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BOOK IV.
Here Adeimantus interposed a question: How would you answer, Socrates,
said he, if a person were to say that you are making these people
miserable, and that they are the cause of their own unhappiness; the city
in fact belongs to them, but they are none the better for it; whereas other
men acquire lands, and build large and handsome houses, and have everything
handsome about them, offering sacrifices to the gods on their own account,
and practising hospitality; moreover, as you were saying just now, they
have gold and silver, and all that is usual among the favourites of
fortune; but our poor citizens are no better than mercenaries who are
quartered in the city and are always mounting guard?
Yes, I said; and you may add that they are only fed, and not paid in
addition to their food, like other men; and therefore they cannot, if they
would, take a journey of pleasure; they have no money to spend on a
mistress or any other luxurious fancy, which, as the world goes, is thought
to be happiness; and many other accusations of the same nature might be
added.
But, said he, let us suppose all this to be included in the charge.
You mean to ask, I said, what will be our answer?
Yes.
If we proceed along the old path, my belief, I said, is that we shall find
the answer. And our answer will be that, even as they are, our guardians
may very likely be the happiest of men; but that our aim in founding the
State was not the disproportionate happiness of any one class, but the
greatest happiness of the whole; we thought that in a State which is
ordered with a view to the good of the whole we should be most likely to
find justice, and in the ill-ordered State injustice: and, having found
them, we might then decide which of the two is the happier. At present, I
take it, we are fashioning the happy State, not piecemeal, or with a view
of making a few happy citizens, but as a whole; and by-and-by we will
proceed to view the opposite kind of State. Suppose that we were painting
a statue, and some one came up to us and said, Why do you not put the most
beautiful colours on the most beautiful parts of the body--the eyes ought
to be purple, but you have made them black--to him we might fairly answer,
Sir, you would not surely have us beautify the eyes to such a degree that
they are no longer eyes; consider rather whether, by giving this and the
other features their due proportion, we make the whole beautiful. And so I
say to you, do not compel us to assign to the guardians a sort of happiness
which will make them anything but guardians; for we too can clothe our
husbandmen in royal apparel, and set crowns of gold on their heads, and bid
them till the ground as much as they like, and no more. Our potters also
might be allowed to repose on couches, and feast by the fireside, passing
round the winecup, while their wheel is conveniently at hand, and working
at pottery only as much as they like; in this way we might make every class
happy--and then, as you imagine, the whole State would be happy. But do
not put this idea into our heads; for, if we listen to you, the husbandman
will be no longer a husbandman, the potter will cease to be a potter, and
no one will have the character of any distinct class in the State. Now
this is not of much consequence where the corruption of society, and
pretension to be what you are not, is confined to cobblers; but when the
guardians of the laws and of the government are only seeming and not real
guardians, then see how they turn the State upside down; and on the other
hand they alone have the power of giving order and happiness to the State.
We mean our guardians to be true saviours and not the destroyers of the
State, whereas our opponent is thinking of peasants at a festival, who are
enjoying a life of revelry, not of citizens who are doing their duty to the
State. But, if so, we mean different things, and he is speaking of
something which is not a State. And therefore we must consider whether in
appointing our guardians we would look to their greatest happiness
individually, or whether this principle of happiness does not rather reside
in the State as a whole. But if the latter be the truth, then the
guardians and auxiliaries, and all others equally with them, must be
compelled or induced to do their own work in the best way. And thus the
whole State will grow up in a noble order, and the several classes will
receive the proportion of happiness which nature assigns to them.
I think that you are quite right.
I wonder whether you will agree with another remark which occurs to me.
What may that be?
There seem to be two causes of the deterioration of the arts.
What are they?
Wealth, I said, and poverty.
How do they act?
The process is as follows: When a potter becomes rich, will he, think you,
any longer take the same pains with his art?
Certainly not.
He will grow more and more indolent and careless?
Very true.
And the result will be that he becomes a worse potter?
Yes; he greatly deteriorates.
But, on the other hand, if he has no money, and cannot provide himself with
tools or instruments, he will not work equally well himself, nor will he
teach his sons or apprentices to work equally well.
Certainly not.
