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{{cquote|[The Peloponnesians] devote a very small fraction of the time to the consideration of any public object, most of it to the prosecution of their own objects. Meanwhile each fancies that no harm will come of his neglect, that it is the business of somebody else to look after this or that for him; and so, by the same notion being entertained by all separately, the common cause imperceptibly decays.}}
{{cquote|[The Peloponnesians] devote a very small fraction of the time to the consideration of any public object, most of it to the prosecution of their own objects. Meanwhile each fancies that no harm will come of his neglect, that it is the business of somebody else to look after this or that for him; and so, by the same notion being entertained by all separately, the common cause imperceptibly decays.}}
::-Thucydides, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mo3-jF9-jlUC History of the Peloponnesian War]'' (ca. 460 B.C.-ca. 395 BC; tr. Richard Crawley, London: J. M. Dent & Sons; New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1910; reprint: Forgotten Books, 1954), p. 70
::-Thucydides, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mo3-jF9-jlUC History of the Peloponnesian War]'' (ca. 460 B.C.-ca. 395 BC; tr. Richard Crawley, London: J. M. Dent & Sons; New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1910; reprint: Forgotten Books, 1954), p. 70
{{cquote|[S]hould the citizens of the perfect state have their possessions in common or not? ... [M]ay there not be an advantage in having and using possessions in common?
If [husbandmen] do not share equally enjoyments and toils, those who labor much and get little will necessarily complain of those who labor little and receive or consume much. But indeed there is always a difficulty in men living together and having all human relations in common, but especially in their having common property....
[W]hen everyone has a distinct interest, men will not complain of one another, and they will make more progress, because every one will be attending to his own business.... [H]ow immeasurably greater is the pleasure, when a man feels a thing to be his own; for surely the love of self is a feeling implanted by nature and not given in vain.... And further, there is the greatest pleasure in doing a kindness or service to friends or guests or companions, which can only be rendered when a man has private property..... No one, when men have all things in common, will any longer set an example of liberality or do any liberal action; for liberality consists in the use which is made of property.
Such legislation may have a specious appearance of benevolence; men readily listen to it, and are easily induced to believe that in some wonderful manner everybody will become everybody's friend, especially when some one is heard denouncing the evils now existing in states, suits about contracts, convictions for perjury, flatteries of rich men and the like, which are said to arise out of the possession of private property. These evils, however, are due to a very different cause -- the wickedness of human nature. Indeed, we see that there is much more quarrelling among those who have all things in common....}}
::-Aristotle, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=NqcD2AIQIfYC Politics]'' (ca. 335-323 BC; tr. Benjamin Jowett, Oxford University Press, 1895; reprint: Digireads.com Publishing, 2005) ISBN 1420926020, p. 20
{{cquote|[E]ven if one prescribed a moderate property for all, it would be of no avail, since it is more needful to level men's desires than their properties.}}
{{cquote|[E]ven if one prescribed a moderate property for all, it would be of no avail, since it is more needful to level men's desires than their properties.}}
{{cquote|[T]hat which is common to the greatest number has the least care bestowed upon it. Every one thinks chiefly of his own, hardly at all of the common interest; and only when he is himself concerned as an individual. For besides other considerations, everybody is more inclined to neglect the duty which he expects another to fulfill; as in families many attendants are often less useful than a few. Each citizen will have a thousand sons who will not be his sons individually but anybody will be equally the son of anybody, and will therefore be neglected by all alike. Further, upon this principle, every one will use the word 'mine' of one who is prospering or the reverse, however small a fraction he may himself be of the whole number.}}
{{cquote|[T]hat which is common to the greatest number has the least care bestowed upon it. Every one thinks chiefly of his own, hardly at all of the common interest; and only when he is himself concerned as an individual. For besides other considerations, everybody is more inclined to neglect the duty which he expects another to fulfill; as in families many attendants are often less useful than a few. Each citizen will have a thousand sons who will not be his sons individually but anybody will be equally the son of anybody, and will therefore be neglected by all alike. Further, upon this principle, every one will use the word 'mine' of one who is prospering or the reverse, however small a fraction he may himself be of the whole number.}}
::-Aristotle, ''[http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.3.three.html Politics Book II]'' (ca. 335-323 BC; tr. Benjamin Jowett, Oxford University Press, 1895; reprint: Courier Dover Publications, 2000, ISBN 0486414248), p. 120
::-Aristotle, ''[http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.2.two.html Politics Book II]'' (ca. 335-323 BC; tr. Benjamin Jowett, Oxford University Press, 1895; reprint: Courier Dover Publications, 2000, ISBN 0486414248), p. 120
{{cquote|If the poor, for example, because they are more in number, divide among themselves the property of the rich—is not this unjust? No, by heaven (will be the reply), for the supreme authority justly willed it. But if this is not injustice, pray what is? Again, when in the first division all has been taken, and the majority divide anew the property of the minority, is it not evident, if this goes on, that they will ruin the state? Yet surely, virtue is not the ruin of those who possess her, nor is justice destructive of a state; and therefore this law of confiscation clearly cannot be just. If it were, all the acts of a tyrant must of necessity be just; for he only coerces other men by superior power, just as the multitude coerce the rich.}}
{{cquote|If the poor, for example, because they are more in number, divide among themselves the property of the rich—is not this unjust? No, by heaven (will be the reply), for the supreme authority justly willed it. But if this is not injustice, pray what is? Again, when in the first division all has been taken, and the majority divide anew the property of the minority, is it not evident, if this goes on, that they will ruin the state? Yet surely, virtue is not the ruin of those who possess her, nor is justice destructive of a state; and therefore this law of confiscation clearly cannot be just. If it were, all the acts of a tyrant must of necessity be just; for he only coerces other men by superior power, just as the multitude coerce the rich.}}