_ STRANGER: You have been too quick for me, Socrates; I was just going to ask you whether you objected to any of my statements. And now I see that we shall have to consider this notion of there being good government without laws.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: There can be no doubt that legislation is in a manner the business of a king, and yet the best thing of all is not that the law should rule, but that a man should rule supposing him to have wisdom and royal power. Do you see why this is?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Why?
STRANGER: Because the law does not perfectly comprehend what is noblest and most just for all and therefore cannot enforce what is best. The differences of men and actions, and the endless irregular movements of human things, do not admit of any universal and simple rule. And no art whatsoever can lay down a rule which will last for all time.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Of course not.
STRANGER: But the law is always striving to make one;--like an obstinate and ignorant tyrant, who will not allow anything to be done contrary to his appointment, or any question to be asked--not even in sudden changes of circumstances, when something happens to be better than what he commanded for some one.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly; the law treats us all precisely in the manner which you describe.
STRANGER: A perfectly simple principle can never be applied to a state of things which is the reverse of simple.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: Then if the law is not the perfection of right, why are we compelled to make laws at all? The reason of this has next to be investigated.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: Let me ask, whether you have not meetings for gymnastic contests in your city, such as there are in other cities, at which men compete in running, wrestling, and the like?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes; they are very common among us.
STRANGER: And what are the rules which are enforced on their pupils by professional trainers or by others having similar authority? Can you remember?
YOUNG SOCRATES: To what do you refer?
STRANGER: The training-masters do not issue minute rules for individuals, or give every individual what is exactly suited to his constitution; they think that they ought to go more roughly to work, and to prescribe generally the regimen which will benefit the majority.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: And therefore they assign equal amounts of exercise to them all; they send them forth together, and let them rest together from their running, wrestling, or whatever the form of bodily exercise may be.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: And now observe that the legislator who has to preside over the herd, and to enforce justice in their dealings with one another, will not be able, in enacting for the general good, to provide exactly what is suitable for each particular case.
YOUNG SOCRATES: He cannot be expected to do so.
STRANGER: He will lay down laws in a general form for the majority, roughly meeting the cases of individuals; and some of them he will deliver in writing, and others will be unwritten; and these last will be traditional customs of the country.
YOUNG SOCRATES: He will be right.
STRANGER: Yes, quite right; for how can he sit at every man's side all through his life, prescribing for him the exact particulars of his duty? Who, Socrates, would be equal to such a task? No one who really had the royal science, if he had been able to do this, would have imposed upon himself the restriction of a written law.
YOUNG SOCRATES: So I should infer from what has now been said.
STRANGER: Or rather, my good friend, from what is going to be said.
YOUNG SOCRATES: And what is that?
STRANGER: Let us put to ourselves the case of a physician, or trainer, who is about to go into a far country, and is expecting to be a long time away from his patients--thinking that his instructions will not be remembered unless they are written down, he will leave notes of them for the use of his pupils or patients.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: But what would you say, if he came back sooner than he had intended, and, owing to an unexpected change of the winds or other celestial influences, something else happened to be better for them,--would he not venture to suggest this new remedy, although not contemplated in his former prescription? Would he persist in observing the original law, neither himself giving any new commandments, nor the patient daring to do otherwise than was prescribed, under the idea that this course only was healthy and medicinal, all others noxious and heterodox? Viewed in the light of science and true art, would not all such enactments be utterly ridiculous?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Utterly.
STRANGER: And if he who gave laws, written or unwritten, determining what was good or bad, honourable or dishonourable, just or unjust, to the tribes of men who flock together in their several cities, and are governed in accordance with them; if, I say, the wise legislator were suddenly to come again, or another like to him, is he to be prohibited from changing them?--would not this prohibition be in reality quite as ridiculous as the other?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: Do you know a plausible saying of the common people which is in point?
YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not recall what you mean at the moment.
STRANGER: They say that if any one knows how the ancient laws may be improved, he must first persuade his own State of the improvement, and then he may legislate, but not otherwise.
YOUNG SOCRATES: And are they not right?