Then, under the influence either of poverty or of wealth, workmen and their
work are equally liable to degenerate?
That is evident.
Here, then, is a discovery of new evils, I said, against which the
guardians will have to watch, or they will creep into the city unobserved.
What evils?
Wealth, I said, and poverty; the one is the parent of luxury and indolence,
and the other of meanness and viciousness, and both of discontent.
That is very true, he replied; but still I should like to know, Socrates,
how our city will be able to go to war, especially against an enemy who is
rich and powerful, if deprived of the sinews of war.
There would certainly be a difficulty, I replied, in going to war with one
such enemy; but there is no difficulty where there are two of them.
How so? he asked.
In the first place, I said, if we have to fight, our side will be trained
warriors fighting against an army of rich men.
That is true, he said.
And do you not suppose, Adeimantus, that a single boxer who was perfect in
his art would easily be a match for two stout and well-to-do gentlemen who
were not boxers?
Hardly, if they came upon him at once.
What, now, I said, if he were able to run away and then turn and strike at
the one who first came up? And supposing he were to do this several times
under the heat of a scorching sun, might he not, being an expert, overturn
more than one stout personage?
Certainly, he said, there would be nothing wonderful in that.
And yet rich men probably have a greater superiority in the science and
practise of boxing than they have in military qualities.
Likely enough.
Then we may assume that our athletes will be able to fight with two or
three times their own number?
I agree with you, for I think you right.
And suppose that, before engaging, our citizens send an embassy to one of
the two cities, telling them what is the truth: Silver and gold we neither
have nor are permitted to have, but you may; do you therefore come and help
us in war, and take the spoils of the other city: Who, on hearing these
words, would choose to fight against lean wiry dogs, rather than, with the
dogs on their side, against fat and tender sheep?
That is not likely; and yet there might be a danger to the poor State if
the wealth of many States were to be gathered into one.
But how simple of you to use the term State at all of any but our own!
Why so?
You ought to speak of other States in the plural number; not one of them is
a city, but many cities, as they say in the game. For indeed any city,
however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the
other of the rich; these are at war with one another; and in either there
are many smaller divisions, and you would be altogether beside the mark if
you treated them all as a single State. But if you deal with them as many,
and give the wealth or power or persons of the one to the others, you will
always have a great many friends and not many enemies. And your State,
while the wise order which has now been prescribed continues to prevail in
her, will be the greatest of States, I do not mean to say in reputation or
appearance, but in deed and truth, though she number not more than a
thousand defenders. A single State which is her equal you will hardly
find, either among Hellenes or barbarians, though many that appear to be as
great and many times greater.
That is most true, he said.
And what, I said, will be the best limit for our rulers to fix when they
are considering the size of the State and the amount of territory which
they are to include, and beyond which they will not go?
What limit would you propose?
I would allow the State to increase so far as is consistent with unity;
that, I think, is the proper limit.
Very good, he said.
Here then, I said, is another order which will have to be conveyed to our
guardians: Let our city be accounted neither large nor small, but one and
self-sufficing.
And surely, said he, this is not a very severe order which we impose upon
them.
And the other, said I, of which we were speaking before is lighter still,--
I mean the duty of degrading the offspring of the guardians when inferior,
and of elevating into the rank of guardians the offspring of the lower
classes, when naturally superior. The intention was, that, in the case of
the citizens generally, each individual should be put to the use for which
nature intended him, one to one work, and then every man would do his own
business, and be one and not many; and so the whole city would be one and
not many.
Yes, he said; that is not so difficult.
The regulations which we are prescribing, my good Adeimantus, are not, as
might be supposed, a number of great principles, but trifles all, if care
be taken, as the saying is, of the one great thing,--a thing, however,
which I would rather call, not great, but sufficient for our purpose.
What may that be? he asked.
Education, I said, and nurture: If our citizens are well educated, and
grow into sensible men, they will easily see their way through all these,
as well as other matters which I omit; such, for example, as marriage, the
possession of women and the procreation of children, which will all follow
the general principle that friends have all things in common, as the
proverb says.
That will be the best way of settling them.
