U.S. Politics Online
U.S. Politics
Online Archives
ENTER THE U.S. POLITICS ONLINE DISCUSSION
FORUM
Note: The text below is in
the public domain.
This text is offered to the general public for non-profit educational purposes. U.S.
Politics Online does not own any copyrights pertaining to the text. Any copyrights
that may exist as to the
format, translation, etc., resides with the respective author/formatter, not U.S. Politics
Online. U.S.
Politics Online did convert the original text file into html. Any errors
with respect to formatting is a result of a program used to automate the
process.
Due to the requirements for redistribution of this text
by
some of the sources, the original source from which I obtained the text at times
will not be disclosed. If you would like information with respect to where
I obtained the text then please send me an e-mail:
archives@uspoliticsonline.com.
Such sources are not liable in any way for the text here. I would simply
provide you with information where you can find the original text of the
document, which may or may not be identical to what you see here. I have
made every attempt to comply with the wishes of the sources of these documents.
If an error is found with respect to such compliance then please bring it to my
attention immediately so the matter can be resolved.
Also, if you are the person responsible for
converting the text to the electronic format and would like credit for your work
in the document, please e-mail me and I would be more than happy to comply.
Due to my conversion of these text documents into the html format and the
possibility for errors to occur in said conversion, I did not want to
inadvertently attribute such errors to you.
360 BC
LAWS
by Plato
translated by Benjamin Jowett
BOOK I
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: An ATHENIAN STRANGER; CLEINIAS, a
Cretan; MEGILLUS, a Lacedaemonian
Athenian Stranger. Tell me, Strangers, is a God or some man supposed
to be the author of your laws?
Cleinias. A God, Stranger; in very truth a, God: among us Cretans he
is said to have been Zeus, but in Lacedaemon, whence our friend here
comes, I believe they would say that Apollo is their lawgiver: would
they not, Megillus?
Megillus. Certainly.
Ath. And do you, Cleinias, believe, as Homer tells, that every ninth
year Minos went to converse with his Olympian sire, and was inspired
by him to make laws for your cities?
Cle. Yes, that is our tradition; and there was Rhadamanthus, a
brother of his, with whose name you are familiar; he is reputed to
have been the justest of men, and we Cretans are of opinion that he
earned this reputation from his righteous administration of justice
when he was alive.
Ath. Yes, and a noble reputation it was, worthy of a son of Zeus. As
you and Megillus have been trained in these institutions, I dare say
that you will not be unwilling to give an account of your government
and laws; on our way we can pass the time pleasantly in about them,
for I am told that the distance from Cnosus to the cave and temple
of Zeus is considerable; and doubtless there are shady places under
the lofty trees, which will protect us from this scorching sun.
Being no longer young, we may often stop to rest beneath them, and get
over the whole journey without difficulty, beguiling the time by
conversation.
Cle. Yes, Stranger, and if we proceed onward we shall come to groves
of cypresses, which are of rare height and beauty, and there are green
meadows, in which we may repose and converse.
Ath. Very good.
Cle. Very good, indeed; and still better when we see them; let us
move on cheerily.
Ath. I am willing-And first, I want to know why the law has ordained
that you shall have common meals and gymnastic exercises, and wear
arms.
Cle. I think, Stranger, that the aim of our institutions is easily
intelligible to any one. Look at the character of our country: Crete
is not like Thessaly, a large plain; and for this reason they have
horsemen in Thessaly, and we have runners-the inequality of the ground
in our country is more adapted to locomotion on foot; but then, if you
have runners you must have light arms-no one can carry a heavy
weight when running, and bows and arrows are convenient because they
are light. Now all these regulations have been made with a view to
war, and the legislator appears to me to have looked to this in all
his arrangements:-the common meals, if I am not mistaken, were
instituted by him for a similar reason, because he saw that while they
are in the field the citizens are by the nature of the case
compelled to take their meals together for the sake of mutual
protection. He seems to me to have thought the world foolish in not
understanding that all are always at war with one another; and if in
war there ought to be common meals and certain persons regularly
appointed under others to protect an army, they should be continued in
peace. For what men in general term peace would be said by him to be
only a name; in reality every city is in a natural state of war with
every other, not indeed proclaimed by heralds, but everlasting. And if
you look closely, you will find that this was the intention of the
Cretan legislator; all institutions, private as well as public, were
arranged by him with a view to war; in giving them he was under the
impression that no possessions or institutions are of any value to him
who is defeated in battle; for all the good things of the conquered
pass into the hands of the conquerors.
Ath. You appear to me, Stranger, to have been thoroughly trained
in the Cretan institutions, and to be well informed about them; will
you tell me a little more explicitly what is the principle of
government which you would lay down? You seem to imagine that a well
governed state ought to be so ordered as to conquer all other states
in war: am I right in supposing this to be your meaning?
Cle. Certainly; and our Lacedaemonian friend, if I am not
mistaken, will agree with me.
Meg. Why, my good friend, how could any Lacedaemonian say anything
else?
Ath. And is what you say applicable only to states, or also to
villages?
Cle. To both alike.
Ath. The case is the same?
Cle. Yes.
Ath. And in the village will there be the same war of family against
family, and of individual against individual?
Cle. The same.
Ath. And should each man conceive himself to be his own
enemy:-what shall we say?
Cle. O Athenian Stranger-inhabitant of Attica I will not call you,
for you seem to deserve rather to be named after the goddess
herself, because you go back to first principles you have thrown a
light upon the argument, and will now be better able to understand
what I was just saying-that all men are publicly one another's
enemies, and each man privately his own.
(Ath. My good sir, what do you mean?)--
Cle..... Moreover, there is a victory and defeat-the first and
best of victories, the lowest and worst of defeats-which each man
gains or sustains at the hands, not of another, but of himself; this
shows that there is a war against ourselves going on within every
one of us.
Ath. Let us now reverse the order of the argument: Seeing that every
individual is either his own superior or his own inferior, may we
say that there is the same principle in the house, the village, and
the state?
Cle. You mean that in each of them there is a principle of
superiority or inferiority to self?
Ath. Yes.
Cle. You are quite right in asking the question, for there certainly
is such a principle, and above all in states; and the state in which
the better citizens win a victory over the mob and over the inferior
classes may be truly said to be better than itself, and may be
justly praised, where such a victory is gained, or censured in the
opposite case.
Ath. Whether the better is ever really conquered by the worse, is a
question which requires more discussion, and may be therefore left for
the present. But I now quite understand your meaning when you say that
citizens who are of the same race and live in the same cities may
unjustly conspire, and having the superiority in numbers may
overcome and enslave the few just; and when they prevail, the state
may be truly called its own inferior and therefore bad; and when
they are defeated, its own superior and therefore good.
Cle. Your remark, Stranger, is a paradox, and yet we cannot possibly
deny it.
Ath. Here is another case for consideration;-in a family there may
be several brothers, who are the offspring of a single pair; very
possibly the majority of them may be unjust, and the just may be in
a minority.
Cle. Very possibly.
Ath. And you and I ought not to raise a question of words as to
whether this family and household are rightly said to be superior when
they conquer, and inferior when they are conquered; for we are not now
considering what may or may not be the proper or customary way of
speaking, but we are considering the natural principles of right and
wrong in laws.
Cle. What you say, Stranger, is most true.
Meg. Quite excellent, in my opinion, as far as we have gone.
Ath. Again; might there not be a judge over these brethren, of
whom we were speaking?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Now, which would be the better judge-one who destroyed the
bad and appointed the good to govern themselves; or one who, while
allowing the good to govern, let the bad live, and made them
voluntarily submit? Or third, I suppose, in the scale of excellence
might be placed a judge, who, finding the family distracted, not
only did not destroy any one, but reconciled them to one another for
ever after, and gave them laws which they mutually observed, and was
able to keep them friends.
Cle. The last would be by far the best sort of judge and legislator.
Ath. And yet the aim of all the laws which he gave would be the
reverse of war.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. And will he who constitutes the state and orders the life of
man have in view external war, or that kind of intestine war called
civil, which no one, if he could prevent, would like to have occurring
in his own state; and when occurring, every one would wish to be
quit of as soon as possible?
Cle. He would have the latter chiefly in view.
Ath. And would he prefer that this civil war should be terminated by
the destruction of one of the parties, and by the victory of the
other, or that peace and friendship should be re-established, and
that, being reconciled, they should give their attention to foreign
enemies?
Cle. Every one would desire the latter in the case of his own state.
Ath. And would not that also be the desire of the legislator?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And would not every one always make laws for the sake of the
best?
Cle. To be sure.
Ath. But war, whether external or civil, is not the best, and the
need of either is to be deprecated; but peace with one another, and
good will, are best. Nor is the victory of the state over itself to be
regarded as a really good thing, but as a necessity; a man might as
well say that the body was in the best state when sick and purged by
medicine, forgetting that there is also a state of the body which
needs no purge. And in like manner no one can be a true statesman,
whether he aims at the happiness of the individual or state, who looks
only, or first of all, to external warfare; nor will he ever be a
sound legislator who orders peace for the sake of war, and not war for
the sake of peace.
Cle. I suppose that there is truth, Stranger, in that remark of
yours; and yet I am greatly mistaken if war is not the entire aim
and object of our own institutions, and also of the Lacedaemonian.
Ath. I dare say; but there is no reason why we should rudely quarrel
with one another about your legislators, instead of gently questioning
them, seeing that both we and they are equally in earnest. Please
follow me and the argument closely:-And first I will put forward
Tyrtaeus, an Athenian by birth, but also a Spartan citizen, who of all
men was most eager about war: Well, he says, "I sing not, I care
not, about any man, even if he were the richest of men, and
possessed every good (and then he gives a whole list of them), if he
be not at all times a brave warrior." I imagine that you, too, must
have heard his poems; our Lacedaemonian friend has probably heard more
than enough of them.
Meg. Very true.
Cle. And they have found their way from Lacedaemon to Crete.
Ath. Come now and let us all join in asking this question of
Tyrtaeus: O most divine poet, we will say to him, the excellent praise
which you have bestowed on those who excel in war sufficiently
proves that you are wise and good, and I and Megillus and Cleinias
of Cnosus do, as I believe, entirely agree with you. But we should
like to be quite sure that we are speaking of the same men; tell us,
then, do you agree with us in thinking that there are two kinds of
war; or what would you say? A far inferior man to Tyrtaeus would
have no difficulty in replying quite truly, that war is of two kinds
one which is universally called civil war, and is as we were just
now saying, of all wars the worst; the other, as we should all
admit, in which we fall out with other nations who are of a
different race, is a far milder form of warfare.
Cle. Certainly, far milder.
Ath. Well, now, when you praise and blame war in this high-flown
strain, whom are you praising or blaming, and to which kind of war are
you referring? I suppose that you must mean foreign war, if I am to
judge from expressions of yours in which you say that you abominate
those
Who refuse to look upon fields of blood, and will not draw near
and strike at their enemies.
And we shall naturally go on to say to him-You, Tyrtaeus, as it seems,
praise those who distinguish themselves in external and foreign war;
and he must admit this.
Cle. Evidently.
Ath. They are good; but we say that there are still better men whose
virtue is displayed in the greatest of all battles. And we too have
a poet whom we summon as a witness, Theognis, citizen of Megara in
Sicily:
Cyrnus, he who is faithful in a civil broil is worth his weight in
gold and silver.
And such an one is far better, as we affirm, than the other in a
more difficult kind of war, much in the same degree as justice and
temperance and wisdom, when united with courage, are better than
courage only; for a man cannot be faithful and good in civil strife
without having all virtue. But in the war of which Tyrtaeus speaks,
many a mercenary soldier will take his stand and be ready to die at
his post, and yet they are generally and almost without exception
insolent, unjust, violent men, and the most senseless of human beings.
You will ask what the conclusion is, and what I am seeking to prove: I
maintain that the divine legislator of Crete, like any other who is
worthy of consideration, will always and above all things in making
laws have regard to the greatest virtue; which, according to Theognis,
is loyalty in the hour of danger, and may be truly called perfect
justice. Whereas, that virtue which Tyrtaeus highly praises is well
enough, and was praised by the poet at the right time, yet in place
and dignity may be said to be only fourth rate.
