that in the case described the just man will be scourged, racked,
bound — will have his eyes burnt out ; and, at last, after suffer-
ing every kind of evil, he will be impaled. This will teach him
» ^schylus (eslcy-lus, 525-456 B.C.): earliest of the three great tragic
poets of Greece.
* "There is a just man that perisheth in his righteousness, and there is a
wicked man that prolongeth his life in wickedness."— Eccl. vii. 15.
204 PLATO THE TEACHER
that he ought to seem only, and not to be, just ; and that the
words of ^Eschylus may be more truly spoken of the unjust
M than of the just. For the unjust, as they will say, is pur-
suing a reality ; at any rate, he does not live with a view
to appearances, he wants to be really unjust, and not to seem
only : —
11 His mind is like a deep and fertile soil
Out of which his prudent counsels spring."
In the first place, he is thought just, and therefore bears rule ;
he can marry whom he will, and give in marriage to whom he
will ; also he can trade and deal where he likes, and always to
his own advantage, because he has no misgivings about injus-
tice ; and in every contest, whether public or private, he gets
the better of his antagonists; and has gains, and is rich, and
out of his gains he can benefit his friends, and harm his en-
emies ; moreover, he can offer sacrifices, and dedicate gifts to
the gods abundantly and magnificently, and can honor the
gods and any man whom he wants to honor in far better style
than the just, which is a very good reason why he should be
dearer to the gods than the just. Thus they make to appear,
Socrates, that the life of the unjust is so ordered both by gods
and men as to be more blessed than the life of the just.
I was going to say something in answer to Glaucon, when
Adeimantus his brother interposed : Socrates, he said, you
don't suppose that there is nothing more to be urged ?
Why, what else is there ? I answered.
The strongest point of all has not been even mentioned, he
replied.
Well, then, according to the proverb, " Let brother help
brother j " and if he fails in any part do you assist him ; al-
though I must confess that Glaucon has already said quite
enough to lay me in the dust, and take from me the power of
helping justice.
Nonsense, he replied ; I want you to hear the converse of
Glaucon's argument, which is equally required in order to
bring out what I believe to be his meaning ; I mean theargu-
6 ment of those who praise justice and censure injustice,
with a view to their consequences only. Parents and
tutors are always telling their sons and their wards that they
are to be just; but why? not for the sake of justice, but for
THE REPUBLIC 205
the sake of character and reputation ; in the hope of obtain-
ing some of those offices and marriages and other advantages
which Glaucon was enumerating as accruing to the unjust from
a fair reputation. More, however, is made of appearances
by this class than by the others ; for they throw in the good
opinion of the gods, and will tell you of a shower of benefits
which the heavens, as they say, rain upon the pious ; and this
accords with the testimony of the noble Hesiod and Homer,
the first of whom says, that for the just the gods make —
** The oaks to bear acorns at their summit, and bees in the middle ;
And the sheep are bowed down with the weight of their own fleeces,"
and many other blessings of a like kind are provided for them.
And Homer has a very similar strain ; for he speaks of one
whose fame is —
" As the fame of some blameless king who, like a god,
Maintains justice ; to whom the black earth brings forth
Wheat and barley, whose trees are bowed with fruit,
And his sheep never fail to bear, and the sea gives him fish."
Still grander are the gifts of Heaven which Musaeus 5 and his
son 5 offer the just ; they take them down into the world below
where they have the saints feasting on couches with crowns on
their heads, and passing their whole time in drinking ; their
idea seems to be that an immortality of drunkenness is the
highest meed of virtue. Some extend their rewards to the
third and fourth generation; the posterity, as they say, of the
faithful and just shall survive them. This is the style in which
they praise justice. But about the wicked there is another
strain ; they bury them in a slough, and make them carry
water in a sieve"; that is their portion in the world below,
and even while living they bring them to infamy, and inflict
upon them the punishments which Glaucon described as the
portion of the just, who are reputed unjust ; nothing else does
their invention supply. Such is their manner of praising the
one and censuring the other.