Also, I said, the State, if once started well, moves with accumulating
force like a wheel. For good nurture and education implant good
constitutions, and these good constitutions taking root in a good education
improve more and more, and this improvement affects the breed in man as in
other animals.
Very possibly, he said.
Then to sum up: This is the point to which, above all, the attention of
our rulers should be directed,--that music and gymnastic be preserved in
their original form, and no innovation made. They must do their utmost to
maintain them intact. And when any one says that mankind most regard
'The newest song which the singers have,'
they will be afraid that he may be praising, not new songs, but a new kind
of song; and this ought not to be praised, or conceived to be the meaning
of the poet; for any musical innovation is full of danger to the whole
State, and ought to be prohibited. So Damon tells me, and I can quite
believe him;--he says that when modes of music change, the fundamental laws
of the State always change with them.
Yes, said Adeimantus; and you may add my suffrage to Damon's and your own.
Then, I said, our guardians must lay the foundations of their fortress in
music?
Yes, he said; the lawlessness of which you speak too easily steals in.
Yes, I replied, in the form of amusement; and at first sight it appears
harmless.
Why, yes, he said, and there is no harm; were it not that little by little
this spirit of licence, finding a home, imperceptibly penetrates into
manners and customs; whence, issuing with greater force, it invades
contracts between man and man, and from contracts goes on to laws and
constitutions, in utter recklessness, ending at last, Socrates, by an
overthrow of all rights, private as well as public.
Is that true? I said.
That is my belief, he replied.
Then, as I was saying, our youth should be trained from the first in a
stricter system, for if amusements become lawless, and the youths
themselves become lawless, they can never grow up into well-conducted and
virtuous citizens.
Very true, he said.
And when they have made a good beginning in play, and by the help of music
have gained the habit of good order, then this habit of order, in a manner
how unlike the lawless play of the others! will accompany them in all their
actions and be a principle of growth to them, and if there be any fallen
places in the State will raise them up again.
Very true, he said.
Thus educated, they will invent for themselves any lesser rules which their
predecessors have altogether neglected.
What do you mean?
I mean such things as these:--when the young are to be silent before their
elders; how they are to show respect to them by standing and making them
sit; what honour is due to parents; what garments or shoes are to be worn;
the mode of dressing the hair; deportment and manners in general. You
would agree with me?
Yes.
But there is, I think, small wisdom in legislating about such matters,--I
doubt if it is ever done; nor are any precise written enactments about them
likely to be lasting.
Impossible.
It would seem, Adeimantus, that the direction in which education starts a
man, will determine his future life. Does not like always attract like?
To be sure.
Until some one rare and grand result is reached which may be good, and may
be the reverse of good?
That is not to be denied.
And for this reason, I said, I shall not attempt to legislate further about
them.
Naturally enough, he replied.
Well, and about the business of the agora, and the ordinary dealings
between man and man, or again about agreements with artisans; about insult
and injury, or the commencement of actions, and the appointment of juries,
what would you say? there may also arise questions about any impositions
and exactions of market and harbour dues which may be required, and in
general about the regulations of markets, police, harbours, and the like.
But, oh heavens! shall we condescend to legislate on any of these
particulars?
I think, he said, that there is no need to impose laws about them on good
men; what regulations are necessary they will find out soon enough for
themselves.
Yes, I said, my friend, if God will only preserve to them the laws which we
have given them.
And without divine help, said Adeimantus, they will go on for ever making
and mending their laws and their lives in the hope of attaining perfection.
You would compare them, I said, to those invalids who, having no self-
restraint, will not leave off their habits of intemperance?
Exactly.
Yes, I said; and what a delightful life they lead! they are always
doctoring and increasing and complicating their disorders, and always
fancying that they will be cured by any nostrum which anybody advises them
to try.
Such cases are very common, he said, with invalids of this sort.
Yes, I replied; and the charming thing is that they deem him their worst
enemy who tells them the truth, which is simply that, unless they give up
eating and drinking and wenching and idling, neither drug nor cautery nor
spell nor amulet nor any other remedy will avail.
Charming! he replied. I see nothing charming in going into a passion with
a man who tells you what is right.
These gentlemen, I said, do not seem to be in your good graces.
Assuredly not.