STRANGER: I dare say. But supposing that he does use some gentle violence for their good, what is this violence to be called? Or rather, before you answer, let me ask the same question in reference to our previous instances.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What do you mean?
STRANGER: Suppose that a skilful physician has a patient, of whatever sex or age, whom he compels against his will to do something for his good which is contrary to the written rules; what is this compulsion to be called? Would you ever dream of calling it a violation of the art, or a breach of the laws of health? Nothing could be more unjust than for the patient to whom such violence is applied, to charge the physician who practises the violence with wanting skill or aggravating his disease.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Most true.
STRANGER: In the political art error is not called disease, but evil, or disgrace, or injustice.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.
STRANGER: And when the citizen, contrary to law and custom, is compelled to do what is juster and better and nobler than he did before, the last and most absurd thing which he could say about such violence is that he has incurred disgrace or evil or injustice at the hands of those who compelled him.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: And shall we say that the violence, if exercised by a rich man, is just, and if by a poor man, unjust? May not any man, rich or poor, with or without laws, with the will of the citizens or against the will of the citizens, do what is for their interest? Is not this the true principle of government, according to which the wise and good man will order the affairs of his subjects? As the pilot, by watching continually over the interests of the ship and of the crew,--not by laying down rules, but by making his art a law,--preserves the lives of his fellow-sailors, even so, and in the self-same way, may there not be a true form of polity created by those who are able to govern in a similar spirit, and who show a strength of art which is superior to the law? Nor can wise rulers ever err while they observing the one great rule of distributing justice to the citizens with intelligence and skill, are able to preserve them, and, as far as may be, to make them better from being worse.
YOUNG SOCRATES: No one can deny what has been now said.
STRANGER: Neither, if you consider, can any one deny the other statement.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What was it?
STRANGER: We said that no great number of persons, whoever they may be, can attain political knowledge, or order a State wisely, but that the true government is to be found in a small body, or in an individual, and that other States are but imitations of this, as we said a little while ago, some for the better and some for the worse.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What do you mean? I cannot have understood your previous remark about imitations.
STRANGER: And yet the mere suggestion which I hastily threw out is highly important, even if we leave the question where it is, and do not seek by the discussion of it to expose the error which prevails in this matter.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What do you mean?
STRANGER: The idea which has to be grasped by us is not easy or familiar; but we may attempt to express it thus:--Supposing the government of which I have been speaking to be the only true model, then the others must use the written laws of this--in no other way can they be saved; they will have to do what is now generally approved, although not the best thing in the world.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What is this?
STRANGER: No citizen should do anything contrary to the laws, and any infringement of them should be punished with death and the most extreme penalties; and this is very right and good when regarded as the second best thing, if you set aside the first, of which I was just now speaking. Shall I explain the nature of what I call the second best?
YOUNG SOCRATES: By all means.
STRANGER: I must again have recourse to my favourite images; through them, and them alone, can I describe kings and rulers.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What images?
STRANGER: The noble pilot and the wise physician, who 'is worth many another man'--in the similitude of these let us endeavour to discover some image of the king.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What sort of an image?
STRANGER: Well, such as this:--Every man will reflect that he suffers strange things at the hands of both of them; the physician saves any whom he wishes to save, and any whom he wishes to maltreat he maltreats--cutting or burning them; and at the same time requiring them to bring him payments, which are a sort of tribute, of which little or nothing is spent upon the sick man, and the greater part is consumed by him and his domestics; and the finale is that he receives money from the relations of the sick man or from some enemy of his, and puts him out of the way. And the pilots of ships are guilty of numberless evil deeds of the same kind; they intentionally play false and leave you ashore when the hour of sailing arrives; or they cause mishaps at sea and cast away their freight; and are guilty of other rogueries. Now suppose that we, bearing all this in mind, were to determine, after consideration, that neither of these arts shall any longer be allowed to exercise absolute control either over freemen or over slaves, but that we will summon an assembly either of all the people, or of the rich only, that anybody who likes, whatever may be his calling, or even if he have no calling, may offer an opinion either about seamanship or about diseases--whether as to the manner in which physic or surgical instruments are to be applied to the patient, or again about the vessels and the nautical implements which are required in navigation, and how to meet the dangers of winds and waves which are incidental to the voyage, how to behave when encountering pirates, and what is to be done with the old-fashioned galleys, if they have to fight with others of a similar build--and that, whatever shall be decreed by the multitude on these points, upon the advice of persons skilled or unskilled, shall be written down on triangular tablets and columns, or enacted although unwritten to be national customs; and that in all future time vessels shall be navigated and remedies administered to the patient after this fashion.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What a strange notion!