" See Apology, note 52 , Protagoras, note 28. Son, Eumolpus (u-mSl'-
pus).
« As a punishment ior killing their husbands, the DanaTdes (da-naT-dez),
daughters of Danaus (da'na-us\, were compelled, in Tartarus, to draw water
forever in sieves.
206 PLATO THE TEACHER
Again, Socrates, let me mention another way of speaking
about justice and injustice, which is not confined to the poets,
6 but is also found in prose writers. The universal voice of
mankind is saying that justice and virtue are honorable,
but grievous and toilsome ; and that the pleasures of vice and
injustice are easy of attainment, and are only censured by law
and opinion. They say also that honesty is generally less
profitable than dishonesty ; and they are quite ready to call
wicked men happy, and to honor them both in public and
private when they are rich or have other sources of power,
while they despise and neglect those who may be weak and
poor, even though acknowledging that these are better than
the others. But the most extraordinary of all their sayings is
about virtue and the gods : they say that the gods apportion
calamity and evil to many good men, and good and happiness
to the evil. And mendicant prophets go to rich men's doors
and persuade them that they have a power committed to them
of making an atonement for their sins or those of their fathers
by sacrifices or charms, with rejoicings and games ; and they
promise to harm an enemy, whether just or unjust, at a small
charge ; with magic arts and incantations binding the will of
Heaven to do their work. And the poets are the authorities
to whom they appeal, some of them dispensing indulgences
out of them, as when the poet sings, —
" Vice may be easily found, and many are they who follow after her ;
the way is smooth and not long. But before virtue the gods have set
toil,"
and a path which they describe as tedious and steep. Others,
again, cite Homer as a witness that the gods may be influenced
by men, as he also says, —
"The gods, too, may be moved by prayers; and men pray to them
and turn away their wrath by sacrifices and entreaties, and by libations
and the odor of fat, when they have sinned and transgressed."
And they produce a host of books written by Musseus and Or-
pheus, who are children of the Moon and the Muses 7 — that is
what they say — according to which they perform their ritual,
7 Musseus was the son of Selene (se-le'ne), goddess of the Moon. Orpheus
was the son of the Muse Calliope and of Apollo, who as god of song and
poetry was called the leader of the Muses.
THE REPUBLIC 207
and persuade not only individuals, but whole cities, that expia-
tions and atonements for sin may be made by sacrifices and
amusements which fill a vacant hour, and are equally at the
service of the living and the dead ; the latter they call
mysteries, 8 and they redeem us from the pains of hell, 3 5
but if we neglect them no one knows what awaits us. 9
He proceeded : And now when the young hear all this said
about virtue and vice, and the manner in which gods and men
regard them, how are they likely to be affected, my dear Socra-
tes ; those of them, I mean, who are quickwitted, and, like
bees on the wing, light on everything which they hear, and
thence gather inferences as to the character and way of life
which are best for them ? Probably the youth will say to
himself in the words of Pindar —
" Can I by justice or by crooked ways of deceit ascend a loftier tower,
which shall be a house of defense to me all my days ? "
For what men say is that, if I am really just without being
thought just, this is no good, but evident pain and loss. But
if, though unjust, I acquire the character of justice, a heavenly
life is to be mine. Since then, as philosophers say, appearance
is master of truth and lord of bliss, to appearance I must wholly
devote myself. Around and about me I will draw the simple
garb of virtue, but behind I will trail the subtle and crafty fox,
8 See Symposium, note 32.
9 On true and false worship, compare : " Now, God is the measure of all
things in a sense far higher than any man could be, as the common saying
affirms. And he who would be dear to God must, as far as is possible, be
like him, and such as he is. Wherefore the temperate man is the friend of
God, for he is like him ; and the intemperate man is unlike him, and differ-
ent from him, and unjust. And the same holds of other things, and this is
the conclusion, which is also the noblest and truest of all sayings : That for
the good man to offer sacrifices to the gods, and hold converse with them by
means of prayers and offerings, and every kind of service, is the noblest and
best of all things, and also the most conducive to a happy life, and very fit
and meet. But with the bad man, the opposite of this holds ; for the bad
man has an impious soul, whereas the good is pure ; and from one who is
polluted, neither a good man nor God is right in receiving gifts. And,
therefore, the unholy waste their much service upon the gods, which, when
offered by any holy man, is always accepted of them." — Plato, Laws IV., 716.