Nor would you praise the behaviour of States which act like the men whom I
was just now describing. For are there not ill-ordered States in which the
citizens are forbidden under pain of death to alter the constitution; and
yet he who most sweetly courts those who live under this regime and
indulges them and fawns upon them and is skilful in anticipating and
gratifying their humours is held to be a great and good statesman--do not
these States resemble the persons whom I was describing?
Yes, he said; the States are as bad as the men; and I am very far from
praising them.
But do you not admire, I said, the coolness and dexterity of these ready
ministers of political corruption?
Yes, he said, I do; but not of all of them, for there are some whom the
applause of the multitude has deluded into the belief that they are really
statesmen, and these are not much to be admired.
What do you mean? I said; you should have more feeling for them. When a
man cannot measure, and a great many others who cannot measure declare that
he is four cubits high, can he help believing what they say?
Nay, he said, certainly not in that case.
Well, then, do not be angry with them; for are they not as good as a play,
trying their hand at paltry reforms such as I was describing; they are
always fancying that by legislation they will make an end of frauds in
contracts, and the other rascalities which I was mentioning, not knowing
that they are in reality cutting off the heads of a hydra?
Yes, he said; that is just what they are doing.
I conceive, I said, that the true legislator will not trouble himself with
this class of enactments whether concerning laws or the constitution either
in an ill-ordered or in a well-ordered State; for in the former they are
quite useless, and in the latter there will be no difficulty in devising
them; and many of them will naturally flow out of our previous regulations.
What, then, he said, is still remaining to us of the work of legislation?
Nothing to us, I replied; but to Apollo, the God of Delphi, there remains
the ordering of the greatest and noblest and chiefest things of all.
Which are they? he said.
The institution of temples and sacrifices, and the entire service of gods,
demigods, and heroes; also the ordering of the repositories of the dead,
and the rites which have to be observed by him who would propitiate the
inhabitants of the world below. These are matters of which we are ignorant
ourselves, and as founders of a city we should be unwise in trusting them
to any interpreter but our ancestral deity. He is the god who sits in the
centre, on the navel of the earth, and he is the interpreter of religion to
all mankind.
You are right, and we will do as you propose.
But where, amid all this, is justice? son of Ariston, tell me where. Now
that our city has been made habitable, light a candle and search, and get
your brother and Polemarchus and the rest of our friends to help, and let
us see where in it we can discover justice and where injustice, and in what
they differ from one another, and which of them the man who would be happy
should have for his portion, whether seen or unseen by gods and men.
Nonsense, said Glaucon: did you not promise to search yourself, saying
that for you not to help justice in her need would be an impiety?
I do not deny that I said so, and as you remind me, I will be as good as my
word; but you must join.
We will, he replied.
Well, then, I hope to make the discovery in this way: I mean to begin with
the assumption that our State, if rightly ordered, is perfect.
That is most certain.
And being perfect, is therefore wise and valiant and temperate and just.
That is likewise clear.
And whichever of these qualities we find in the State, the one which is not
found will be the residue?
Very good.
If there were four things, and we were searching for one of them, wherever
it might be, the one sought for might be known to us from the first, and
there would be no further trouble; or we might know the other three first,
and then the fourth would clearly be the one left.
Very true, he said.
And is not a similar method to be pursued about the virtues, which are also
four in number?
Clearly.
First among the virtues found in the State, wisdom comes into view, and in
this I detect a certain peculiarity.
What is that?
The State which we have been describing is said to be wise as being good in
counsel?
Very true.
And good counsel is clearly a kind of knowledge, for not by ignorance, but
by knowledge, do men counsel well?
Clearly.
And the kinds of knowledge in a State are many and diverse?
Of course.
There is the knowledge of the carpenter; but is that the sort of knowledge
which gives a city the title of wise and good in counsel?
Certainly not; that would only give a city the reputation of skill in
carpentering.
Then a city is not to be called wise because possessing a knowledge which
counsels for the best about wooden implements?
Certainly not.
Nor by reason of a knowledge which advises about brazen pots, I said, nor
as possessing any other similar knowledge?
Not by reason of any of them, he said.
