[BMCDA]

I didn't say that the "rule of men" is necessarily bad. It can degenerate however if it is left unchecked, say there are no instances that check each other.
Every monarchy in Europe regarded itself as legitimated by God since it was the divine order (in the bible are enough examples of kings who were blessed by God). Something like the American system isn't found among the ancient Hebrews or the early Christian societies. The only thing that comes close is the democracy that existed for some time in pagan Greece. The Romans also had something similar before they were ruled by dictators (that's where our current expressions like "senate", "republic", "democracy" originate from).

Further, it's not important who makes the laws or whether powerful men are the lawgivers or not. The problem is that those powerful men often enough think they are above the law which the common man is bound to. There are no laws that emanated from the brain of a powerful man I can think of which approve of murder, theft, rape or other behaviour of this calibre. So if peasant A murdered peasant B (or stole something from him) then he was punished (at least in those societies where the law inforcement was still intact).
So it's only natural that those in power want the societies they rule to function. The only difference between a totalitarian regime and a democracy is that there are no exceptions for those in power i.e. they are also bound to the rules they create.

[betty boop]

The only thing that comes close is the democracy that existed for some time in pagan Greece.

Yeah, and Plato detested it so much that his only salvation from the sheer misery of it all was total withdrawal from public life. Go figure. Actually, he understood that he was living in an age of total social collapse, and there wasn't a thing he could do to help the problem. He thus retreated to the Academy, in completely good conscience. good night BMCDA, with all my best wishes -- bb.