STRANGER: Suppose further, that the pilots and physicians are appointed annually, either out of the rich, or out of the whole people, and that they are elected by lot; and that after their election they navigate vessels and heal the sick according to the written rules.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Worse and worse.
STRANGER: But hear what follows:--When the year of office has expired, the pilot or physician has to come before a court of review, in which the judges are either selected from the wealthy classes or chosen by lot out of the whole people; and anybody who pleases may be their accuser, and may lay to their charge, that during the past year they have not navigated their vessels or healed their patients according to the letter of the law and the ancient customs of their ancestors; and if either of them is condemned, some of the judges must fix what he is to suffer or pay.
YOUNG SOCRATES: He who is willing to take a command under such conditions, deserves to suffer any penalty.
STRANGER: Yet once more, we shall have to enact that if any one is detected enquiring into piloting and navigation, or into health and the true nature of medicine, or about the winds, or other conditions of the atmosphere, contrary to the written rules, and has any ingenious notions about such matters, he is not to be called a pilot or physician, but a cloudy prating sophist;--further, on the ground that he is a corrupter of the young, who would persuade them to follow the art of medicine or piloting in an unlawful manner, and to exercise an arbitrary rule over their patients or ships, any one who is qualified by law may inform against him, and indict him in some court, and then if he is found to be persuading any, whether young or old, to act contrary to the written law, he is to be punished with the utmost rigour; for no one should presume to be wiser than the laws; and as touching healing and health and piloting and navigation, the nature of them is known to all, for anybody may learn the written laws and the national customs. If such were the mode of procedure, Socrates, about these sciences and about generalship, and any branch of hunting, or about painting or imitation in general, or carpentry, or any sort of handicraft, or husbandry, or planting, or if we were to see an art of rearing horses, or tending herds, or divination, or any ministerial service, or draught-playing, or any science conversant with number, whether simple or square or cube, or comprising motion,--I say, if all these things were done in this way according to written regulations, and not according to art, what would be the result?
YOUNG SOCRATES: All the arts would utterly perish, and could never be recovered, because enquiry would be unlawful. And human life, which is bad enough already, would then become utterly unendurable.
STRANGER: But what, if while compelling all these operations to be regulated by written law, we were to appoint as the guardian of the laws some one elected by a show of hands, or by lot, and he caring nothing about the laws, were to act contrary to them from motives of interest or favour, and without knowledge,--would not this be a still worse evil than the former?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: To go against the laws, which are based upon long experience, and the wisdom of counsellors who have graciously recommended them and persuaded the multitude to pass them, would be a far greater and more ruinous error than any adherence to written law?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: Therefore, as there is a danger of this, the next best thing in legislating is not to allow either the individual or the multitude to break the law in any respect whatever.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: The laws would be copies of the true particulars of action as far as they admit of being written down from the lips of those who have knowledge?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly they would.
STRANGER: And, as we were saying, he who has knowledge and is a true Statesman, will do many things within his own sphere of action by his art without regard to the laws, when he is of opinion that something other than that which he has written down and enjoined to be observed during his absence would be better.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes, we said so.
STRANGER: And any individual or any number of men, having fixed laws, in acting contrary to them with a view to something better, would only be acting, as far as they are able, like the true Statesman?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: If they had no knowledge of what they were doing, they would imitate the truth, and they would always imitate ill; but if they had knowledge, the imitation would be the perfect truth, and an imitation no longer.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.
STRANGER: And the principle that no great number of men are able to acquire a knowledge of any art has been already admitted by us.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes, it has.
