Excerpts about Education and Nations
From Πολιτεία (Politica) by Socrates and Plato

 

 

 

Education

 

 

Come then, and let us pass a leisure hour in story-telling,
and our story shall be the education of our heroes.

By all means.

And what shall be their education?  Can we find a better than the traditional sort?–and this has two
divisions, gymnastic for the body, and music for the soul.

True.

Shall we begin education with music, and go on to gymnastic
afterwards?

By all means.

And when you speak of music, do you include literature or
not?

I do.

And literature may be either true or false?

Yes.

And the
young should be trained in both kinds, and we begin with the false?

I do not understand your meaning, he said.

You
know, I said, that we begin by telling children stories which, though not
wholly destitute of truth, are in the main fictitious; and these stories are
told them when they are not of an age to learn gymnastics.

Very true.

That was my meaning when I said that we must teach music
before gymnastics.

Quite right, he said.

You
know also that the beginning is the most important part of any work, especially
in the case of a young and tender thing; for that is the time at which the
character is being formed and the desired impression is more readily taken.

Quite
true.

And
shall we just carelessly allow children to hear any casual tales which may be
devised by casual persons, and to receive into their minds ideas for the most
part the very opposite of those which we should wish them to have when they are
grown up?

We cannot.

Then
the first thing will be to establish a censorship of the writers of fiction,
and let the censors receive any tale of fiction which is good, and reject the
bad; and we will try our best to get mothers and nurses to tell their children
the authorized ones only.

Let them fashion the mind with such tales, even more fondly
than they mould the body with their hands; but most of those which are now in
use must be discarded.

Of what tales are you speaking?  he said.

You may find a model of the lesser in the greater, I said;
for they are necessarily of the same type, and there is the same spirit in both
of them.

Very likely, he replied; but I do not as yet know what you
would term the greater.

Those, I said, which are narrated by Homer and Hesiod, and
the rest of the poets, who have ever been the great story-tellers of mankind.

But which stories do you mean, he said; and what fault do
you find with them?

A fault which is most serious, I said; the fault of telling
a lie, and, what is more, a bad lie.

But when is this fault committed?

Whenever an erroneous representation is made of the nature
of gods and heroes,–as when a painter paints a portrait not having the shadow
of a likeness to the original.

Yes, he said, that sort of thing is certainly very
blamable; but what are the stories which you mean?

First of all, I said, there was that greatest of all lies in
high places, which the poet told about Uranus, and which was a bad lie too,–I
mean what Hesiod says that Uranus did, and how Cronus retaliated on him.

The
doings of Cronus, and the sufferings which in turn his son inflicted upon him,
even if they were true, ought certainly not to be lightly told to young and
thoughtless persons; if possible, they had better be buried in silence.

But if
there is an absolute necessity for their mention, a chosen few might hear them
in a mystery, and they should sacrifice not a common (Eleusinian) pig, but some
huge and unprocurable victim; and then the number of the hearers will be very
few indeed.

Why, yes, said he, those stories are extremely
objectionable.

Yes, Adeimantus,
they are stories not to be repeated in our nation; the young man should not be
told that in committing the worst of crimes he is far from doing anything
outrageous; and that even if he chastises his father when he does wrong, in
whatever manner, he will only be following the example of the first and
greatest among the gods.

I entirely agree with you, he said; in my opinion those
stories are quite unfit to be repeated.

Neither, if we mean our future guardians to regard the habit
of quarrelling among themselves as of all things the basest, should any word be
said to them of the wars in heaven, and of the plots and fightings of the gods
against one another, for they are not true.

No, we shall never mention the battles of the giants, or let
them be embroidered on garments; and we shall be silent about the innumerable
other quarrels of gods and heroes with their friends and relatives.

If they would only believe us we would tell them that
quarrelling is unholy, and that never up to this time has there been any
quarrel between citizens; this is what old men and old women should begin by
telling children; and when they grow up, the poets also should be told to
compose for them in a similar spirit.

But the narrative of Hephaestus binding Here his mother, or
how on another occasion Zeus sent him flying for taking her part when she was
being beaten, and all the battles of the gods in Homer–these tales must not be
admitted into our nation, whether they are supposed to have an allegorical
meaning or not.

For a
young person cannot judge what is allegorical and what is literal; anything
that he receives into his mind at that age is likely to become indelible and
unalterable; and therefore it is most important that the tales which the young
first hear should be models of virtuous thoughts.

There
you are right, he replied; but if any one asks where are such models to be
found and of what tales are you speaking–how shall we answer him?

I said
to him, You and I, Adeimantus, at this moment are not poets, but founders of a nation:
now the founders of a nation ought to know the general forms in which poets
should cast their tales, and the limits which must be observed by them, but to
make the tales is not their business.

 

Now Socrates argues that the old religions are not suitable for the
operation of a nation.  A new religion
must be created to create the right state of mind for the defense of a
nation. 

 

 

Very true,
he said; but what are these forms of theology which you mean?

Something
of this kind, I replied:–God is always to be represented as he truly is,
whatever be the sort of poetry, epic, lyric or tragic, in which the
representation is given.

Right.

And is he
not truly good?  and must he not be
represented as such?

Certainly.

And no good
thing is hurtful?

No, indeed.

And that
which is not hurtful hurts not?

Certainly
not.

And that
which hurts not does no evil?

No.

And can
that which does no evil be a cause of evil?

Impossible.

And the
good is advantageous?

Yes.

And
therefore the cause of well-being?

Yes.

It follows
therefore that the good is not the cause of all things, but of the good only?

Assuredly.

Then God,
if he be good, is not the author of all things, as the many assert, but he is
the cause of a few things only, and not of most things that occur to men.

For few are
the goods of human life, and many are the evils, and the good is to be
attributed to God alone; of the evils the causes are to be sought elsewhere,
and not in him.

That
appears to me to be most true, he said.

Then we
must not listen to Homer or to any other poet who is guilty of the folly
of saying that two casks ’Lie at the threshold of Zeus, full of lots, one of
good, the other of evil lots,’ and that he to whom Zeus gives a mixture of the
two ’Sometimes meets with evil fortune, at other times with good;’ but that he
to whom is given the cup of unmingled ill, ’Him wild hunger drives o’er the
beauteous earth.’ And again– ’Zeus, who is the dispenser of good and evil to
us.’ And if any one asserts that the violation of oaths and treaties, which was
really the work of Pandarus, was brought about by Athene and Zeus, or that the
strife and contention of the gods was instigated by Themis and Zeus, he shall
not have our approval; neither will we allow our young men to hear the words of
Aeschylus, that ’God plants guilt among men when he desires utterly to destroy
a house.’

And if a poet writes of the sufferings of Niobe–the subject
of the tragedy in which these iambic verses occur–or of the house of Pelops, or
of the Trojan war or on any similar theme, either we must not permit him to say
that these are the works of God, or if they are of God, he must devise some
explanation of them such as we are seeking; he must say that God did what was
just and right, and they were the better for being punished; but that those who
are punished are miserable, and that God is the author of their misery–the poet
is not to be permitted to say; though he may say that the wicked are miserable
because they require to be punished, and are benefited by receiving punishment
from God; but that God being good is the author of evil to any one is to be
strenuously denied, and not to be said or sung or heard in verse or prose by
any one whether old or young in any well-ordered commonwealth.

Such a fiction is suicidal, ruinous, impious.

I agree with you, he replied, and am ready to give my assent
to the law.

Let this
then be one of our rules and principles concerning the gods, to which our poets
and recites will be expected to conform,–that God is not the author of all
things, but of good only.

That will
do, he said.

And what do you think of a second principle?  Shall I ask you whether God is a magician,
and of a nature to appear insidiously now in one shape, and now in
another–sometimes himself changing and passing into many forms, sometimes
deceiving us with the semblance of such transformations; or is he one and the
same immutably fixed in his own proper image?

I cannot answer you, he said, without more thought.

Well, I said; but if we suppose a change in anything, that
change must be effected either by the thing itself, or by some other thing?

Most certainly.

And things which are at their best are also least liable to
be altered or discomposed; for example, when healthiest and strongest, the
human frame is least liable to be affected by meats and drinks, and the plant
which is in the fullest vigor also suffers least from winds or the heat of the
sun or any similar causes.

Of course.

And will not the bravest and wisest soul be least confused
or deranged by any external influence?

True.

And the same principle, as I should suppose, applies to all
composite things– furniture, houses, garments: when good and well made, they
are least altered by time and circumstances.

Very true.

Then everything which is good, whether made by art or
nature, or both, is least liable to suffer change from without?

True.

But surely
God and the things of God are in every way perfect?

Of course
they are.

Then he can
hardly be compelled by external influence to take many shapes?

He cannot.

But may he not change and transform himself?

Clearly, he said, that must be the case if he is changed at
all.

And will he then change himself for the better and fairer,
or for the worse and more unsightly?

If he change at all he can only change for the worse, for we
cannot suppose him to be deficient either in virtue or beauty.

Very true, Adeimantus; but then, would any one, whether God
or man, desire to make himself worse?

Impossible.

Then it is impossible that God should ever be willing to
change; being, as is supposed, the fairest and best that is conceivable, every
God remains absolutely and for ever in his own form.

That necessarily follows, he said, in my judgment.

Then, I
said, my dear friend, let none of the poets tell us that ’The gods, taking the
disguise of strangers from other lands, walk up and down countries in all sorts
of forms;’ and let no one slander Proteus and Thetis, neither let any one,
either in tragedy or in any other kind of poetry, introduce Here disguised in
the likeness of a priestess asking an alms ’For the life-giving daughters of
Inachus the river of Argos;’ –let us have no more lies of that sort.

Neither
must we have mothers under the influence of the poets scaring their children
with a bad version of these myths– telling how certain gods, as they say, ’Go
about by night in the likeness of so many strangers and in divers forms;’ but
let them take heed lest they make cowards of their children, and at the same
time speak blasphemy against the gods.

Heaven forbid, he said.

But although the gods are themselves unchangeable, still by
witchcraft and deception they may make us think that they appear in various
forms?

Perhaps, he replied.

Well, but can you imagine that God will be willing to lie,
whether in word or deed, or to put forth a phantom of himself?

I cannot say, he replied.

Do you not know, I said, that the true lie, if such an
expression may be allowed, is hated of gods and men?

What do you mean?  he
said.

I mean that no one is willingly deceived in that which is
the truest and highest part of himself, or about the truest and highest
matters; there, above all, he is most afraid of a lie having possession of him.

Still, he said, I do not comprehend you.

The reason is, I replied, that you attribute some profound
meaning to my words; but I am only saying that deception, or being deceived or
uninformed about the highest realities in the highest part of themselves, which
is the soul, and in that part of them to have and to hold the lie, is what
mankind least like;–that, I say, is what they utterly detest.

There is nothing more hateful to them.

And, as I was just now remarking, this ignorance in the soul
of him who is deceived may be called the true lie; for the lie in words is only
a kind of imitation and shadowy image of a previous affection of the soul, not
pure unadulterated falsehood.

Am I not right?

Perfectly right.

The true lie is hated not only by the gods, but also by men?

Yes.

Whereas
the lie in words is in certain cases useful and not hateful; in dealing with
enemies–that would be an instance; or again, when those whom we call our
friends in a fit of madness or illusion are going to do some harm, then it is
useful and is a sort of medicine or preventive; also in the tales of mythology,
of which we were just now speaking–because we do not know the truth about ancient
times, we make falsehood as much like truth as we can, and so turn it to
account.

