed men to found The magisterial office, and did frame Codes that they might consent to follow laws. For humankind, o'er wearied with a life Fostered by force, was ailing from its feuds; And so the sooner of its own …

(Quote from Nate) I could see that interpretation. There is no divine right of kings. It was more like people decided it would be good to have some kind of governing authority.