Cle. Stranger, we are degrading our inspired lawgiver to a rank
which is far beneath him.
Ath. Nay, I think that we degrade not him but ourselves, if we
imagine that Lycurgus and Minos laid down laws both in Lacedaemon
and Crete mainly with a view to war.
Cle. What ought we to say then?
Ath. What truth and what justice require of us, if I am not
mistaken, when speaking in behalf of divine excellence;-at the
legislator when making his laws had in view not a part only, and
this the lowest part of virtue, but all virtue, and that he devised
classes of laws answering to the kinds of virtue; not in the way in
which modern inventors of laws make the classes, for they only
investigate and offer laws whenever a want is felt, and one man has
a class of laws about allotments and heiresses, another about
assaults; others about ten thousand other such matters. But we
maintain that the right way of examining into laws is to proceed as we
have now done, and I admired the spirit of your exposition; for you
were quite right in beginning with virtue, and saying that this was
the aim of the giver of the law, but I thought that you went wrong
when you added that all his legislation had a view only to a part, and
the least part of virtue, and this called forth my subsequent remarks.
Will you allow me then to explain how I should have liked to have
heard you expound the matter?
Cle. By all means.
Ath. You ought to have said, Stranger-The Cretan laws are with
reason famous among the Hellenes; for they fulfil the object of
laws, which is to make those who use them happy; and they confer every
sort of good. Now goods are of two kinds: there are human and there
are divine goods, and the human hang upon the divine; and the state
which attains the greater, at the same time acquires the less, or, not
having the greater, has neither. Of the lesser goods the first is
health, the second beauty, the third strength, including swiftness
in running and bodily agility generally, and the fourth is wealth, not
the blind god [Pluto], but one who is keen of sight, if only he has
wisdom for his companion. For wisdom is chief and leader of the divine
dass of goods, and next follows temperance; and from the union of
these two with courage springs justice, and fourth in the scale of
virtue is courage. All these naturally take precedence of the other
goods, and this is the order in which the legislator must place
them, and after them he will enjoin the rest of his ordinances on
the citizens with a view to these, the human looking to the divine,
and the divine looking to their leader mind. Some of his ordinances
will relate to contracts of marriage which they make one with another,
and then to the procreation and education of children, both male and
female; the duty of the lawgiver will be to take charge of his
citizens, in youth and age, and at every time of life, and to give
them punishments and rewards; and in reference to all their
intercourse with one another, he ought to consider their pains and
pleasures and desires, and the vehemence of all their passions; he
should keep a watch over them, and blame and praise them rightly by
the mouth of the laws themselves. Also with regard to anger and
terror, and the other perturbations of the soul, which arise out of
misfortune, and the deliverances from them which prosperity brings,
and the experiences which come to men in diseases, or in war, or
poverty, or the opposite of these; in all these states he should
determine and teach what is the good and evil of the condition of
each. In the next place, the legislator has to be careful how the
citizens make their money and in what way they spend it, and to have
an eye to their mutual contracts and dissolutions of contracts,
whether voluntary or involuntary: he should see how they order all
this, and consider where justice as well as injustice is found or is
wanting in their several dealings with one another; and honour those
who obey the law, and impose fixed penalties on those who disobey,
until the round of civil life is ended, and the time has come for
the consideration of the proper funeral rites and honours of the dead.
And the lawgiver reviewing his work, will appoint guardians to preside
over these things-some who walk by intelligence, others by true
opinion only, and then mind will bind together all his ordinances
and show them to be in harmony with temperance and justice, and not
with wealth or ambition. This is the spirit, Stranger, in which I
was and am desirous that you should pursue the subject. And I want
to know the nature of all these things, and how they are arranged in
the laws of Zeus, as they are termed, and in those of the Pythian
Apollo, which Minos and Lycurgus gave; and how the order of them is
discovered to his eyes, who has experience in laws gained either by
study or habit, although they are far from being self-evident to the
rest of mankind like ourselves.
Cle. How shall we proceed, Stranger?
Ath. I think that we must begin again as before, and first
consider the habit of courage; and then we will go on and discuss
another and then another form of virtue, if you please. In this way we
shall have a model of the whole; and with these and similar discourses
we will beguile the way. And when we have gone through all the
virtues, we will show, by the grace of God, that the institutions of
which I was speaking look to virtue.
Meg. Very good; and suppose that you first criticize this praiser of
Zeus and the laws of Crete.
Ath. I will try to criticize you and myself, as well as him, for the
argument is a common concern. Tell me-were not first the syssitia, and
secondly the gymnasia, invented by your legislator with a view to war?
Meg. Yes.
Ath. And what comes third, and what fourth? For that, I think, is
the sort of enumeration which ought to be made of the remaining
parts of virtue, no matter whether you call them parts or what their
name is, provided the meaning is clear.
Meg. Then I, or any other Lacedaemonian, would reply that hunting is
third in order.
Ath. Let us see if we can discover what comes fourth and fifth.
Meg. I think that I can get as far as the fouth head, which is the
frequent endurance of pain, exhibited among us Spartans in certain
hand-to-hand fights; also in stealing with the prospect of getting a
good beating; there is, too, the so-called Crypteia, or secret
service, in which wonderful endurance is shown-our people wander
over the whole country by day and by night, and even in winter have
not a shoe to their foot, and are without beds to lie upon, and have
to attend upon themselves. Marvellous, too, is the endurance which our
citizens show in their naked exercises, contending against the violent
summer heat; and there are many similar practices, to speak of which
in detail would be endless.
Ath. Excellent, O Lacedaemonian Stranger. But how ought we to define
courage? Is it to be regarded only as a combat against fears and
pains, or also against desires and pleasures, and against
flatteries; which exercise such a tremendous power, that they make the
hearts even of respectable citizens to melt like wax?
Meg. I should say the latter.
Ath. In what preceded, as you will remember, our Cnosian friend
was speaking of a man or a city being inferior to themselves:-Were you
not, Cleinias?
Cle. I was.
Ath. Now, which is in the truest sense inferior, the man who is
overcome by pleasure or by pain?
Cle. I should say the man who is overcome by pleasure; for all men
deem him to be inferior in a more disgraceful sense, than the other
who is overcome by pain.
Ath. But surely the lawgivers of Crete and Lacedaemon have not
legislated for a courage which is lame of one leg, able only to meet
attacks which come from the left, but impotent against the insidious
flatteries which come from the right?
Cle. Able to meet both, I should say.
Ath. Then let me once more ask, what institutions have you in either
of your states which give a taste of pleasures, and do not avoid
them any more than they avoid pains; but which set a person in the
midst of them, and compel or induce him by the prospect of reward to
get the better of them? Where is an ordinance about pleasure similar
to that about pain to be found in your laws? Tell me what there is
of this nature among you:-What is there which makes your citizen
equally brave against pleasure and pain, conquering what they ought to
conquer, and superior to the enemies who are most dangerous and
nearest home?
Meg. I was able to tell you, Stranger, many laws which were directed
against pain; but I do not know that I can point out any great or
obvious examples of similar institutions which are concerned with
pleasure; there are some lesser provisions, however, which I might
mention.
Cle. Neither can I show anything of that sort which is at all
equally prominent in the Cretan laws.
Ath. No wonder, my dear friends; and if, as is very likely, in our
search after the true and good, one of us may have to censure the laws
of the others, we must not be offended, but take kindly what another
says.
Cle. You are quite right, Athenian Stranger, and we will do as you
say.
Ath. At our time of life, Cleinias, there should be no feeling of
irritation.
Cle. Certainly not.
Ath. I will not at present determine whether he who censures the
Cretan or Lacedaemonian polities is right or wrong. But I believe that
I can tell better than either of you what the many say about them. For
assuming that you have reasonably good laws, one of the best of them
will be the law forbidding any young men to enquire which of them
are right or wrong; but with one mouth and one voice they must all
agree that the laws are all good, for they came from God; and any
one who says the contrary is not to be listened to. But an old man who
remarks any defect in your laws may communicate his observation to a
ruler or to an equal in years when no young man is present.
Cle. Exactly so, Stranger; and like a diviner, although not there at
the time, you seem to me quite to have hit the meaning of the
legislator, and to say what is most true.
Ath. As there are no young men present, and the legislator has given
old men free licence, there will be no impropriety in our discussing
these very matters now that we are alone.
Cle. True. And therefore you may be as free as you like in your
censure of our laws, for there is no discredit in knowing what is
wrong; he who receives what is said in a generous and friendly
spirit will be all the better for it.
Ath. Very good; however, I am not going to say anything against your
laws until to the best of my ability I have examined them, but I am
going to raise doubts about them. For you are the only people known to
us, whether Greek or barbarian, whom the legislator commanded to
eschew all great pleasures and amusements and never to touch them;
whereas in the matter of pains or fears which we have just been
discussing, he thought that they who from infancy had always avoided
pains and fears and sorrows, when they were compelled to face them
would run away from those who were hardened in them, and would
become their subjects. Now the legislator ought to have considered
that this was equally true of pleasure; he should have said to
himself, that if our citizens are from their youth upward unacquainted
with the greatest pleasures, and unused to endure amid the temptations
of pleasure, and are not disciplined to refrain from all things
evil, the sweet feeling of pleasure will overcome them just as fear
would overcome the former class; and in another, and even a worse
manner, they will be the slaves of those who are able to endure amid
pleasures, and have had the opportunity of enjoying them, they being
often the worst of mankind. One half of their souls will be a slave,
the other half free; and they will not be worthy to be called in the
true sense men and freemen. Tell me whether you assent to my words?
Cle. On first hearing, what you say appears to be the truth; but
to be hasty in coming to a conclusion about such important matters
would be very childish and simple.
Ath. Suppose, Cleinias and Megillus, that we consider the virtue
which follows next of those which we intended to discuss (for after
courage comes temperance), what institutions shall we find relating to
temperance, either in Crete or Lacedaemon, which, like your military
institutions, differ from those of any ordinary state.
Meg. That is not an easy question to answer; still I should say that
the common meals and gymnastic exercises have been excellently devised
for the promotion both of temperance and courage.
Ath. There seems to be a difficulty, Stranger, with regard to
states, in making words and facts coincide so that there can be no
dispute about them. As in the human body, the regimen which does
good in one way does harm in another; and we can hardly say that any
one course of treatment is adapted to a particular constitution. Now
the gymnasia and common meals do a great deal of good, and yet they
are a source of evil in civil troubles; as is shown in the case of the
Milesian, and Boeotian, and Thurian youth, among whom these
institutions seem always to have had a tendency to degrade the ancient
and natural custom of love below the level, not only of man, but of
the beasts. The charge may be fairly brought against your cities above
all others, and is true also of most other states which especially
cultivate gymnastics. Whether such matters are to be regarded
jestingly or seriously, I think that the pleasure is to be deemed
natural which arises out of the intercourse between men and women; but
that the intercourse of men with men, or of women with women, is
contrary to nature, and that the bold attempt was originally due to
unbridled lust. The Cretans are always accused of having invented
the story of Ganymede and Zeus because they wanted to justify
themselves in the enjoyment of unnatural pleasures by the practice
of the god whom they believe to have been their lawgiver. Leaving
the story, we may observe that any speculation about laws turns almost
entirely on pleasure and pain, both in states and in individuals:
these are two fountains which nature lets flow, and he who draws
from them where and when, and as much as he ought, is happy; and
this holds of men and animals-of individuals as well as states; and he
who indulges in them ignorantly and at the wrong time, is the
reverse of happy.
Meg. I admit, Stranger, that your words are well spoken, and I
hardly know what to say in answer to you; but still I think that the
Spartan lawgiver was quite right in forbidding pleasure. Of the Cretan
laws, I shall leave the defence to my Cnosian friend. But the laws
of Sparta, in as far as they relate to pleasure, appear to me to be
the best in the world; for that which leads mankind in general into
the wildest pleasure and licence, and every other folly, the law has
clean driven out; and neither in the country nor in towns which are
under the control of Sparta, will you find revelries and the many
incitements of every kind of pleasure which accompany them; and any
one who meets a drunken and disorderly person, will immediately have
him most severely punished, and will not let him off on any
pretence, not even at the time of a Dionysiac festival; although I
have remarked that this may happen at your performances "on the cart,"
as they are called; and among our Tarentine colonists I have seen
the whole city drunk at a Dionysiac festival; but nothing of the
sort happens among us.