Very true, he said.

But can any of these reasons apply to God?  Can we suppose that he is ignorant of
antiquity, and therefore has recourse to invention?

That would be ridiculous, he said.

Then the lying poet has no place in our idea of God?

I should say not.

Or perhaps he may tell a lie because he is afraid of
enemies?

That is inconceivable.

But he may have friends who are senseless or mad?

But no mad or senseless person can be a friend of God.

Then no motive can be imagined why God should lie?

None whatever.

Then the superhuman and divine is absolutely incapable of
falsehood?

Yes.

Then is God perfectly simple and true both in word and deed;
he changes not; he deceives not, either by sign or word, by dream or waking
vision.

Your thoughts, he said, are the reflection of my own.

You agree with me then, I said, that this is the second type
or form in which we should write and speak about divine things.

The gods are not magicians who transform themselves, neither
do they deceive mankind in any way.

I grant that.

Then, although we are admirers of Homer, we do not admire
the lying dream which Zeus sends to Agamemnon; neither will we praise the
verses of Aeschylus in which Thetis says that Apollo at her nuptials ’Was
celebrating in song her fair progeny whose days were to be long, and to know no
sickness.

And when he had spoken of my lot as in all things blessed of
heaven he raised a note of triumph and cheered my soul.

And I thought that the word of Phoebus, being divine and
full of prophecy, would not fail.

And now he himself who uttered the strain, he who was
present at the banquet, and who said this–he it is who has slain my son.’ These
are the kind of sentiments about the gods which will arouse our anger; and he
who utters them shall be refused a chorus; neither shall we allow teachers to
make use of them in the instruction of the young, meaning, as we do, that our guardians, as far as men can be,
should be true worshippers of the gods and like them.

I entirely agree, he said, in these principles, and promise
to make them my laws.

 

The use of Religion in war

 

Such
then, I said, are our principles of theology–some tales are to be told, and
others are not to be told to our disciples from their youth upwards, if we mean
them to honor the gods and their parents, and to value friendship with one
another.

Yes;
and I think that our principles are right, he said.

But if
they are to be courageous, must they not learn other lessons besides these, and
lessons of such a kind as will take away the fear of death?  Can any man be courageous who has the fear
of death in him?

Certainly not, he said.

And can
he be fearless of death, or will he choose death in battle rather than defeat
and slavery, who believes the world below to be real and terrible?

Impossible.

Then we
must assume a control over the narrators of this class of tales as well as over
the others, and beg them not simply to revile but rather to commend the world
below, intimating to them that their descriptions are untrue, and will do harm
to our future warriors.

That will be our duty, he said.

Then, I
said, we shall have to obliterate many obnoxious passages, beginning
with the verses, ’I would rather be a serf on the land of a poor and
portionless man than rule over all the dead who have come to naught.’ We must
also expunge the verse, which tells us how Pluto feared, ’Lest the mansions
grim and squalid which the gods abhor should be seen both of mortals and
immortals.’ And again:– ’O heavens! verily in the house of Hades there is soul
and ghostly form but no mind at all!’ Again of Tiresias:– ’(To him even after
death did Persephone grant mind,) that he alone should be wise; but the other
souls are flitting shades.’ Again:– ’The soul flying from the limbs had gone to
Hades, lamenting her fate, leaving manhood and youth.’ Again:– ’And the soul,
with shrilling cry, passed like smoke beneath the earth.’ And,– ’As bats in
hollow of mystic cavern, whenever any of them has dropped out of the string and
falls from the rock, fly shrilling and cling to one another, so did they with
shrilling cry hold together as they moved.’ And we must beg Homer and the other
poets not to be angry if we strike out these and similar passages, not because
they are unpoetical, or unattractive to the popular ear, but because the
greater the poetical charm of them, the less are they meet for the ears of boys
and men who are meant to be free, and who should fear slavery more than death.

Undoubtedly.

Also we shall have to reject all the terrible and appalling
names which describe the world below–Cocytus and Styx, ghosts under the earth,
and sapless shades, and any similar words of which the very mention causes a
shudder to pass through the inmost soul of him who hears them.

I do
not say that these horrible stories may not have a use of some kind; but there
is a danger that the nerves of our guardians may be rendered too excitable and
effeminate by them.

There is a real danger, he said.

Then we
must have no more of them.

True.

Another and a nobler strain must be composed and sung by us.

Clearly.

And shall we proceed to get rid of the weepings and wailings
of famous men?

They will go with the rest.

But
shall we be right in getting rid of them?
Reflect: our principle is that the good man will not consider death
terrible to any other good man who is his comrade.

Yes; that is our principle.

And
therefore he will not sorrow for his departed friend as though he had suffered
anything terrible?

He will
not.

Such an one, as we further maintain, is sufficient for
himself and his own happiness, and therefore is least in need of other men.

True, he said.

And for this reason the loss of a son or brother, or the
deprivation of fortune, is to him of all men least terrible.

Assuredly.

And therefore he will be least likely to lament, and will
bear with the greatest equanimity any misfortune of this sort which may befall
him.

Yes, he will feel such a misfortune far less than another.

Then we shall be right in getting rid of the lamentations of
famous men, and making them over to women (and not even to women who are good
for anything), or to men of a baser sort, that those who are being educated by us to be the
defenders of their country may scorn to do the like.

That will be very right.

Then we will once more entreat Homer and the other poets not
to depict Achilles, who is the son of a goddess, first lying on his side, then
on his back, and then on his face; then starting up and sailing in a frenzy
along the shores of the barren sea; now taking the sooty ashes in both his
hands and pouring them over his head, or weeping and wailing in the various
modes which Homer has delineated.

Nor should he describe Priam the kinsman of the gods as
praying and beseeching, ’Rolling in the dirt, calling each man loudly by his
name.’ Still more earnestly will we beg of him at all events not to introduce
the gods lamenting and saying, ’Alas! my misery! Alas! that I bore the bravest
to my sorrow.’ But if he must introduce the gods, at any rate let him not dare
so completely to misrepresent the greatest of the gods, as to make him say– ’O
heavens! with my eyes verily I behold a dear friend of mine chased round and
round the city, and my heart is sorrowful.’ Or again:– Woe is me that I am
fated to have Sarpedon, dearest of men to me, subdued at the hands of Patroclus
the son of Menoetius.’ For if, my sweet Adeimantus, our youth seriously listen
to such unworthy representations of the gods, instead of laughing at them as
they ought, hardly will any of them deem that he himself, being but a man, can
be dishonored by similar actions; neither will he rebuke any inclination which
may arise in his mind to say and do the like.

And instead of having any shame or self-control, he will be
always whining and lamenting on slight occasions.

Yes, he said, that is most true.

Yes, I replied; but that surely is what ought not to be, as
the argument has just proved to us; and by that proof we must abide until it is
disproved by a better.

It ought not to be.

Neither
ought our guardians to be given to laughter.

For a
fit of laughter which has been indulged to excess almost always produces a
violent reaction.

So I believe.

Then persons of worth, even if only mortal men, must not be
represented as overcome by laughter, and still less must such a representation
of the gods be allowed.

Still less of the gods, as you say, he replied.

Then we shall not suffer such an expression to be used about
the gods as that of Homer when he describes how ’Inextinguishable laughter
arose among the blessed gods, when they saw Hephaestus bustling about the
mansion.’ On your views,
we must not admit them.

On my
views, if you like to father them on me; that we must not admit them is
certain.

Again, truth should be highly valued; if, as we were saying,
a lie is useless to the gods, and useful only as a medicine to men, then the
use of such medicines should be restricted to physicians; private individuals
have no business with them.

Clearly not, he said.

 

He discusses the role of the lie, the fact that politicians are not just
allowed to lie they are expected to lie, and non-politicians are to be
considered to be traitors if they lie.

 

Then if any
one at all is to have the privilege of lying, the rulers of the nation should
be the persons; and they, in their dealings either with enemies or with their
own citizens, may be allowed to lie for the public good.

But nobody else should meddle with anything of the kind; and
although the rulers have this privilege, for a private man to lie to them in
return is to be deemed a more heinous fault than for the patient or the pupil
of a gymnasium not to speak the truth about his own bodily illnesses to the
physician or to the trainer, or for a sailor not to tell the captain what is
happening about the ship and the rest of the crew, and how things are going
with himself or his fellow sailors.

Most true, he said.

If, then,
the ruler catches anybody beside himself lying in the nation, ’Any of the
craftsmen, whether he be priest or physician or carpenter,’ he will punish him
for introducing a practice which is equally subversive and destructive of ship
or nation.

Most certainly, he said, if our idea of the nation is ever
carried out.

In the next place our youth must be temperate?

Certainly.

Are not the chief elements of temperance, speaking generally,
obedience to commanders and self-control in sensual pleasures?

True.

Then we
shall approve such language as that of Diomede in Homer, ’Friend, sit still and
obey my word,’ and the verses which follow, ’The Greeks marched breathing
prowess, ...in silent awe of their leaders,’ and other sentiments of the same
kind.

We shall.

What of this line, ’O heavy with wine, who hast the eyes of
a dog and the heart of a stag,’ and of the words which follow?  Would you say that these, or any similar
impertinences which private individuals are supposed to address to their
rulers, whether in verse or prose, are well or ill spoken?

They are ill spoken.

They may very possibly afford some amusement, but they do
not conduce to temperance.

And
therefore they are likely to do harm to our young men–you would agree with me
there?

Yes.

And then, again, to make the wisest of men say that nothing
in his opinion is more glorious than ’When the tables are full of bread and
meat, and the cup-bearer carries round wine which he draws from the bowl and
pours into the cups,’ is it fit or conducive to temperance for a young man to
hear such words?  Or the verse ’The
saddest of fates is to die and meet destiny from hunger?’ What would you say
again to the tale of Zeus, who, while other gods and men were asleep and he the
only person awake, lay devising plans, but forgot them all in a moment through
his lust, and was so completely overcome at the sight of Here that he would not
even go into the hut, but wanted to lie with her on the ground, declaring that
he had never been in such a nation of rapture before, even when they first met
one another ’Without the knowledge of their parents;’ or that other tale of how
Hephaestus, because of similar goings on, cast a chain around Ares and Aphrodite?

Indeed,
he said, I am strongly of opinion that they ought not to hear that sort of
thing.

But any
deeds of endurance which are done or told by famous men, these they ought to
see and hear; as, for example, what is said in the verses, ’He smote his breast,
and thus reproached his heart, Endure, my heart; far worse hast thou endured!’
Certainly, he said.

In the next place, we must not let them be receivers of
gifts or lovers of money.

Certainly not.

Neither must we sing to them of ’Gifts persuading gods, and
persuading reverend kings.’ Neither is Phoenix, the tutor of Achilles, to be
approved or deemed to have given his pupil good counsel when he told him that
he should take the gifts of the Greeks and assist them; but that without a gift
he should not lay aside his anger.

Neither will we believe or acknowledge Achilles himself to
have been such a lover of money that he took Agamemnon’s gifts, or that when he
had received payment he restored the dead body of Hector, but that without
payment he was unwilling to do so.

Undoubtedly,
he said, these are not sentiments which can be approved.

