At first this rule was good, for by experience the nobles learnt a great deal about the art of governing; {95} they realised that order was better than disorder in a state, and they set high standards of devotion to public duty. But the nobles all belonged to one class of people, they were the best educated and the more wealthy, and instead of using their advantages of position and education and wealth as a trust for the good of the whole state (the ideal developed in later years by the Athenians), they grew to consider these things their own exclusive property and they became very narrow and intolerant. They considered themselves in every way superior to the common people, and began to make laws which benefited themselves alone, ignoring the rights of others, especially those of the poor. Now the nobles had acquired their power because of their opposition to the rule of one man, but when the authority had been placed in their hands, they proved themselves equally unable to be just towards all, and their rule became as intolerant as that of the Kings. Then it was that their authority was questioned in its turn, and the people began to ask each other questions. What is the difference, they asked, between rich and poor, between the noble and the plain man, between the freeman and the slave? Who, they asked, are citizens, and what does it mean to be a citizen? The more the people questioned, the greater grew the oppression and injustice of the nobles, and conditions in Athens grew very bad. Many things helped to create this spirit of discontent: there had been wars, the harvests had been bad and famine had resulted, and there were very harsh laws which allowed debtors who could not pay their {96} debts to sell themselves as slaves. Quarrels arose, and more and more the people questioned as to the justice of all this. They said: But ye who have store of land, who are sated and overflow, Restrain your swelling soul, and still it and keep it low; Let the heart that is great within you be trained a lowlier way; Ye shall not have all at your will, we will not forever obey.[3] III. SOLON, THE WISE MAN OF ATHENS AND THE RULE OF THE MANY[4] It was at this time of confusion and distress that Solon, one of the Seven Wise Men of Greece, appeared. By birth he was a noble, but he was a poor man and in the early part of his life he had been a merchant. There came a time later when the merchant was not looked upon as the equal of the noble, for Plutarch, in writing the life of Solon about seven hundred years after his death, makes an apology for his having been engaged in trade.