Ath. O Lacedaemonian Stranger, these festivities are praiseworthy
where there is a spirit of endurance, but are very senseless when they
are under no regulations. In order to retaliate, an Athenian has
only to point out the licence which exists among your women. To all
such accusations, whether they are brought against the Tarentines,
or us, or you, there is one answer which exonerates the practice in
question from impropriety. When a stranger expresses wonder at the
singularity of what he sees, any inhabitant will naturally answer
him:-Wonder not, O stranger; this is our custom, and you may very
likely have some other custom about the same things. Now we are
speaking, my friends, not about men in general, but about the merits
and defects of the lawgivers themselves. Let us then discourse a
little more at length about intoxication, which is a very important
subject, and will seriously task the discrimination of the legislator.
I am not speaking of drinking, or not drinking, wine at all, but of
intoxication. Are we to follow the custom of the Scythians, and
Persians, and Carthaginians, and Celts, and Iberians, and Thracians,
who are all warlike nations, or that of your countrymen, for they,
as you say, altogether abstain? But the Scythians and Thracians,
both men and women, drink unmixed wine, which they pour on their
garments, and this they think a happy and glorious institution. The
Persians, again, are much given to other practices of luxury which you
reject, but they have more moderation in them than the Thracians and
Scythians.
Meg. O best of men, we have only to take arms into our hands, and we
send all these nations flying before us.
Ath. Nay, my good friend, do not say that; there have been, as there
always will be, flights and pursuits of which no account can be given,
and therefore we cannot say that victory or defeat in battle affords
more than a doubtful proof of the goodness or badness of institutions.
For when the greater states conquer and enslave the lesser, as the
Syracusans have done the Locrians, who appear to be the
best-governed people in their part of the world, or as the Athenians
have done the Ceans (and there are ten thousand other instances of the
same sort of thing), all this is not to the point; let us endeavour
rather to form a conclusion about each institution in itself and say
nothing, at present, of victories and defeats. Let us only say that
such and such a custom is honourable, and another not. And first
permit me to tell you how good and bad are to be estimated in
reference to these very matters.
Meg. How do you mean?
Ath. All those who are ready at a moment's notice to praise or
censure any practice which is matter of discussion, seem to me to
proceed in a wrong way. Let me give you an illustration of what I
mean:-You may suppose a person to be praising wheat as a good kind
of food, whereupon another person instantly blames wheat, without ever
enquiring into its effect or use, or in what way, or to whom, or
with what, or in what state and how, wheat is to be given. And that is
just what we are doing in this discussion. At the very mention of
the word intoxication, one side is ready with their praises and the
other with their censures; which is absurd. For either side adduce
their witnesses and approvers, and some of us think that we speak with
authority because we have many witnesses; and others because they
see those who abstain conquering in battle, and this again is disputed
by us. Now I cannot say that I shall be satisfied, if we go on
discussing each of the remaining laws in the same way. And about
this very point of intoxication I should like to speak in another way,
which I hold to be the right one; for if number is to be the
criterion, are there not myriads upon myriads of nations ready to
dispute the point with you, who are only two cities?
Meg. I shall gladly welcome any method of enquiry which is right.
Ath. Let me put the matter thus:-Suppose a person to praise the
keeping of goats, and the creatures themselves as capital things to
have, and then some one who had seen goats feeding without a
goatherd in cultivated spots, and doing mischief, were to censure a
goat or any other animal who has no keeper, or a bad keeper, would
there be any sense or justice in such censure?
Meg. Certainly not.
Ath. Does a captain require only to have nautical knowledge in order
to be a good captain, whether he is sea-sick or not? What do you say?
Meg. I say that he is not a good captain if, although he have
nautical skill, he is liable to sea-sickness.
Ath. And what would you say of the commander of an army? Will he
be able to command merely because he has military skill if he be a
coward, who, when danger comes, is sick and drunk with fear?
Meg. Impossible.
Ath. And what if besides being a coward he has no skill?
Meg. He is a miserable fellow, not fit to be a commander of men, but
only of old women.
Ath. And what would you say of some one who blames or praises any
sort of meeting which is intended by nature to have a ruler, and is
well enough when under his presidency? The critic, however, has
never seen the society meeting together at an orderly feast under
the control of a president, but always without a ruler or with a bad
one:-when observers of this class praise or blame such meetings, are
we to suppose that what they say is of any value?
Meg. Certainly not, if they have never seen or been present at
such a meeting when rightly ordered.
Ath. Reflect; may not banqueters and banquets be said to
constitute a kind of meeting?
Meg. Of course.
Ath. And did any one ever see this sort of convivial meeting rightly
ordered? Of course you two will answer that you have never seen them
at all, because they are not customary or lawful in your country;
but I have come across many of them in many different places, and
moreover I have made enquiries about them wherever I went, as I may
say, and never did I see or hear of anything of the kind which was
carried on altogether rightly; in some few particulars they might be
right, but in general they were utterly wrong.
Cle. What do you mean, Stranger, by this remark? Explain; For we, as
you say, from our inexperience in such matters, might very likely
not know, even if they came in our way, what was right or wrong in
such societies.
Ath. Likely enough; then let me try to be your instructor: You would
acknowledge, would you not, that in all gatherings of man, kind, of
whatever sort, there ought to be a leader?
Cle. Certainly I should.
Ath. And we were saying just now, that when men are at war the
leader ought to be a brave man?
Cle. We were.
Ath. The brave man is less likely than the coward to be disturbed by
fears?
Cle. That again is true.
Ath. And if there were a possibility of having a general of an
army who was absolutely fearless and imperturbable, should we not by
all means appoint him?
Cle. Assuredly.
Ath. Now, however, we are speaking not of a general who is to
command an army, when foe meets foe in time of war, but of one who
is to regulate meetings of another sort, when friend meets friend in
time of peace.
Cle. True.
Ath. And that sort of meeting, if attended with drunkenness, is
apt to be unquiet.
Cle. Certainly; the reverse of quiet.
Ath. In the first place, then, the revellers as well as the soldiers
will require a ruler?
Cle. To be sure; no men more so.
Ath. And we ought, if possible, to provide them with a quiet ruler?
Cle. Of course.
Ath. And he should be a man who understands society; for his duty is
to preserve the friendly feelings which exist among the company at the
time, and to increase them for the future by his use of the occasion.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. Must we not appoint a sober man and a wise to be our master
of the revels? For if the ruler of drinkers be himself young and
drunken, and not over-wise, only by some special good fortune will
he be saved from doing some great evil.
Cle. It will be by a singular good fortune that he is saved.
Ath. Now suppose such associations to be framed in the best way
possible in states, and that some one blames the very fact of their
existence-he may very likely be right. But if he blames a practice
which he only sees very much mismanaged, he shows in the first place
that he is not aware of the mismanagement, and also not aware that
everything done in this way will turn out to be wrong, because done
without the superintendence of a sober ruler. Do you not see that a
drunken pilot or a drunken ruler of any sort will ruin ship,
chariot, army-anything, in short, of which he has the direction?
Cle. The last remark is very true, Stranger; and I see quite clearly
the advantage of an army having a good leader-he will give victory
in war to his followers, which is a very great advantage; and so of
other things. But I do not see any similar advantage which either
individuals or states gain from the good management of a feast; and
I want you to tell me what great good will be effected, supposing that
this drinking ordinance is duly established.
Ath. If you mean to ask what great good accrues to the state from
the right training of a single youth, or of a single chorus-when the
question is put in that form, we cannot deny that the good is not very
great in any particular instance. But if you ask what is the good of
education in general, the answer is easy-that education makes good
men, and that good men act nobly, and conquer their enemies in battle,
because they are good. Education certainly gives victory, although
victory sometimes produces forgetfulness of education; for many have
grown insolent from victory in war, and this insolence has
engendered in them innumerable evils; and many a victory has been
and will be suicidal to the victors; but education is never suicidal.
Cle. You seem to imply, my friend, that convivial meetings, when
rightly ordered, are an important element of education.
Ath. Certainly I do.
Cle. And can you show that what you have been saying is true?
Ath. To be absolutely sure of the truth of matters concerning
which there are many opinions, is an attribute of the Gods not given
to man, Stranger; but I shall be very happy to tell you what I
think, especially as we are now proposing to enter on a discussion
concerning laws and constitutions.
Cle. Your opinion, Stranger, about the questions which are now being
raised, is precisely what we want to hear.
Ath. Very good; I will try to find a way of explaining my meaning,
and you shall try to have the gift of understanding me. But first
let me make an apology. The Athenian citizen is reputed among all
the Hellenes to be a great talker, whereas Sparta is renowned for
brevity, and the Cretans have more wit than words. Now I am afraid
of appearing to elicit a very long discourse out of very small
materials. For drinking indeed may appear to be a slight matter, and
yet is one which cannot be rightly ordered according to nature,
without correct principles of music; these are necessary to any
clear or satisfactory treatment of the subject, and music again runs
up into education generally, and there is much to be said about all
this. What would you say then to leaving these matters for the
present, and passing on to some other question of law?
Meg. O Athenian Stranger, let me tell you what perhaps you do not
know, that our family is the proxenus of your state. I imagine that
from their earliest youth all boys, when they are told that they are
the proxeni of a particular state, feel kindly towards their second
and this has certainly been my own feeling. I can well remember from
the days of my boyhood, how, when any Lacedaemonians praised or blamed
the Athenians, they used to say to me-"See, Megillus, how ill or how
well," as the case might be, "has your state treated us"; and having
always had to fight your battles against detractors when I heard you
assailed, I became warmly attached to you. And I always like to hear
the Athenian tongue spoken; the common saying is quite true, that a
good Athenian is more than ordinarily good, for he is the only man who
is freely and genuinely good by the divine inspiration of his own
nature, and is not manufactured. Therefore be assured that I shall
like to hear you say whatever you have to say.
Cle. Yes, Stranger; and when you have heard me speak, say boldly
what is in your thoughts. Let me remind you of a tie which unites
you to Crete. You must have heard here the story of the prophet
Epimenides, who was of my family, and came to Athens ten years
before the Persian war, in accordance with the response of the Oracle,
and offered certain sacrifices which the God commanded. The
Athenians were at that time in dread of the Persian invasion; and he
said that for ten years they would not come, and that when they
came, they would go away again without accomplishing any of their
objects, and would suffer more evil than they inflicted. At that
time my forefathers formed ties of hospitality with you; thus
ancient is the friendship which I and my parents have had for you.
Ath. You seem to be quite ready to listen; and I am also ready to
perform as much as I can of an almost impossible task, which I will
nevertheless attempt. At the outset of the discussion, let me define
the nature and power of education; for this is the way by which our
argument must travel onwards to the God Dionysus.
Cle. Let us proceed, if you please.
Ath. Well, then, if I tell you what are my notions of education,
will you consider whether they satisfy you?
Cle. Let us hear.
Ath. According to my view, any one who would be good at anything
must practise that thing from his youth upwards, both in sport and
earnest, in its several branches: for example, he who is to be a
good builder, should play at building children's houses; he who is
to be a good husbandman, at tilling the ground; and those who have the
care of their education should provide them when young with mimic
tools. They should learn beforehand the knowledge which they will
afterwards require for their art. For example, the future carpenter
should learn to measure or apply the line in play; and the future
warrior should learn riding, or some other exercise, for amusement,
and the teacher should endeavour to direct the children's inclinations
and pleasures, by the help of amusements, to their final aim in
life. The most important part of education is right training in the
nursery. The soul of the child in his play should be guided to the
love of that sort of excellence in which when he grows up to manhood
he will have to be perfected. Do you agree with me thus far?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Then let us not leave the meaning of education ambiguous or
ill-defined. At present, when we speak in terms of praise or blame
about the bringing-up of each person, we call one man educated and
another uneducated, although the uneducated man may be sometimes
very well educated for the calling of a retail trader, or of a captain
of a ship, and the like. For we are not speaking of education in
this narrower sense, but of that other education in virtue from
youth upwards, which makes a man eagerly pursue the ideal perfection
of citizenship, and teaches him how rightly to rule and how to obey.