Compare the attitude of the Old Testament prophets toward ritualism :
" To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the
Lord : I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts ;
and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats.
" When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your
hands, to tread my courts ?
" Bring no more vain oblations ; incense is an abomination unto me ; the
208 PLATO THE TEACHER
as Archilochus, 10 first of sages, counsels. But I hear some one
exclaiming that wickedness is not easily concealed ; to which
I answer that nothing great is easy. Nevertheless, this is the
road to happiness ; and the way by which we must go, follow-
ing in the steps of the argument ; and as to concealment, that
may be secured by the cooperation of societies and political
clubs. And there are professors of rhetoric who teach the
philosophy of persuading courts and assemblies ; and so, partly
by persuasion and partly by force, I shall make unlawful gains
and not be punished. Still I hear a voice saying that the gods
cannot be deceived, neither can they be compelled. But what
if there are no gods ? or, suppose that the gods have no care
about human things — in either case the result is the same, that
we need not trouble ourselves with concealment. And even if
there are gods, and they have a care of us, yet we know about
them only from the traditions and genealogies of the poets ;
and these are the very persons who say that they may be influ-
enced by prayers and offerings. Let us be consistent then, and
new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with ; it
is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.
"Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth ; they are
a trouble to me ; I am weary to bear them.
" And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you :
yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear : your hands are full of
blood.
" Wash you, make you clean ; put away the evil of your doing from be-
fore mine eyes ; cease to do evil.
" Learn to do well." — Isaiah i. 11-17.
" I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn as-
semblies.
" Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not
accept them : neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts.
" Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs ; for I will not hear the
melody of thy viols.
" But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty
stream." — Amos v. 21-24.
" Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands
of rivers of oil ? shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of
my body for the sin of my soul ? " — Micah vi. 7.
" To what purpose cometh there to me incense from Sheba, and the sweet
cane from a far country ? your burnt offerings are not acceptable nor your
sacrifices sweet unto me." — Jeremiah vi. 20.
"The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord: but the
prayer of the upright is his delight." — Proverbs xv. 8.
" For thou desirest not sacrifice ; else would I give it : thou delightest not
in burnt offering.
" The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit : a broken and a contrite heart,
O God, thou wilt not despise." — Psalms vi. 16, 17.
10 Archilochus (ar-kiTo-kus, 714 ? -676 B.C.) : Greek lyric poet, noted es-
pecially for his satire.
THE REPUBLIC 209
either believe both or neither. And if we believe them, why-
then we had better be unjust, and offer of the fruits of injus-
tice ; for if we are just we shall indeed escape the ven- .
geance of heaven, but we shall lose the gains of injustice ;
whereas, if we are unjust, we shall keep the gains, and by our
sinning and praying, and praying and sinning, the gods will be
propitiated, and we shall be forgiven. " But there is a world
below in which either we or our children will suffer for our
deeds." Yes, my friend, will be the reply, but there are mys-
teries and atoning deities, and these have great power. That
is what mighty cities declare ; and the children of the gods,
who are their poets and prophets, affirm the same.
On what principle, then, shall we choose justice rather than
the worst injustice? when, if we only unite the latter with a
deceitful regard to appearances, we shall fare to our mind
both with gods and men, here as well as hereafter, as say the
most numerous and the highest authorities. Knowing all this,
Socrates, how can any one who has any advantage of mind or
person or rank or wealth, be willing to honor, or indeed re-
frain from laughing at the praises of justice? For even if there
should be any one who is able to disprove my words, and
who is satisfied that justice is best, still he is not angry with
the unjust ; he is very ready to forgive them, knowing as he
also does that men are not just of their own free will ; unless,
perad venture, there be some one whom the divinity within
him has inspired with a hatred of injustice, or who abstains
because he has found knowledge — but no other man. He
only blames injustice who, owing to cowardice or age or some
weakness, is incapable of being unjust. And this is proved by
the fact that those who are incapable, when they have the
power, and in as far as they have the power, are the first to
be unjust.