Loving Homer as I do, I hardly like to say that in
attributing these feelings to Achilles, or in believing that they are truly
attributed to him, he is guilty of downright impiety.

As little can I believe the narrative of his insolence to
Apollo, where he says, ’Thou hast wronged me, O far-darter, most abominable of
deities.

Verily I would be even with thee, if I had only the power;’
or his insubordination to the river-god, on whose divinity he is ready to lay
hands; or his offering to the dead Patroclus of his own hair, which had been
previously dedicated to the other river-god Spercheius, and that he actually
performed this vow; or that he dragged Hector round the tomb of Patroclus, and
slaughtered the captives at the pyre; of all this I cannot believe that he was
guilty, any more than I can allow our citizens to believe that he, the wise
Cheiron’s pupil, the son of a goddess and of Peleus who was the gentlest of men
and third in descent from Zeus, was so disordered in his wits as to be at one
time the slave of two seemingly inconsistent passions, meanness, not untainted
by avarice, combined with overweening contempt of gods and men.

You are quite right, he replied.

And let us equally refuse to believe, or allow to be
repeated, the tale of Theseus son of Poseidon, or of Peirithous son of Zeus,
going forth as they did to perpetrate a horrid rape; or of any other hero or
son of a god daring to do such impious and dreadful things as they falsely
ascribe to them in our day: and let us further compel the poets to declare
either that these acts were not done by them, or that they were not the sons of
gods;–both in the same breath they shall not be permitted to affirm.

We will not
have them trying to persuade our youth that the gods are the authors of evil,
and that heroes are no better than men–sentiments which, as we were saying, are
neither pious nor true, for we have already proved that evil cannot come from
the gods.

Assuredly not.

And further they are likely to have a bad effect on those
who hear them; for everybody will begin to excuse his own vices when he is
convinced that similar wickedness are always being perpetrated by– ’The
kindred of the gods, the relatives of Zeus, whose ancestral altar, the altar of
Zeus, is aloft in air on the peak of Ida,’ and who have ’the blood of deities
yet flowing in their veins.’ And therefore let us put an end to such tales,
lest they engender laxity of morals among the young.

By all means, he replied.

But now
that we are determining what classes of subjects are or are not to be spoken
of, let us see whether any have been omitted by us.

The manner in which gods and demigods and heroes and the
world below should be treated has been already laid down.

Very true.

And what shall we say about men?  That is clearly the remaining portion of our subject.

Clearly so.

But we are not in a condition to answer this question at
present, my friend.

Why not?

Because, if I am not mistaken, we shall have to say that about
men poets and story-tellers are guilty of making the gravest misstatements when
they tell us that wicked men are often happy, and the good miserable; and that
injustice is profitable when undetected, but that justice is a man’s own loss
and another’s gain–these things we shall forbid them to utter, and command them
to sing and say the opposite.

To be sure we shall, he replied.

But if you admit that I am right in this, then I shall
maintain that you have implied the principle for which we have been all along
contending.

I grant the truth of your inference.

That such things are or are not to be said about men is a
question which we cannot determine until we have discovered what justice is,
and how naturally advantageous to the possessor, whether he seem to be just or
not.

Most true, he said.

Enough
of the subjects of poetry: let us now speak of the style; and when this has
been considered, both matter and manner will have been completely treated.

I do not understand what you mean, said Adeimantus.

Then I must make you understand; and perhaps I may be more
intelligible if I put the matter in this way.

You are aware, I suppose, that all mythology and poetry is a
narration of events, either past, present, or to come?

Certainly, he replied.

And narration may be either simple narration, or imitation,
or a union of the two?

That again, he said, I do not quite understand.

I fear that I must be a ridiculous teacher when I have so
much difficulty in making myself apprehended.

Like a bad speaker, therefore, I will not take the whole of
the subject, but will break a piece off in illustration of my meaning.

You know the first lines of the Iliad, in which the poet
says that Chryses prayed Agamemnon to release his daughter, and that Agamemnon
flew into a passion with him; whereupon Chryses, failing of his object, invoked
the anger of the God against the Achaeans.

Now as far as these lines, ’And he prayed all the Greeks,
but especially the two sons of Atreus, the chiefs of the people,’ the poet is
speaking in his own person; he never leads us to suppose that he is any one
else.

But in what follows he takes the person of Chryses, and then
he does all that he can to make us believe that the speaker is not Homer, but
the aged priest himself.

And in this double form he has cast the entire narrative of
the events which occurred at Troy and in Ithaca and throughout the Odyssey.

Yes.

And a narrative it remains both in the speeches which the
poet recites from time to time and in the intermediate passages?

Quite true.

But when the poet speaks in the person of another, may we
not say that he assimilates his style to that of the person who, as he informs
you, is going to speak?

Certainly.

And this assimilation of himself to another, either by the
use of voice or gesture, is the imitation of the person whose character he
assumes?

Of course.

Then in this case the narrative of the poet may be said to
proceed by way of imitation?

Very true.

Or, if the poet everywhere appears and never conceals
himself, then again the imitation is dropped, and his poetry becomes simple
narration.

However, in order that I may make my meaning quite clear,
and that you may no more say, ’I don’t understand,’ I will show how the change
might be effected.

If Homer had said, ’The priest came, having his daughter’s
ransom in his hands, supplicating the Achaeans, and above all the kings;’ and
then if, instead of speaking in the person of Chryses, he had continued in his
own person, the words would have been, not imitation, but simple narration.

The passage would have run as follows (I am no poet, and
therefore I drop the metre), ’The priest came and prayed the gods on behalf of
the Greeks that they might capture Troy and return safely home, but begged that
they would give him back his daughter, and take the ransom which he brought,
and respect the God.

Thus he spoke, and the other Greeks revered the priest and
assented.

But Agamemnon was wroth, and bade him depart and not come
again, lest the staff and chaplets of the God should be of no avail to him–the
daughter of Chryses should not be released, he said–she should grow old with
him in Argos.

And then he told him to go away and not to provoke him, if
he intended to get home unscathed.

And the old man went away in fear and silence, and, when he
had left the camp, he called upon Apollo by his many names, reminding him of
everything which he had done pleasing to him, whether in building his temples,
or in offering sacrifice, and praying that his good deeds might be returned to
him, and that the Achaeans might expiate his tears by the arrows of the
god,’–and so on.

In this way the whole becomes simple narrative.

I understand, he said.

Or you may suppose the opposite case–that the intermediate
passages are omitted, and the dialogue only left.

That also, he said, I understand; you mean, for example, as
in tragedy.

You have conceived my meaning perfectly; and if I mistake
not, what you failed to apprehend before is now made clear to you, that poetry
and mythology are, in some cases, wholly imitative–instances of this are
supplied by tragedy and comedy; there is likewise the opposite style, in which
the poet is the only speaker–of this the dithyramb affords the best example;
and the combination of both is found in epic, and in several other styles of
poetry.

Do I take you with me?

Yes, he said; I see now what you meant.

I will
ask you to remember also what I began by saying, that we had done with the
subject and might proceed to the style.

Yes, I remember.

In saying this, I intended to imply that we must come to an
understanding about the mimetic art,–whether the poets, in narrating their
stories, are to be allowed by us to imitate, and if so, whether in whole or in
part, and if the latter, in what parts; or should all imitation be prohibited?

You mean, I suspect, to ask whether tragedy and comedy shall
be admitted into our nation?

Yes, I said; but there may be more than this in question: I
really do not know as yet, but whither the argument may blow, thither we go.

And go we will, he said.

Then, Adeimantus, let me ask you whether our guardians ought
to be imitators; or rather, has not this question been decided by the rule
already laid down that one man can only do one thing well, and not many; and
that if he attempt many, he will altogether fail of gaining much reputation in
any?

Certainly.

And this is equally true of imitation; no one man can
imitate many things as well as he would imitate a single one?

He cannot.

Then the same person will hardly be able to play a serious
part in life, and at the same time to be an imitator and imitate many other
parts as well; for even when two species of imitation are nearly allied, the
same persons cannot succeed in both, as, for example, the writers of tragedy
and comedy–did you not just now call them imitations?

Yes, I did; and you are right in thinking that the same
persons cannot succeed in both.

Any more than they can be rhapsodists and actors at once?

True.

Neither are comic and tragic actors the same; yet all these
things are but imitations.

They are so.

And human nature, Adeimantus, appears to have been coined
into yet smaller pieces, and to be as incapable of imitating many things well,
as of performing well the actions of which the imitations are copies.

Quite true, he replied.

If then
we adhere to our original notion and bear in mind that our guardians, setting
aside every other business, are to dedicate themselves wholly to the
maintenance of freedom in the nation, making this their craft, and engaging in
no work which does not bear on this end, they ought not to practice or imitate
anything else; if they imitate at all, they should imitate from youth upward
only those characters which are suitable to their profession–the courageous,
temperate, holy, free, and the like; but they should not depict or be skilful
at imitating any kind of illiberality or baseness, lest from imitation they
should come to be what they imitate.

Did you never observe how imitations, beginning in early
youth and continuing far into life, at length grow into habits and become a
second nature, affecting body, voice, and mind?

Yes, certainly, he said.

Then, I said, we will not allow those for whom we profess a
care and of whom we say that they ought to be good men, to imitate a woman,
whether young or old, quarrelling with her husband, or striving and vaunting
against the gods in conceit of her happiness, or when she is in affliction, or
sorrow, or weeping; and certainly not one who is in sickness, love, or labor.

Very right, he said.

Neither must they represent slaves, male or female,
performing the offices of slaves?

They must not.

And surely not bad men, whether cowards or any others, who
do the reverse of what we have just been prescribing, who scold or mock or
revile one another in drink or out of drink, or who in any other manner sin
against themselves and their neighbors in word or deed, as the manner of such
is.

Neither should they be trained to imitate the action or
speech of men or women who are mad or bad; for madness, like vice, is to be
known but not to be practiced or imitated.

Very true, he replied.

Neither may they imitate smiths or other artificers, or
oarsmen, or boatswains, or the like?

How can they, he said, when they are not allowed to apply
their minds to the callings of any of these?

Nor may they imitate the neighing of horses, the bellowing
of bulls, the murmur of rivers and roll of the ocean, thunder, and all that
sort of thing?

Nay, he said, if madness be forbidden, neither may they copy
the behavior of madmen.

You mean, I said, if I understand you aright, that there is
one sort of narrative style which may be employed by a truly good man when he
has anything to say, and that another sort will be used by a man of an opposite
character and education.

And which are these two sorts?  he asked.

Suppose, I answered, that a just and good man in the course
of a narration comes on some saying or action of another good man,–I should
imagine that he will like to personate him, and will not be ashamed of this
sort of imitation: he will be most ready to play the part of the good man when
he is acting firmly and wisely; in a less degree when he is overtaken by
illness or love or drink, or has met with any other disaster.

But when he comes to a character which is unworthy of him,
he will not make a study of that; he will disdain such a person, and will
assume his likeness, if at all, for a moment only when he is performing some
good action; at other times he will be ashamed to play a part which he has
never practiced, nor will he like to fashion and frame himself after the baser
models; he feels the employment of such an art, unless in jest, to be beneath
him, and his mind revolts at it.

So I should expect, he replied.

Then he will adopt a mode of narration such as we have
illustrated out of Homer, that is to say, his style will be both imitative and
narrative; but there will be very little of the former, and a great deal of the
latter.

Do you agree?