This is the only education which, upon our view, deserves the name;
that other sort of training, which aims at the acquisition of wealth
or bodily strength, or mere cleverness apart from intelligence and
justice, is mean and illiberal, and is not worthy to be called
education at all. But let us not quarrel with one another about a
word, provided that the proposition which has just been granted hold
good: to wit, that those who are rightly educated generally become
good men. Neither must we cast a slight upon education, which is the
first and fairest thing that the best of men can ever have, and which,
though liable to take a wrong direction, is capable of reformation.
And this work of reformation is the great business of every man
while he lives.
Cle. Very true; and we entirely agree with you.
Ath. And we agreed before that they are good men who are able to
rule themselves, and bad men who are not.
Cle. You are quite right.
Ath. Let me now proceed, if I can, to clear up the subject a
little further by an illustration which I will offer you.
Cle. Proceed.
Ath. Do we not consider each of ourselves to be one?
Cle. We do.
Ath. And each one of us has in his bosom two counsellors, both
foolish and also antagonistic; of which we call the one pleasure,
and the other pain.
Cle. Exactly.
Ath. Also there are opinions about the future, which have the
general name of expectations; and the specific name of fear, when
the expectation is of pain; and of hope, when of pleasure; and
further, there is reflection about the good or evil of them, and this,
when embodied in a decree by the State, is called Law.
Cle. I am hardly able to follow you; proceed, however, as if I were.
Meg. I am in the like case.
Ath. Let us look at the matter thus: May we not conceive each of
us living beings to be a puppet of the Gods, either their plaything
only, or created with a purpose-which of the two we cannot certainly
know? But we do know, that these affections in us are like cords and
strings, which pull us different and opposite ways, and to opposite
actions; and herein lies the difference between virtue and vice.
According to the argument there is one among these cords which every
man ought to grasp and never let go, but to pull with it against all
the rest; and this is the sacred and golden cord of reason, called
by us the common law of the State; there are others which are hard and
of iron, but this one is soft because golden; and there are several
other kinds. Now we ought always to cooperate with the lead of the
best, which is law. For inasmuch as reason is beautiful and gentle,
and not violent, her rule must needs have ministers in order to help
the golden principle in vanquishing the other principles. And thus the
moral of the tale about our being puppets will not have been lost, and
the meaning of the expression "superior or inferior to a man's self"
will become clearer; and the individual, attaining to right reason
in this matter of pulling the strings of the puppet, should live
according to its rule; while the city, receiving the same from some
god or from one who has knowledge of these things, should embody it in
a law, to be her guide in her dealings with herself and with other
states. In this way virtue and vice will be more clearly distinguished
by us. And when they have become clearer, education and other
institutions will in like manner become clearer; and in particular
that question of convivial entertainment, which may seem, perhaps,
to have been a very trifling matter, and to have taken a great many
more words than were necessary.
Cle. Perhaps, however, the theme may turn out not to be unworthy
of the length of discourse.
Ath. Very good; let us proceed with any enquiry which really bears
on our present object.
Cle. Proceed.
Ath. Suppose that we give this puppet of ours drink-what will be the
effect on him?
Cle. Having what in view do you ask that question?
Ath. Nothing as yet; but I ask generally, when the puppet is brought
to the drink, what sort of result is likely to follow. I will
endeavour to explain my meaning more clearly: what I am now asking
is this-Does the drinking of wine heighten and increase pleasures
and pains, and passions and loves?
Cle. Very greatly.
Ath. And are perception and memory, and opinion and prudence,
heightened and increased? Do not these qualities entirely desert a man
if he becomes saturated with drink?
Cle. Yes, they entirely desert him.
Ath. Does he not return to the state of soul in which he was when
a young child?
Cle. He does.
Ath. Then at that time he will have the least control over himself?
Cle. The least.
Ath. And will he not be in a most wretched plight?
Cle. Most wretched.
Ath. Then not only an old man but also a drunkard becomes a second
time a child?
Cle. Well said, Stranger.
Ath. Is there any argument which will prove to us that we ought to
encourage the taste for drinking instead of doing all we can to
avoid it?
Cle. I suppose that there is; you at any rate, were just now
saying that you were ready to maintain such a doctrine.
Ath. True, I was; and I am ready still, seeing that you have both
declared that you are anxious to hear me.
Cle. To sure we are, if only for the strangeness of the paradox,
which asserts that a man ought of his own accord to plunge into
utter degradation.
Ath. Are you speaking of the soul?
Cle. Yes.
Ath. And what would you say about the body, my friend? Are you not
surprised at any one of his own accord bringing upon himself
deformity, leanness, ugliness, decrepitude?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Yet when a man goes of his own accord to a doctor's shop, and
takes medicine, is he not aware that soon, and for many days
afterwards, he will be in a state of body which he would die rather
than accept as the permanent condition of his life? Are not those
who train in gymnasia, at first beginning reduced to a state of
weakness?
Cle. Yes, all that is well known.
Ath. Also that they go of their own accord for the sake of the
subsequent benefit?
Cle. Very good.
Ath. And we may conceive this to be true in the same way of other
practices?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And the same view may be taken of the pastime of drinking wine,
if we are right in supposing that the same good effect follows?
Cle. To be sure.
Ath. If such convivialities should turn out to have any advantage
equal in importance to that of gymnastic, they are in their very
nature to be preferred to mere bodily exercise, inasmuch as they
have no accompaniment of pain.
Cle. True; but I hardly think that we shall be able to discover
any such benefits to be derived from them.
Ath. That is just what we must endeavour to show. And let me ask you
a question:-Do we not distinguish two kinds of fear, which are very
different?
Cle. What are they?
Ath. There is the fear of expected evil.
Cle. Yes.
Ath. And there is the fear of an evil reputation; we are afraid
of being thought evil, because we do or say some dishonourable
thing, which fear we and all men term shame.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. These are the two fears, as I called them; one of which is
the opposite of pain and other fears, and the opposite also of the
greatest and most numerous sort of pleasures.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. And does not the legislator and every one who is good for
anything, hold this fear in the greatest honour? This is what he terms
reverence, and the confidence which is the reverse of this he terms
insolence; and the latter he always deems to be a very great evil both
to individuals and to states.
Cle. True.
Ath. Does not this kind of fear preserve us in many important
ways? What is there which so surely gives victory and safety in war?
For there are two things which give victory-confidence before enemies,
and fear of disgrace before friends.
Cle. There are.
Ath. Then each of us should be fearless and also fearful; and why we
should be either has now been determined.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And when we want to make any one fearless, we and the law bring
him face to face with many fears.
Cle. Clearly.
Ath. And when we want to make him rightly fearful, must we not
introduce him to shameless pleasures, and train him to take up arms
against them, and to overcome them? Or does this principle apply to
courage only, and must he who would be perfect in valour fight against
and overcome his own natural character-since if he be unpractised
and inexperienced in such conflicts, he will not be half the man which
he might have been-and are we to suppose, that with temperance it is
otherwise, and that he who has never fought with the shameless and
unrighteous temptations of his pleasures and lusts, and conquered
them, in earnest and in play, by word, deed, and act, will still be
perfectly temperate?
Cle. A most unlikely supposition.
Ath. Suppose that some God had given a fear-potion to men, and
that the more a man drank of this the more he regarded himself at
every draught as a child of misfortune, and that he feared
everything happening or about to happen to him; and that at last the
most courageous of men utterly lost his presence of mind for a time,
and only came to himself again when he had slept off the influence
of the draught.
Cle. But has such a draught, Stranger, ever really been known
among men?
Ath. No; but, if there had been, might not such a draught have
been of use to the legislator as a test of courage? Might we not go
and say to him, "O legislator, whether you are legislating for the
Cretan, or for any other state, would you not like to have a
touchstone of the courage and cowardice of your citizens?"
Cle. "I should," will be the answer of every one.
Ath. "And you would rather have a touchstone in which there is no
risk and no great danger than the reverse?"
Cle. In that proposition every one may safely agree.
Ath. "And in order to make use of the draught, you would lead them
amid these imaginary terrors, and prove them, when the affection of
fear was working upon them, and compel them to be fearless,
exhorting and admonishing them; and also honouring them, but
dishonouring any one who will not be persuaded by you to be in all
respects such as you command him; and if he underwent the trial well
and manfully, you would let him go unscathed; but if ill, you would
inflict a punishment upon him? Or would you abstain from using the
potion altogether, although you have no reason for abstaining?"
Cle. He would be certain, Stranger, to use the potion.
Ath. This would be a mode of testing and training which would be
wonderfully easy in comparison with those now in use, and might be
applied to a single person, or to a few, or indeed to any number;
and he would do well who provided himself with the potion only, rather
than with any number of other things, whether he preferred to be by
himself in solitude, and there contend with his fears, because he
was ashamed to be seen by the eye of man until he was perfect; or
trusting to the force of his own nature and habits, and believing that
he had been already disciplined sufficiently, he did not hesitate to
train himself in company with any number of others, and display his
power in conquering the irresistible change effected by the
draught-his virtue being such, that he never in any instance fell into
any great unseemliness, but was always himself, and left off before he
arrived at the last cup, fearing that he, like all other men, might be
overcome by the potion.
Cle. Yes, Stranger, in that last case, too, he might equally show
his self-control.
Ath. Let us return to the lawgiver, and say to him:-"Well, lawgiver,
there is certainly no such fear-potion which man has either received
from the Gods or himself discovered; for witchcraft has no place at
our board. But is there any potion which might serve as a test of
overboldness and excessive and indiscreet boasting?
Cle. I suppose that he will say, Yes-meaning that wine is such a
potion.
Ath. Is not the effect of this quite the opposite of the effect of
the other? When a man drinks wine he begins to be better pleased
with himself, and the more he drinks the more he is filled full of
brave hopes, and conceit of his power, and at last the string of his
tongue is loosened, and fancying himself wise, he is brimming over
with lawlessness, and has no more fear or respect, and is ready to
do or say anything.
Cle. I think that every one will admit the truth of your
description.
Meg. Certainly.
Ath. Now, let us remember, as we were saying, that there are two
things which should be cultivated in the soul: first, the greatest
courage; secondly, the greatest fear-
Cle. Which you said to be characteristic of reverence, if I am not
mistaken.
Ath. Thank you for reminding me. But now, as the habit of courage
and fearlessness is to be trained amid fears, let us consider
whether the opposite quality is not also to be trained among
opposites.
Cle. That is probably the case.
Ath. There are times and seasons at which we are by nature more than
commonly valiant and bold; now we ought to train ourselves on these
occasions to be as free from impudence and shamelessness as
possible, and to be afraid to say or suffer or do anything that is
base.
Cle. True.
Ath. Are not the moments in which we are apt to be bold and
shameless such as these?-when we are under the influence of anger,
love, pride, ignorance, avarice, cowardice? or when wealth, beauty,
strength, and all the intoxicating workings of pleasure madden us?
What is better adapted than the festive use of wine, in the first
place to test, and in the second place to train the character of a
man, if care be taken in the use of it? What is there cheaper, or more
innocent? For do but consider which is the greater risk:-Would you
rather test a man of a morose and savage nature, which is the source
of ten thousand acts of injustice, by making bargains with him at a
risk to yourself, or by having him as a companion at the festival of
Dionysus? Or would you, if you wanted to apply a touchstone to a man
who is prone to love, entrust your wife, or your sons, or daughters to
him, perilling your dearest interests in order to have a view of the
condition of his soul? I might mention numberless cases, in which
the advantage would be manifest of getting to know a character in
sport, and without paying dearly for experience. And I do not
believe that either a Cretan, or any other man, will doubt that such a
test is a fair test, and safer, cheaper, and speedier than any other.