Nor yet by reason of a knowledge which cultivates the earth; that would
give the city the name of agricultural?
Yes.
Well, I said, and is there any knowledge in our recently-founded State
among any of the citizens which advises, not about any particular thing in
the State, but about the whole, and considers how a State can best deal
with itself and with other States?
There certainly is.
And what is this knowledge, and among whom is it found? I asked.
It is the knowledge of the guardians, he replied, and is found among those
whom we were just now describing as perfect guardians.
And what is the name which the city derives from the possession of this
sort of knowledge?
The name of good in counsel and truly wise.
And will there be in our city more of these true guardians or more smiths?
The smiths, he replied, will be far more numerous.
Will not the guardians be the smallest of all the classes who receive a
name from the profession of some kind of knowledge?
Much the smallest.
And so by reason of the smallest part or class, and of the knowledge which
resides in this presiding and ruling part of itself, the whole State, being
thus constituted according to nature, will be wise; and this, which has the
only knowledge worthy to be called wisdom, has been ordained by nature to
be of all classes the least.
Most true.
Thus, then, I said, the nature and place in the State of one of the four
virtues has somehow or other been discovered.
And, in my humble opinion, very satisfactorily discovered, he replied.
Again, I said, there is no difficulty in seeing the nature of courage, and
in what part that quality resides which gives the name of courageous to the
State.
How do you mean?
Why, I said, every one who calls any State courageous or cowardly, will be
thinking of the part which fights and goes out to war on the State's
behalf.
No one, he replied, would ever think of any other.
The rest of the citizens may be courageous or may be cowardly, but their
courage or cowardice will not, as I conceive, have the effect of making the
city either the one or the other.
Certainly not.
The city will be courageous in virtue of a portion of herself which
preserves under all circumstances that opinion about the nature of things
to be feared and not to be feared in which our legislator educated them;
and this is what you term courage.
I should like to hear what you are saying once more, for I do not think
that I perfectly understand you.
I mean that courage is a kind of salvation.
Salvation of what?
Of the opinion respecting things to be feared, what they are and of what
nature, which the law implants through education; and I mean by the words
'under all circumstances' to intimate that in pleasure or in pain, or under
the influence of desire or fear, a man preserves, and does not lose this
opinion. Shall I give you an illustration?
If you please.
You know, I said, that dyers, when they want to dye wool for making the
true sea-purple, begin by selecting their white colour first; this they
prepare and dress with much care and pains, in order that the white ground
may take the purple hue in full perfection. The dyeing then proceeds; and
whatever is dyed in this manner becomes a fast colour, and no washing
either with lyes or without them can take away the bloom. But, when the
ground has not been duly prepared, you will have noticed how poor is the
look either of purple or of any other colour.
Yes, he said; I know that they have a washed-out and ridiculous appearance.
Then now, I said, you will understand what our object was in selecting our
soldiers, and educating them in music and gymnastic; we were contriving
influences which would prepare them to take the dye of the laws in
perfection, and the colour of their opinion about dangers and of every
other opinion was to be indelibly fixed by their nurture and training, not
to be washed away by such potent lyes as pleasure--mightier agent far in
washing the soul than any soda or lye; or by sorrow, fear, and desire, the
mightiest of all other solvents. And this sort of universal saving power
of true opinion in conformity with law about real and false dangers I call
and maintain to be courage, unless you disagree.
But I agree, he replied; for I suppose that you mean to exclude mere
uninstructed courage, such as that of a wild beast or of a slave--this, in
your opinion, is not the courage which the law ordains, and ought to have
another name.
Most certainly.
Then I may infer courage to be such as you describe?
Why, yes, said I, you may, and if you add the words 'of a citizen,' you
will not be far wrong;--hereafter, if you like, we will carry the
examination further, but at present we are seeking not for courage but
justice; and for the purpose of our enquiry we have said enough.
You are right, he replied.
Two virtues remain to be discovered in the State--first, temperance, and
then justice which is the end of our search.
Very true.
Now, can we find justice without troubling ourselves about temperance?
I do not know how that can be accomplished, he said, nor do I desire that
justice should be brought to light and temperance lost sight of; and
therefore I wish that you would do me the favour of considering temperance
first.