Now all this simply arises out of the circumstance which
you may remember, Socrates, that my brother and I both
mentioned to you at the beginning of the argument. We told
you how astonished we were to find that of all the professing
panegyrists of justice — beginning with the heroes of old, of
whom any memorial has been preserved to us, and ending
with the men of our own time — no one has ever blamed in-
justice or praised justice except with a view to the glories,
honors, and benefits which flow from them. No one has ever
14
210 PLATO THE TEACHER
adequately described either in verse or prose the true essential
nature of either of these immanent in the soul, and invisible
to any human or divine eye ; or shown that of all the things
of a man's soul which he has within him, justice is the great-
, est good, and injustice the greatest evil. Had this been
7 the universal strain, had you sought to persuade us of
this from our youth upwards, we should not have been on the
watch to keep one another from doing wrong, but every one
would have been his own watchman, because afraid, if he did
wrong, of having the greatest evil dwelling with him. I dare
say that Thrasymachus and others would seriously hold the
language which I have been only repeating, and more of the
same sort about justice and injustice, grossly, as I conceive,
perverting their true nature. But I am speaking with all my
might, as I must confess, only because I want to hear you
speak on the opposite side ; and I would ask you to show not
only the superiority of justice over injustice, but what they do
to the possessors of them that makes the one to be a good and
the other an evil to him. 11 And please, as Glaucon said, to
exclude reputation ; for unless you clothe the just in the garb
of injustice, and the unjust in that of justice, we shall say that
you do not praise justice, but the appearance of justice ; we
shall think that you are only exhorting us to keep injustice
dark, and that you really agree with Thrasymachus in think-
ing that justice is another's good and the interest of the
stronger, and that injustice is a man's own profit and interest,
though injurious to the weaker. Now as you have admitted
that justice is one of that highest class of goods which are de-
sired as well for their results as, in a far greater degree, for their
own sakes — just as sight or knowledge or health, or any other
real and natural and not merely conventional goods, are de-
sired for their own sakes — I would ask you to direct your
praises to that one point only : I mean to the essential good
of justice and evil of injustice. Let others praise the rewards
and appearances of justice ; that is a manner of arguing
which, as coming from them, I am ready to tolerate, but
from you who have spent your whole life in thinking of this,
unless I hear the contrary from your own lips, I expect some-
thing better. And therefore, I say, not only prove to us that
11 " The labour of the righteous tendeth to life ; the fruit of the wicked to
sin." — Proverbs x. 16.
THE REPUBLIC 211
justice is better than injustice, but show what they either of
them do to the possessors of them, which makes the one to be
good and the other an evil, whether seen or unseen by gods
and men.
I had always admired the genius of Glaucon and Adeiman-
tus, but when I heard this I was quite charmed, and said :
That was not a bad beginning of the Elegiacs 12 in
which the admirer of Glaucon addressed you as your
father's sons after you had distinguished yourselves at the bat-
tle of Megara 13 . —
" Sons of Ariston, divine offspring of a glorious hero."
The epithet is very appropriate, for there is something truly
divine in being able to argue as you have done for the superi-
ority of injustice, and remaining uninfluenced by your own
arguments. And I do believe that you are not influenced ;
this I infer from your general character, for had I judged only
from your speeches I should have mistrusted you. But now,
trusting you, I have all the greater mistrust of myself. For I
am in a strait between two ; on the one hand I feel my own
inability to maintain the cause of justice — your unwillingness
to accept the answer which I made to Thrasymachus about the
superiority of justice over injustice proves to me that I am un-
equal to the task ; and yet on the other hand I cannot re-
fuse to help, for I fear that there may be a sin when justice is
evil spoken of in standing by and failing to offer help or suc-
cor while breath or speech remain to me. And therefore I
must give such help as I can. Glaucon and the rest entreated
me by all means not to let the question drop, but to proceed
in the investigation. They wanted to arrive at the truth,
first, about the nature of justice and injustice, and secondly,
about their relative advantages. I told them, what I really
thought, that the search would be no easy one, and would re-
quire very good eyes. Seeing then, I said, we are no great
wits, I think that we had better adopt a method which might
be recommended to those who are short-sighted, and are
bidden by some one to read small letters a long way off; one
12 Refers merely to the metre, not the subject of the poem from which the
quotation is made.