Cle. That is certainly true.
Ath. And this knowledge of the natures and habits of men's souls
will be of the greatest use in that art which has the management of
them; and that art, if I am not mistaken, is politics.
Cle. Exactly so.
BOOK II
Athenian Stranger. And now we have to consider whether the insight
into human nature is the only benefit derived from well ordered
potations, or whether there are not other advantages great and much to
be desired. The argument seems to imply that there are. But how and in
what way these are to be attained, will have to be considered
attentively, or we may be entangled in error.
Cleinias. Proceed.
Ath. Let me once more recall our doctrine of right education; which,
if I am not mistaken, depends on the due regulation of convivial
intercourse.
Cle. You talk rather grandly.
Ath. Pleasure and pain I maintain to be the first perceptions of
children, and I say that they are the forms under which virtue and
vice are originally present to them. As to wisdom and true and fixed
opinions, happy is the man who acquires them, even when declining in
years; and we may say that he who possesses them, and the blessings
which are contained in them, is a perfect man. Now I mean by education
that training which is given by suitable habits to the first instincts
of virtue in children;-when pleasure, and friendship, and pain, and
hatred, are rightly implanted in souls not yet capable of
understanding the nature of them, and who find them, after they have
attained reason, to be in harmony with her. This harmony of the
soul, taken as a whole, is virtue; but the particular training in
respect of pleasure and pain, which leads you always to hate what
you ought to hate, and love what you ought to love from the
beginning of life to the end, may be separated off; and, in my view,
will be rightly called education.
Cle. I think, Stranger, that you are quite right in all that you
have said and are saying about education.
Ath. I am glad to hear that you agree with me; for, indeed, the
discipline of pleasure and pain which, when rightly ordered, is a
principle of education, has been often relaxed and corrupted in
human life. And the Gods, pitying the toils which our race is born
to undergo, have appointed holy festivals, wherein men alternate
rest with labour; and have given them the Muses and Apollo, the leader
of the Muses, and Dionysus, to be companions in their revels, that
they may improve their education by taking part in the festivals of
the Gods, and with their help. I should like to know whether a
common saying is in our opinion true to nature or not. For men say
that the young of all creatures cannot be quiet in their bodies or
in their voices; they are always wanting to move and cry out; some
leaping and skipping, and overflowing with sportiveness and delight at
something, others uttering all sorts of cries. But, whereas the
animals have no perception of order or disorder in their movements,
that is, of rhythm or harmony, as they are called, to us, the Gods,
who, as we say, have been appointed to be our companions in the dance,
have given the pleasurable sense of harmony and rhythm; and so they
stir us into life, and we follow them, joining hands together in
dances and songs; and these they call choruses, which is a term
naturally expressive of cheerfulness. Shall we begin, then, with the
acknowledgment that education is first given through Apollo and the
Muses? What do you say?
Cle. I assent.
Ath. And the uneducated is he who has not been trained in the
chorus, and the educated is he who has been well trained?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And the chorus is made up of two parts, dance and song?
Cle. True.
Ath. Then he who is well educated will be able to sing and dance
well?
Cle. I suppose that he will.
Ath. Let us see; what are we saying?
Cle. What?
Ath. He sings well and dances well; now must we add that he sings
what is good and dances what is good?
Cle. Let us make the addition.
Ath. We will suppose that he knows the good to be good, and the
bad to be bad, and makes use of them accordingly: which now is the
better trained in dancing and music-he who is able to move his body
and to use his voice in what is understood to be the right manner, but
has no delight in good or hatred of evil; or he who is incorrect in
gesture and voice, but is right in his sense of pleasure and pain, and
welcomes what is good, and is offended at what is evil?
Cle. There is a great difference, Stranger, in the two kinds of
education.
Ath. If we three know what is good in song and dance, then we
truly know also who is educated and who is uneducated; but if not,
then we certainly shall not know wherein lies the safeguard of
education, and whether there is any or not.
Cle. True.
Ath. Let us follow the scent like hounds, and go in pursuit of
beauty of figure, and melody, and song, and dance; if these escape us,
there will be no use in talking about true education, whether Hellenic
or barbarian.
Cle. Yes.
Ath. And what is beauty of figure, or beautiful melody? When a manly
soul is in trouble, and when a cowardly soul is in similar case, are
they likely to use the same figures and gestures, or to give utterance
to the same sounds?
Cle. How can they, when the very colours of their faces differ?
Ath. Good, my friend; I may observe, however, in passing, that in
music there certainly are figures and there are melodies: and music is
concerned with harmony and rhythm, so that you may speak of a melody
or figure having good rhythm or good harmony-the term is correct
enough; but to speak metaphorically of a melody or figure having a
"good colour," as the masters of choruses do, is not allowable,
although you can speak of the melodies or figures of the brave and the
coward, praising the one and censuring the other. And not to be
tedious, let us say that the figures and melodies which are expressive
of virtue of soul or body, or of images of virtue, are without
exception good, and those which are expressive of vice are the reverse
of good.
Cle. Your suggestion is excellent; and let us answer that these
things are so.
Ath. Once more, are all of us equally delighted with every sort of
dance?
Cle. Far otherwise.
Ath. What, then, leads us astray? Are beautiful things not the
same to us all, or are they the same in themselves, but not in our
opinion of them? For no one will admit that forms of vice in the dance
are more beautiful than forms of virtue, or that he himself delights
in the forms of vice, and others in a muse of another character. And
yet most persons say, that the excellence of music is to give pleasure
to our souls. But this is intolerable and blasphemous; there is,
however, a much more plausible account of the delusion.
Cle. What?
Ath. The adaptation of art to the characters of men. Choric
movements are imitations of manners occurring in various actions,
fortunes, dispositions-each particular is imitated, and those to
whom the words, or songs, or dances are suited, either by nature or
habit or both, cannot help feeling pleasure in them and applauding
them, and calling them beautiful. But those whose natures, or ways, or
habits are unsuited to them, cannot delight in them or applaud them,
and they call them base. There are others, again, whose natures are
right and their habits wrong, or whose habits are right and their
natures wrong, and they praise one thing, but are pleased at
another. For they say that all these imitations are pleasant, but
not good. And in the presence of those whom they think wise, they
are ashamed of dancing and singing in the baser manner, or of
deliberately lending any countenance to such proceedings; and yet,
they have a secret pleasure in them.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. And is any harm done to the lover of vicious dances or songs,
or any good done to the approver of the opposite sort of pleasure?
Cle. I think that there is.
Ath. "I think" is not the word, but I would say, rather, "I am
certain." For must they not have the same effect as when a man
associates with bad characters, whom he likes and approves rather than
dislikes, and only censures playfully because he has a suspicion of
his own badness? In that case, he who takes pleasure in them will
surely become like those in whom he takes pleasure, even though he
be ashamed to praise them. And what greater good or evil can any
destiny ever make us undergo?
Cle. I know of none.
Ath. Then in a city which has good laws, or in future ages is to
have them, bearing in mind the instruction and amusement which are
given by music, can we suppose that the poets are to be allowed to
teach in the dance anything which they themselves like, in the way
of rhythm, or melody, or words, to the young children of any
well-conditioned parents? Is the poet to train his choruses as he
pleases, without reference to virtue or vice?
Cle. That is surely quite unreasonable, and is not to be thought of.
Ath. And yet he may do this in almost any state with the exception
of Egypt.
Cle. And what are the laws about music and dancing in Egypt?
Ath. You will wonder when I tell you: Long ago they appear to have
recognized the very principle of which we are now speaking-that
their young citizens must be habituated to forms and strains of
virtue. These they fixed, and exhibited the patterns of them in
their temples; and no painter or artist is allowed to innovate upon
them, or to leave the traditional forms and invent new ones. To this
day, no alteration is allowed either in these arts, or in music at
all. And you will find that their works of art are painted or
moulded in the same forms which they had ten thousand years
ago;-this is literally true and no exaggeration-their ancient
paintings and sculptures are not a whit better or worse than the
work of to-day, but are made with just the same skill.
Cle. How extraordinary!
Ath. I should rather say, How statesmanlike, how worthy of a
legislator! I know that other things in Egypt are nat so well. But
what I am telling you about music is true and deserving of
consideration, because showing that a lawgiver may institute
melodies which have a natural truth and correctness without any fear
of failure. To do this, however, must be the work of God, or of a
divine person; in Egypt they have a tradition that their ancient
chants which have been preserved for so many ages are the
composition of the Goddess Isis. And therefore, as I was saying, if
a person can only find in any way the natural melodies, he may
confidently embody them in a fixed and legal form. For the love of
novelty which arises out of pleasure in the new and weariness of the
old, has not strength enough to corrupt the consecrated song and
dance, under the plea that they have become antiquated. At any rate,
they are far from being corrupted in Egypt.
Cle. Your arguments seem to prove your point.
Ath. May we not confidently say that the true use of music and of
choral festivities is as follows: We rejoice when we think that we
prosper, and again we think that we prosper when we rejoice?
Cle. Exactly.
Ath. And when rejoicing in our good fortune, we are unable to be
still?
Cle. True.
Ath. Our young men break forth into dancing and singing, and we
who are their elders deem that we are fulfilling our part in life when
we look on at them. Having lost our agility, we delight in their
sports and merry-making, because we love to think of our former
selves; and gladly institute contests for those who are able to awaken
in us the memory of our youth.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. Is it altogether unmeaning to say, as the common people do
about festivals, that he should be adjudged the wisest of men, and the
winner of the palm, who gives us the greatest amount of pleasure and
mirth? For on such occasions, and when mirth is the order of the
day, ought not he to be honoured most, and, as I was saying, bear
the palm, who gives most mirth to the greatest number? Now is this a
true way of speaking or of acting?
Cle. Possibly.
Ath. But, my dear friend, let us distinguish between different
cases, and not be hasty in forming a judgment: One way of
considering the question will be to imagine a festival at which
there are entertainments of all sorts, including gymnastic, musical,
and equestrian contests: the citizens are assembled; prizes are
offered, and proclamation is made that any one who likes may enter the
lists, and that he is to bear the palm who gives the most pleasure
to the spectators-there is to be no regulation about the manner how;
but he who is most successful in giving pleasure is to be crowned
victor, and deemed to be the pleasantest of the candidates: What is
likely to be the result of such a proclamation?
Cle. In what respect?
Ath. There would be various exhibitions: one man, like Homer, will
exhibit a rhapsody, another a performance on the lute; one will have a
tragedy, and another a comedy. Nor would there be anything astonishing
in some one imagining that he could gain the prize by exhibiting a
puppet-show. Suppose these competitors to meet, and not these only,
but innumerable others as well can you tell me who ought to be the
victor?
Cle. I do not see how any one can answer you, or pretend to know,
unless he has heard with his own ears the several competitors; the
question is absurd.
Ath. Well, then, if neither of you can answer, shall I answer this
question which you deem so absurd?
Cle. By all means.
Ath. If very small children are to determine the question, they will
decide for the puppet show.
Cle. Of course.
Ath. The older children will be advocates of comedy; educated women,
and young men, and people in general, will favour tragedy.
Cle. Very likely.
Ath. And I believe that we old men would have the greatest
pleasure in hearing a rhapsodist recite well the Iliad and Odyssey, or
one of the Hesiodic poems, and would award the victory to him. But,
who would really be the victor?-that is the question.
Cle. Yes.