Certainly, he said; that is the model which such a speaker
must necessarily take.

But there is another sort of character who will narrate
anything, and, the worse he is, the more unscrupulous he will be; nothing will
be too bad for him: and he will be ready to imitate anything, not as a joke,
but in right good earnest, and before a large company.

As I was just now saying, he will attempt to represent the
roll of thunder, the noise of wind and hail, or the creaking of wheels, and
pulleys, and the various sounds of flutes, pipes, trumpets, and all sorts of
instruments: he will bark like a dog, bleat like a sheep, or crow like a cock;
his entire art will consist in imitation of voice and gesture, and there will
be very little narration.

That, he said, will be his mode of speaking.

These, then, are the two kinds of style?

Yes.

And you would agree with me in saying that one of them is
simple and has but slight changes; and if the harmony and rhythm are also
chosen for their simplicity, the result is that the speaker, if he speaks
correctly, is always pretty much the same in style, and he will keep within the
limits of a single harmony (for the changes are not great), and in like manner
he will make use of nearly the same rhythm?

That is quite true, he said.

Whereas the other requires all sorts of harmonies and all
sorts of rhythms, if the music and the style are to correspond, because the
style has all sorts of changes.

That is also perfectly true, he replied.

And do not the two styles, or the mixture of the two,
comprehend all poetry, and every form of expression in words?  No one can say anything except in one or
other of them or in both together.

They include all, he said.

And
shall we receive into our nation all the three styles, or one only of the two
unmixed styles?  or would you include
the mixed?

I
should prefer only to admit the pure imitator of virtue.

Yes, I said, Adeimantus, but the mixed style is also very
charming: and indeed the pantomimic, which is the opposite of the one chosen by
you, is the most popular style with children and their attendants, and with the
world in general.

I do not deny it.

But I suppose you would argue that such a style is
unsuitable to our nation, in which human nature is not twofold or manifold, for
one man plays one part only?

Yes; quite unsuitable.

And this is the reason why in our nation, and in our nation
only, we shall find a shoemaker to be a shoemaker and not a pilot also, and a
husbandman to be a husbandman and not a dicast also, and a soldier a soldier
and not a trader also, and the same throughout?

True, he said.

And
therefore when any one of these pantomimic gentlemen, who are so clever that
they can imitate anything, comes to us, and makes a proposal to exhibit himself
and his poetry, we will fall down and worship him as a sweet and holy and
wonderful being; but we must also inform him that in our nation such as he are
not permitted to exist; the law will not allow them.

And so when we have anointed him with myrrh, and set a
garland of wool upon his head, we shall send him away to another country.

For we mean to employ for our souls’ health the rougher and
severer poet or story-teller, who will imitate the style of the virtuous only,
and will follow those models which we prescribed at first when we began the
education of our soldiers.

We certainly will, he said, if we have the power.

Then now, my friend, I said, that part of music or literary
education which relates to the story or myth may be considered to be finished;
for the matter and manner have both been discussed.

I think so too, he said.

 

Now he discusses how music needs to be constructed, to make the nation good
at war:

 

 

Next in
order will follow melody and song.

That is obvious.

Every
one can see already what we ought to say about them, if we are to be consistent
with ourselves.

I fear, said Glaucon, laughing, that the word ’every one’
hardly includes me, for I cannot at the moment say what they should be; though
I may guess.

At any rate you can tell that a song or ode has three
parts–the words, the melody, and the rhythm; that degree of knowledge I may
presuppose?

Yes, he said; so much as that you may.

And as
for the words, there will surely be no difference between words which are and
which are not set to music; both will conform to the same laws, and these have
been already determined by us?

Yes.

And the melody and rhythm will depend upon the words?

Certainly.

We were
saying, when we spoke of the subject-matter, that we had no need of lamentation
and strains of sorrow?

True.

And which are the harmonies expressive of sorrow?  You are musical, and can tell me.

The harmonies which you mean are the mixed or tenor Lydian,
and the fulltoned or bass Lydian, and such like.

These then, I said, must be banished; even to women who have
a character to maintain they are of no use, and much less to men.

Certainly.

In the next place, drunkenness and softness and indolence
are utterly unbecoming the character of our guardians.

Utterly unbecoming.

And which are the soft or drinking harmonies?

The Ionian, he replied, and the Lydian; they are termed
’relaxed.’ Well, and are
these of any military use?

Quite
the reverse, he replied; and if so the Dorian and the Phrygian are the only
ones which you have left.

I answered: Of the harmonies I know nothing, but I want to have one warlike, to
sound the note or accent which a brave man utters in the hour of danger and
stern resolve, or when his cause is failing, and he is going to wounds or death
or is overtaken by some other evil, and at every such crisis meets the blows of
fortune with firm step and a determination to endure; and another to be used by him in times of peace
and freedom of action, when there is no pressure of necessity, and he is
seeking to persuade God by prayer, or man by instruction and admonition, or on
the other hand, when he is expressing his willingness to yield to persuasion or
entreaty or admonition, and which represents him when by prudent conduct he has
attained his end, not carried away by his success, but acting moderately and
wisely under the circumstances, and acquiescing in the event.

These two harmonies I ask you to leave; the strain of
necessity and the strain of freedom, the strain of the unfortunate and the
strain of the fortunate, the strain of courage, and the strain of temperance;
these, I say, leave.

And these, he replied, are the Dorian and Phrygian harmonies
of which I was just now speaking.

Then, I
said, if these and these only are to be used in our songs and melodies, we
shall not want multiplicity of notes or a panharmonic scale?

I suppose not.

Then we shall not maintain the artificers of lyres with
three corners and complex scales, or the makers of any other many-stringed
curiously- harmonized instruments?

Certainly not.

But what do you say to flute-makers and flute-players?  Would you admit them into our nation when
you reflect that in this composite use of harmony the flute is worse than all
the stringed instruments put together; even the panharmonic music is only an imitation
of the flute?

Clearly not.

There remain then only the lyre and the harp for use in the
city, and the shepherds may have a pipe in the country.

That is surely the conclusion to be drawn from the argument.

The preferring of Apollo and his instruments to Marsyas and
his instruments is not at all strange, I said.

Not at all, he replied.

And so,
by the dog of Egypt, we have been unconsciously purging the nation, which not
long ago we termed luxurious.

And we have done wisely, he replied.

Then let us now finish the purgation, I said.

Next in order to harmonies, rhythms will naturally follow,
and they should be subject to the same rules, for we ought not to seek out
complex systems of metre, or metres of every kind, but rather to discover what
rhythms are the expressions of a courageous and harmonious life; and when we
have found them, we shall adapt the foot and the melody to words having a like
spirit, not the words to the foot and melody.

To say what these rhythms are will be your duty–you must
teach me them, as you have already taught me the harmonies.

But, indeed, he replied, I cannot tell you.

I only know that there are some three principles of rhythm
out of which metrical systems are framed, just as in sounds there are four
notes (i.e. the four notes of the chord.) out of which all the harmonies are
composed; that is an observation which I have made.

But of what sort of lives they are severally the imitations
I am unable to say.

Then, I said, we must take Damon into our counsels; and he
will tell us what rhythms are expressive of meanness, or insolence, or fury, or
other unworthiness, and what are to be reserved for the expression of opposite
feelings.

And I think that I have an indistinct recollection of his
mentioning a complex Cretic rhythm; also a dactylic or heroic, and he arranged
them in some manner which I do not quite understand, making the rhythms equal
in the rise and fall of the foot, long and short alternating; and, unless I am
mistaken, he spoke of an iambic as well as of a trochaic rhythm, and assigned
to them short and long quantities.

Also in some cases he appeared to praise or censure the
movement of the foot quite as much as the rhythm; or perhaps a combination of
the two; for I am not certain what he meant.

These matters, however, as I was saying, had better be
referred to Damon himself, for the analysis of the subject would be difficult,
you know?  (Socrates expresses himself
carelessly in accordance with his assumed ignorance of the details of the
subject.

In the first part of the sentence he appears to be speaking
of paeonic rhythms which are in the ratio of 3/2; in the second part, of
dactylic and anapaestic rhythms, which are in the ratio of 1/1; in the last
clause, of iambic and trochaic rhythms, which are in the ratio of 1/2 or 2/1.)
Rather so, I should say.

But there is no difficulty in seeing that grace or the
absence of grace is an effect of good or bad rhythm.

None at all.

And also that good and bad rhythm naturally assimilate to a
good and bad style; and that harmony and discord in like manner follow style;
for our principle is that rhythm and harmony are regulated by the words, and
not the words by them.

Just so, he said, they should follow the words.

And will not the words and the character of the style depend
on the temper of the soul?

Yes.

And everything else on the style?

Yes.

Then beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm
depend on simplicity,–I mean the true simplicity of a rightly and nobly ordered
mind and character, not that other simplicity which is only an euphemism for
folly?

Very true, he replied.

And if
our youth are to do their work in life, must they not make these graces and
harmonies their perpetual aim?

They must.

And surely the art of the painter and every other creative
and constructive art are full of them,–weaving, embroidery, architecture, and
every kind of manufacture; also nature, animal and vegetable,–in all of them
there is grace or the absence of grace.

And ugliness and discord and inharmonious motion are nearly
allied to ill words and ill nature, as grace and harmony are the twin sisters
of goodness and virtue and bear their likeness.

That is quite true, he said.

But shall our superintendence go no further, and are the
poets only to be required by us to express the image of the good in their
works, on pain, if they do anything else, of expulsion from our nation?  Or is the same control to be extended to
other artists, and are they also to be prohibited from exhibiting the opposite
forms of vice and intemperance and meanness and indecency in sculpture and
building and the other creative arts; and is he who cannot conform to this rule
of ours to be prevented from practising his art in our nation, lest the taste
of our citizens be corrupted by him?  We
would not have our guardians grow up amid images of moral deformity, as in some
noxious pasture, and there browse and feed upon many a baneful herb and flower
day by day, little by little, until they silently gather a festering mass of
corruption in their own soul.

Let our artists rather be those who are gifted to discern
the true nature of the beautiful and graceful; then will our youth dwell in a
land of health, amid fair sights and sounds, and receive the good in
everything; and beauty, the effluence of fair works, shall flow into the eye
and ear, like a health-giving breeze from a purer region, and insensibly draw
the soul from earliest years into likeness and sympathy with the beauty of
reason.

There can be no nobler training than that, he replied.

And
therefore, I said, Glaucon, musical training is a more potent instrument than
any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of
the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the
soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who is ill-educated
ungraceful; and also because he who has received this true education of the
inner being will most shrewdly perceive omissions or faults in art and nature,
and with a true taste, while he praises and rejoices over and receives into his
soul the good, and becomes noble and good, he will justly blame and hate the
bad, now in the days of his youth, even before he is able to know the reason
why; and when reason comes he will recognise and salute the friend with whom
his education has made him long familiar.

Yes, he
said, I quite agree with you in thinking that our youth should be trained in
music and on the grounds which you mention.