13 It is uncertain which of the many battles fought at Megara is here re-
ferred to.
212 PLATO THE TEACHER
of the party recollects that he has seen the very same letters
elsewhere written larger and on a larger scale — if they were
the same and we could read the larger letters first, and then
proceed to the lesser — that would be thought a rare piece of
good fortune.
Very true, said Adeimantus, but how does this apply to
our present inquiry ?
I will tell you, I replied ; justice, which is the subject of
our inquiry, is, as you know, sometimes spoken of as a virtue
of an individual, and sometimes as the virtue of a State.
True, he replied.
And is not a State larger than an individual ?
It is.
Then in the larger the quantity of justice will be larger and
more easily discernible. I propose therefore that we inquire
, into the nature of justice and injustice as appearing in
the State first, and secondly in the individual, proceed-
ing from the greater to the lesser and comparing them.
That, he said, is an excellent proposal.
And suppose we imagine the State as in a process of crea-
tion, and then we shall see the justice and injustice of the
State in process of creation also.
Very likely.
When the State is completed there may be a hope that the
object of our search will be more easily discovered.
Yes, more easily.
And shall we make the attempt? I said ; although I cannot
promise you as an inducement that the task will be a light
one. Reflect therefore.
I have reflected, said Adeimantus, and am anxious that you
should proceed.
A State, I said, arises, as I conceive, out of the needs of
mankind ; no one is self-sufficing, but all of us have many
wants. Can any other origin of a State be imagined ?
None, he replied.
Then, as we have many wants, and many persons are
needed to supply them, one takes a helper for one purpose
and another for another ; and when these helpers and partners
are gathered together in one habitation, the body of inhabi-
tants is termed a State.
True, he said.
THE REPUBLIC 2l3
And they exchange with one another, and one gives, and
another receives, under the idea that the exchange will be for
their good.
Very true.
Then, I said, let us begin and create a State ; and yet the
true creator is necessity, who is the mother of our invention.
True, he replied.
Now the first and greatest of necessities is food, which is
the condition of life and existence.
Certainly.
The second is a dwelling, and the third clothing and that
sort of thing.
True.
And now let us see how our city will be able to supply this
great demand. We may suppose that one man is a husband-
man, another a builder, some one else a weaver â– shall we add
to them a shoemaker, or perhaps some other purveyor to our
bodily wants ?
Quite right.
The barest notion of a State must include four or five men.
Clearly.
And how then will they proceed ? Will each give the re-
sult of his labors to all? — the husbandman, for example, pro-
ducing, for four, and laboring in the production of food for
himself and others four times as long and as much as he needs
to labor ; or shall he leave others and not be at the trouble of
producing for them, but produce a fourth for himself
in a fourth of the time, and in the remaining three
fourths of his time be employed in making a house or a coat
or a pair of shoes ?
Adeimantus thought that the former would be the better
way.
I dare say that you are right, I replied, for I am reminded
as you speak that we are not all alike ; there are diversities of
natures among us which are adapted to different occupations.
Very true.
And will you have a work better done when the workman
has many occupations, or when he has only one?
When he has only one.
Further, there can be no doubt that a work is spoilt when
not done at the right time ?
214 PLATO THE TEACHER
No doubt of that.
For business is not disposed to wait until the doer of the
business is at leisure j but the doer must be at command, and
make the business his first object.
He must.
Thus then all things are produced more plentifully and
easily and of a better quality when one man does one thing