Now in regard to the eligibility of all Athenians indiscriminately to the office of archon, we find a clear and positive testimony as to the time when it was first introduced. Plutarch tells us[263] that the oligarchical,[264] but high-principled Aristeidês, was himself the proposer of this constitutional change,—shortly after the battle of Platæa, with the consequent expulsion of the Persians from Greece, and the return of the refugee Athenians to their ruined city. Seldom has it happened in the history of mankind, that rich and poor have been so completely equalized as among the population of Athens in that memorable expatriation and heroic struggle. Nor are we at all surprised to hear that the mass of the citizens, coming back with freshly-kindled patriotism as well as with the consciousness that their country had only been recovered by the equal efforts of all, would no longer submit to be legally disqualified from any office of state. It was on this occasion that the constitution was first made really “common” to all, and that the archons, stratêgi, and all functionaries, first began to be chosen from all Athenians without any difference of legal eligibility.[265] No mention is made of the lot, in this important statement of Plutarch, which appears to me every way worthy of credit, and which teaches us that, down to the invasion of Xerxês, not only had the exclusive principle of the Solonian law of qualification continued in force (whereby the first three classes on the census were alone admitted to all individual offices, and the fourth or Thêtic class excluded), but also the archons had hitherto been elected by the citizens,—not taken by lot. [263] Plutarch, Arist. 22. [264] So at least the supporters of the constitution of Kleisthenês were called by the contemporaries of Periklês. [265] Plutarch, Arist. _ut sup._ γράφει ψήφισμα, κοινὴν εἶναι τὴν πολιτείαν, καὶ τοὺς ἄρχοντας ἐξ Ἀθηναίων πάντων αἱρεῖσθαι.