Just as in learning to read, I said, we were satisfied when
we knew the letters of the alphabet, which are very few, in all their recurring
sizes and combinations; not slighting them as unimportant whether they occupy a
space large or small, but everywhere eager to make them out; and not thinking
ourselves perfect in the art of reading until we recognise them wherever they are
found: True– Or, as we recognise the reflection of letters in the water, or in
a mirror, only when we know the letters themselves; the same art and study
giving us the knowledge of both: Exactly– Even so, as I maintain, neither we nor our guardians,
whom we have to educate, can ever become musical until we and they know the
essential forms of temperance, courage, liberality, magnificence, and
their kindred, as well as the contrary forms, in all their combinations, and
can recognise them and their images wherever they are found, not slighting them
either in small things or great, but believing them all to be within the sphere
of one art and study.

Most assuredly.

And when a beautiful soul harmonizes with a beautiful form,
and the two are cast in one mould, that will be the fairest of sights to him
who has an eye to see it?

The fairest indeed.

And the fairest is also the loveliest?

That may be assumed.

And the man who has the spirit of harmony will be most in
love with the loveliest; but he will not love him who is of an inharmonious
soul?

That is true, he replied, if the deficiency be in his soul;
but if there be any merely bodily defect in another he will be patient of it,
and will love all the same.

I perceive, I said, that you have or have had experiences of
this sort, and I agree.

But let me ask you another question: Has excess of pleasure
any affinity to temperance?

How can that be?  he
replied; pleasure deprives a man of the use of his faculties quite as much as
pain.

Or any affinity to virtue in general?

None whatever.

Any affinity to wantonness and intemperance?

Yes, the greatest.

And is there any greater or keener pleasure than that of
sensual love?

No, nor a madder.

Whereas true love is a love of beauty and order–temperate
and harmonious?

Quite true, he said.

Then no intemperance or madness should be allowed to
approach true love?

Certainly not.

Then mad or intemperate pleasure must never be allowed to
come near the lover and his beloved; neither of them can have any part in it if
their love is of the right sort?

No, indeed, Socrates, it must never come near them.

Then I suppose that in the country which we are founding you
would make a law to the effect that a friend should use no other familiarity to
his love than a father would use to his son, and then only for a noble purpose,
and he must first have the other’s consent; and this rule is to limit him in
all his intercourse, and he is never to be seen going further, or, if he
exceeds, he is to be deemed guilty of coarseness and bad taste.

I quite agree, he said.

Thus much of music, which makes a fair ending; for what
should be the end of music if not the love of beauty?

I agree, he said.

After music comes gymnastic, in which our youth are next to
be trained.

Certainly.

Gymnastic as well as music should begin in early years; the
training in it should be careful and should continue through life.

Now my belief is,–and this is a matter upon which I should
like to have your opinion in confirmation of my own, but my own belief is,–not
that the good body by any bodily excellence improves the soul, but, on the
contrary, that the good soul, by her own excellence, improves the body as far
as this may be possible.

What do you say?

Yes, I agree.

 

The mind has been trained, now to the body

 

 

Then,
to the mind when adequately trained, we shall be right in handing over the more
particular care of the body; and in order to avoid prolixity we will now only
give the general outlines of the subject.

Very good.

That they must abstain from intoxication has been already
remarked by us; for of all persons a guardian should be the last to get drunk
and not know where in the world he is.

Yes, he said; that a guardian should require another
guardian to take care of him is ridiculous indeed.

But
next, what shall we say of their food; for the men are in training for the
great contest of all–are they not?

Yes, he said.

And will the habit of body of our ordinary athletes be
suited to them?

Why not?

I am afraid, I said, that a habit of body such as they have
is but a sleepy sort of thing, and rather perilous to health.

Do you not observe that these athletes sleep away their
lives, and are liable to most dangerous illnesses if they depart, in ever so
slight a degree, from their customary regimen?

Yes, I do.

Then, I
said, a finer sort of training will be required for our warrior athletes, who
are to be like wakeful dogs, and to see and hear with the utmost
keenness; amid the many changes of water and also of food, of summer heat and
winter cold, which they will have to endure when on a campaign, they must not
be liable to break down in health.

That is my view.

The really excellent gymnastic is twin sister of that simple
music which we were just now describing.

How so?

Why, I
conceive that there is a gymnastic which, like our music, is simple and good;
and especially the military gymnastic.

What do you mean?

My meaning may be learned from Homer; he, you know, feeds
his heroes at their feasts, when they are campaigning, on soldiers’ fare; they
have no fish, although they are on the shores of the Hellespont, and they are
not allowed boiled meats but only roast, which is the food most convenient for
soldiers, requiring only that they should light a fire, and not involving the
trouble of carrying about pots and pans.

True.

And I can hardly be mistaken in saying that sweet sauces are
nowhere mentioned in Homer.

In proscribing them, however, he is not singular; all
professional athletes are well aware that a man who is to be in good condition
should take nothing of the kind.

Yes, he said; and knowing this, they are quite right in not
taking them.

Then you would not approve of Syracusan dinners, and the
refinements of Sicilian cookery?

I think not.

Nor, if
a man is to be in condition, would you allow him to have a Corinthian girl as
his fair friend?

Certainly not.

Neither would you approve of the delicacies, as they are
thought, of Athenian confectionary?

Certainly not.

All such feeding and living may be rightly compared by us to
melody and song composed in the panharmonic style, and in all the rhythms.

Exactly.

There complexity engendered licence, and here disease;
whereas simplicity in music was the parent of temperance in the soul; and
simplicity in gymnastic of health in the body.

Most true, he said.

But when intemperance and diseases multiply in a nation,
halls of justice and medicine are always being opened; and the arts of the
doctor and the lawyer give themselves airs, finding how keen is the interest
which not only the slaves but the freemen of a country take about them.

Of course.

And yet what greater proof can there be of a bad and
disgraceful nation of education than this, that not only artisans and the
meaner sort of people need the skill of first-rate physicians and judges, but
also those who would profess to have had a liberal education?  Is it not disgraceful, and a great sign of
want of good-breeding, that a man should have to go abroad for his law and
physic because he has none of his own at home, and must therefore surrender
himself into the hands of other men whom he makes lords and judges over him?

Of all things, he said, the most disgraceful.

Would you say ’most,’ I replied, when you consider that
there is a further stage of the evil in which a man is not only a life-long
litigant, passing all his days in the courts, either as plaintiff or defendant,
but is actually led by his bad taste to pride himself on his litigiousness; he
imagines that he is a master in dishonesty; able to take every crooked turn,
and wriggle into and out of every hole, bending like a withy and getting out of
the way of justice: and all for what?–in order to gain small points not worth
mentioning, he not knowing that so to order his life as to be able to do
without a napping judge is a far higher and nobler sort of thing.

Is not that still more disgraceful?

Yes, he said, that is still more disgraceful.

Well, I said, and to require the help of medicine, not when
a wound has to be cured, or on occasion of an epidemic, but just because, by
indolence and a habit of life such as we have been describing, men fill
themselves with waters and winds, as if their bodies were a marsh, compelling
the ingenious sons of Asclepius to find more names for diseases, such as
flatulence and catarrh; is not this, too, a disgrace?

Yes, he said, they do certainly give very strange and
newfangled names to diseases.

Yes, I said, and I do not believe that there were any such
diseases in the days of Asclepius; and this I infer from the circumstance that
the hero Eurypylus, after he has been wounded in Homer, drinks a posset of
Pramnian wine well besprinkled with barley-meal and grated cheese, which are
certainly inflammatory, and yet the sons of Asclepius who were at the Trojan
war do not blame the damsel who gives him the drink, or rebuke Patroclus, who
is treating his case.

Well, he said, that was surely an extraordinary drink to be
given to a person in his condition.

Not so extraordinary, I replied, if you bear in mind that in
former days, as is commonly said, before the time of Herodicus, the guild of
Asclepius did not practise our present system of medicine, which may be said to
educate diseases.

But Herodicus, being a trainer, and himself of a sickly
constitution, by a combination of training and doctoring found out a way of
torturing first and chiefly himself, and secondly the rest of the world.

How was that?  he
said.

By the invention of lingering death; for he had a mortal
disease which he perpetually tended, and as recovery was out of the question,
he passed his entire life as a valetudinarian; he could do nothing but attend
upon himself, and he was in constant torment whenever he departed in anything
from his usual regimen, and so dying hard, by the help of science he struggled
on to old age.

A rare reward of his skill! Yes, I said; a reward which a
man might fairly expect who never understood that, if Asclepius did not
instruct his descendants in valetudinarian arts, the omission arose, not from
ignorance or inexperience of such a branch of medicine, but because he knew
that in all well-ordered  nations every
individual has an occupation to which he must attend, and has therefore no
leisure to spend in continually being ill.

This we remark in the case of the artisan, but, ludicrously
enough, do not apply the same rule to people of the richer sort.

How do you mean?  he
said.

I mean this: When a carpenter is ill he asks the physician
for a rough and ready cure; an emetic or a purge or a cautery or the
knife,–these are his remedies.

And if some one prescribes for him a course of dietetics,
and tells him that he must swathe and swaddle his head, and all that sort of
thing, he replies at once that he has no time to be ill, and that he sees no
good in a life which is spent in nursing his disease to the neglect of his
customary employment; and therefore bidding good-bye to this sort of physician,
he resumes his ordinary habits, and either gets well and lives and does his
business, or, if his constitution fails, he dies and has no more trouble.

Yes, he said, and a man in his condition of life ought to
use the art of medicine thus far only.

Has he not, I said, an occupation; and what profit would there be in his life if he
were deprived of his occupation?

Quite true, he said.

But with the rich man this is otherwise; of him we do not
say that he has any specially appointed work which he must perform, if he would
live.

He is generally supposed to have nothing to do.

Then you never heard of the saying of Phocylides, that as
soon as a man has a livelihood he should practise virtue?

Nay, he said, I think that he had better begin somewhat
sooner.

Let us not have a dispute with him about this, I said; but
rather ask ourselves: Is the practice of virtue obligatory on the rich man, or
can he live without it?

And if obligatory on him, then let us raise a further
question, whether this dieting of disorders, which is an impediment to the
application of the mind in carpentering and the mechanical arts, does not
equally stand in the way of the sentiment of Phocylides?

Of that, he replied, there can be no doubt; such excessive
care of the body, when carried beyond the rules of gymnastic, is most inimical
to the practice of virtue.

Yes, indeed, I replied, and equally incompatible with the
management of a house, an army, or an office of nation; and, what is most
important of all, irreconcileable with any kind of study or thought or
self-reflection–there is a constant suspicion that headache and giddiness are
to be ascribed to philosophy, and hence all practising or making trial of
virtue in the higher sense is absolutely stopped; for a man is always fancying
that he is being made ill, and is in constant anxiety about the nation of his
body.

Yes, likely enough.

And therefore our politic Asclepius may be supposed to have
exhibited the power of his art only to persons who, being generally of healthy
constitution and habits of life, had a definite ailment; such as these he cured
by purges and operations, and bade them live as usual, herein consulting the
interests of the nation; but bodies which disease had penetrated through and
through he would not have attempted to cure by gradual processes of evacuation
and infusion: he did not want to lengthen out good-for-nothing lives, or to
have weak fathers begetting weaker sons; –if a man was not able to live in the ordinary way he had
no business to cure him; for such a cure would have been of no use either to
himself, or to the nation.

Then, he said, you regard Asclepius as a  nationsman.

Clearly; and his character is further illustrated by his
sons.