STRANGER: Then the royal or political art, if there be such an art, will never be attained either by the wealthy or by the other mob.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Impossible.
STRANGER: Then the nearest approach which these lower forms of government can ever make to the true government of the one scientific ruler, is to do nothing contrary to their own written laws and national customs.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very good.
STRANGER: When the rich imitate the true form, such a government is called aristocracy; and when they are regardless of the laws, oligarchy.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: Or again, when an individual rules according to law in imitation of him who knows, we call him a king; and if he rules according to law, we give him the same name, whether he rules with opinion or with knowledge.
YOUNG SOCRATES: To be sure.
STRANGER: And when an individual truly possessing knowledge rules, his name will surely be the same--he will be called a king; and thus the five names of governments, as they are now reckoned, become one.
YOUNG SOCRATES: That is true.
STRANGER: And when an individual ruler governs neither by law nor by custom, but following in the steps of the true man of science pretends that he can only act for the best by violating the laws, while in reality appetite and ignorance are the motives of the imitation, may not such an one be called a tyrant?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: And this we believe to be the origin of the tyrant and the king, of oligarchies, and aristocracies, and democracies,--because men are offended at the one monarch, and can never be made to believe that any one can be worthy of such authority, or is able and willing in the spirit of virtue and knowledge to act justly and holily to all; they fancy that he will be a despot who will wrong and harm and slay whom he pleases of us; for if there could be such a despot as we describe, they would acknowledge that we ought to be too glad to have him, and that he alone would be the happy ruler of a true and perfect State.
YOUNG SOCRATES: To be sure.
STRANGER: But then, as the State is not like a beehive, and has no natural head who is at once recognized to be the superior both in body and in mind, mankind are obliged to meet and make laws, and endeavour to approach as nearly as they can to the true form of government.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: And when the foundation of politics is in the letter only and in custom, and knowledge is divorced from action, can we wonder, Socrates, at the miseries which there are, and always will be, in States? Any other art, built on such a foundation and thus conducted, would ruin all that it touched. Ought we not rather to wonder at the natural strength of the political bond? For States have endured all this, time out of mind, and yet some of them still remain and are not overthrown, though many of them, like ships at sea, founder from time to time, and perish and have perished and will hereafter perish, through the badness of their pilots and crews, who have the worst sort of ignorance of the highest truths--I mean to say, that they are wholly unaquainted with politics, of which, above all other sciences, they believe themselves to have acquired the most perfect knowledge.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: Then the question arises:--which of these untrue forms of government is the least oppressive to their subjects, though they are all oppressive; and which is the worst of them? Here is a consideration which is beside our present purpose, and yet having regard to the whole it seems to influence all our actions: we must examine it.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes, we must.
STRANGER: You may say that of the three forms, the same is at once the hardest and the easiest.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What do you mean?
STRANGER: I am speaking of the three forms of government, which I mentioned at the beginning of this discussion--monarchy, the rule of the few, and the rule of the many.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: If we divide each of these we shall have six, from which the true one may be distinguished as a seventh.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How would you make the division?
STRANGER: Monarchy divides into royalty and tyranny; the rule of the few into aristocracy, which has an auspicious name, and oligarchy; and democracy or the rule of the many, which before was one, must now be divided.
YOUNG SOCRATES: On what principle of division?
STRANGER: On the same principle as before, although the name is now discovered to have a twofold meaning. For the distinction of ruling with law or without law, applies to this as well as to the rest.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes.
STRANGER: The division made no difference when we were looking for the perfect State, as we showed before. But now that this has been separated off, and, as we said, the others alone are left for us, the principle of law and the absence of law will bisect them all.
YOUNG SOCRATES: That would seem to follow, from what has been said.
STRANGER: Then monarchy, when bound by good prescriptions or laws, is the best of all the six, and when lawless is the most bitter and oppressive to the subject.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: The government of the few, which is intermediate between that of the one and many, is also intermediate in good and evil; but the government of the many is in every respect weak and unable to do either any great good or any great evil, when compared with the others, because the offices are too minutely subdivided and too many hold them. And this therefore is the worst of all lawful governments, and the best of all lawless ones. If they are all without the restraints of law, democracy is the form in which to live is best; if they are well ordered, then this is the last which you should choose, as royalty, the first form, is the best, with the exception of the seventh, for that excels them all, and is among States what God is among men.