Ath. Clearly you and I will have to declare that those whom we old
men adjudge victors ought to win; for our ways are far and away better
than any which at present exist anywhere in the world.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Thus far I too should agree with the many, that the
excellence of music is to be measured by pleasure. But the pleasure
must not be that of chance persons; the fairest music is that which
delights the best and best educated, and especially that which
delights the one man who is pre-eminent in virtue and education. And
therefore the judges must be men of character, for they will require
both wisdom and courage; the true judge must not draw his
inspiration from the theatre, nor ought he to be unnerved by the
clamour of the many and his own incapacity; nor again, knowing the
truth, ought he through cowardice and unmanliness carelessly to
deliver a lying judgment, with the very same lips which have just
appealed to the Gods before he judged. He is sitting not as the
disciple of the theatre, but, in his proper place, as their
instructor, and he ought to be the enemy of all pandering to the
pleasure of the spectators. The ancient and common custom of Hellas,
which still prevails in Italy and Sicily, did certainly leave the
judgment to the body of spectators, who determined the victor by
show of hands. But this custom has been the destruction of the
poets; for they are now in the habit of composing with a view to
please the bad taste of their judges, and the result is that the
spectators instruct themselves;-and also it has been the ruin of the
theatre; they ought to be having characters put before them better
than their own, and so receiving a higher pleasure, but now by their
own act the opposite result follows. What inference is to be drawn
from all this? Shall I tell you?
Cle. What?
Ath. The inference at which we arrive for the third or fourth time
is, that education is the constraining and directing of youth
towards that right reason, which the law affirms, and which the
experience of the eldest and best has agreed to be truly right. In
order, then, that the soul of the child may not be habituated to
feel joy and sorrow in a manner at variance with the law, and those
who obey the law, but may rather follow the law and rejoice and sorrow
at the same things as the aged-in order, I say, to produce this
effect, chants appear to have been invented, which really enchant, and
are designed to implant that harmony of which we speak. And, because
the mind of the child is incapable of enduring serious training,
they are called plays and songs, and are performed in play; just as
when men are sick and ailing in their bodies, their attendants give
them wholesome diet in pleasant meats and drinks, but unwholesome diet
in disagreeable things, in order that they may learn, as they ought,
to like the one, and to dislike the other. And similarly the true
legislator will persuade, and, if he cannot persuade, will compel
the poet to express, as he ought, by fair and noble words, in his
rhythms, the figures, and in his melodies, the music of temperate
and brave and in every way good men.
Cle. But do you really imagine, Stranger, that this is the way in
which poets generally compose in States at the present day? As far
as I can observe, except among us and among the Lacedaemonians,
there are no regulations like those of which you speak; in other
places novelties are always being introduced in dancing and in
music, generally not under the authority of any law, but at the
instigation of lawless pleasures; and these pleasures are so far
from being the same, as you describe the Egyptian to be, or having the
same principles, that they are never the same.
Ath. Most true, Cleinias; and I daresay that I may have expressed
myself obscurely, and so led you to imagine that I was speaking of
some really existing state of things, whereas I was only saying what
regulations I would like to have about music; and hence there occurred
a misapprehension on your part. For when evils are far gone and
irremediable, the task of censuring them is never pleasant, although
at times necessary. But as we do not really differ, will you let me
ask you whether you consider such institutions to be more prevalent
among the Cretans and Lacedaemonians than among the other Hellenes?
Cle. Certainly they are.
Ath. And if they were extended to the other Hellenes, would it be an
improvement on the present state of things?
Cle. A very great improvement, if the customs which prevail among
them were such as prevail among us and the Lacedaemonians, and such as
you were just now saying ought to prevail.
Ath. Let us see whether we understand one another:-Are not the
principles of education and music which prevail among you as
follows: you compel your poets to say that the good man, if he be
temperate and just, is fortunate and happy; and this whether he be
great and strong or small and weak, and whether he be rich or poor;
and, on the other hand, if he have a wealth passing that of Cinyras or
Midas, and be unjust, he is wretched and lives in misery? As the
poet says, and with truth: I sing not, I care not about him who
accomplishes all noble things, not having justice; let him who
"draws near and stretches out his hand against his enemies be a just
man." But if he be unjust, I would not have him "look calmly upon
bloody death," nor "surpass in swiftness the Thracian Boreas"; and let
no other thing that is called good ever be his. For the goods of which
the many speak are not really good: first in the catalogue is placed
health, beauty next, wealth third; and then innumerable others, as for
example to have a keen eye or a quick ear, and in general to have
all the senses perfect; or, again, to be a tyrant and do as you
like; and the final consummation of happiness is to have acquired
all these things, and when you have acquired them to become at once
immortal. But you and I say, that while to the just and holy all these
things are the best of possessions, to the unjust they are all,
including even health, the greatest of evils. For in truth, to have
sight, and hearing, and the use of the senses, or to live at all
without justice and virtue, even though a man be rich in all the
so-called goods of fortune, is the greatest of evils, if life be
immortal; but not so great, if the bad man lives only a very short
time. These are the truths which, if I am not mistaken, you will
persuade or compel your poets to utter with suitable accompaniments of
harmony and rhythm, and in these they must train up your youth. Am I
not right? For I plainly declare that evils as they are termed are
goods to the unjust, and only evils to the just, and that goods are
truly good to the good, but evil to the evil. Let me ask again, Are
you and I agreed about this?
Cle. I think that we partly agree and partly do not.
Ath. When a man has health and wealth and a tyranny which lasts, and
when he is preeminent in strength and courage, and has the gift of
immortality, and none of the so-called evils which counter-balance
these goods, but only the injustice and insolence of his own nature-of
such an one you are, I suspect, unwilling to believe that he is
miserable rather than happy.
Cle. That is quite true.
Ath. Once more: Suppose that he be valiant and strong, and
handsome and rich, and does throughout his whole life whatever he
likes, still, if he be unrighteous and insolent, would not both of you
agree that he will of necessity live basely? You will surely grant
so much?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And an evil life too?
Cle. I am not equally disposed to grant that.
Ath. Will he not live painfully and to his own disadvantage?
Cle. How can I possibly say so?
Ath. How! Then may Heaven make us to be of one mind, for now we
are of two. To me, dear Cleinias, the truth of what I am saying is
as plain as the fact that Crete is an island. And, if I were a
lawgiver, I would try to make the poets and all the citizens speak
in this strain, and I would inflict the heaviest penalties on any
one in all the land who should dare to say that there are bad men
who lead pleasant lives, or that the profitable and gainful is one
thing, and the just another; and there are many other matters about
which I should make my citizens speak in a manner different from the
Cretans and Lacedaemonians of this age, and I may say, indeed, from
the world in general. For tell me, my good friends, by Zeus and Apollo
tell me, if I were to ask these same Gods who were your legislators-Is
not the most just life also the pleasantest? or are there two lives,
one of which is the justest and the other the pleasantest?-and they
were to reply that there are two; and thereupon I proceeded to ask,
(that would be the right way of pursuing the enquiry), Which are the
happier-those who lead the justest, or those who lead the
pleasantest life? and they replied, Those who lead the
pleasantest-that would be a very strange answer, which I should not
like to put into the mouth of the Gods. The words will come with
more propriety from the lips of fathers and legislators, and therefore
I will repeat my former questions to one of them, and suppose him to
say again that he who leads the pleasantest life is the happiest.
And to that I rejoin:-O my father, did you not wish me to live as
happily as possible? And yet you also never ceased telling me that I
should live as justly as possible. Now, here the giver of the rule,
whether he be legislator or father, will be in a dilemma, and will
in vain endeavour to be consistent with himself. But if he were to
declare that the justest life is also the happiest, every one
hearing him would enquire, if I am not mistaken, what is that good and
noble principle in life which the law approves, and which is
superior to pleasure. For what good can the just man have which is
separated from pleasure? Shall we say that glory and fame, coming from
Gods and men, though good and noble, are nevertheless unpleasant,
and infamy pleasant? Certainly not, sweet legislator. Or shall we
say that the not-doing of wrong and there being no wrong done is
good and honourable, although there is no pleasure in it, and that the
doing wrong is pleasant, but evil and base?
Cle. Impossible.
Ath. The view which identifies the pleasant and the pleasant and the
just and the good and the noble has an excellent moral and religious
tendency. And the opposite view is most at variance with the designs
of the legislator, and is, in his opinion, infamous; for no one, if he
can help, will be persuaded to do that which gives him more pain
than pleasure. But as distant prospects are apt to make us dizzy,
especially in childhood, the legislator will try to purge away the
darkness and exhibit the truth; he will persuade the citizens, in some
way or other, by customs and praises and words, that just and unjust
are shadows only, and that injustice, which seems opposed to
justice, when contemplated by the unjust and evil man appears pleasant
and the just most unpleasant; but that from the just man's point of
view, the very opposite is the appearance of both of them.
Cle. True.
Ath. And which may be supposed to be the truer judgment-that of
the inferior or of the better soul?
Cle. Surely, that of the better soul.
Ath. Then the unjust life must not only be more base and depraved,
but also more unpleasant than the just and holy life?
Cle. That seems to be implied in the present argument.
Ath. And even supposing this were otherwise, and not as the argument
has proven, still the lawgiver, who is worth anything, if he ever
ventures to tell a lie to the young for their good, could not invent a
more useful lie than this, or one which will have a better effect in
making them do what is right, not on compulsion but voluntarily.
Cle. Truth, Stranger, is a noble thing and a lasting, but a thing of
which men are hard to be persuaded.
Ath. And yet the story of the Sidonian Cadmus, which is so
improbable, has been readily believed, and also innumerable other
tales.
Cle. What is that story?
Ath. The story of armed men springing up after the sowing of
teeth, which the legislator may take as a proof that he can persuade
the minds of the young of anything; so that he has only to reflect and
find out what belief will be of the greatest public advantage, and
then use all his efforts to make the whole community utter one and the
same word in their songs and tales and discourses all their life long.
But if you do not agree with me, there is no reason why you should not
argue on the other side.
Cle. I do not see that any argument can fairly be raised by either
of us against what you are now saying.
Ath. The next suggestion which I have to offer is, that all our
three choruses shall sing to the young and tender souls of children,
reciting in their strains all the noble thoughts of which we have
already spoken, or are about to speak; and the sum of them shall be,
that the life which is by the Gods deemed to be the happiest is also
the best;-we shall affirm this to be a most certain truth; and the
minds of our young disciples will be more likely to receive these
words of ours than any others which we might address to them.
Cle. I assent to what you say.
Ath. First will enter in their natural order the sacred choir
composed of children, which is to sing lustily the heaven-taught lay
to the whole city. Next will follow the choir of young men under the
age of thirty, who will call upon the God Paean to testify to the
truth of their words, and will pray him to be gracious to the youth
and to turn their hearts. Thirdly, the choir of elder men, who are
from thirty to sixty years of age, will also sing. There remain
those who are too old to sing, and they will tell stories,
illustrating the same virtues, as with the voice of an oracle.
Cle. Who are those who compose the third choir, Stranger? for I do
not clearly understand what you mean to say about them.
Ath. And yet almost all that I have been saying has said with a view
to them.
Cle. Will you try to be a little plainer?
Ath. I was speaking at the commencement of our discourse, as you
will remember, of the fiery nature of young creatures: I said that
they were unable to keep quiet either in limb or voice, and that
they called out and jumped about in a disorderly manner; and that no
other animal attained to any perception of order, but man only. Now
the order of motion is called rhythm, and the order of the voice, in
which high and low are duly mingled, is called harmony; and both
together are termed choric song. And I said that the Gods had pity
on us, and gave us Apollo and the Muses to be our playfellows and
leaders in the dance; and Dionysus, as I dare say that you will
remember, was the third.
Cle. I quite remember.
Ath. Thus far I have spoken of the chorus of Apollo and the Muses,
and I have still to speak of the remaining chorus, which is that of
Dionysus.
Cle. How is that arranged? There is something strange, at any rate
on first hearing, in a Dionysiac chorus of old men, if you really mean
that those who are above thirty, and may be fifty, or from fifty to
sixty years of age, are to dance in his honour.
Ath. Very true; and therefore it must be shown that there is good
reason for the proposal.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Are we agreed thus far?
Cle. About what?
Ath. That every man and boy, slave and free, both sexes, and the
whole city, should never cease charming themselves with the strains of
which we have spoken; and that there should be every sort of change
and variation of them in order to take away the effect of sameness, so
that the singers may always receive pleasure from their hymns, and may
never weary of them?
Cle. Every one will agree.
Ath. Where, then, will that best part of our city which, by reason
of age and intelligence, has the greatest influence, sing these
fairest of strains, which are to do so much good? Shall we be so
foolish as to let them off who would give us the most beautiful and
also the most useful of songs?
