#049: Submission through Corruption

“For it is plainly evident that the dictator does not consider his power firmly established until he has reached the point where there is no man under him who is of any worth. Therefore there may be justly applied to him the reproach to the master of the elephants made by Thrason and reported by Terence:

Are you indeed so proud
Because you command wild beasts?

This method tyrants use of stultifying their subjects cannot be more clearly observed than in what Cyrus did with the Lydians after he had taken Sardis, their chief city, and had at his mercy the captured Croesus, their fabulously rich king. When news was brought to him that the people of Sardis had rebelled, it would have been easy for him to reduce them by force; but being unwilling either to sack such a fine city or to maintain an army there to police it, he thought of an unusual expedient for reducing it. He established in it brothels, taverns, and public games, and issued the proclamation that the inhabitants were to enjoy them. He found this type of garrison so effective that he never again had to draw the sword against the Lydians.”

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La Boétie's, Étienne de. The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude (LvMI) (p. 63). Ludwig von Mises Institute. Kindle Edition.

Étienne or Estienne de La Boétie (French: ... 1 November 1530 – 18 August 1563) was a French judge, writer and "a founder of modern political philosophy in France". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89tienne_de_La_Bo%C3%A9tie