YOUNG SOCRATES: You are quite right, and we should choose that above all.
STRANGER: The members of all these States, with the exception of the one which has knowledge, may be set aside as being not Statesmen but partisans,--upholders of the most monstrous idols, and themselves idols; and, being the greatest imitators and magicians, they are also the greatest of Sophists.
YOUNG SOCRATES: The name of Sophist after many windings in the argument appears to have been most justly fixed upon the politicians, as they are termed.
STRANGER: And so our satyric drama has been played out; and the troop of Centaurs and Satyrs, however unwilling to leave the stage, have at last been separated from the political science.
YOUNG SOCRATES: So I perceive.
STRANGER: There remain, however, natures still more troublesome, because they are more nearly akin to the king, and more difficult to discern; the examination of them may be compared to the process of refining gold.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What is your meaning?
STRANGER: The workmen begin by sifting away the earth and stones and the like; there remain in a confused mass the valuable elements akin to gold, which can only be separated by fire,--copper, silver, and other precious metal; these are at last refined away by the use of tests, until the gold is left quite pure.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes, that is the way in which these things are said to be done.
STRANGER: In like manner, all alien and uncongenial matter has been separated from political science, and what is precious and of a kindred nature has been left; there remain the nobler arts of the general and the judge, and the higher sort of oratory which is an ally of the royal art, and persuades men to do justice, and assists in guiding the helm of States:--How can we best clear away all these, leaving him whom we seek alone and unalloyed?
YOUNG SOCRATES: That is obviously what has in some way to be attempted.
STRANGER: If the attempt is all that is wanting, he shall certainly be brought to light; and I think that the illustration of music may assist in exhibiting him. Please to answer me a question.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What question?
STRANGER: There is such a thing as learning music or handicraft arts in general?
YOUNG SOCRATES: There is.
STRANGER: And is there any higher art or science, having power to decide which of these arts are and are not to be learned;--what do you say?
YOUNG SOCRATES: I should answer that there is.
STRANGER: And do we acknowledge this science to be different from the others?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes.
STRANGER: And ought the other sciences to be superior to this, or no single science to any other? Or ought this science to be the overseer and governor of all the others?
YOUNG SOCRATES: The latter.
STRANGER: You mean to say that the science which judges whether we ought to learn or not, must be superior to the science which is learned or which teaches?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Far superior.
STRANGER: And the science which determines whether we ought to persuade or not, must be superior to the science which is able to persuade?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Of course.
STRANGER: Very good; and to what science do we assign the power of persuading a multitude by a pleasing tale and not by teaching?
YOUNG SOCRATES: That power, I think, must clearly be assigned to rhetoric.
STRANGER: And to what science do we give the power of determining whether we are to employ persuasion or force towards any one, or to refrain altogether?
YOUNG SOCRATES: To that science which governs the arts of speech and persuasion.
STRANGER: Which, if I am not mistaken, will be politics?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very good.
STRANGER: Rhetoric seems to be quickly distinguished from politics, being a different species, yet ministering to it.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes.
STRANGER: But what would you think of another sort of power or science?
YOUNG SOCRATES: What science?
STRANGER: The science which has to do with military operations against our enemies--is that to be regarded as a science or not?
YOUNG SOCRATES: How can generalship and military tactics be regarded as other than a science?
STRANGER: And is the art which is able and knows how to advise when we are to go to war, or to make peace, the same as this or different?
YOUNG SOCRATES: If we are to be consistent, we must say different.
STRANGER: And we must also suppose that this rules the other, if we are not to give up our former notion?
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: And, considering how great and terrible the whole art of war is, can we imagine any which is superior to it but the truly royal?
YOUNG SOCRATES: No other.
STRANGER: The art of the general is only ministerial, and therefore not political?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Exactly.
STRANGER: Once more let us consider the nature of the righteous judge.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very good.