Cle. But, says the argument, we cannot let them off.
Ath. Then how can we carry out our purpose with decorum? Will this
be the way?
Cle. What?
Ath. When a man is advancing in years, he is afraid and reluctant to
sing;-he has no pleasure in his own performances; and if compulsion is
used, he will be more and more ashamed, the older and more discreet he
grows;-is not this true?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Well, and will he not be yet more ashamed if he has to stand up
and sing in the theatre to a mixed audience?-and if moreover when he
is required to do so, like the other choirs who contend for prizes,
and have been trained under a singing master, he is pinched and
hungry, he will certainly have a feeling of shame and discomfort which
will make him very unwilling to exhibit.
Cle. No doubt.
Ath. How, then, shall we reassure him, and get him to sing? Shall we
begin by enacting that boys shall not taste wine at all until they are
eighteen years of age; we will tell them that fire must not be
poured upon fire, whether in the body or in the soul, until they begin
to go to work-this is a precaution which has to be taken against the
excitableness of youth;-afterwards they may taste wine in moderation
up to the age of thirty, but while a man is young he should abstain
altogether from intoxication and from excess of wine; when, at length,
he has reached forty years, after dinner at a public mess, he may
invite not only the other Gods, but Dionysus above all, to the mystery
and festivity of the elder men, making use of the wine which he has
given men to lighten the sourness of old age; that in age we may renew
our youth, and forget our sorrows; and also in order that the nature
of the soul, like iron melted in the fire, may become softer and so
more impressible. In the first place, will not any one who is thus
mellowed be more ready and less ashamed to sing-I do not say before
a large audience, but before a moderate company; nor yet among
strangers, but among his familiars, and, as we have often said, to
chant, and to enchant?
Cle. He will be far more ready.
Ath. There will be no impropriety in our using such a method of
persuading them to join with us in song.
Cle. None at all.
Ath. And what strain will they sing, and what muse will they hymn?
The strain should clearly be one suitable to them.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And what strain is suitable for heroes? Shall they sing a
choric strain?
Cle. Truly, Stranger, we of Crete and Lacedaemon know no strain
other than that which we have learnt and been accustomed to sing in
our chorus.
Ath. I dare say; for you have never acquired the knowledge of the
most beautiful kind of song, in your military way of life, which is
modelled after the camp, and is not like that of dwellers in cities;
and you have your young men herding and feeding together like young
colts. No one takes his own individual colt and drags him away from
his fellows against his will, raging and foaming, and gives him a
groom to attend to him alone, and trains and rubs him down
privately, and gives him the qualities in education which will make
him not only a good soldier, but also a governor of a state and of
cities. Such an one, as we said at first, would be a greater warrior
than he of whom Tyrtaeus sings; and he would honour courage
everywhere, but always as the fourth, and not as the first part of
virtue, either in individuals or states.
Cle. Once more, Stranger, I must complain that you depreciate our
lawgivers.
Ath. Not intentionally, if at all, my good friend; but whither the
argument leads, thither let us follow; for if there be indeed some
strain of song more beautiful than that of the choruses or the
public theatres, I should like to impart it to those who, as we say,
are ashamed of these, and want to have the best.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. When things have an accompanying charm, either the best thing
in them is this very charm, or there is some rightness or utility
possessed by them;-for example, I should say that eating and drinking,
and the use of food in general, have an accompanying charm which we
call pleasure; but that this rightness and utility is just the
healthfulness of the things served up to us, which is their true
rightness.
Cle. Just so.
Ath. Thus, too, I should say that learning has a certain
accompanying charm which is the pleasure; but that the right and the
profitable, the good and the noble, are qualities which the truth
gives to it.
Cle. Exactly.
Ath. And so in the imitative arts-if they succeed in making
likenesses, and are accompanied by pleasure, may not their works be
said to have a charm?
Cle. Yes.
Ath. But equal proportions, whether of quality or quantity, and
not pleasure, speaking generally, would give them truth or rightness.
Cle. Yes.
Ath. Then that only can be rightly judged by the standard of
pleasure, which makes or furnishes no utility or truth or likeness,
nor on the other hand is productive of any hurtful quality, but exists
solely for the sake of the accompanying charm; and the term "pleasure"
is most appropriately applied to it when these other qualities are
absent.
Cle. You are speaking of harmless pleasure, are you not?
Ath. Yes; and this I term amusement, when doing neither harm nor
good in any degree worth speaking of.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. Then, if such be our principles, we must assert that
imitation is not to be judged of by pleasure and false opinion; and
this is true of all equality, for the equal is not equal or the
symmetrical symmetrical, because somebody thinks or likes something,
but they are to be judged of by the standard of truth, and by no other
whatever.
Cle. Quite true.
Ath. Do we not regard all music as representative and imitative?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Then, when any one says that music is to be judged of by
pleasure, his doctrine cannot be admitted; and if there be any music
of which pleasure is the criterion, such music is not to be sought out
or deemed to have any real excellence, but only that other kind of
music which is an imitation of the good.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. And those who seek for the best kind of song and music ought
not to seek for that which is pleasant, but for that which is true;
and the truth of imitation consists, as we were saying, in rendering
the thing imitated according to quantity and quality.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And every one will admit that musical compositions are all
imitative and representative. Will not poets and spectators and actors
all agree in this?
Cle. They will.
Ath. Surely then he who would judge correctly must know what each
composition is; for if he does not know what is the character and
meaning of the piece, and what it represents, he will never discern
whether the intention is true or false.
Cle. Certainly not.
Ath. And will he who does not know what is true be able to
distinguish what is good and bad? My statement is not very clear;
but perhaps you will understand me better if I put the matter in
another way.
Cle. How?
Ath. There are ten thousand likenesses of objects of sight?
Cle. Yes.
Ath. And can he who does not know what the exact object is which
is imitated, ever know whether the resemblance is truthfully executed?
I mean, for example, whether a statue has the proportions of a body,
and the true situation of the parts; what those proportions are, and
how the parts fit into one another in due order; also their colours
and conformations, or whether this is all confused in the execution:
do you think that any one can know about this, who does not know
what the animal is which has been imitated?
Cle. Impossible.
Ath. But even if we know that the thing pictured or sculptured is
a man, who has received at the hand of the artist all his proper parts
and colours and shapes, must we not also know whether the work is
beautiful or in any respect deficient in beauty?
Cle. If this were not required, Stranger, we should all of us be
judges of beauty.
Ath. Very true; and may we not say that in everything imitated,
whether in drawing, music, or any other art, he who is to be a
competent judge must possess three things;-he must know, in the
first place, of what the imitation is; secondly, he must know that
it is true; and thirdly, that it has been well executed in words and
melodies and rhythms?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Then let us not faint in discussing the peculiar difficulty
of music. Music is more celebrated than any other kind of imitation,
and therefore requires the greatest care of them all. For if a man
makes a mistake here, he may do himself the greatest injury by
welcoming evil dispositions, and the mistake may be very difficult
to discern, because the poets are artists very inferior in character
to the Muses themselves, who would never fall into the monstrous error
of assigning to the words of men the gestures and songs of women;
nor after combining the melodies with the gestures of freemen would
they add on the rhythms of slaves and men of the baser sort; nor,
beginning with the rhythms and gestures of freemen, would they
assign to them a melody or words which are of an opposite character;
nor would they mix up the voices and sounds of animals and of men
and instruments, and every other sort of noise, as if they were all
one. But human poets are fond of introducing this sort of inconsistent
mixture, and so make themselves ridiculous in the eyes of those who,
as Orpheus says, "are ripe for true pleasure." The experienced see all
this confusion, and yet the poets go on and make still further havoc
by separating the rhythm and the figure of the dance from the
melody, setting bare words to metre, and also separating the melody
and the rhythm from the words, using the lyre or the flute alone.
For when there are no words, it is very difficult to recognize the
meaning of the harmony and rhythm, or to see that any worthy object is
imitated by them. And we must acknowledge that all this sort of thing,
which aims only at swiftness and smoothness and a brutish noise, and
uses the flute and the lyre not as the mere accompaniments of the
dance and song, is exceedingly coarse and tasteless. The use of either
instrument, when unaccompanied, leads to every sort of irregularity
and trickery. This is all rational enough. But we are considering
not how our choristers, who are from thirty to fifty years of age, and
may be over fifty, are not to use the Muses, but how they are to use
them. And the considerations which we have urged seem to show in
what way these fifty year-old choristers who are to sing, may be
expected to be better trained. For they need to have a quick
perception and knowledge of harmonies and rhythms; otherwise, how
can they ever know whether a melody would be rightly sung to the
Dorian mode, or to the rhythm which the poet has assigned to it?
Cle. Clearly they cannot.
Ath. The many are ridiculous in imagining that they know what is
in proper harmony and rhythm, and what is not, when they can only be
made to sing and step in rhythm by force; it never occurs to them that
they are ignorant of what they are doing. Now every melody is right
when it has suitable harmony and rhythm, and wrong when unsuitable.
Cle. That is most certain.
Ath. But can a man who does not know a thing, as we were saying,
know that the thing is right?
Cle. Impossible.
Ath. Then now, as would appear, we are making the discovery that our
newly-appointed choristers, whom we hereby invite and, although they
are their own masters, compel to sing, must be educated to such an
extent as to be able to follow the steps of the rhythm and the notes
of the song, that they may know the harmonies and rhythms, and be able
to select what are suitable for men of their age and character to
sing; and may sing them, and have innocent pleasure from their own
performance, and also lead younger men to welcome with dutiful delight
good dispositions. Having such training, they will attain a more
accurate knowledge than falls to the lot of the common people, or even
of the poets themselves. For the poet need not know the third point,
viz., whether the imitation is good or not, though he can hardly
help knowing the laws of melody and rhythm. But the aged chorus must
know all the three, that they may choose the best, and that which is
nearest to the best; for otherwise they will never be able to charm
the souls of young men in the way of virtue. And now the original
design of the argument which was intended to bring eloquent aid to the
Chorus of Dionysus, has been accomplished to the best of our
ability, and let us see whether we were right:-I should imagine that a
drinking assembly is likely to become more and more tumultuous as
the drinking goes on: this, as we were saying at first, will certainly
be the case.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Every man has a more than natural elevation; his heart is
glad within him, and he will say anything and will be restrained by
nobody at such a time; he fancies that he is able to rule over himself
and all mankind.
Cle. Quite true.
Ath. Were we not saying that on such occasions the souls of the
drinkers become like iron heated in the fire, and grow softer and
younger, and are easily moulded by him who knows how to educate and
fashion them, just as when they were young, and that this fashioner of
them is the same who prescribed for them in the days of their youth,
viz., the good legislator; and that he ought to enact laws of the
banquet, which, when a man is confident, bold, and impudent, and
unwilling to wait his turn and have his share of silence and speech,
and drinking and music, will change his character into the
opposite-such laws as will infuse into him a just and noble fear,
which will take up arms at the approach of insolence, being that
divine fear which we have called reverence and shame?
Cle. True.
Ath. And the guardians of these laws and fellow-workers with them
are the calm and sober generals of the drinkers; and without their
help there is greater difficulty in fighting against drink than in
fighting against enemies when the commander of an army is not
himself calm; and he who is unwilling to obey them and the
commanders of Dionysiac feasts who are more than sixty years of age,
shall suffer a disgrace as great as he who disobeys military
leaders, or even greater.
Cle. Right.
Ath. If, then, drinking and amusement were regulated in this way,
would not the companions of our revels be improved? they would part
better friends than they were, and not, as now enemies. Their whole
intercourse would be regulated by law and observant of it, and the
sober would be the leaders of the drunken.
Cle. I think so too, if drinking were regulated as you propose.
Ath. Let us not then simply censure the gift of Dionysus as bad
and unfit to be received into the State. For wine has many
excellences, and one pre-eminent one, about which there is a
difficulty in speaking to the many, from a fear of their misconceiving
and misunderstanding what is said.
Cle. To what do you refer?