Note that they were heroes in the days of old and practised
the medicines of which I am speaking at the siege of Troy: You will remember
how, when Pandarus wounded Menelaus, they ’Sucked the blood out of the wound,
and sprinkled soothing remedies,’ but they never prescribed what the patient
was afterwards to eat or drink in the case of Menelaus, any more than in the
case of Eurypylus; the remedies, as they conceived, were enough to heal any man
who before he was wounded was healthy and regular in his habits; and even
though he did happen to drink a posset of Pramnian wine, he might get well all
the same.

But they would have nothing to do with unhealthy and
intemperate subjects, whose lives were of no use either to themselves or
others; the art of medicine was not designed for their good, and though they
were as rich as Midas, the sons of Asclepius would have declined to attend
them.

They were very acute persons, those sons of Asclepius.

Naturally so, I replied.

Nevertheless, the tragedians and Pindar disobeying our
behests, although they acknowledge that Asclepius was the son of Apollo, say
also that he was bribed into healing a rich man who was at the point of death,
and for this reason he was struck by lightning.

But we, in accordance with the principle already affirmed by
us, will not believe them when they tell us both;– if he was the son of a god,
we maintain that he was not avaricious; or, if he was avaricious, he was not
the son of a god.

All that, Socrates, is excellent; but I should like to put a
question to you: Ought there not to be good physicians in a nation, and are not
the best those who have treated the greatest number of constitutions good and
bad?  and are not the best judges in
like manner those who are acquainted with all sorts of moral natures?

Yes, I said, I too would have good judges and good
physicians.

But do you know whom I think good?

Will you tell me?

I will, if I can.

Let me however note that in the same question you join two
things which are not the same.

How so?  he asked.

Why, I said, you join physicians and judges.

Now the most skilful physicians are those who, from their
youth upwards, have combined with the knowledge of their art the greatest
experience of disease; they had better not be robust in health, and should have
had all manner of diseases in their own persons.

For the body, as I conceive, is not the instrument with
which they cure the body; in that case we could not allow them ever to be or to
have been sickly; but they cure the body with the mind, and the mind which has
become and is sick can cure nothing.

That is very true, he said.

But with the judge it is otherwise; since he governs mind by
mind; he ought not therefore to have been trained among vicious minds, and to
have associated with them from youth upwards, and to have gone through the
whole calendar of crime, only in order that he may quickly infer the crimes of
others as he might their bodily diseases from his own self-consciousness; the
honourable mind which is to form a healthy judgment should have had no
experience or contamination of evil habits when young.

And this is the reason why in youth good men often appear to
be simple, and are easily practised upon by the dishonest, because they have no
examples of what evil is in their own souls.

Yes, he said, they are far too apt to be deceived.

Therefore, I said, the judge should not be young; he should
have learned to know evil, not from his own soul, but from late and long
observation of the nature of evil in others: knowledge should be his guide, not
personal experience.

Yes, he said, that is the ideal of a judge.

Yes, I replied, and he will be a good man (which is my
answer to your question); for he is good who has a good soul.

But the cunning and suspicious nature of which we spoke,–he
who has committed many crimes, and fancies himself to be a master in
wickedness, when he is amongst his fellows, is wonderful in the precautions
which he takes, because he judges of them by himself: but when he gets into the
company of men of virtue, who have the experience of age, he appears to be a
fool again, owing to his unseasonable suspicions; he cannot recognise an honest
man, because he has no pattern of honesty in himself; at the same time, as the
bad are more numerous than the good, and he meets with them oftener, he thinks
himself, and is by others thought to be, rather wise than foolish.

Most true, he said.

Then the good and wise judge whom we are seeking is not this
man, but the other; for vice cannot know virtue too, but a virtuous nature,
educated by time, will acquire a knowledge both of virtue and vice: the
virtuous, and not the vicious, man has wisdom–in my opinion.

And in mine also.

This is the sort of medicine, and this is the sort of law,
which you will sanction in your nation.

They will minister to better natures, giving health both of
soul and of body; but those who are diseased in their bodies they will leave to
die, and the corrupt and incurable souls they will put an end to themselves.

That is clearly the best thing both for the patients and for
the nation.

And thus our youth, having been educated only in that simple
music which, as we said, inspires temperance, will be reluctant to go to law.

Clearly.

And the musician, who, keeping to the same track, is content
to practise the simple gymnastic, will have nothing to do with medicine unless
in some extreme case.

That I quite believe.

The very exercises and tolls which he undergoes are intended
to stimulate the spirited element of his nature, and not to increase his
strength; he will not, like common athletes, use exercise and regimen to
develope his muscles.

Very right, he said.

Neither are the two arts of music and gymnastic really
designed, as is often supposed, the one for the training of the soul, the other
for the training of the body.

What then is the real object of them?

I believe, I said, that the teachers of both have in view
chiefly the improvement of the soul.

How can that be?  he
asked.

Did you never observe, I said, the effect on the mind itself
of exclusive devotion to gymnastic, or the opposite effect of an exclusive
devotion to music?

In what way shown?
he said.

The one producing a temper of hardness and ferocity, the
other of softness and effeminacy, I replied.

Yes, he said, I am quite aware that the mere athlete becomes
too much of a savage, and that the mere musician is melted and softened beyond
what is good for him.

Yet surely, I said, this ferocity only comes from spirit,
which, if rightly educated, would give courage, but, if too much intensified,
is liable to become hard and brutal.

That I quite think.

On the other hand the philosopher will have the quality of
gentleness.

And this also, when too much indulged, will turn to
softness, but, if educated rightly, will be gentle and moderate.

True.

And in our opinion the guardians ought to have both these
qualities?

Assuredly.

And both should be in harmony?

Beyond question.

And the harmonious soul is both temperate and courageous?

Yes.

And the inharmonious is cowardly and boorish?

Very true.

And, when a man allows music to play upon him and to pour
into his soul through the funnel of his ears those sweet and soft and
melancholy airs of which we were just now speaking, and his whole life is
passed in warbling and the delights of song; in the first stage of the process
the passion or spirit which is in him is tempered like iron, and made useful,
instead of brittle and useless.

But, if he carries on the softening and soothing process, in
the next stage he begins to melt and waste, until he has wasted away his spirit
and cut out the sinews of his soul; and he becomes a feeble warrior.

Very true.

If the element of spirit is naturally weak in him the change
is speedily accomplished, but if he have a good deal, then the power of music
weakening the spirit renders him excitable;–on the least provocation he flames
up at once, and is speedily extinguished; instead of having spirit he grows
irritable and passionate and is quite impracticable.

Exactly.

And so in gymnastics, if a man takes violent exercise and is
a great feeder, and the reverse of a great student of music and philosophy, at
first the high condition of his body fills him with pride and spirit, and he
becomes twice the man that he was.

Certainly.

And what happens?  if
he do nothing else, and holds no converse with the Muses, does not even that
intelligence which there may be in him, having no taste of any sort of learning
or enquiry or thought or culture, grow feeble and dull and blind, his mind
never waking up or receiving nourishment, and his senses not being purged of
their mists?

True, he said.

And he ends by becoming a hater of philosophy, uncivilized,
never using the weapon of persuasion,–he is like a wild beast, all violence and
fierceness, and knows no other way of dealing; and he lives in all ignorance
and evil conditions, and has no sense of propriety and grace.

That is quite true, he said.

And as there are two principles of human nature, one the
spirited and the other the philosophical, some God, as I should say, has given
mankind two arts answering to them (and only indirectly to the soul and body),
in order that these two principles (like the strings of an instrument) may be
relaxed or drawn tighter until they are duly harmonized.

That appears to be the intention.

And he who mingles music with gymnastic in the fairest
proportions, and best attempers them to the soul, may be rightly called the
true musician and harmonist in a far higher sense than the tuner of the
strings.

You are quite right, Socrates.

And such a presiding genius will be always required in our
nation if the government is to last.

Yes, he will be absolutely necessary.

Such, then, are our principles of nurture and education:
Where would be the use of going into further details about the dances of our
citizens, or about their hunting and coursing, their gymnastic and equestrian
contests?  For these all follow the
general principle, and having found that, we shall have no difficulty in
discovering them.

I dare say that there will be no difficulty.

Very good, I said; then what is the next question?  Must we not ask who are to be rulers and who
subjects?

Certainly.

There can be no doubt that the elder must rule the younger.

Clearly.

And that the best of these must rule.

That is also clear.

Now, are not the best husbandmen those who are most devoted
to husbandry?

Yes.

And as we are to have the best of guardians for our city,
must they not be those who have most the character of guardians?

Yes.

And to this end they ought to be wise and efficient, and to
have a special care of the nation?

 

Loyalty

 

 

True.

And a
man will be most likely to care about that which he loves?

To be sure.

And he
will be most likely to love that which he regards as having the same interests
with himself, and that of which the good or evil fortune is supposed by him at
any time most to affect his own?

Very true, he replied.

Then there must be a selection.

Let us
note among the guardians those who in their whole life show the greatest
eagerness to do what is for the good of their country, and the greatest
repugnance to do what is against her interests.

Those
are the right men.

And they will have to be watched at every age, in order that
we may see whether they preserve their resolution, and never, under the
influence either of force or enchantment, forget or cast off their sense of
duty to the nation.

How cast off?  he
said.

I will explain to you, I replied.

A resolution may go out of a man’s mind either with his will
or against his will; with his will when he gets rid of a falsehood and learns
better, against his will whenever he is deprived of a truth.

I understand, he said, the willing loss of a resolution; the
meaning of the unwilling I have yet to learn.

Why, I said, do you not see that men are unwillingly
deprived of good, and willingly of evil?
Is not to have lost the truth an evil, and to possess the truth a
good?  and you would agree that to
conceive things as they are is to possess the truth?

Yes, he replied; I agree with you in thinking that mankind
are deprived of truth against their will.

And is not this involuntary deprivation caused either by
theft, or force, or enchantment?

Still, he replied, I do not understand you.

I fear that I must have been talking darkly, like the
tragedians.

I only mean that some men are changed by persuasion and that
others forget; argument steals away the hearts of one class, and time of the
other; and this I call theft.

Now you understand me?

Yes.

Those again who are forced, are those whom the violence of
some pain or grief compels to change their opinion.

I understand, he said, and you are quite right.

And you would also acknowledge that the enchanted are those
who change their minds either under the softer influence of pleasure, or the
sterner influence of fear?

Yes, he said; everything that deceives may be said to
enchant.

Therefore,
as I was just now saying, we must enquire who are the best guardians of their
own conviction that what they think the interest of the nation is to be the
rule of their lives.

We must
watch them from their youth upwards, and make them perform actions in which
they are most likely to forget or to be deceived, and he who remembers and is
not deceived is to be selected, and he who fails in the trial is to be
rejected.

That will be the way?

Yes.

And there should also be toils and pains and conflicts
prescribed for them, in which they will be made to give further proof of the
same qualities.

Very right, he replied.

And then, I said, we must try them with enchantments–that is
the third sort of test–and see what will be their behaviour: like those who
take colts amid noise and tumult to see if they are of a timid nature, so must
we take our youth amid terrors of some kind, and again pass them into pleasures,
and prove them more thoroughly than gold is proved in the furnace, that we may
discover whether they are armed against all enchantments, and of a noble
bearing always, good guardians of themselves and of the music which they have
learned, and retaining under all circumstances a rhythmical and harmonious
nature, such as will be most serviceable to the individual and to the nation.