STRANGER: Does he do anything but decide the dealings of men with one another to be just or unjust in accordance with the standard which he receives from the king and legislator,--showing his own peculiar virtue only in this, that he is not perverted by gifts, or fears, or pity, or by any sort of favour or enmity, into deciding the suits of men with one another contrary to the appointment of the legislator?
YOUNG SOCRATES: No; his office is such as you describe.
STRANGER: Then the inference is that the power of the judge is not royal, but only the power of a guardian of the law which ministers to the royal power?
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: The review of all these sciences shows that none of them is political or royal. For the truly royal ought not itself to act, but to rule over those who are able to act; the king ought to know what is and what is not a fitting opportunity for taking the initiative in matters of the greatest importance, whilst others should execute his orders.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: And, therefore, the arts which we have described, as they have no authority over themselves or one another, but are each of them concerned with some special action of their own, have, as they ought to have, special names corresponding to their several actions.
YOUNG SOCRATES: I agree.
STRANGER: And the science which is over them all, and has charge of the laws, and of all matters affecting the State, and truly weaves them all into one, if we would describe under a name characteristic of their common nature, most truly we may call politics.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Exactly so.
STRANGER: Then, now that we have discovered the various classes in a State, shall I analyse politics after the pattern which weaving supplied?
YOUNG SOCRATES: I greatly wish that you would.
STRANGER: Then I must describe the nature of the royal web, and show how the various threads are woven into one piece.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Clearly.
STRANGER: A task has to be accomplished, which, although difficult, appears to be necessary.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly the attempt must be made.
STRANGER: To assume that one part of virtue differs in kind from another, is a position easily assailable by contentious disputants, who appeal to popular opinion.
YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not understand.
STRANGER: Let me put the matter in another way: I suppose that you would consider courage to be a part of virtue?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly I should.
STRANGER: And you would think temperance to be different from courage; and likewise to be a part of virtue?
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: I shall venture to put forward a strange theory about them.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What is it?
STRANGER: That they are two principles which thoroughly hate one another and are antagonistic throughout a great part of nature.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How singular!
STRANGER: Yes, very--for all the parts of virtue are commonly said to be friendly to one another.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes.
STRANGER: Then let us carefully investigate whether this is universally true, or whether there are not parts of virtue which are at war with their kindred in some respect.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Tell me how we shall consider that question.
STRANGER: We must extend our enquiry to all those things which we consider beautiful and at the same time place in two opposite classes.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Explain; what are they?
STRANGER: Acuteness and quickness, whether in body or soul or in the movement of sound, and the imitations of them which painting and music supply, you must have praised yourself before now, or been present when others praised them.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: And do you remember the terms in which they are praised?
YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not.
STRANGER: I wonder whether I can explain to you in words the thought which is passing in my mind.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Why not?
STRANGER: You fancy that this is all so easy: Well, let us consider these notions with reference to the opposite classes of action under which they fall. When we praise quickness and energy and acuteness, whether of mind or body or sound, we express our praise of the quality which we admire by one word, and that one word is manliness or courage.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How?
STRANGER: We speak of an action as energetic and brave, quick and manly, and vigorous too; and when we apply the name of which I speak as the common attribute of all these natures, we certainly praise them.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: And do we not often praise the quiet strain of action also?
YOUNG SOCRATES: To be sure.
STRANGER: And do we not then say the opposite of what we said of the other?
YOUNG SOCRATES: How do you mean?
STRANGER: We exclaim How calm! How temperate! in admiration of the slow and quiet working of the intellect, and of steadiness and gentleness in action, of smoothness and depth of voice, and of all rhythmical movement and of music in general, when these have a proper solemnity. Of all such actions we predicate not courage, but a name indicative of order.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: But when, on the other hand, either of these is out of place, the names of either are changed into terms of censure.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How so?
STRANGER: Too great sharpness or quickness or hardness is termed violence or madness; too great slowness or gentleness is called cowardice or sluggishness; and we may observe, that for the most part these qualities, and the temperance and manliness of the opposite characters, are arrayed as enemies on opposite sides, and do not mingle with one another in their respective actions; and if we pursue the enquiry, we shall find that men who have these different qualities of mind differ from one another.