Certainly, I replied, I should not be justified in refusing your request.
Then consider, he said.
Yes, I replied; I will; and as far as I can at present see, the virtue of
temperance has more of the nature of harmony and symphony than the
preceding.
How so? he asked.
Temperance, I replied, is the ordering or controlling of certain pleasures
and desires; this is curiously enough implied in the saying of 'a man being
his own master;' and other traces of the same notion may be found in
language.
No doubt, he said.
There is something ridiculous in the expression 'master of himself;' for
the master is also the servant and the servant the master; and in all these
modes of speaking the same person is denoted.
Certainly.
The meaning is, I believe, that in the human soul there is a better and
also a worse principle; and when the better has the worse under control,
then a man is said to be master of himself; and this is a term of praise:
but when, owing to evil education or association, the better principle,
which is also the smaller, is overwhelmed by the greater mass of the worse
--in this case he is blamed and is called the slave of self and
unprincipled.
Yes, there is reason in that.
And now, I said, look at our newly-created State, and there you will find
one of these two conditions realized; for the State, as you will
acknowledge, may be justly called master of itself, if the words
'temperance' and 'self-mastery' truly express the rule of the better part
over the worse.
Yes, he said, I see that what you say is true.
Let me further note that the manifold and complex pleasures and desires and
pains are generally found in children and women and servants, and in the
freemen so called who are of the lowest and more numerous class.
Certainly, he said.
Whereas the simple and moderate desires which follow reason, and are under
the guidance of mind and true opinion, are to be found only in a few, and
those the best born and best educated.
Very true.
These two, as you may perceive, have a place in our State; and the meaner
desires of the many are held down by the virtuous desires and wisdom of the
few.
That I perceive, he said.
Then if there be any city which may be described as master of its own
pleasures and desires, and master of itself, ours may claim such a
designation?
Certainly, he replied.
It may also be called temperate, and for the same reasons?
Yes.
And if there be any State in which rulers and subjects will be agreed as to
the question who are to rule, that again will be our State?
Undoubtedly.
And the citizens being thus agreed among themselves, in which class will
temperance be found--in the rulers or in the subjects?
In both, as I should imagine, he replied.
Do you observe that we were not far wrong in our guess that temperance was
a sort of harmony?
Why so?
Why, because temperance is unlike courage and wisdom, each of which resides
in a part only, the one making the State wise and the other valiant; not so
temperance, which extends to the whole, and runs through all the notes of
the scale, and produces a harmony of the weaker and the stronger and the
middle class, whether you suppose them to be stronger or weaker in wisdom
or power or numbers or wealth, or anything else. Most truly then may we
deem temperance to be the agreement of the naturally superior and inferior,
as to the right to rule of either, both in states and individuals.
I entirely agree with you.
And so, I said, we may consider three out of the four virtues to have been
discovered in our State. The last of those qualities which make a state
virtuous must be justice, if we only knew what that was.
The inference is obvious.
The time then has arrived, Glaucon, when, like huntsmen, we should surround
the cover, and look sharp that justice does not steal away, and pass out of
sight and escape us; for beyond a doubt she is somewhere in this country:
watch therefore and strive to catch a sight of her, and if you see her
first, let me know.
Would that I could! but you should regard me rather as a follower who has
just eyes enough to see what you show him--that is about as much as I am
good for.
Offer up a prayer with me and follow.
I will, but you must show me the way.
Here is no path, I said, and the wood is dark and perplexing; still we must
push on.
Let us push on.
Here I saw something: Halloo! I said, I begin to perceive a track, and I
believe that the quarry will not escape.
Good news, he said.
Truly, I said, we are stupid fellows.
Why so?
Why, my good sir, at the beginning of our enquiry, ages ago, there was
justice tumbling out at our feet, and we never saw her; nothing could be
more ridiculous. Like people who go about looking for what they have in
their hands--that was the way with us--we looked not at what we were
seeking, but at what was far off in the distance; and therefore, I suppose,
we missed her.
What do you mean?
I mean to say that in reality for a long time past we have been talking of
justice, and have failed to recognise her.
I grow impatient at the length of your exordium.
up,
back,
forward