Ath. There is a tradition or story, which has somehow crept about
the world, that Dionysus was robbed of his wits by his stepmother
Here, and that out of revenge he inspires Bacchic furies and dancing
madnesses in others; for which reason he gave men wine. Such
traditions concerning the Gods I leave to those who think that they
may be safely uttered; I only know that no animal at birth is mature
or perfect in intelligence; and in the intermediate period, in which
he has not yet acquired his own proper sense, he rages and roars
without rhyme or reason; and when he has once got on his legs he jumps
about without rhyme or reason; and this, as you will remember, has
been already said by us to be the origin of music and gymnastic.
Cle. To be sure, I remember.
Ath. And did we not say that the sense of harmony and rhythm
sprang from this beginning among men, and that Apollo and the Muses
and Dionysus were the Gods whom we had to thank for them?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. The other story implied that wine was given man out of revenge,
and in order to make him mad; but our present doctrine, on the
contrary, is, that wine was given him as a balm, and in order to
implant modesty in the soul, and health and strength in the body.
Cle. That, Stranger, is precisely what was said.
Ath. Then half the subject may now be considered to have been
discussed; shall we proceed to the consideration of the other half?
Cle. What is the other half, and how do you divide the subject?
Ath. The whole choral art is also in our view the whole of
education; and of this art, rhythms and harmonies form the part
which has to do with the voice.
Cle. Yes.
Ath. The movement of the body has rhythm in common with the movement
of the voice, but gesture is peculiar to it, whereas song is simply
the movement of the voice.
Cle. Most true.
Ath. And the sound of the voice which reaches and educates the soul,
we have ventured to term music.
Cle. We were right.
Ath. And the movement of the body, when regarded as an amusement, we
termed dancing; but when extended and pursued with a view to the
excellence of the body, this scientific training may be called
gymnastic.
Cle. Exactly.
Ath. Music, which was one half of the choral art, may be said to
have been completely discussed. Shall we proceed to the other half
or not? What would you like?
Cle. My good friend, when you are talking with a Cretan and
Lacedaemonian, and we have discussed music and not gymnastic, what
answer are either of us likely to make to such an enquiry?
Ath. An answer is contained in your question; and I understand and
accept what you say not only as an answer, but also as a command to
proceed with gymnastic.
Cle. You quite understand me; do as you say.
Ath. I will; and there will not be any difficulty in speaking
intelligibly to you about a subject with which both of you are far
more familiar than with music.
Cle. There will not.
Ath. Is not the origin of gymnastics, too, to be sought in the
tendency to rapid motion which exists in all animals; man, as we
were saying, having attained the sense of rhythm, created and invented
dancing; and melody arousing and awakening rhythm, both united
formed the choral art?
Cle. Very true.
Ath. And one part of this subject has been already discussed by
us, and there still remains another to be discussed?
Cle. Exactly.
Ath. I have first a final word to add to my discourse about drink,
if you will allow me to do so.
Cle. What more have you to say?
Ath. I should say that if a city seriously means to adopt the
practice of drinking under due regulation and with a view to the
enforcement of temperance, and in like manner, and on the same
principle, will allow of other pleasures, designing to gain the
victory over them in this way all of them may be used. But if the
State makes drinking an amusement only, and whoever likes may drink
whenever he likes, and with whom he likes, and add to this any other
indulgences, I shall never agree or allow that this city or this man
should practise drinking. I would go further than the Cretans and
Lacedaemonians, and am disposed rather to the law of the
Carthaginians, that no one while he is on a campaign should be allowed
to taste wine at all, but that he should drink water during all that
time, and that in the city no slave, male or female, should ever drink
wine; and that no magistrates should drink during their year of
office, nor should pilots of vessels or judges while on duty taste
wine at all, nor any one who is going to hold a consultation about any
matter of importance; nor in the daytime at all, unless in consequence
of exercise or as medicine; nor again at night, when any one, either
man or woman, is minded to get children. There are numberless other
cases also in which those who have good sense and good laws ought
not to drink wine, so that if what I say is true, no city will need
many vineyards. Their husbandry and their way of life in general
will follow an appointed order, and their cultivation of the vine will
be the most limited and the least common of their employments. And
this, Stranger, shall be the crown of my discourse about wine, if
you agree.
Cle. Excellent: we agree.
BOOK III
Athenian Stranger. Enough of this. And what, then, is to be regarded
as the origin of government? Will not a man be able to judge of it
best from a point of view in which he may behold the progress of
states and their transitions to good or evil?
Cleinias. What do you mean?
Ath. I mean that he might watch them from the point of view of time,
and observe the changes which take place in them during infinite ages.
Cle. How so?
Ath. Why, do you think that you can reckon the time which has
elapsed since cities first existed and men were citizens of them?
Cle. Hardly.
Ath. But are sure that it must be vast and incalculable?
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. And have not thousands and thousands of cities come into
being during this period and as many perished? And has not each of
them had every form of government many times over, now growing larger,
now smaller, and again improving or declining?
Cle. To be sure.
Ath. Let us endeavour to ascertain the cause of these changes; for
that will probably explain the first origin and development of forms
of government.
Cle. Very good. You shall endeavour to impart your thoughts to us,
and we will make an effort to understand you.
Ath. Do you believe that there is any truth in ancient traditions?
Cle. What traditions?
Ath. The traditions about the many destructions of mankind which
have been occasioned by deluges and pestilences, and in many other
ways, and of the survival of a remnant?
Cle. Every one is disposed to believe them.
Ath. Let us consider one of them, that which was caused by the
famous deluge.
Cle. What are we to observe about it?
Ath. I mean to say that those who then escaped would only be hill
shepherds-small sparks of the human race preserved on the tops of
mountains.
Cle. Clearly.
Ath. Such survivors would necessarily be unacquainted with the
arts and the various devices which are suggested to the dwellers in
cities by interest or ambition, and with all the wrongs which they
contrive against one another.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. Let us suppose, then, that the cities in the plain and on the
sea-coast were utterly destroyed at that time.
Cle. Very good.
Ath. Would not all implements have then perished and every other
excellent invention of political or any other sort of wisdom have
utterly disappeared?
Cle. Why, yes, my friend; and if things had always continued as they
are at present ordered, how could any discovery have ever been made
even in the least particular? For it is evident that the arts were
unknown during ten thousand times ten thousand years. And no more than
a thousand or two thousand years have elapsed since the discoveries of
Daedalus, Orpheus and Palamedes-since Marsyas and Olympus invented
music, and Amphion the lyre-not to speak of numberless other
inventions which are but of yesterday.
Ath. Have you forgotten, Cleinias, the name of a friend who is
really of yesterday?
Cle. I suppose that you mean Epimenides.
Ath. The same, my friend; he does indeed far overleap the heads of
all mankind by his invention; for he carried out in practice, as you
declare, what of old Hesiod only preached.
Cle. Yes, according to our tradition.
Ath. After the great destruction, may we not suppose that the
state of man was something of this sort:-In the beginning of things
there was a fearful illimitable desert and a vast expanse of land; a
herd or two of oxen would be the only survivors of the animal world;
and there might be a few goats, these too hardly enough to maintain
the shepherds who tended them?
Cle. True.
Ath. And of cities or governments or legislation, about which we are
now talking, do you suppose that they could have any recollection at
all?
Cle. None whatever.
Ath. And out of this state of things has there not sprung all that
we now are and have: cities and governments, and arts and laws, and
a great deal of vice and a great deal of virtue?
Cle. What do you mean?
Ath. Why, my good friend, how can we possibly suppose that those who
knew nothing of all the good and evil of cities could have attained
their full development, whether of virtue or of vice?
Cle. I understand your meaning, and you are quite right.
Ath. But, as time advanced and the race multiplied, the world came
to be what the world is.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. Doubtless the change was not made all in a moment, but little
by little, during a very long period of time.
Cle. A highly probable supposition.
Ath. At first, they would have a natural fear ringing in their
ears which would prevent their descending from the heights into the
plain.
Cle. Of course.
Ath. The fewness of the survivors at that time would have made
them all the more desirous of seeing one another; but then the means
of travelling either by land or sea had been almost entirely lost,
as I may say, with the loss of the arts, and there was great
difficulty in getting at one another; for iron and brass and all
metals were jumbled together and had disappeared in the chaos; nor was
there any possibility of extracting ore from them; and they had
scarcely any means of felling timber. Even if you suppose that some
implements might have been preserved in the mountains, they must
quickly have worn out and vanished, and there would be no more of them
until the art of metallurgy had again revived.
Cle. There could not have been.
Ath. In how many generations would this be attained?
Cle. Clearly, not for many generations.
Ath. During this period, and for some time afterwards, all the
arts which require iron and brass and the like would disappear.
Cle. Certainly.
Ath. Faction and war would also have died out in those days, and for
many reasons.
Cle. How would that be?
Ath. In the first place, the desolation of these primitive men would
create in them a feeling of affection and good-will towards one
another; and, secondly, they would have no occasion to quarrel about
their subsistence, for they would have pasture in abundance, except
just at first, and in some particular cases; and from their
pasture-land they would obtain the greater part of their food in a
primitive age, having plenty of milk and flesh; moreover they would
procure other food by the chase, not to be despised either in quantity
or quality. They would also have abundance of clothing, and bedding,
and dwellings, and utensils either capable of standing on the fire
or not; for the plastic and weaving arts do not require any use of
iron: and God has given these two arts to man in order to provide
him with all such things, that, when reduced to the last extremity,
the human race may still grow and increase. Hence in those days
mankind were not very poor; nor was poverty a cause of difference
among them; and rich they could not have been, having neither gold nor
silver:-such at that time was their condition. And the community which
has neither poverty nor riches will always have the noblest
principles; in it there is no insolence or injustice, nor, again,
are there any contentions or envyings. And therefore they were good,
and also because they were what is called simple-minded; and when they
were told about good and evil, they in their simplicity believed
what they heard to be very truth and practised it. No one had the
wit to suspect another of a falsehood, as men do now; but what they
heard about Gods and men they believed to be true, and lived
accordingly; and therefore they were in all respects such as we have
described them.
Cle. That quite accords with my views, and with those of my friend
here.
Ath. Would not many generations living on in a simple manner,
although ruder, perhaps, and more ignorant of the arts generally,
and in particular of those of land or naval warfare, and likewise of
other arts, termed in cities legal practices and party conflicts,
and including all conceivable ways of hurting one another in word
and deed;-although inferior to those who lived before the deluge, or
to the men of our day in these respects, would they not, I say, be
simpler and more manly, and also more temperate and altogether more
just? The reason has been already explained.
Cle. Very true.
Ath. I should wish you to understand that what has preceded and what
is about to follow, has been, and will be said, with the intention
of explaining what need the men of that time had of laws, and who
was their lawgiver.
Cle. And thus far what you have said has been very well said.
Ath. They could hardly have wanted lawgivers as yet; nothing of that
sort was likely to have existed in their days, for they had no letters
at this early period; they lived by habit and the customs of their
ancestors, as they are called.
Cle. Probably.
Ath. But there was already existing a form of government which, if I
am not mistaken, is generally termed a lordship, and this still
remains in many places, both among Hellenes and barbarians, and is the
government which is declared by Homer to have prevailed among the
Cyclopes:
They have neither councils nor judgments, but they dwell in hollow
caves on the tops of high mountains, and every one gives law to his
wife and children, and they do not busy themselves about one another.
Cle. That seems to be a charming poet of yours; I have read some
other verses of his, which are very clever; but I do not know much
of him, for foreign poets are very little read among the Cretans.
Megillus. But they are in Lacedaemon, and he appears to be the
prince of them all; the manner of life, however, which he describes is
not Spartan, but rather Ionian, and he seems quite to confirm what you
are saying, when he traces up the ancient state of mankind by the help
of tradition to barbarism.
Ath. Yes, he does confirm it; and we may accept his witness to the
fact that such forms of government sometimes arise.
Cle. We may.
Ath. And were not such states composed of men who had been dispersed
in single habitations and families by the poverty which attended the
devastations; and did not the eldest then rule among them, because
with them government originated in the authority of a father and a
mother, whom, like