YOUNG SOCRATES: In what respect?
STRANGER: In respect of all the qualities which I mentioned, and very likely of many others. According to their respective affinities to either class of actions they distribute praise and blame,--praise to the actions which are akin to their own, blame to those of the opposite party--and out of this many quarrels and occasions of quarrel arise among them.
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: The difference between the two classes is often a trivial concern; but in a state, and when affecting really important matters, becomes of all disorders the most hateful.
YOUNG SOCRATES: To what do you refer?
STRANGER: To nothing short of the whole regulation of human life. For the orderly class are always ready to lead a peaceful life, quietly doing their own business; this is their manner of behaving with all men at home, and they are equally ready to find some way of keeping the peace with foreign States. And on account of this fondness of theirs for peace, which is often out of season where their influence prevails, they become by degrees unwarlike, and bring up their young men to be like themselves; they are at the mercy of their enemies; whence in a few years they and their children and the whole city often pass imperceptibly from the condition of freemen into that of slaves.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What a cruel fate!
STRANGER: And now think of what happens with the more courageous natures. Are they not always inciting their country to go to war, owing to their excessive love of the military life? they raise up enemies against themselves many and mighty, and either utterly ruin their native-land or enslave and subject it to its foes?
YOUNG SOCRATES: That, again, is true.
STRANGER: Must we not admit, then, that where these two classes exist, they always feel the greatest antipathy and antagonism towards one another?
YOUNG SOCRATES: We cannot deny it.
STRANGER: And returning to the enquiry with which we began, have we not found that considerable portions of virtue are at variance with one another, and give rise to a similar opposition in the characters who are endowed with them?
YOUNG SOCRATES: True.
STRANGER: Let us consider a further point.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What is it?
STRANGER: I want to know, whether any constructive art will make any, even the most trivial thing, out of bad and good materials indifferently, if this can be helped? does not all art rather reject the bad as far as possible, and accept the good and fit materials, and from these elements, whether like or unlike, gathering them all into one, work out some nature or idea?
YOUNG SOCRATES: To, be sure.
STRANGER: Then the true and natural art of statesmanship will never allow any State to be formed by a combination of good and bad men, if this can be avoided; but will begin by testing human natures in play, and after testing them, will entrust them to proper teachers who are the ministers of her purposes--she will herself give orders, and maintain authority; just as the art of weaving continually gives orders and maintains authority over the carders and all the others who prepare the material for the work, commanding the subsidiary arts to execute the works which she deems necessary for making the web.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.
STRANGER: In like manner, the royal science appears to me to be the mistress of all lawful educators and instructors, and having this queenly power, will not permit them to train men in what will produce characters unsuited to the political constitution which she desires to create, but only in what will produce such as are suitable. Those which have no share of manliness and temperance, or any other virtuous inclination, and, from the necessity of an evil nature, are violently carried away to godlessness and insolence and injustice, she gets rid of by death and exile, and punishes them with the greatest of disgraces.
YOUNG SOCRATES: That is commonly said.
STRANGER: But those who are wallowing in ignorance and baseness she bows under the yoke of slavery.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite right.
STRANGER: The rest of the citizens, out of whom, if they have education, something noble may be made, and who are capable of being united by the statesman, the kingly art blends and weaves together; taking on the one hand those whose natures tend rather to courage, which is the stronger element and may be regarded as the warp, and on the other hand those which incline to order and gentleness, and which are represented in the figure as spun thick and soft, after the manner of the woof--these, which are naturally opposed, she seeks to bind and weave together in the following manner:
YOUNG SOCRATES: In what manner?
STRANGER: First of all, she takes the eternal element of the soul and binds it with a divine cord, to which it is akin, and then the animal nature, and binds that with human cords.
YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not understand what you mean.
STRANGER: The meaning is, that the opinion about the honourable and the just and good and their opposites, which is true and confirmed by reason, is a divine principle, and when implanted in the soul, is implanted, as I maintain, in a nature of heavenly birth.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes; what else should it be?