 

How Rulers are to gain power

 

And he
who at every age, as boy and youth and in mature life, has come out of the
trial victorious and pure, shall be appointed a ruler and guardian of the
nation; he shall be honoured in life and death, and shall receive sepulture and
other memorials of honour, the greatest that we have to give.

But him who fails, we must reject.

I am
inclined to think that this is the sort of way in which our rulers and
guardians should be chosen and appointed.

I speak generally, and not with any pretension to exactness.

And, speaking generally, I agree with you, he said.

And
perhaps the word ’guardian’ in the fullest sense ought to be applied to this
higher class only who preserve us against foreign enemies and maintain peace
among our citizens at home, that the one may not have the will, or the others
the power, to harm us.

The
young men whom we before called guardians may be more properly designated
auxiliaries and supporters of the principles of the rulers.

I agree with you, he said.

How
then may we devise one of those needful falsehoods of which we lately
spoke–just one royal lie which may deceive the rulers, if that be possible, and
at any rate the rest of the country?

What
sort of lie?  he said.

Nothing new, I replied; only an old Phoenician tale (Laws)
of what has often occurred before now in other places, (as the poets say, and
have made the world believe,) though not in our time, and I do not know whether
such an event could ever happen again, or could now even be made probable, if
it did.

How your words seem to hesitate on your lips! You will not
wonder, I replied, at my hesitation when you have heard.

Speak, he said, and fear not.

Well
then, I will speak, although I really know not how to look you in the face, or
in what words to utter the audacious fiction, which I propose to communicate
gradually, first to the rulers, then to the soldiers, and lastly to the people.

They
are to be told that their youth was a dream, and the education and training
which they received from us, an appearance only; in reality during all that
time they were being formed and fed in the womb of the country, where they
themselves and their arms and appurtenances were manufactured; when they were
completed, the country, their mother, sent them up; and so, their country being
their mother and also their nurse, they are bound to advise for her good, and
to defend her against attacks, and her citizens they are to regard as their own
brothers.

You had good reason, he said, to be ashamed of the lie which
you were going to tell.

True, I replied, but there is more coming; I have only told
you half.

Citizens,
we shall say to them in our tale, you are brothers, yet God has framed you
differently.

Some of
you have the power of command, and in the composition of these he has mingled
gold, wherefore also they have the greatest honour; others he has made of
silver, to be auxiliaries; others again who are to be husbandmen and craftsmen
he has composed of brass and iron; and the species will generally be preserved
in the children.

But as
all are of the same original stock, a golden parent will sometimes have a
silver son, or a silver parent a golden son.

And God
proclaims as a first principle to the rulers, and above all else, that there is
nothing which they should so anxiously guard, or of which they are to be such
good guardians, as of
the purity of the race.

They should observe what elements mingle in their offspring;
for if the son of a golden or silver parent has an admixture of brass and iron,
then nature orders a transposition of ranks, and the eye of the ruler must not
be pitiful towards the child because he has to descend in the scale and become
a husbandman or artisan, just as there may be sons of artisans who having an
admixture of gold or silver in them are raised to honour, and become guardians
or auxiliaries.

For an oracle says that when a man of brass or iron guards
the nation, it will be destroyed.

Such is the tale; is there any possibility of making our
citizens believe in it?

Not in the present generation, he replied; there is no way
of accomplishing this; but their sons may be made to believe in the tale, and
their sons’ sons, and posterity after them.

I see the difficulty, I replied; yet the fostering of such a
belief will make them care more for the country and for one another.

Enough, however, of the fiction, which may now fly abroad
upon the wings of rumour, while we arm our earthborn heroes, and lead them
forth under the command of their rulers.

Let them look round and select a spot whence they can best
suppress insurrection, if any prove refractory within, and also defend
themselves against enemies, who like wolves may come down on the fold from
without; there let them encamp, and when they have encamped, let them sacrifice
to the proper Gods and prepare their dwellings.

Just so, he said.

And their dwellings must be such as will shield them against
the cold of winter and the heat of summer.

I suppose that you mean houses, he replied.

Yes, I said; but they must be the houses of soldiers, and
not of shop- keepers.

What is the difference?
he said.

That I will endeavour to explain, I replied.

To keep watch-dogs, who, from want of discipline or hunger,
or some evil habit or other, would turn upon the sheep and worry them, and
behave not like dogs but wolves, would be a foul and monstrous thing in a
shepherd?

Truly monstrous, he said.

And therefore every care must be taken that our auxiliaries,
being stronger than our citizens, may not grow to be too much for them and
become savage tyrants instead of friends and allies?

Yes, great care should be taken.

And would not a really good education furnish the best
safeguard?

But they are well-educated already, he replied.

I cannot be so confident, my dear Glaucon, I said; I am much
more certain that they ought to be, and that true education, whatever that may
be, will have the greatest tendency to civilize and humanize them in their
relations to one another, and to those who are under their protection.

Very true, he replied.

And not only their education, but their habitations, and all
that belongs to them, should be such as will neither impair their virtue as
guardians, nor tempt them to prey upon the other citizens.

Any man of sense must acknowledge that.

He must.

Then now let us consider what will be their way of life, if
they are to realize our idea of them.

In the first place, none of them should have any property of
his own beyond what is absolutely necessary; neither should they have a private
house or store closed against any one who has a mind to enter; their provisions
should be only such as are required by trained warriors, who are men of
temperance and courage; they should agree to receive from the citizens a fixed
rate of pay, enough to meet the expenses of the year and no more; and they will
go to mess and live together like soldiers in a camp.

Gold and silver we will tell them that they have from God;
the diviner metal is within them, and they have therefore no need of the dross
which is current among men, and ought not to pollute the divine by any such
earthly admixture; for that commoner metal has been the source of many unholy
deeds, but their own is undefiled.

And they alone of all the citizens may not touch or handle
silver or gold, or be under the same roof with them, or wear them, or drink
from them.

And this will be their salvation, and they will be the
saviours of the nation.

But should they ever acquire homes or lands or moneys of their
own, they will become housekeepers and husbandmen instead of guardians, enemies
and tyrants instead of allies of the other citizens; hating and being hated,
plotting and being plotted against, they will pass their whole life in much
greater terror of internal than of external enemies, and the hour of ruin, both
to themselves and to the rest of the nation, will be at hand.

For all
which reasons may we not say that thus shall our nation be ordered, and that
these shall be the regulations appointed by us for guardians concerning their
houses and all other matters?

Yes,
said Glaucon.

 

 

 

The Purpose of Justice

 

Parents and tutors are always telling their sons and their
wards that they are to be just; but why?
Not for the sake of justice, but for the sake of character and
reputation; in the hope of obtaining for him who is reputed just some of those
offices, marriages, and the like which Glaucon has enumerated among the
advantages accruing to the unjust from the reputation of justice.

More, however, is made of appearances by this class of
persons than by the others; for they throw in the good opinion of the gods, and
will tell you of a shower of benefits which the heavens, as they say, rain upon
the pious; and this accords with the testimony of the noble Hesiod and Homer,
the first of whom says, that the gods make the oaks of the just– ’To bear
acorns at their summit, and bees in the middle; And the sheep are bowed down
with the weight of their fleeces,’ and many other blessings of a like kind are
provided for them.

Some extend their rewards yet further; the posterity, as
they say, of the faithful and just shall survive to the third and fourth
generation.

This is the style in which they praise justice.

But about the wicked there is another strain; they bury them
in a slough in Hades, and make them carry water in a sieve; also while they are
yet living they bring them to infamy, and inflict upon them the punishments
which Glaucon described as the portion of the just who are reputed to be
unjust; nothing else does their invention supply.

Such is their manner of praising the one and censuring the
other.

Once more, Socrates, I will ask you to consider another way
of speaking about justice and injustice, which is not confined to the poets,
but is found in prose writers.

 

Nations

 

I will tell you, I replied; justice, which is the subject of
our enquiry, is, as you know, sometimes spoken of as the virtue of an
individual, and sometimes as the virtue of a nation.

True, he replied.

And is not a nation larger than an individual?

It is.

Then in the larger the quantity of justice is likely to be
larger and more easily discernible.

I propose therefore that we enquire into the nature of
justice and injustice, first as they appear in the nation, and secondly in the
individual, proceeding from the greater to the lesser and comparing them.

That, he said, is an excellent proposal.

And if we imagine the nation in process of creation, we
shall see the justice and injustice of the nation in process of creation also.

I dare say.

When the nation is completed there may be a hope that the
object of our search will be more easily discovered.

Yes, far more easily.

But ought we to attempt to construct one?  I said; for to do so, as I am inclined to
think, will be a very serious task.

Reflect therefore.

I have reflected, said Adeimantus, and am anxious that you
should proceed.

A
nation, I said, arises, as I conceive, out of the needs of mankind; no one is
self-sufficing, but all of us have many wants.

Can any other origin of a nation be imagined?

There can be no other.

Then, as we have many wants, and many persons are needed to
supply them, one takes a helper for one purpose and another for another; and
when these partners and helpers are gathered together in one habitation the
body of inhabitants is termed a nation.

True, he said.

And they exchange with one another, and one gives, and
another receives, under the idea that the exchange will be for their good.

Very true.

Then, I said, let us begin and create in idea a nation; and
yet the true creator is necessity, who is the mother of our invention.

Of course, he replied.

Now the
first and greatest of necessities is food, which is the condition of life and
existence.

Certainly.

The
second is a dwelling, and the third clothing and the like.

True.

And now let us see how our country will be able to supply
this great demand: We may suppose that one man is a husbandman, another a
builder, some one else a weaver–shall we add to them a shoemaker, or perhaps
some other purveyor to our bodily wants?

Quite right.

The barest notion of a
nation must include four or five men.[ds1]

Clearly.

And how will they proceed?
Will each bring the result of his labours into a common stock?–the
individual husbandman, for example, producing for four, and labouring four
times as long and as much as he need in the provision of food with which he
supplies others as well as himself; or will he have nothing to do with others
and not be at the trouble of producing for them, but provide for himself alone
a fourth of the food in a fourth of the time, and in the remaining three
fourths of his time be employed in making a house or a coat or a pair of shoes,
having no partnership with others, but supplying himself all his own wants?

Adeimantus thought that he should aim at producing food only
and not at producing everything.

Probably, I replied, that would be the better way; and when
I hear you say this, I am myself reminded that we are not all alike; there are
diversities of natures among us which are adapted to different occupations.

Very true.

And will you have a
work better done when the workman has many occupations, or when he has only
one?[ds2]

When he has only one.

Further, there can be no doubt that a work is spoilt when
not done at the right time?

No doubt.

For business is not disposed to wait until the doer of the
business is at leisure; but the doer must follow up what he is doing, and make
the business his first object.

He must.

And if so, we must infer that all things are produced more
plentifully and easily and of a better quality when one man does one thing
which is natural to him and does it at the right time, and leaves other things.

Undoubtedly.

Then more than four citizens will be required; for the
husbandman will not make his own plough or mattock, or other implements of
agriculture, if they are to be good for anything.

Neither will the builder make his tools–and he too needs
many; and in like manner the weaver and shoemaker.

True.

Then carpenters, and smiths, and many other artisans, will
be sharers in our little nation, which is already beginning to grow?

True.

Yet even if we add neatherds, shepherds, and other herdsmen,
in order that our husbandmen may have oxen to plough with, and builders as well
as husbandmen may have draught cattle, and curriers and weavers fleeces and
hides,–still our nation will not be very large.