STRANGER: Only the Statesman and the good legislator, having the inspiration of the royal muse, can implant this opinion, and he, only in the rightly educated, whom we were just now describing.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Likely enough.
STRANGER: But him who cannot, we will not designate by any of the names which are the subject of the present enquiry.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very right.
STRANGER: The courageous soul when attaining this truth becomes civilized, and rendered more capable of partaking of justice; but when not partaking, is inclined to brutality. Is not that true?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.
STRANGER: And again, the peaceful and orderly nature, if sharing in these opinions, becomes temperate and wise, as far as this may be in a State, but if not, deservedly obtains the ignominious name of silliness.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.
STRANGER: Can we say that such a connexion as this will lastingly unite the evil with one another or with the good, or that any science would seriously think of using a bond of this kind to join such materials?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Impossible.
STRANGER: But in those who were originally of a noble nature, and who have been nurtured in noble ways, and in those only, may we not say that union is implanted by law, and that this is the medicine which art prescribes for them, and of all the bonds which unite the dissimilar and contrary parts of virtue is not this, as I was saying, the divinest?
YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.
STRANGER: Where this divine bond exists there is no difficulty in imagining, or when you have imagined, in creating the other bonds, which are human only.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How is that, and what bonds do you mean?
STRANGER: Rights of intermarriage, and ties which are formed between States by giving and taking children in marriage, or between individuals by private betrothals and espousals. For most persons form marriage connexions without due regard to what is best for the procreation of children.
YOUNG SOCRATES: In what way?
STRANGER: They seek after wealth and power, which in matrimony are objects not worthy even of a serious censure.
YOUNG SOCRATES: There is no need to consider them at all.
STRANGER: More reason is there to consider the practice of those who make family their chief aim, and to indicate their error.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.
STRANGER: They act on no true principle at all; they seek their ease and receive with open arms those who are like themselves, and hate those who are unlike them, being too much influenced by feelings of dislike.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How so?
STRANGER: The quiet orderly class seek for natures like their own, and as far as they can they marry and give in marriage exclusively in this class, and the courageous do the same; they seek natures like their own, whereas they should both do precisely the opposite.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How and why is that?
STRANGER: Because courage, when untempered by the gentler nature during many generations, may at first bloom and strengthen, but at last bursts forth into downright madness.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Like enough.
STRANGER: And then, again, the soul which is over-full of modesty and has no element of courage in many successive generations, is apt to grow too indolent, and at last to become utterly paralyzed and useless.
YOUNG SOCRATES: That, again, is quite likely.
STRANGER: It was of these bonds I said that there would be no difficulty in creating them, if only both classes originally held the same opinion about the honourable and good;--indeed, in this single work, the whole process of royal weaving is comprised--never to allow temperate natures to be separated from the brave, but to weave them together, like the warp and the woof, by common sentiments and honours and reputation, and by the giving of pledges to one another; and out of them forming one smooth and even web, to entrust to them the offices of State.
YOUNG SOCRATES: How do you mean?
STRANGER: Where one officer only is needed, you must choose a ruler who has both these qualities--when many, you must mingle some of each, for the temperate ruler is very careful and just and safe, but is wanting in thoroughness and go.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly, that is very true.
STRANGER: The character of the courageous, on the other hand, falls short of the former in justice and caution, but has the power of action in a remarkable degree, and where either of these two qualities is wanting, there cities cannot altogether prosper either in their public or private life.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly they cannot.
STRANGER: This then we declare to be the completion of the web of political action, which is created by a direct intertexture of the brave and temperate natures, whenever the royal science has drawn the two minds into communion with one another by unanimity and friendship, and having perfected the noblest and best of all the webs which political life admits, and enfolding therein all other inhabitants of cities, whether slaves or freemen, binds them in one fabric and governs and presides over them, and, in so far as to be happy is vouchsafed to a city, in no particular fails to secure their happiness.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Your picture, Stranger, of the king and statesman, no less than of the Sophist, is quite perfect.
[THE END]
Plato's Writing: Statesman
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