That is true; yet neither will it be a very small nation
which contains all these.

Then, again, there is the situation of the city–to find a
place where nothing need be imported is well nigh impossible.

Impossible.

Then there must be another class of citizens who will bring
the required supply from another country?

There must.

But if the trader goes empty-handed, having nothing which
they require who would supply his need, he will come back empty-handed.

That is certain.

And therefore what they produce at home must be not only
enough for themselves, but such both in quantity and quality as to accommodate
those from whom their wants are supplied.

Very true.

Then more husbandmen and more artisans will be required?

They will.

Not to mention the importers and exporters, who are called
merchants?

Yes.

Then we shall want merchants?

We shall.

And if merchandise is to be carried over the sea, skilful
sailors will also be needed, and in considerable numbers?

Yes, in considerable numbers.

Then, again, within the city, how will they exchange their
productions?  To secure such an exchange
was, as you will remember, one of our principal objects when we formed them
into a society and constituted a nation.

Clearly they will buy and sell.

Then
they will need a market-place, and a money-token for purposes of exchange.

Certainly.

Suppose now that a husbandman, or an artisan, brings some
production to market, and he comes at a time when there is no one to exchange
with him,– is he to leave his calling and sit idle in the market-place?

Not at all; he will find people there who, seeing the want,
undertake the office of salesmen.

In well-ordered
nations they are commonly those who are the weakest in bodily strength,
and therefore of little use for any other purpose; their duty is to be in the
market, and to give money in exchange for goods to those who desire to sell and
to take money from those who desire to buy.

This want, then, creates a class of retail-traders in our
nation.

Is not ’retailer’ the term which is applied to those who sit
in the market-place engaged in buying and selling, while those who wander from
one country to another are called merchants?

Yes, he said.

And there is another class of servants, who are
intellectually hardly on the level of companionship; still they have plenty of
bodily strength for labour, which accordingly they sell, and are called, if I
do not mistake, hirelings, hire being the name which is given to the price of
their labour.

True.

Then hirelings will help to make up our population?

Yes.

And now, Adeimantus, is our nation matured and perfected?

I think so.

Where, then, is justice, and where is injustice, and in what
part of the nation did they spring up?

Probably in the dealings of these citizens with one another.

I cannot imagine that they are more likely to be found any
where else.

I dare say that you are right in your suggestion, I said; we
had better think the matter out, and not shrink from the enquiry.

Let us then consider, first of all, what will be their way
of life, now that we have thus established them.

Will they not produce corn, and wine, and clothes, and
shoes, and build houses for themselves?
And when they are housed, they will work, in summer, commonly, stripped
and barefoot, but in winter substantially clothed and shod.

They will feed on barley-meal and flour of wheat, baking and
kneading them, making noble cakes and loaves; these they will serve up on a mat
of reeds or on clean leaves, themselves reclining the while upon beds strewn
with yew or myrtle.

And they and their children will feast, drinking of the wine
which they have made, wearing garlands on their heads, and hymning the praises
of the gods, in happy converse with one another.

And they will take care that their families do not exceed
their means; having an eye to poverty or war.

But, said Glaucon, interposing, you have not given them a
relish to their meal.

True, I replied, I had forgotten; of course they must have a
relish–salt, and olives, and cheese, and they will boil roots and herbs such as
country people pare; for a dessert we shall give them figs, and peas, and
beans; and they will roast myrtle-berries and acorns at the fire, drinking in
moderation.

And with such a diet they may be expected to live in peace
and health to a good old age, and bequeath a similar life to their children
after them.

Yes, Socrates, he said, and if you were providing for a
nation of pigs, how else would you feed the beasts?

But what would you have, Glaucon?  I replied.

Why, he said, you should give them the ordinary conveniences
of life.

People who are to be comfortable are accustomed to lie on
sofas, and dine off tables, and they should have sauces and sweets in the
modern style.

Yes, I said, now I understand: the question which you would
have me consider is, not only how a nation, but how a luxurious nation is
created; and possibly there is no harm in this, for in such a nation we shall
be more likely to see how justice and injustice originate.

In my opinion the true and healthy constitution of the nation
is the one which I have described.

But if you wish also to see a nation at fever-heat, I have
no objection.

For I suspect that many will not be satisfied with the
simpler way of life.

They will be for adding sofas, and tables, and other
furniture; also dainties, and perfumes, and incense, and courtesans, and cakes,
all these not of one sort only, but in every variety; we must go beyond the
necessaries of which I was at first speaking, such as houses, and clothes, and
shoes: the arts of the painter and the embroiderer will have to be set in
motion, and gold and ivory and all sorts of materials must be procured.

True, he said.

Then we must enlarge our borders; for the original healthy
nation is no longer sufficient.

Now will the country have to fill and swell with a multitude
of callings which are not required by any natural want; such as the whole tribe
of hunters and actors, of whom one large class have to do with forms and
colours; another will be the votaries of music–poets and their attendant train
of rhapsodists, players, dancers, contractors; also makers of divers kinds of
articles, including women’s dresses.

And we shall want more servants.

Will not tutors be also in request, and nurses wet and dry,
tirewomen and barbers, as well as confectioners and cooks; and swineherds, too,
who were not needed and therefore had no place in the former edition of our
nation, but are needed now?  They must
not be forgotten: and there will be animals of many other kinds, if people eat
them.

Certainly.

And living in this way we shall have much greater need of
physicians than before?

Much greater.

And the
country which was enough to support the original inhabitants will be too small
now, and not enough?

Quite true.

Then a
slice of our neighbours’ land will be wanted by us for pasture and tillage, and
they will want a slice of ours, if, like ourselves, they exceed the limit of
necessity, and give themselves up to the unlimited accumulation of wealth?

That, Socrates, will be inevitable.

And so
we shall go to war, Glaucon.

Shall
we not?

Most
certainly, he replied.

Then without determining as yet whether war does good or
harm, thus much we may affirm, that now we have discovered war to be derived
from causes which are also the causes of almost all the evils in nations,
private as well as public.

Undoubtedly.

And our
nation must once more enlarge; and this time the enlargement will be nothing
short of a whole army, which will have to go out and fight with the invaders
for all that we have, as well as for the things and persons whom we were
describing above.

Why?  he said; are
they not capable of defending themselves?

No, I said; not if we were right in the principle which was
acknowledged by all of us when we were framing the nation: the principle, as
you will remember, was that one man cannot practise many arts with success.

Very true, he said.

But is not war an art?

Certainly.

And an art requiring as much attention as shoemaking?

Quite true.

And the shoemaker was not allowed by us to be a husbandman,
or a weaver, or a builder–in order that we might have our shoes well made; but
to him and to every other worker was assigned one work for which he was by
nature fitted, and at that he was to continue working all his life long and at
no other; he was not to let opportunities slip, and then he would become a good
workman.

Now nothing can be more important than that the work of a
soldier should be well done.

But is war an art so easily acquired that a man may be a
warrior who is also a husbandman, or shoemaker, or other artisan; although no
one in the world would be a good dice or draught player who merely took up the
game as a recreation, and had not from his earliest years devoted himself to
this and nothing else?  No tools will
make a man a skilled workman, or master of defence, nor be of any use to him
who has not learned how to handle them, and has never bestowed any attention
upon them.

How then will he who takes up a shield or other implement of
war become a good fighter all in a day, whether with heavy-armed or any other
kind of troops?

Yes, he said, the tools which would teach men their own use
would be beyond price.

And the higher the duties of the guardian, I said, the more
time, and skill, and art, and application will be needed by him?

No doubt, he replied.

Will he not also require natural aptitude for his calling?

Certainly.

Then it
will be our duty to select, if we can, natures which are fitted for the task of
guarding the country?

It will.

And the selection will be no easy matter, I said; but we
must be brave and do our best.

We must.

Is not
the noble youth very like a well-bred dog in respect of guarding and watching?

What do
you mean?

I mean
that both of them ought to be quick to see, and swift to overtake the enemy
when they see him; and strong too if, when they have caught him, they have to
fight with him.

All
these qualities, he replied, will certainly be required by them.

Well,
and your guardian must be brave if he is to fight well?

Certainly.

And is
he likely to be brave who has no spirit, whether horse or dog or any other
animal?  Have you never observed how
invincible and unconquerable is spirit and how the presence of it makes the
soul of any creature to be absolutely fearless and indomitable?

I have.

Then now we have a clear notion of the bodily qualities
which are required in the guardian.

True.

And
also of the mental ones; his soul is to be full of spirit?

Yes.

But are
not these spirited natures apt to be savage with one another, and with
everybody else?

A
difficulty by no means easy to overcome, he replied.

Whereas,
I said, they ought to be dangerous to their enemies, and gentle to their
friends; if not, they will destroy themselves without waiting for their enemies
to destroy them.

True,
he said.

What is
to be done then?  I said; how shall we
find a gentle nature which has also a great spirit, for the one is the
contradiction of the other?

True.

He will not be a good guardian who is wanting in either of
these two qualities; and yet the combination of them appears to be impossible;
and hence we must infer that to be a good guardian is impossible.

I am afraid that what you say is true, he replied.

Here feeling perplexed I began to think over what had
preceded.–My friend, I said, no wonder that we are in a perplexity; for we have
lost sight of the image which we had before us.

What do you mean?  he
said.

I mean to say that there do exist natures gifted with those
opposite qualities.

And where do you find them?

Many
animals, I replied, furnish examples of them; our friend the dog is a very good
one: you know that well-bred dogs are perfectly gentle to their familiars and
acquaintances, and the reverse to strangers.

Yes, I know.

Then there is nothing impossible or out of the order of
nature in our finding a guardian who has a similar combination of qualities?

Certainly not.

Would not he who is fitted to be a guardian, besides the
spirited nature, need to have the qualities of a philosopher?

I do not apprehend your meaning.

The trait of which I am speaking, I replied, may be also
seen in the dog, and is remarkable in the animal.

What trait?

Why, a
dog, whenever he sees a stranger, is angry; when an acquaintance, he welcomes
him, although the one has never done him any harm, nor the other any good.

Did
this never strike you as curious?

The
matter never struck me before; but I quite recognise the truth of your remark.

And
surely this instinct of the dog is very charming;–your dog is a true
philosopher.

Why?

Why,
because he distinguishes the face of a friend and of an enemy only by the
criterion of knowing and not knowing.

And must not an animal be a lover of learning who determines
what he likes and dislikes by the test of knowledge and ignorance?

Most assuredly.

And is not the love of learning the love of wisdom, which is
philosophy?

They are the same, he replied.

And may we not say confidently of man also, that he who is
likely to be gentle to his friends and acquaintances, must by nature be a lover
of wisdom and knowledge?

That we may safely affirm.

Then he who is to be a really good and noble guardian of the
nation will require to unite in himself philosophy and spirit and swiftness and
strength?

Undoubtedly.

Then we
have found the desired natures; and now that we have found them, how are they
to be reared and educated?  Is
not this an enquiry which may be expected to throw light on the greater enquiry
which is our final end– How do justice and injustice grow up in  nations?
for we do not want either to omit what is to the point or to draw out
the argument to an inconvenient length.

Adeimantus thought that the enquiry would be of great
service to us.

Then, I said, my dear friend, the task must not be given up,
even if somewhat long.

Certainly not.

 [ds1] Barest notion of a nation

 [ds2]division of labor